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Abul Barkat hits out at Muhith

Star Business Report
Abul Barkat, the immediate past chairman of Janata Bank, yesterday pilloried Finance Minister AMA Muhith, calling him an intellectual fraud, vindictive and power abuser.
"He |Muhith| is always humiliating people. He does not know how to show respect - that's why he is always using dismissive words like 'rubbish'," Barkat said at the unveiling of the book, Janata Bank's Five Years in Corporate Social Responsibility, at the National Press Club in Dhaka.
He went on to term the finance minister an elitist, adding that he only works for his region's upper crust - not for the poor. "There is nothing that he would not do for the elite." No-one can beat Muhith when it comes to nepotism, Barkat said.
"He gives jobs in important positions to his close relatives such as brother, sister, son, daughter, niece and nephew, even if they are not qualified for the positions," he alleged.
Barkat also called the finance minister a lobbyist, while citing an incident in which Muhith requested him to give a bank guarantee to a private TV channel owner for the purpose of opening a letter of credit account.
"He did that just because the TV channel interviewed him. But I rejected the request and now, he has become vindictive toward me." Barkat said he never got the support of the finance minister during his time at the state-owned bank. “I was always opposed by him."
Janata Bank sends its budget including allocation for corporate social responsibility activities to the finance ministry every year for approval, he said.
"Then how can the finance minister say that he did not know about the bank's CSR expenditure? It is his ignorance," Barkat said, while seeking apology from Muhith over his "false comments" about the state bank.
He went on to assert that the state minister for finance sent him a letter asking for money from the bank's CSR fund for a boat race in Sunamganj. "I have the letter to back up my words."
Barkat, then the chairman of Janata, did not entertain the request,
due to which, he says, the bank's CSR activities were suspended.
Muhith earlier said Janata, along with Agrani, Rupali and Bangladesh Development Bank, were found spending abnormal sums of money under the guise of CSR, which prompted the finance ministry's banking division to temporarily ban the activity.
Subsequently, Barkat requested the government to form a five-member panel to probe the allegations made by the finance minister about Janata's CSR expenditures.
"I request the finance minister to nominate three members as he is older than me and I will nominate the remaining two," he said, adding that the probe body must publish the report.
About the ban on the four state banks' CSR activities, Barkat said the ministry cannot do it.
"Janata Bank is an independent company," he said, adding that the state-owned banks should be allowed to operate and perform independently.
About his successor, Barkat said the finance minister is now searching for a 'giant economist', one who will be an agent of neo-liberalism or Muhith's personal agent or a bureaucrat who will follow the World Bank's and IMF's prescription ora rent-seeker.
The Daily Star tried to reach Muhith by phone several times for comment, but he did not answer or return the calls.