The National Citizen Party has delivered a stinging critique of the government’s performance, asserting that the administration has entirely failed to meet the three primary commitments outlined during its inaugural cabinet session six months ago. Nahid Islam, the platform’s convener, presented the assessment during a crowded press conference at the party’s central headquarters in Banglamotor, Dhaka, on Monday afternoon.
Speaking before journalists, Islam pointed to the cabinet’s first formal assembly on 18 February, where policymakers framed an initial 180-day programme to stabilise a turbulent economic and political landscape. That transitional agenda focused on three immediate objectives: reining in skyrocketing prices of daily essentials, restoring law and order nationwide, and ensuring uninterrupted supplies of electricity and primary fuels.
Six months on, Islam argued, the reality on the ground offers a bleak contrast to those initial promises. Evaluating empirical indicators across local markets, industrial zones, and civic safety spheres reveals a persistent inability to deliver tangible relief. The platform’s leadership described the government’s track record over the half-year window as a display of bureaucratic inertia, flawed planning, and executive mismanagement.
The inability to curb food inflation across kitchen markets has hit low-income households and fixed-wage earners particularly hard. Essential food items remain stubbornly expensive, eroding household savings and deepening living-cost pressures across urban and rural communities alike. Administrative interventions into market surveillance have produced little noticeable impact on price volatility or predatory supply chain cartels.
The manufacturing sector faces equally severe headwinds. Acute fuel and natural gas shortages, alongside persistent disruptions to the national electrical grid, continue to cripple key production hubs. Industrial output has dropped sharply, leaving factory owners struggling to maintain operations. Many commercial units and textile facilities have been forced to cut production shifts or shut down lines altogether. The ripple effect has led to widespread factory redundancies, leaving thousands of formal labourers and daily-wage earners without dependable income.
Turning to domestic security, Islam criticised the slow and fragmented restoration of civil law enforcement across metropolitan centres and district towns. A general sense of insecurity persists, with criminal networks taking advantage of weak administrative cohesion and policing gaps.
Concluding the briefing, Islam urged the executive leadership to overhaul its governance strategy immediately. Without decisive measures to secure fuel supplies, protect livelihoods, and re-establish public safety, the platform warned that the country risks sliding into deeper socioeconomic distress.
