One of them is a $3.5 million contract to deploy an optical fibre transmission link between Dhaka and Rajshahi. The planning ministry's Central Procurement Technical Unit (CPTU) had repeatedly alerted the telecoms secretary that Huawei has "created the opportunity to influence the decision" in its favour by hosting overseas trips for the officials who evaluated this bid.

CPTU in letters to the secretary in March, April and June this year has labelled the Huawei-funded foreign trips as "conflict of interest". It has asked him to cancel Huawei's bid for 'corrupt practices' and blacklist the company according to regulation 15 of the Public Procurement Regulation 2003.

The purchase proposal that the telecoms secretary has signed, however, mentions nothing about the consecutive warnings. Therefore, the uninformed cabinet purchase committee stamped this deal in favour of Huawei and passed it over for the PM's nod.

The telecoms ministry has similarly misled the cabinet purchase committee and had $3.6 million VoIP platform procurement deal, again for Huawei, approved. Whereas, on July 7 the CPTU asked the telecoms secretary to suspend processing Huawei's bid until the planning ministry's review panel decides its fate.

Subsequently, on July 24 the review panel informed the telecoms secretary that Huawei's bid was evaluated without imposing 50 penalty points for "material deviation". The panel has also found all bidders being disqualified in this tender and, therefore, it recommended re-tendering.

Although the telecoms secretary has brushed aside this directive, the BTTB has, however, decided to be compliant. On August 15, the BTTB sought the telecoms secretary's administrative approval to re-tender the VoIP platform supply project, as suggested by the planning ministry's review panel.

Instead of responding to BTTB's plea, the telecoms secretary processed the VoIP platform purchase proposal hiding Huawei's shortcomings and the cabinet purchase committee has approved it too.

"Both the deals are perfect recipe for anti-corruption prosecution, but we are safe since the telecoms ministry has unilaterally handled them," said a BTTB high official requesting anonymity. He alleges the cabinet purchase committee could have rejected these deals if the telecoms secretary would have presented the planning ministry's reservations.

Telecoms Secretary AKM Shamsuddin, however, pleads not guilty and claims to have 'verbally' informed the cabinet purchase committee about the CPTU's reservations on these two deals with Huawei. "I could not present the CPTU's remarks in writing as they came after processing the purchase proposals," he said.

The telecoms secretary, however, could not clarify why he did not send supplementary notes stating the CPTU's remarks afterwards. "I was extremely busy with various issues since I am retiring soon," he said.

Sources said the telecoms minister has recently strongly recommended for an extension of Shamsuddin's service. The matter is now waiting for the prime minister's assent.