AppId is over the quota
Staff Correspondent
The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party in an eleventh-hour press briefing in Dhaka announced that it would boycott the Narayanganj city polls, saying it had withdrawn support for Taimur Alam Khandakar.
Immediately after the announcement, BNP-backed candidate Taimur in another press briefing in Narayanganj said he would not be in the mayoral race.
The decision came with only a few hours for the Narayanganj City Corporation polls to begin.
‘No army has been deployed. Voters have been threatened in their houses. In such a situation, we had no option but to reject the farcical move of election,’ Abdullah Al Noman told journalists at a press briefing at the party chairperson’s office.
The after-midnight announcement followed a meeting among senior BNP leaders and legal experts at the party chief’s Gulshan office, where both the BNP chairperson, Khaleda Zia, and its acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir were absent.
The party standing committee members, Khandkar Mosharraf Hossain, MK
Anwar and Rafiqul Islam Mia, vice-chairman Abdullah Al Noman, party chief’s adviser Khondkar Mahbub Hossain and other senior lawyers were present at the meeting.
At a hurriedly arranged briefing at around 12:45am on Sunday, the party’s vice-chairman Abdullah Al Noman
made the announcement of Taimur’s quitting the race.
Soon after the BNP’s press briefing, Taimur Alam Khandakar in his Narayanganj residence made similar statement and demanded resignation of the election commissioners, terming the Election Commission a ‘puppet’ as it continued with the polls process even after accusing the government of violating the constitution by not deploying army in the polls.
The BNP earlier on the day said their candidate would continue being in the race, even after non-deployment of the army, to ‘unmask’ the government and the Election Commission.
‘We were ready to contest the polls knowing that it would not be held in a free and fair manner and we also informed you of our position in the morning. But since the afternoon, situation changed rapidly leaving no way for us but to quit the race,’ Noman told the briefing last night.
‘The entire situation in Narayangaj has changed since after Saturday noon and the town went in the grip of ruling party goons. Known and unknown goons are roaming around at the direct patronisation of the administration and they had started threatening the electorates going door to door,’ he said.
‘In such a situation, we had no option but to reject farcical move of election,’ he said.
Earlier, BNP lawmaker AM Mahbub Uddin Khokan sent a legal notice to the prime minister’s principal secretary, the secretary of defence ministry and the secretary of home ministry, asking them to inform why he would not resort to the court to get justice when the administration refused to deploy army in Narayanganj.
A vice-chairman of the party, Abdullah Al Noman criticised the Election Commission saying, ‘The chief election commissioner said the government violated the constitution by not deploying the army. Why are you then holding the polls?’ he asked.
Citing Article 126 of the constitution, Noman said as in accordance with the article the government was obliged to extend all support to the Election Commission during any polls and the deployment of troops was part of that.
‘It is a clear violation of the constitution not to deploy the army after formal requisition from the commission. Now the question is whether the commission has the right to hold the polls,’ he said.
He also questioned the ‘contradictory’ statements of the chief election commissioner, who had said that army would not be deployed and he would not take the responsibility of any violence in the polls.
Source: newagebd.com/newspaper1
Read More on Bengali News
No comments:
Post a Comment