Khaleda herself is wiping out BNP, Hasina tells Parliament

The BNP is on its way to extinction for being led up the ‘wrong path’ by Chairperson Khaleda Zia, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has said.

Parliament Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 1 April 2015, 02:09 PM
Updated : 1 April 2015, 02:28 PM

“She (Khaleda) pretends not to understand that the people are not with her. It’s a mistake like the one she made by boycotting the elections on Jan 5, 2014,” the prime minister told Parliament on Wednesday.

Hasina was speaking about the BNP’s agitations demanding a snap general election under a ‘neutral’ caretaker government.

A blockade enforced by the BNP for around three months has been criticised for violence that killed over 120 people. The protest programme seems to have no effect on life in Bangladesh now.

“This programme of her (Khaleda) will obliterate the BNP and end the so-called movement,” Hasina remarked.

The head of the Awami League-led government said 130 people were burnt alive in petrol bomb attacks during the 85-day blockade. 

The violence left over 1,000 people injured and more than 2,000 vehicles torched, according to Hasina.

“It’s nothing but a plot to stop the current economic progress. It cannot be allowed to go on,” she said.

Police were working to normalise law and order situation by ensuring people’s security and property, she added.

According to her, 127 people harmed in violence have been given a total of Tk 117 million from the Prime Minister’s Relief and Welfare Fund.
 
The process to give Tk 11.7 million to 30 others was under way.
 
Besides, 426 owners of vehicles got around Tk 57.78 million.
 
Owners of 395 other vehicles harmed during the violence will also get compensation.

Though the BNP activists appear to be running out of steam in enforcing the blockade, Khaleda announced on Mar 13 her resolve to persist with the programme.

Hasina criticised her for not expressing in her speech any regrets for the deaths caused by violence unleashed by her party.

“Actually she (Khaleda) killed these innocent people. So, she lacks the moral strength to sympathise with them,” she said.

The BNP chief has been staying in her office since Jan 3.

The police had barred her from leaving the place amidst tension over her party programmes on Jan 5, the first anniversary of the last general election boycotted by BNP.

Khaleda called a country-wide indefinite blockade that very day.

She has not left the office even after police lifted the barricade.

Arrest warrants were issued for her in graft cases, but they are yet to be executed.

A court issued the warrants in the Zia Orphanage Trust and Zia Charitable Trust graft cases, the hearings of which she has repeatedly skipped.

Hasina said the BNP chief violated the law by chosing not to appear in court. 

She said police would take the necessary steps once the warrants reached the police station, if she refused to surrender to the court.