Government officials and educational cadres in Bangladesh’s civil service have strongly opposed two recommendations made by the Public Administration Reform Commission.

Administration officials said they would not accept the recommendation to appoint 50 percent of assistant secretaries from among administration executives and an additional 50 percent from others.

Those responsible for education cadres, on the other hand, do not agree with the recommendation proposed by the commission to remove education and health cadres from the cadre system.

On Tuesday (December 17), Commission Head Abdul Mueed Chowdhury and Commission Member-Secretary and Principal Secretary, Ministry of Public Administration, Md Mokhles Ur Rahman, presented some recommendations during an exchange of views meeting with journalists from the ministry.

The recommendations include: promotion to the posts of Deputy Secretary and Additional Secretary through examinations, allocation of 50% of Deputy Secretary posts to administration cadres and an additional 50% to civil servants of other cadres, keeping education and health executives away from the executive system, eliminating executives. police verification system during recruitment in government jobs and separating Cumilla and Faridpur into separate divisions.

The Commission is expected to submit its recommendations to the government by December 31.

Right after the Commission meeting, the Bangladesh Administrative Services Association (BASA) held an emergency meeting at the Bangladesh Institute of Administration and Management (BIAM) Auditorium in the capital on Tuesday evening , during which officials disagreed with the Commission’s recommendation and said they wanted an allocation of 75% of the deputy secretary posts for themselves and 25% for officials in other cadres, declared an administrative official under cover of anonymity.

According to the Ministry of Public Administration, 1,599 civil servants currently work as assistant secretaries.

Meanwhile, many education sector officials reacted to the Commission’s recommendation on social media, with one writing: “I thought discrimination between managers would be eliminated. But now they are trying to completely remove the framework of education.”

In a statement released today (December 18), the BCS General Education Association, a platform of education sector leaders, rejected the Commission’s recommendation to keep the education sector separate from the service of frames.