Questions hang over role of owners in deadly fire at BM Container Depot

Questions abound about the role of the owners of BM Container Depot after a devastating fire at the facility in Chattogram’s Sitakunda claimed at least 41 lives.

The port authority, fire service and police said they did not find any of the owners at the scene after the inferno.

The Department of Environment and the Department of Explosives said the depot did not have the clearance to store chemicals.

One of the owners of Smart Group, which partnered with the Netherlands to set up the depot, is a leader of the ruling Awami League. This is the reason no charges have been brought in the wake of the deadly fire, opposition BNP has claimed.

Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal and State Minister for Shipping Khalid Mahmud Chowdhury, however, promised action based on investigation findings.

Smart Group denies all the allegations of negligence.

The fire started at the container depot near Keshabpur Village in Shonaichari Union around 9:30pm on Saturday.

According to various government agencies, including the fire service, the accident occurred due to negligence of the depot authorities and the breach of rules on storing chemicals.

The army, the navy, the fire service, police and the local administration were still on duty at the site but they did not find any of the owners there.

Fire service officials also complained that they did not receive any cooperation from the owners to accomplish their work.

They said the depot authorities did not inform them about the presence of hydrogen peroxide or other chemicals there.

They believe that there would not have been so many deaths and damage if the owners had cooperated in the firefighting at first.

However, some senior officials of the depot were seen at the site and in the hospital.

They claimed they could not go to the depot as they were busy with other work, including treatment and payment of compensation to the victims.

The depot, some 30 km from Chattogram city, was built in 2011 with an investment of about Tk 1.5 billion. Smart Group owns most of the shares in the depot.

Containers full of export goods are sent to Chattogram port for shipment via the depot. Imported goods are also kept at the depot.

Mostafizur Rahman, the chairman of Smart Group, is the managing director of BM Depot, while his younger brother Muzibur Rahman, also the MD of Smart Group, is a director of the depot.

Of the total 3.5 million shares of BM Depot, Mostafizur holds 138,000, Muzibur 15,000, Smart Jeans 1.83 million and Pronk Properties of Netherlands 1.5 million.

Although the capacity of the depot could not be confirmed, there were reportedly 4,300 containers on the day of the inferno.

Most of the containers were full of readymade garments. The chemical compound named hydrogen peroxide belonged to Al-Razi Chemical Complex, a subsidiary of Smart Group. Al-Razi did not renew its licence, an official said.

Muzibur, 48, treasurer of the Chattogram South unit of the Awami League, had failed in his attempt to secure the party’s nomination to run for the Banskhali parliamentary constituency.

Although a family business, Muzibur, the editor of Chattogram-based daily the Purbodesh, supervises the activities of all the business establishments under the Smart Group, which has investments in readymade garments, LPG, container depots, food products and real estate sectors.

As part of Corporate Social Responsibility, Muzibur and his family have set up social and educational institutions in Banshkhali Upazila.

Muzibur has been named a Commercially Important Person by the government five times.

About him and other owners nowhere to be seen, Abul Kalam Azad, chief of Sitakunda Police Station, said: "We haven’t found any of the owners since the fire. They haven’t contacted us either.”

Chattogram Deputy Commissioner Md Mominur Rahman refused to comment on the matter as it was under investigation.

Hundreds of containers burn in the BM Container Depot as firefighters officials are unable to bring the huge blaze under control on Sunday, Jun 5, 2022. Photo: Suman Babu

The Department of Explosives and the Department of Environment said that the depot did not have permission to store chemicals or inflammable substances. The fire was not caused by hydrogen peroxide alone. They believe some other combustible substance may have been stored in the facility.

“The organisation only had clearance to keep containers. They mentioned emptying and filling up the containers with some materials including food, poultry feed and garment items, but not chemicals,” said Mofidul Alam, director at the environment department in Chattogram.

WHAT OWNERS SAY

Muzibur declined comment on the allegations of negligence and irregularities.

His elder brother Azizur Rahman denied the allegation that the owners did not visit the site, claiming that he and Muzibur had gone to the depot in the wee hours of Sunday and later to the Chattogram Medical College Hospital to help the victims. “No one cared about who was who at that time.”

Asked about the lack of clearances, he said, “We set up the depot in a joint venture with a foreign company. Had we not followed the rules, would we get the permission to run the business?”  

“Where were they when we exported hydrogen peroxide in the past few years?” he said when asked about the presence of chemicals in the depot.

Asked if they can evade liability for the deaths, he said, “Truth will be known when the investigations end.”