The ruling Grand Alliance government will become ‘illegal’ from the moment the 90-day countdown to the next election begins, Khaleda Zia has asserted.
The BNP Chairperson vowed to wage an anti-government movement from that day, Oct 25.
“The current government would cease to be legal from tomorrow. They will be forced out of power through an uncompromising movement,” Khaleda said at a rally at the National Press Club.
The Opposition Leader spoke at a rally of the BNP-backed teachers and educational institution employees.
Her arrival attracted huge media attention, as the Dhaka police have banned all meetings, rallies, processions and human chains in capital Dhaka in view of counter-programmes announced by the two major political parties on the issue of poll-time government.
“This government will no longer be legal tomorrow, it will be illegal,” claimed Khaleda. “They will have to be removed from power through a had-hitting movement.”
The Constitution stipulates the election 90 days before the end of government’s term – that is between Oct 25 and Jan 24.
So the countdown to the election will start from Oct 25 even though the current Awami League-led government will remain in power until Jan 25.
The BNP, in a long campaign for polls under a caretaker government, has announced a public rally in the capital on the very day the polls countdown begins.
Police have granted the main opposition conditional permission at Suhrawardy Udyan, even though it was originally planned in front of BNP’s Naya Paltan headquarters.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in her address to the nation on Oct 18 proposed the formation of an all-party poll-time government and urged the opposition to name their representatives for it.
BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia termed the Prime Minister’s proposal ‘disappointing and unacceptable’ and proposed her poll-time dispensation comprising ex-caretaker advisors. That however was termed ‘unrealistic’ by Hasina.
A day after Hasina’s reaction, Khaleda in the rally at the press club on Thursday said, “So far they have been saying ‘give us a formula’ and now that we have, the government is making excuses.”
The former Prime Minister on Tuesday proposed that the ruling party and the opposition each pick five ex-advisors among the 20 from the caretaker governments of 1996 and 2001. The Leader of the Opposition suggested a ‘respectable man of society’, acceptable to both parties, helm the interim administration.
The Awami League leaders have been saying the Constitution does not allow such arrangements.
“This proposal can be considered within the bounds of the Constitution,” insisted Khaleda. “There are still plenty of educated, eligible and neutral people in the country who can form an interim government.”
The BNP chief said the Teachers-Staff Coalition will have all its demands met once the BNP goes to power.
Khaleda was welcomed into the rally by thundering slogans from the members of the Teachers-Staff Coalition. They presented their professional demands including the reinstatement of teachers and staff who lost their jobs, complaints against non-MPO institutions that were brought under the government’s MPO facility and also the nationalisation of jobs.
Source: Bd news24
