SM Mizanur Rahman :
The ruling Awami League (AL) is going to hold its 20th triennial central council by next January to include clean image and new hands in the central committee and to strengthen party network throughout the country.
The 19th council was held on December 29 in 2012.
After the national council and announcement of the new committees, AL President Sheikh Hasina and her senior colleagues had taken various initiatives to resolve the intra-party feud, but there is no sign of improvement till date.
 “As we have already held councils to 52 organisational district committees out of 73, we have started taking preparation to hold 20th triennial central council by January next year,” AL Presidium Member Kazi
 Zafarullah told The New Nation on Friday. He said, the council with new programmes will rejuvenate the party at its grassroots level. “There is a competition among many dedicated and qualified leaders. The competition among the party leaders doesn’t mean internal conflict,” replying to a query he said.
After the January 5 Parliamentary Election last year, which the BNP-led alliance boycotted, the AL policymakers eyed on strengthening the AL network from the central to grassroots level. The party President and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has asked her front ranking leaders for holding the council in time, said highly placed sources in AL, adding that its General Secretary Syed Ashraful Islam continued to discuss issue relating to the party national council with party stalwarts. According to party insiders, the AL President will go for a major reshuffle in the party as she did in the AL-led Cabinet.
The leaders, who have failed to perform their assigned responsibilities and the leaders with corruption allegations against them, may be ousted from the party central committee. Besides, veteran leaders like Amir Hossain Amu and Tofail Ahmed may be included in the party Presidium, the AL’s highest policy-making body. They were dropped from the Presidium in 2009 for their role during the January 11, 2007 changeover.
At present, three posts of the Presidium are lying vacant. One became vacant after the last council while the two others after death of Syeda Zohra Tajuddin and expulsion of Abdul Latif Siddiqui from the party.
AL has now 10 Presidium members. They are Syeda Sajeda Chowdhury, Begum Matia Chowdhury, Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim, Mohammad Nasim, Kazi Zafarullah, Satish Chandra Roy, Advocate Sahara Khatun, Obaidul Quader, Nuh-Ul-Alam Lenin and Engineer Mosharraf Hossain. Of them, Satish Chandra Roy and advocate Sahara Khatun may be excluded from the party’s highest policymaking body-AL Presidium Â
However talking to this reporter, a front ranking leader preferring not be named said, AL’s firm determination to bring qualitative changes within the party, remain miles away mainly due to bitterness among the party ranks and files. “Councils were held to 52 organisational districts but full fledged committees have not been declared at many of them. Intra-party feud is a major barrier to the AL to make its organisational activities strengthened,” the leader said.
When the leaders and the workers are being asked to strengthen the party’s activities and to get united to face the major political party BNP on the streets, they are engaged in internal conflicts throughout the country. The leaders and the workers of rival factions from grassroots to Metropolitan City unit levels are staging showdown and counter showdown against each other, even engaging arms clashes across the country.
As the district and upazila leaders of AL and its associate bodies are engaged in grouping and intra-party conflicts, the grassroots workers do not have any guideline and even they do not know who is running their district politics.
They lamented that they were not allowed to meet the party President to inform her about the real organisational scenario in the remote area. “As the AL always favours personal relationship instead of picking up its leadership from the grassroots level,” another leader said, adding, the party is thus being destroyed.
He also alleged, party leaders do not follow the chain of command “Specially there is no chain of command in the party’s midlevel leadership. As a section of influential party leaders are intervening in local politics in a bid to establish their supremacy, it is very natural it would affect the party’s organizational activities,” he added.
The ruling Awami League (AL) is going to hold its 20th triennial central council by next January to include clean image and new hands in the central committee and to strengthen party network throughout the country.
The 19th council was held on December 29 in 2012.
After the national council and announcement of the new committees, AL President Sheikh Hasina and her senior colleagues had taken various initiatives to resolve the intra-party feud, but there is no sign of improvement till date.
 “As we have already held councils to 52 organisational district committees out of 73, we have started taking preparation to hold 20th triennial central council by January next year,” AL Presidium Member Kazi
 Zafarullah told The New Nation on Friday. He said, the council with new programmes will rejuvenate the party at its grassroots level. “There is a competition among many dedicated and qualified leaders. The competition among the party leaders doesn’t mean internal conflict,” replying to a query he said.
After the January 5 Parliamentary Election last year, which the BNP-led alliance boycotted, the AL policymakers eyed on strengthening the AL network from the central to grassroots level. The party President and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has asked her front ranking leaders for holding the council in time, said highly placed sources in AL, adding that its General Secretary Syed Ashraful Islam continued to discuss issue relating to the party national council with party stalwarts. According to party insiders, the AL President will go for a major reshuffle in the party as she did in the AL-led Cabinet.
The leaders, who have failed to perform their assigned responsibilities and the leaders with corruption allegations against them, may be ousted from the party central committee. Besides, veteran leaders like Amir Hossain Amu and Tofail Ahmed may be included in the party Presidium, the AL’s highest policy-making body. They were dropped from the Presidium in 2009 for their role during the January 11, 2007 changeover.
At present, three posts of the Presidium are lying vacant. One became vacant after the last council while the two others after death of Syeda Zohra Tajuddin and expulsion of Abdul Latif Siddiqui from the party.
AL has now 10 Presidium members. They are Syeda Sajeda Chowdhury, Begum Matia Chowdhury, Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim, Mohammad Nasim, Kazi Zafarullah, Satish Chandra Roy, Advocate Sahara Khatun, Obaidul Quader, Nuh-Ul-Alam Lenin and Engineer Mosharraf Hossain. Of them, Satish Chandra Roy and advocate Sahara Khatun may be excluded from the party’s highest policymaking body-AL Presidium Â
However talking to this reporter, a front ranking leader preferring not be named said, AL’s firm determination to bring qualitative changes within the party, remain miles away mainly due to bitterness among the party ranks and files. “Councils were held to 52 organisational districts but full fledged committees have not been declared at many of them. Intra-party feud is a major barrier to the AL to make its organisational activities strengthened,” the leader said.
When the leaders and the workers are being asked to strengthen the party’s activities and to get united to face the major political party BNP on the streets, they are engaged in internal conflicts throughout the country. The leaders and the workers of rival factions from grassroots to Metropolitan City unit levels are staging showdown and counter showdown against each other, even engaging arms clashes across the country.
As the district and upazila leaders of AL and its associate bodies are engaged in grouping and intra-party conflicts, the grassroots workers do not have any guideline and even they do not know who is running their district politics.
They lamented that they were not allowed to meet the party President to inform her about the real organisational scenario in the remote area. “As the AL always favours personal relationship instead of picking up its leadership from the grassroots level,” another leader said, adding, the party is thus being destroyed.
He also alleged, party leaders do not follow the chain of command “Specially there is no chain of command in the party’s midlevel leadership. As a section of influential party leaders are intervening in local politics in a bid to establish their supremacy, it is very natural it would affect the party’s organizational activities,” he added.
