PM spreading false narrative on Oct 28 violence: BNP

The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party on Tuesday accused prime minister Sheikh Hasina of spreading an ‘unstoppable stream of lies’ at her press conference to hush up what actually happened on October 28 centring BNP’s Naya Paltan grand rally in Dhaka.

‘What the prime minister said (on October 28 violence) was an unstoppable stream of lies…I would like to tell the prime minister that videos on all things that happened on October 28 were captured as cameras are now in people’s hands,’ said BNP senior joint secretary general Ruhul Kabir Rizvi.

Speaking at a virtual press briefing, he also said that no incident now remains unrecorded, undocumented, or out of sight of people in this age of technology. ‘You (PM) can tell various lies in police protection, but you won’t be able to cover up the truth.’

The BNP leader said that the government would not be able to hush up the truth by resorting to lies, staging dramas and making videos as the true videos are now available in people’s hands:  ‘I would like to also tell the government that all information is now available.’

He said that BNP’s massive rally on Saturday reached near Notre Dame College on the east side while it reached near Shahbagh with a packed crowd up to Kakrail Mosque on the west side.

‘So, how did the buses and trucks carrying Awami League activists go there (Kakrail)? The government and its law enforcement agencies did it to create tension and to foil the BNP’s rally by carrying out untoward incidents as per their premeditated plans,’ Rizvi said.

He said that available videos suggest that some people were vandalising the main gate of the residence of the chief justice and other establishments with police protection. ‘Didn’t the prime minister know it? There are videos and other evidence of it.  You can tell irresistible lies by force, but you won’t be able to hide the truth. All the facts are recorded and the truth is being exposed. So, you have no scope to deny the facts.’

He said that the government might try to intimidate people by issuing threats and letting loose the law enforcers but it will not be able to scare and silence everyone.

The BNP leader said that a video was also found on how the ruling party men used a bus driver to torch a bus in front of the national Eidgah ground in the capital on Tuesday.

Earlier in the day, prime minister Sheikh Hasina said that BNP had again proved that it is a terrorist party by resorting to violence on October 28.

‘BNP-Jamaat clique is terrorists. BNP is a terrorist party, which they proved again,’ she said while addressing a press conference arranged at her official residence Ganabhaban to speak about the outcomes of her recent visit to Belgium.

New Age