Staff Reporter :
The Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) has alleged that climate change fund is allocated based on the influence of local influential portions with the blessings of ministers and lawmakers instead of the severity of threat.
“Local people do not get the scope to participate in the formulation of climate change projects at local government level since most such projects have been taken based on political consideration,” TIB Executive Director Dr Iftekharuzzaman disclosed this at a press conference in Dhaka on Monday.
The TIB conducted the study on six climate projects titled “Climate Financing and Local Government Institutions: Good Governance in Project Implementation” during March to November last year.
Senior Programme Manager of TIB ASM Jewel and Deputy Programme Manager Nahid Sharmin jointly unveiled the survey findings.
Chairperson of Board of Trustees of TIB Sultana Kamal, Executive Director Iftekharuzzaman, Deputy Executive Director Sumaiya Khair and Director (Research and Policy) Mohammad Rafique Hassan were present in the press conference.
The TIB urged the government to ensure transparency and accountability, maintain equity in resource allocation and enhance capacity of local government institutions (LGIs) in implementing climate projects.
The research reveals that mayors, deputy commissioners and chief executive officers of Zila Parishads, engineers and municipality secretaries play the vital role in preparing project proposals while councilors did not get the scope to get involved in this process.
Although these projects were taken to cope with climate change impacts, it shows, climate change risk and impacts were not assessed at community level before taking six climate projects.
Irregularities and corruption are major challenges in implementing the projects. In most of the cases, contracts for implementing the projects are awarded in political consideration, nepotism or illegal underhand dealings, the study also revealed. The study found non-disclosure of project information in many cases, lack of transparency in vendor selection process, nepotism and abuse of power in vendor selection process, selection of less vulnerable areas for implementation, irregularities during direct beneficiary selection, use of political consideration to change implementation authority, tricks in contractor selection to evade tax and VAT, and unnecessary cost over the beneficiaries in building disaster resilient houses.
The TIB gave many recommendations, including reformulation of the BCCTF Trustee Board, raising climate funds, approval of projects after verification of local climate vulnerabilities, strengthening the capacity of the LGIs, enhancing information disclosure mechanism, and enhancing coordination for strengthening accountability mechanism and monitoring system.
Sultana Kamal said, the authorities concerned should be sincere about Bangladesh Climate Change Trust Fund (BCCTF) as it was formed with public money and should be used in a legal way instead of political gains.
She said there is no alternative to improving the fund management skill. Iftekharuzzaman urged the government to increase BCCTF allocation and reform its Board of Trustees with people having climate change expertise and who will work rising above personal and political interest.
He stressed the need for implementing the climate finance projects with integrity and accountability.
