Advisers skip Dhaka city unit BNP’s first outdoor programme

Although the idea behind the new Dhaka city unit convening committee of BNP was to launch a strong anti-government movement after Eid, its first official outdoor programme yesterday was marred by clashes and absence of senior members.

Four advisers to the newly formed Dhaka city unit BNP convening committee skipped their first official programme yesterday, only a day after their chief Mirza Abbas said there was no grouping among them.

The new committee yesterday placed wreaths at the grave of party founder Ziaur Rahman. They were accompanied by BNP’s acting secretary general Mirza Fakrul Islam Alamgir.

However, a couple of female leaders of the party got involved in a scuffle, prompting the senior leaders, who were very much present at the spot, to scold them for their behaviour.

Of the four advisers, former Dhaka city unit chief Sadeque Hossain

Khoka and his deputy Abdus Salam could not attend the first meeting of the new committee on Wednesday because they were in the USA and the UK respectively.

Another adviser and BNP’s Standing Committee Member Rafiqul Islam Miah skipped the meeting reportedly because he was unhappy as his supporters were ignored in the new Dhaka committee. According to sources, he even told his associates that he would resign from his adviser post.

Miah, a lawyer by profession, told the Dhaka Tribune: “How will I go there? I am still busy at the court.”

The other adviser ASM Hannan Shah, also a standing committee member, claimed that he did not know about the programme.

Asked why he did not attend the first meeting and the programme, he shot back at the reporter saying: “Do not you understand Bangla? I do not know anything. I am at home.”

On Wednesday, Mirza Abbas said there was no grouping in the party; rather all were united under Khaleda Zia’s leadership.

Abbas himself was reportedly unhappy because Khoka and Salam were made advisers to the new committee. For four days in a row after the committee was announced on Friday night, he kept himself away from meeting his party men and journalists.

Sources said he had decided to come out in the open and start working only after a series of meetings at his home in which other leaders and activists managed to convince him after a lot of effort.

After placing wreaths at Zia’s grave, BNP acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul told reporters that he had hoped that the Dhaka city committee would play a vital role in intensifying the anti-government movement that they wanted to launch after Eid.

“The BNP has been on a movement for the last five years and it will continue [the struggle] until final victory [by toppling the government] is achieved,” he said

Abbas said the main target of the new committee was to prepare the Dhaka city unit for a vigorous movement by reorganising it.

However, minutes before the two senior leaders of the party made the encouraging remarks, female leaders Nilufar Akter Moni and Nasim Akter Keya locked into a cat-fight because they both wanted to stand in the front row with the senior leaders to come into the media spotlight.

After some of the senior leaders scolded the two women and pacified the situation, a tension arose among two top tier leaders.

In the front row, one of the convenors of the new committee Goyeshwar Chandra Roy was standing on one side of Mira Fakhrul and Mirza Abbas and Abdul Awal Mintoo, the two other convenors, on the other side.

When new Member Secretary Habib-un-Nabi Khan Sohel pushed Goyeshwar back and took his place beside Fakhrul, Roy got angry, scolded Sohel and was about to leave the

place.

Fakhrul and Abbas then brought the situation under control and Sohel allowed Goyeshwar to come back to his place in the front row.

After placing wreaths, when Fakhrul was talking to journalists, some leaders and activists started a pushing and shouting because all of them wanted to appear in the television cameras.

That enraged Fakhrul, who left the place, walked towards the bank of the Crescent Lake and called the journalists over there.