Pro-Awami League lawyers take control of Bar Council

Pro-Awami League lawyers have regained control of the Bar Council, winning a clear majority in recently-concluded elections.

The 'White Panel' fielded by lawyers owing allegiance to the ruling party won 11 of the 14 seats in the Bar Council.

The BNP-supported 'Blue Panel', which had controlled the Bar Council for the last three years, could win only three seats.

The chances of victory of the ruling party supported panel looked bright after the voting.

On Wednesday, counting of the ballots started after they had been collected from the different polling centres.

On Thursday, Attorney General Mahbubey Alam, the ex-officio chairman of the Bar Council, announced the results.

The pro-Awami League 'White Panel' won five of the seven general member positions in the Bar Council.

M Amir-Ul Islam, Abdul Baset Mazumder, Abdul Matin Khashru, ZI Khan Panna and SM Rezaul Karim were elected general members from the pro-Awami League panel.

Of them, Islam and Mazumder had both served as the Council’s vice chairman as well the president of the Supreme Court Bar Association.

Comilla MP Khashru is the Awami League’s legal affairs secretary. He served as the law minister between 1996 and 2001.

Karim is a former general secretary of the Supreme Court Bar while Panna is known as a lawyer often arguing cases related to human rights.

From the pro-BNP panel, the current Bar Council Vice Chairman Khandker Mahbub Hossain and MM Mahbub Uddin Khokon have been elected as general members.

Hossain is the current Supreme Court Bar Association president while Khokon is the general secretary.

As many as 43,302 lawyers voted on Aug 26 to elect 14 members of the council – seven for the posts of general members and as many for the region-based posts.

The pro-AL lawyers who won in six posts from the regions are Kazi Md Nazibullah Hiru (Dhaka), HR Zahid Anwar (Mymensingh and Faridpur region), Md Ibrahim Hossain Chowdhury (Chittagong and Noakhali), Parvez Alam Khan (Khulna, Barisal amd Patuakhali), Md Yahya (Rajshahi, Jessore and Kushtia) and Md Rezaul Karim (Dinajpur, Rangpur, Bogra and Pabna).

Kaiyum Haque has been elected as the only pro-BNP lawyer from the Sylhet and Comilla region.

These 14 members will elect the vice-chairman.

In the 2012 Bar Council polls, pro-BNP lawyers clinched nine while pro-AL lawyers got five members elected. Khandker Mahbub, an Advisor to the BNP Chairperson was made the vice chairman then.