Food and Disaster Management Minister Abdur Razzak said the government should not cancel the World Bank’s finance for construction of much-talked-about Padma Bridge.

He said this to the journalists after a two-hour long meeting between five ministers at Finance Minister’s office on Monday.

The other ministers who attended the meeting are Syed Ashraful Islam, Minister for Local Government and Rural Development (LGRD), Obaidul Kader, Minister for Communications and Syed Abul Hossain, Minister for Information and Communication Technology.

“The crisis on World Bank finance for Padma Bridge project still goes on. But given the over all aspect, I think the government should not cancel the contract that it signed with the global lender,” said Dr Razzak. Finance Minister, however, didn’t talk anything about it with the journalists, rather said: “We sat together after a long time. So we discussed some old matters, which were only political.”

The total cost of the 6.15 kilometre long Padma Bridge is set at US$ 2.90 billion while the World Bank was supposed to provide US$ 1.20 billion.

The Daily Sun/Bangladesh/ 14th March 2012