Khaleda meets with her party’s Executive Committee members

About 450 members of the BNP National Executive Committee are meeting in Dhaka ahead of a verdict in the Zia Orphanage Trust graft case against Khaleda Zia.

Senior Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 3 Feb 2018, 06:53 AM
Updated : 3 Feb 2018, 10:48 AM

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia presided over the meeting, which started at the Le Meridien hotel around 11am on Saturday.

The BNP National Executive Committee has 502 members, but about 450 were present at the start of the meeting. Members of the Advisory Council were also in attendance.

Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir had said the BNP chief would send an ‘important message’ from the meeting.

“The meeting of our National Executive Committee is taking place amidst an ongoing complex political situation in the election year. This meeting is very important,” he told bdnews24.com on Friday.

The BNP sits out of parliament after the boycott of the 2014 general elections as its demand for a non-partisan polls-time government was not met. It is now staring at the possibility of their party chief being thrown into jail.

The party has raised the same demand again, but the ruling Awami League is firm on its decision to keep Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina at the helm of the administration that will oversee the next election.

Khaleda will be ineligible to run in the next elections if she is convicted of embezzling Tk 21 million in a case related to Zia Orphanage Trust. The verdict on the case is due on Feb 8.

She faces maximum life imprisonment in the event of her conviction in the case and following ruling coalition leaders’ comments that Khaleda “had stolen orphans' money”, BNP leaders fear the verdict will not go in her favour.