A huge delegation from Bangladesh will be participating in the eight-day World Health Summit to be held in Switzerland’s Geneva from May 20 allegedly using funds that have been extorted from the private businesses in the health sector as donations and sponsorships.
Questions have been raised about a 34-member team going all the way to attend two side events of the summit where Bangladesh will participate and about the willingness of all but four to bear the costs on their own.
The government is only bearing the costs of Health Minister AFM Ruhul Haque and Prime Minister’s Health Adviser Professor Dr Syed Modasser Ali, while ICDDR-B will cover expenses of the ministry’s Additional Secretary (WHO) Shafiqul Islam Lashkar and health service’s Additional Director General Professor Dr Abul Kalam Azad.
The remaining delegation consisting of a number of secretaries including deputy secretaries, Khaleda Akter, Humayan Kabir, Sayedul Islam and M A Manjur; former and current leaders of doctors associations SACHIP and BMA including Professor Dr. M Iqbal Arslan, chief of Homeopathy Board, leaders of journalists union and media personnel along with the minister’s Personal Secretary Kazi Mohibul Islam, Assistant Personal Secretary Moshaid Ali, Protocol Officer Harun Ur Rashid and GAVI Alliance related adviser.
Health ministry sources claimed that many of the entourage members have been to the summit before and have gone to the US, the UK, Australia, Japan, China, Russia and other countries at least once in the tenure of the incumbent AL-led government.
A number of officials, requesting anonymity, expressed their frustrations over a few members being given chance to repeatedly attend the summit.
The week-long trip would cost around Tk300,000-Tk500,000 per head considering only the plane fare, hotel charges and pocket money for the summit attendees and the ability of the participating members, mostly bureaucrats and physicians, have raised eyebrows.
Allegations have been levelled that large-scale extortion has taken place in the health sector to fund the trip. The sector’s contractors, representatives of medicine companies and owners of hospitals and clinics have told the Dhaka Tribune that they have been forced into providing grants and sponsorship for the trip.
Health ministry sources said that the delegation was quite small at the begining of the planning phase and reached the epic proportion by lobbying from interested participants.
The minister reportedly tried to rein the matter initially but many ruling party leaders persuaded him by allegedly pointing out that this is the last scope for them to have a trip abroad officially if the ruling Awami League does not win the upcoming national elections.
A top national committee leader of the Human Rights Movement vented frustration and said that those attending the meet should at least understand what such summits are and pointed out that most participants just take it as a tour.
The leader, who requested anonymity, also pointed out that since there is no government funding for majority of the delegations, there would be huge extortion in the sector to finance the trip.
Health services ADG Azad said, “Bangladesh will be participating in the talks on Autism Spectrum Disorder and Success and Requisite in Miller Future of Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 4 and 5.”
He said the prime minister’s daughter Saima Wazed, who is also an autism specialist, and health minister would be speaking at these events.
World Health Organisation member countries would also attend a board meeting about autism. Bangladesh is not yet on the committee, but chances are there that members Myanmar, Maldives and Timor-leste might propose Bangladesh’s participation.
When asked about the cost of the trip, additional secretary (WHO) of Health Ministry Shafiqul Islam Lashkar said, there are 31 persons in the team. All are going by their own expenses except 4.
