PM sees ‘conspiracy to usurp power’

bdnews24.com :
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has said the BNP and its ally the Jamaat-e-Islami have launched their activities to “usurp power” by misleading people before the next general election.
In her address to the nation on Friday to mark the completion of the current Awami League government’s fourth year, Hasina described the BNP-Jamaat nexus as “plunderers and anti-liberation forces” and urged citizens not to heed “disinformation spread by them”.
“Their goal is to usurp power through the backdoor and hinder the progress of democracy by creating a murky situation. They have hired intellectuals and commentators at home and abroad with their looted money in a bid to mislead people by spreading lies and false information against the Awami League on social media. Please do not get misled by their lies.”
Hasina called on the political parties and organisations that believe in democracy and the rule of law not to harbour any ideas that hinder the process set by the constitution to govern the country.
Noting that the Election Commission reinstituted under the new law has financial independence, Hasina said the Awami League expects a free and fair election full of competition and it will provide the EC with all assistance necessary for fair and peaceful polls.
“The Awami League is the people’s party. It believes in peace and the power of the people.
The Awami League will continue fulfilling its duty to build the country. We will join the general public if we lose the election. We will continue to work for the people no matter where we are,” she said.
“I urge everyone to be alert so that no one can rob people of their rights through conspiracy. All must also be alert to prevent attempts to damage people’s lives, properties and livelihoods through anarchy in the name of protests.”
The prime minister greeted the nation on New Year and remembered Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the four national leaders and the martyrs of the Liberation War in the beginning of her speech.
She then described the achievements of her government – how it took Bangladesh onto the path of socio-economic development in nearly one and a half decades. “It’s up to you how you’ll judge what we’ve given the country and its people in the past 14 years.”
‘SCANDALOUS’
Hasina also compared the activities of her administration and those of the BNP-Jamaat government, which was in power from 2001 to 2006. “Those five years were a scandalous chapter in the history of Bangladesh. The coalition government set a milestone of misrule through killings, rapes, looting, terrorism, militancy and spreading malicious communal hatred.”
She said the BNP-Jamaat government hindered the process of peaceful hand-over of power and “staged a farce in the name of election” after the country’s economy “grinded to a halt”.
When the BNP-Jamaat alliance left power in 2006, the size of Bangladesh’s GDP was $60 billion. After the end of the 2021-22 fiscal year, the size of the country’s GDP increased to $460.75 billion, Hasina said.
The size of the national budget increased from Tk 610 billion to Tk 6.78 trillion. The foreign currency reserves boosted from $3.5 billion in 2006 to $48 billion in 2021. “As import costs increased due to a global recession and inflation, the reserves have fallen to $34 billion, which is enough to pay the import bills of five months,” Hasina said.
Noting the completion of the Padma Bridge, a section of Dhaka Metro Rail and one of the two tubes of the Bangabandhu Tunnel under the Karnaphuli river, the prime minister said: “Now Bangladesh is the 41st largest economy in the world. It has achieved the eligibility to graduate from a least developed country to a developing nation.”
She said the government launched and continued several programmes to help the poor amid a global crisis triggered by the coronavirus pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war.