Gono Forum MPs-elect Mansur, Mukabbir to take oath Thursday

The Jatiya Oikya Front MPs-elect Sultan Muhammed Mansur and Mukabbir Khan are set to defy the coalition decision and take their oaths of office in parliament on Thursday.

Their swearing-in ceremony will take place in the speaker’s office around 11 am on Mar 7, the Parliament Secretariat said on Tuesday.

In the Dec 30 polls, Sultan Mansur was elected from the Moulvibazar-2 seat with the ticket of the Jatiya Oikya Front under the paddy sheaf symbol while Mukabbir Khan ran under the Gono Forum’s ‘rising sun’ symbol.

As part of the Jatiya Oikya Front alliance led by Dr Kamal Hossain, the BNP could only manage six seats in the Dec 30 polls.

The alliance rejected the outcome of the polls after raising allegations of rigging with the Election Commission and said their candidates, who won the elections, would not take oath as MPs.

Dr Kamal initially took the interests of the two leaders of his party as 'positive', but changed his tone after a meeting with the BNP leaders.

On Sunday, Gono Forum General Secretary Mostafa Mohsin Montu told reporters: “We will take legal actions against them (the Gono Forum MPs-elect) if they take oaths.”

“They’d have to be crazy to go there against the party’s decision. It’s unacceptable for them to do so.”

Defending his decision to secure his parliamentary berth, Sultan Mansur said that he will take his oath of office to uphold the will of his constituency. 

A former vice-president of Dhaka University Central Students’ Union or DUCSU and president of Bangladesh Chhatra League, Sultan Mansur had risen as high as to the position of organising secretary in the Awami League.

Sultan Mansur went under the fold of Gono Forum chief Dr Kamal Hossain after he faced the wrath of the Awami League leadership for seeking reforms during the 2007-08 military-controlled caretaker government.

After winning the Moulvibazar-2 seat in the Dec 30 polls, he expressed an interest to take oath as an MP of the 11th national parliament despite the alliance’s rejection of the election results.

The former Awami League leader told bdnews24.com: “I haven’t joined any other party. I never left the Awami League, neither was I expelled.”