Saqeb Mahbub is an Associate Partner at Mahbub & Company, a leading full-service firm in Bangladesh with an international outlook serving clients since 1995. Saqeb handles labour and employment, banking and finance, commercial disputes and foreign investment matters at the firm. He discusses why Bangladesh is an exciting place to keep an eye on, and how the country has progressed, legally and economically.
How have you seen the commercial scope change over the years in Bangladesh?
Of course, I have witnessed many changes. With a consistent 7% GDP growth rate, Bangladesh’s economy and its businesses have matured a lot, attracting large investments - particularly home grown. Multinationals had entered the manufacturing industry long ago, but I think it is the boom of the local private sector catering to a growing middle class that has transformed the face of the commercial sphere in Bangladesh.
With this in mind, how has this affected your role and the legal world?
As businesses have matured, their need for legal services has grown and that has created a huge demand for lawyers well-versed in the language of international commerce, information technology and client-oriented service. Young lawyers, being more adaptable to this change have been far more successful in tapping this growing demand. The composition of our firm’s work has changed over the years from primarily dispute resolution, in order to include a healthy mix of regulatory advice and transactional work. Many young law firms are now coming to the forefront, which was not the case even a decade ago.
Moreover, what do you think could be done to help aid international investment in Bangladesh?
Bangladesh manages to attract healthy amounts of foreign investment every year despite many infrastructural issues. I think factors like our geographical location, consumer base and readily available labour have been helpful in the past two decades. But now the time has come to invest in infrastructure, with a focus on IT, streamlining bureaucracy and most importantly, people. Bangladesh is infamously known for its cheap labour. We need to start being known for our skills too. Legal services also need to be more outward looking, as lawyers are often the first point of contact for foreign investors. The Bangladesh Investment Development Authority (BIDA) has taken a very good initiative to start a quarterly round-table meeting with professionals like us who are in the frontline advising foreign investors.
What is the most challenging aspect of your role as a litigator in the Supreme Court of Bangladesh? How do you overcome this challenge?
Litigation is challenging anywhere in the world. Our Supreme Court is not an exception. It has an abundance of well read and high calibre judges who can test your mettle. There is really no shortcut to overcoming this challenge, except to prepare well. In commercial litigation, it is vital to know and understand the business of your client and ground realities of the industry they are in. No preparation is sufficient without that.
You have advised well known corporations such as PepsiCo; what unique challenges do you face when representing or advising big companies?
Once we have accepted an instruction or a brief, the quality of the effort we put in is not really affected by the size of the client’s business. But, with a big corporation often comes a big and experienced in-house team instructing us. That can mean potential for more scrutiny, but I think most of the time it works to our advantage as good in-house counsel will usually draft well-articulated and focused instructions making it easier for us to understand what the client really wants from us.
As Thought Leader, can you share the biggest difference between the UK and Bangladesh legal system and how you adjusted to this change?
The British created the Bangladeshi legal system as we know it, but unfortunately we have not really been good at updating and modernising it as time progressed. In terms of time required to enforce a contract, we are ranked at the bottom. Efficiency in dispute resolution is a certainly a key challenge that I have had to adapt to. However, there is always room to be innovative. While drafting contracts, it is particularly important to have a strong dispute resolution clause with an ADR mechanism. Often the prospect of an expensive arbitration can persuade an offending party to settle.
Is there anything else you would like to add?
I would like to thank Lawyer Monthly for taking the time to conduct this interview. I would just like to add that as we speak, Bangladesh is going through exciting changes and is maturing into a modern economy very fast. Mahbub & Company is proud to be a part of the progress and hopes to keep contributing in the future.
Saqeb Mahbub
Barrister-at-Law
Senior Associate
m: +8801725150912 a: F: E1, H: 37, Rd: 12/A, Dhanmondi, Dhaka, Bangladesh
e: saqeb.mahbub@mahbub-law.com
Saqeb Mahbub is an Advocate of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh having experience of providing legal services to international organizations of repute. He obtained his LLB (Hons) and LLM Degrees from the London School of Economics, UK, and was called to the Bar of England and Wales from Lincoln's Inn, UK in 2009. He has extensive experience in corporate and commercial litigation, documentation and advice. During his time at his previous firm, he advised and represented Wells Fargo Bank, Pepsi Co, TVS Motors, Grameen and Bangladesh Bank among others.
MAHBUB & COMPANY is one of the leading law firms in Dhaka, Bangladesh having extensive litigation and corporate services experience of over 20 years. We have a strong client base of local and international businesses and organizations across all emerging and established sectors.
With a dedicated team comprising of UK-trained Barristers and qualified Advocates, Mahbub & Company is a client's one-stop shop for legal assistance.
MAHBUB & COMPANY is the a trusted legal adviser to businesses spread across the construction, energy, real-estate, technology and shipping industries and acts as a full-service firm with a dedicated corporate team.
Members of the firm have expertise in a wide range of areas of law and regularly participate in policy-level meetings on legislative reform. MAHBUB & COMPANY prides itself on modern, cutting-edge legal practice that breaks traditions and is client-oriented to the core.
The firm's expertise in corporate affairs lies at the heart of services giving impetus to its litigation and arbitration practice in commercial law, shipping, intellectual property, employment, tax and so on.
