BNP Senior Joint Secretary General Ruhul Kabir Rizvi has alleged that the country is facing an “artificial’ shortage of soybean oil for the lack of market intervention and the government’s accountability.
“Had there been a government accountable to people, it would have intervened and arrested the syndicates involved in market manipulation. But that is not happening, resulting in the soybean oil crisis,” the BNP leader said on Monday.
He made the remarks while talking to reporters at the graveyard of BNP founder and military strongman Ziaur Rahman at Sher-e-Bangla Nagar in Dhaka.
Rizvi along with leaders and activists of Jatiyatabadi Sramik Dal paid homage to Zia by placing a wreath at his grave, marking the 43rd founding anniversary of BNP’s labour wing.
He said that the common and low-income people were struggling to cope with the unbridled price hike in daily essentials, including soybean oil, rice, pulses and flour.
“One of the reasons for this is severe inflation caused by siphoning off money abroad in the name of development. Due to this horrible inflation, the income of the low-income people and the workers has not increased at all,” he alleged.
Rizvi said that many people would have to celebrate the Eid-ul-Fitr with great difficulty due to the price hike of commodities.
The BNP had been carrying out various programs in protest against the growing price hike, he added.
The BNP leader also alleged that many homebound passengers, mainly workers, were suffering on their way home on the occasion of Eid.