BNP chairperson's Advisory Council Member Zainul Abedin Farroque on Thursday said the country’s people will give a befitting reply to the current Awami League government through a street movement as it has been in power without mandates of voters.
"You (AL) have destroyed democracy. You arranged a dummy election without voting on January 7. You issued many threats even before the election, and you're threatening us again,” he said.
Speaking at a human chain programme, Farroque said their party together with the like-minded opposition parties will continue their street agitation until the restoration of people’s rights to vote.
“You (govt) won’t be able to subdue the BNP and keep our leaders and activists confined to their homes with repressive acts and implicating them in cases,” he said.
The BNP leader said that they will intensify the movement to force the government, which was formed without voting to quit power.
Jatiyatabadi Nabin Dal arranged the human chain programme in front of the Jatiya Press Club demanding the release of BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, Standing committee Member Mirza Abbas, Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury and other arrested opposition leaders
Farroque slammed Awami League general secretary Obaidul Quader and Foreign Minister Dr Hasan Mahmud for calling Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) a BNP agent.
“I fear you will also brand former Agriculture Minister Abdur Razzaque (a presidium member of Awami League) as an agent of the BNP a few days later as those who oppose you are your enemies,” the BNP leader said.
He said though the Awami League claims itself as a pro-democratic party and a pro-liberation force, this party does not practice democracy and rather it acts against the spirit of the Liberation War.
Farroque, also the former opposition chief whip in parliament, said the government can suppress BNP and other opposition parties for a temporary period using the state machinery. “The history of the world suggests that the autocratic regime can’t suppress the democratic forces for a long time by using the police.”
He also came down hard on the critics of the BNP who talked about the BNP’s organisational capacity and urged the ruling party leaders to face the opposition without police to test their strength.
Addressing the programme, Gono Odhikar Parishad President Nurul Haque Nur said over one lakh people have now been staying in prisons though the country’s jails can accommodate only 41,000 inmates.
He alleged that the law enforcers have been arresting the capable opposition leaders and workers and persecuting them in jails to contain the anti-government movement.
Nur said Gono Odhikar Parishad leaders have been freed on bail narrated how they were subjected to cruel torture and experienced electric shock in the jail. “They (jail authorities) removed nails and broke the bones of the opposition leaders and activists. It is very hard to think that it is happening in a civilised country”.
He deplored that senior opposition politicians like BNP leaders Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, Mirza Abbas and Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury were not given bail by the court. “We demand immediate release of all the state prisoners and withdrawal of false cases filed against them."
Nur called upon the police and the state institutions to work neutrally and not to do injustice to people.