BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Tuesday alleged that the current government has ‘surpassed the Pakistani occupation forces in terms of repressing people’.
“This government has implicated 26 lakh people in different cases, made 500 others disappeared and maimed over a thousand ones. It seems to me the repression being carried out by the current government across the country has outstripped the Pakistani’s repressive acts in 1971,” he said.
Speaking at a discussion, the BNP leader also said the government has applied all the strength to obliterate democracy and the politics of opposition to hang onto power. “They usurped power on the night of December 29 using the state machinery.”
Tariqul Islam Smriti Sangsad arranged the programme at the Jatiya Press Club, marking the 1st death anniversary of BNP standing committee member Tariqul Islam.
Fakhrul alleged that the government has ruined the country’s economy and all the democratic institutions to turn Bangladesh into a dysfunctional state.
He said the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) recently said the government’s statistics about the country’s GDP growth is not accurate as all the basic structures of the economy are being destroyed. “Banks and the share market have been plundered. Around Tk one lakh crore has been siphoned off abroad with which five Padma Bridges can be built.”
The BNP leader also accused the government of destroying the judiciary, administration, snatching people’s rights and controlling the media.
He recalled the contributions of BNP leaders Tariqul Islam and Sadeque Hossain Khoka to the country and BNP. “Tariqul Bahi died on November 4 last year while our another brave leader Sadeque Hossain Khoka died just a year later. We would have taken their departure normally had it been in a normal process as they had to be subjected to repression of the government.”
Fakhrul called upon their party leaders and activists to put in their best efforts to free BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia and establish a pro-people government by forcing the current one to hold a fair and credible election under a neutral administration and the Election Commission, if they truly want to show respect to Tariqul and Khoka.
Speaking at the programme, BNP standing committee member Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain said Tariqul was a genuine nationalist, patriot, and brave political warrior since his student life.
Under the current context of the country, he said, the BNP leaders and activists should play a brave role in saving the country from ‘misrule’ taking lesson from Tariqul’s life.
Moudud Ahmed, another BNP standing committee member, said Tariqul was a sincere and dedicated politician who always followed the ideals of BNP founder Ziaur Rahman.
He bemoaned that politics is no longer in the hands of politicians as ‘miscreants’ controlling it with money and muscle power for lack of an ‘elected’ government in the country. “We must free the country from such a situation by restoring democracy and freeing Khaleda Zia from jail.”
BNP standing committee members Mirza Abbas, Gayeshwar Chandra Roy, Iqbal Hasan Mahmud Tuku, Selima Rahman, vice chairman Shamsuzzaman Dudu, Netai Roy Chowdhury and Tariqul Islam’s wife Professor Nargis Islam, among others, addressed the programme.
