BNP says PM's visit to Khaleda's office was pretentious

BNP leader Ruhul Kabir Rizvi has called Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s visit to Khaleda Zia’s office to console her after the death of her youngest son "pretentious".

In a statement on Sunday, he said the party had taken her visit ‘positively’ but could realise that it was a ‘farce’ after getting the news about the lawsuit against the BNP chairperson.

The prime minister went to Khaleda’s office on Saturday evening following the news of her son Arafat Rahman Coco’s death but was turned away without an audience.

The main gate of the office was locked and blocked by several vehicles before the prime minister reached there.

Minutes after the prime minister’s convoy had left the Ganabhaban, the BNP chief’s Special Assistant Shamsur Rahman Shimul Biswas told reporters that the doctors had put Khaleda on sedatives and that she would not be able to meet Hasina.

Khaleda is staying at her office since the law enforcers surrounded it before Jan 5, the first anniversary of the general elections.

Joint Secretary General Rizvi said: “We thought the prime minister was coming to express sympathy out of her social responsibility, rising above politics.”

“But it has become clear after a case was filed against (Khaleda) that the prime minister’s coming to the BNP chairperson’s Gulshan office to express her sympathy over Coco’s death was a farce.”