Without BNP fair polls will be called into question: Opposition leaders

Staff Reporter :
The 12th parliamentary election is poised to take place without creating a fair competition, the opposition parties, including the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), remain out of election preparations as the nomination submission deadline is just a week away.

If BNP does not join the poll, the political party leaders said that the much talked about election would lose the legitimacy at home and abroad and the government’s commitment of ensuring a free, fair and participatory poll be called into question.

Though the ‘petty’ political parties are boarding on the election wagon under the current framework, the ruling party and the Election Commission are still calling upon the major opposition BNP to join the poll although the widespread arrest of its leaders and workers continue.

Opposition BNP and others said that the election under the partisan government cannot be free and fair as it was witnessed in the last two parliamentary elections held in 2014 and 2018.

They are urging the voters to boycott the poll and not to exercise their rights of franchise in the upcoming election under the mechanism of the incumbent government.

With the nearing of the election, the political landscape is being mired in uncertainties, coupled with the refusal of bails for key figures of BNP, including its Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, who is languishing behind bars with his frail health.

BNP has been condemning the mass hunt down and poaching on the houses of their leaders and workers across the country after the Oct 28 grand rally in the capital when law enforcers dismantled it under the plea on the attack on residence of the Chief Justice Obaidul Hassan.

BNP further alleged that their leaders and workers are being arrested under trumped-up charges.

Meanwhile, Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal on Thursday said that the law enforcers were not nabbing the opposition wholesale and the number of filing cases has also been decreased since October 28.

“Before BNP’s rally on 28 October, on an average 565 cases were filed daily and after that date the average daily cases decreased to 438, a reduction by 127 cases per day,” he told the journalists in the Secretariat.

Though the election preparation is going on in full swing in the circle of Awami League, Jatiya Party and some other alliance partners, BNP and likeminded oppositions are in the ground with blockade and hartal like programmes.

Every day the BNP has been sending messages to the mass population that they would not join the poll under the government and their movement would continue with the demand for a caretaker government against the election arrangement under the partisan government.

Another opposition Islamic political party Islamic Andolan Bangladesh on Thursday said that the election under partisan government would not be free and fair and they would not vie for poll under the incumbent government.

“We have observed during 2014 and 2018 that elections under a partisan government have not been fair and participatory. Therefore, the upcoming election will not be fair under the party government as well.

So, we do not see any possibility of participating in the election,” Sayed Mohammad Rezaul Karim, the Ameer of the Islamic Andolan Bangladesh said.

He also said that the people do not want to see the government in power for a moment and urged the leaders and workers to continue their movement to topple it.

Political leaders stated that tightening the political activities of BNP and unleashing the law enforcers to hunt them down cannot ensure a participatory election and level playing field.

When the opposition is continuing their movement to hold elections under a caretaker government, the United States said that they want to see a free, fair and peaceful election.

The ruling Awami League has also pledged that it would hold a free and fair election, but the opposition leaders said that the government’s ongoing crackdown on the opposition parties does not align with their commitment.