Self-exiled de facto BNP chief to return to Bangladesh to contest Feb election

Dhaka, Oct 6 (PTI) The acting chairman and eldest son of former premier Khaleda Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) on Monday announced that he would “return soon”, ending his 26 years in self-exile in London to contest the February general election.

Tarique Rahman in an interview to BBC Bangla said, “For some reasonable reasons my return has not happened... but the time has come, and I will return soon.” The 58-year-old de facto chief of the BNP added, “I am running in the election (as well).” Asked about the possibility of assuming office as prime minister if the BNP formed the government, he said “The people will decide.” The then army-backed caretaker government sent him to London in 2008 for medical treatment while legal procedures were underway against him on several criminal and graft cases.

He subsequently preferred to stay in the British capital during the subsequent Awami League government of now deposed premier Sheikh Hasina visibly to evade punitive actions.

One such case accused him of masterminding a grenade attack in 2004 on the then opposition leader Hasina and her party leaders.

Zia, 80, is suffering from various ailments and it remains unclear if she will run again or play a guiding role behind her son and the party.

Rahman’s comments came amid speculation after his party overnight, deviating from its earlier stance, agreed to accept a referendum to elicit public opinion on “July Declaration” made by interim government chief Muhammad Yunus to make it part of the Constitution.

Yunus announced the declaration on August 5 this year coinciding with the first anniversary of the ouster of Hasina’s Awami League regime following a violent street campaign dubbed as July uprising, led by the Students against Discrimination (SAD).

The declaration demanded Bangladesh’s Constitution to acknowledge the 2024 uprising alongside trials for deposed regime leaders, including Hasina, recognition of July martyrs and protection of July movement participants.

Most SAD activists and leaders earlier this year regrouped and floated the National Citizen Party (NCP) visibly with Yunus’s blessings while the student-led grouping last week secured registration from the Election Commission.

In the absence of Hasina’s Awami League, disbanded by the Yunus regime under an executive order, the BNP emerged as the main political party with its once ally and now apparent rival Jamaat-e-Islami being its main opponent.

Jamaat and the NCP have been waging a campaign to stage a referendum ahead of the elections seeking to draw peoples’ approval for the declaration to be part of the Constitution while the BNP was opposed to any such referendum and wanted the matter to be left to the next parliament.

However, emerging from a meeting with the National Consensus Commission on Sunday, BNP’s standing committee member Salahuddin Ahmed said the referendum could be held on the day of the voting and not ahead of the general elections.

On Monday, Ahmed criticised the proponents of the referendum before the parliamentary election alleging they were led by an ulterior motive to delay the polls when “the next parliamentary election is only a few months away, and its arrangement is a huge task”.

“If we try to hold a separate referendum before the election, it will need the same preparations, manpower, logistics, and budget as a general election. This will only waste time and delay the polls,” he said.

Hasina, 78, is living in India since her ouster while most of her senior party colleagues are in Bangladesh jails or on the run at home and abroad to evade widespread criminal charges such as murder, including “genocide”, to tame the last year’s uprising.

The interim government banned the Awami League activities until the trials of its leaders and activists were completed while the Election Commission “suspended” its registration disqualifying the party from contesting elections. PTI AR GSP GSP