Awami League leaders involved in Mujib murder: Alamgir

Awami League leaders involved in Mujib murder: Alamgir

Bangladesh Nationalist Party secretary-general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Monday said that Awami League leaders were involved in the assassination of the country’s founding president Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and his family members and that late president and BNP founder Ziaur Rahman was not involved in the heinous crime.

The BNP leader made the comment while responding to reporters after placing wreaths and offering supplication at Zia’s grave at Sher-e-Bangla Nagar in Dhaka on the occasion of the founding anniversary of the Jatiyatabadi Swechchhasebak Dal.

The BNP leader also said that the AL was trying to distort the history.

‘It is evident like the pole star that Ziaur Rahman declared the independence of the country. He was never involved in any killing. History testifies to this,’ Fakhrul said.

He said that the AL men who formed the government and went to the Jatiya Sangsad following Mujib’s murder were involved in the killing.

Responding to another question about the industries affairs minister’s comment that the BNP had bought rawhides in the Eid-ul-Azha and destroyed them, Fakhrul said that the unelected government had totally failed to run the country and that they had no mandate of the people.

He alleged that the government as well as the JS was without people’s representatives and that was why they had no other option but to speak such ‘nonsense’.

He further alleged that the government had destroyed all the democratic institutions of the country in a planned way and now it was working to destroy the country’s economy.

‘The government’s only aim is to establish a one-party rule and depoliticise the political parties,’ he went on.

He, however, said that the country’s people, like in the past, would restore democracy and free BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia through movement.

About the Indian external affairs minister’s current visit to Bangladesh, he said that they (BNP) were not much optimistic about the solution of any problem in the interest of Bangladesh during the visit.

‘We have been hearing for the past 10 to 12 years that the relation between the Awami League and the Indian government is at a high level. But we are yet to get our just share of the Teesta waters. Border killings [by the India Border Security Force] are yet to be stopped. No initiative was taken to reduce the widening trade deficit now heavily in favour of India,’ he observed.

Asked for his comment about media reports that India wanted a piece of Bangladesh’s land in Brahmanbaria to expand the Agartala airport, he said that his party was closely observing the matter.

‘Bangladesh government hasn’t agreed yet, and there’s no question about providing any land. There’s no reason to give our land to any other country,’ he said.

BNP standing committee member Iqbal Hasan Mahmud Tuku, joint secretary-general Habib Un-Nabi Khan Sohel, organising secretary Fazlul Huq Milon, volunteer affairs secretary Mir Sarafat Ali Sapu and Swechchhasebak Dal president Shafiul Bari Babu and general secretary Abdul Quadir Bhuiyan Jewel were present.