Dr Kamal welcomes Razzaq resignation from Jamaat over 1971 role play

Dr Kamal Hossain has welcomed Abdur Razzaq’s decision to resign from the Jamaat-e-Islami citing the party’s failure to apologise for its anti-liberation role.

“I welcome the (demand for) apology,” the Jatiya Oikya Front chief told reporters at his office in Dhaka when he was asked for reaction to Barrister Razzaq’s resignation from the Jamaat.

Abdur Razzaq

Razzaq, who led the defence of top Jamaat leaders convicted of 1971 war crimes, triggered a political maelstrom in Bangladesh after standing down from the position of an assistant secretary general of the party.

Many see his move as a strategy to bring the Jamaat out of “existential crisis” created by the loss of its registration as a political party, thus the rights to nominate candidates in elections.

Besides this, five of its top leaders have been hanged after conviction by war crimes tribunals for crimes against humanity committed during the Liberation War.

Some others have been jailed for similar crimes like killings, rape and arson attacks.     

The Jamaat recently moved to revive itself with a new name and charter, according to media reports. 

Awami League General Secretary Obaidul Quader has said they want to grasp the Jamaat’s strategy.

Joint General Secretary Mahbub-Ul Alam Hanif has said there is no scope for forgiving the Jamaat even if it apologises for what it did in support of Pakistan during the war.

Dr Kamal, a former Awami League leader, earlier regretted giving Jamaat leaders the opportunity to contest in the Dec 30 parliamentary elections under the banner of the Oikya Front.

He said he had not known about the candidates of the Jamaat, a key ally of the BNP which is also the major party in the Oikya Front coalition.

Dr Kamal was speaking to the media after a meeting of the alliance’s steering committee ahead of its “public hearing” scheduled for Friday.

The alliance is organising the demonstration at the Supreme Court Bar Association Auditorium against what it calls rigging in the general election that the Awami League won by a landslide. 

On being asked, the Oikya Front chief said he did not know whether the 22 Jamaat leaders, who contested in the election with the BNP’s ‘paddy sheaf’ symbol, the same one used by the alliance candidates, would take part in Friday’s programme.