Shamima Chowdhury
BNP Secretary General Fakrul Islam Alamgir has raised a very pertinent question and it is, the Interim Government of Dr. Mohammed Yunus has lost its credibility to arrange the upcoming national parliamentary election as it is a partisan government. Its advisors are supporting a particular party and they are hostile to both the largest political parties of Bangladesh, the Awami League (AL) and the BNP. Even they are hostile to the third largest party, the Jatiyo Party of Gen. H. M. Ershad. They are trying to keep AL party, the oldest and largest political party of Bangladesh to stay away from participating in the election.
Instead, they are trying their best to get the Jamatee Islami and its affiliated parties to win the election. They have already released thousands of convicted radical Jehadis and terrorists belonging to Islamic parties that have increased theft, dacoity, hijaking, looting, murder in the cities. Over 619 people are being murdered each month, an increase of few hundred percent. Mahfuz Alam, the most important Advisor in the Dr. Yunus cabinet is a leader of radical terrorist party, Hijbut Tahir, outlawed by the past Bangladesh government and the USA. Islami Chatra Sibir, the youth group of the Jamatee Islam party is also termed by the US government as a radical terrorist group. Many members of this group were trained by Al-Qaeda and many of them returned from Afghanistan.
Muhammad Yunus’s closet and powerful Advisor Mahfuz Alam stated that the Bangladesh Awami League party will not be allowed to contest in the upcoming election. Such statement itself made him a partisan figure and therefore, Dr. Yunus should ask him to resign. Besides Mahfuz, 4 other advisers are also strong supporters of radical Jamatee Islam party. In fact, this Interim Government should quit right away and a non-political non-partisan government should be installed as soon as possible to conduct the next parliamentary election within 60 days. The Election Commission should be ready to hold the election by March-April 2025 to save the country and its economy from disasters.
Already under Dr. Yunus government, the economy is in shamble. The ADP (annual development program) implementation is only 18% lowest in decades. The foreign aid commitments reduced by 67% and country’s credit rating deteriorated. The inflation still unchecked and double-digit. As economic activities are halted, people’s income drastically reduced. The poverty that was declining under the past government has started deteriorating and as per a recent survey, additional 10 million people are being pushed into poverty level and another 3.8 million into extreme poverty. Unemployment has risen and 26.4 million people have added to the unemployed roster in last six months. As 68 factories in Gazipur-Dhaka industrial belt have closed down as the government seized their bank accounts, nearly 70,000 workers have been laid off. In fact, since 16 factories of Beximco group, a large conglomerate have been closed down, its 40,000 workers have been demanding their arrear wages and they have created roadblocks in Gazipur city area disrupting inter-state traffic, trade and commerce.
In the commercial city of Chittagong, since 8 industries of S. Alam group have been taken over by the government and their accounts have been seized, thousands of workers are on the streets demanding reopening of the factories. It is interesting that those who joined the AL government in recent years caused maximum damages to AL party’s reputation. For example, S. Alam was a Jamathee and he switched to AL party after Sheikh Hasina’s victory. Beximco group of Salman F. Rahman and his family were all Muslim Leaguers and Nazrul Islam, the bank leader who has been financing BNP leaders for years, and they switched to AL party after AL’s victory and they brought bad name to Sheikh Hasina government.
Thousands of Bangladeshi workers that used to go abroad for jobs are finding difficulties to get jobs abroad. During Sheikh Hasina’s government nearly 12 lakh workers went abroad in 2022 alone, now even one-third of them could not make it as many countries are denying work visa or not recruiting Bangladeshi workers. The situation is getting worse everyday. Till now remittance of the workers is the second best foreign exchange earner of the country and if workers cannot go abroad, this remittance may decline. Already the export market is shrinking as the factories cannot supply goods on time as they are facing myriad challenges such as frequent power shortages and price hike, factory closures, non-availability of industrial raw materials, workers unrest, increasing extortion, frequent changes in government policies including tax benefits, foreign exchange volatility and more importantly, they are being denied to open LC and their checks are being dishonored as banks have no cash. In the agricultural sector, the backbone of the country, the farmers are not getting either fertilizer, or seeds, electricity or their essential inputs on time. As a result, production is likely to go down forcing the government to import more of essential food items from overseas. Already it has started importing essential food items such as rice, sugar, onions from Pakistan and Myanmar.
Since the interim government of Yunus is failing in all sectors; mainly economy, law and order, banking, management, administration, development, judiciary, etc. and now it also lost its credibility as a non-partisan government, it must quit and allow a non-partisan, non-political Caretaker government like that of 1/11 of 2007-08 to hold the upcoming parliamentary election as soon as possible to stabilize the country and its economy. The election should be free, fair, credible, transparent and inclusive, and level playing fields must be guaranteed to all political parties. Dr. Yunus government must not delay the process in the pretext of reforms. Reforms to be sustainable must be done by an elected government.
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