The protesting officials of the National Board of Revenue under the banner of NBR Sangskar Oikya Parishad on Wednesday announced a fresh five-day programme.
Along with their demand for the cancellation of the ordinance that split the NBR into two divisions, they also announced a non-cooperation programme, demanding an immediate removal of the NBR chairman.
At a press briefing at the NBR headquarters at Agargaon in the capital Dhaka on Wednesday, additional commissioner (tax) Hasina Akhter told reporters that they had declared a non-cooperation programme with the NBR chairman starting Wednesday.
Moreover, under the banner of their platform, which includes officials from tax, customs, and value-added tax departments, they will submit a memorandum to the chief adviser today, followed by sit-in programmes at NBR offices in Dhaka and across the country.
However, the exports and international passenger services will be out of the purview of the protests.
The protesting officials also said they would go for complete work abstention from all tax, customs, and VAT offices 鈥� excluding customs houses and land customs stations 鈥� on May 24 and 25 from 9:00am to 5:00pm.
Hasina Akhter added that they would also go for a complete work stoppage in all relevant offices from May 26 if their demands were not met by then.
The international passenger services will remain out of the strike鈥檚 purview.
The protesting NBR officials observed a pen-down strike in May 14-15 and May 17-19 and declared the non-cooperation on the sixth day of their protests.
On Tuesday, they met with interim government advisers, including the finance adviser, reform committee members and some ministry officials to discuss issues related to their protests.
Regarding the meeting, Hasina Akhter said that they were given no assurances at the meeting.
She also said that they had three-point demand, including revoking the ordinance on restructuring the revenue administration, public disclosure of the advisory committee鈥檚 report on NBR reforms, and inclusive, consultative and sustainable revenue administration reforms.
Shahadat Jamil, additional commissioner (customs), told reporters that they had almost completed forming an ad hoc committee of the NBR Sangskar Oikya Parishad.
Earlier on May 12, the interim government promulgated the ordinance dissolving the revenue board and splitting it into two divisions under the finance ministry to modernise the tax administration and boost revenue collection.
The ordinance was approved by president Mohammed Sahabuddin and signed by law secretary Hafiz Ahmed Chowdhury.
The divisions to be created are Revenue Policy Division and Revenue Management Division, in line with the International Monetary Fund鈥檚 key condition of separating tax policy from tax administration.
NBR officials have opposed the decision since the advisory council approved the draft ordinance to split the board in April.
