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AL might be forced to change stance

Leaders allege govt’s undue favour to BNP-Jamaat alliance

Hasan Jahid Tusher
Awami League (AL) is viewing the military backed caretaker government's manoeuvring for releasing-detained BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia and her son Tarique Rahman as an undue administrative favour towards BNP-Jamaat alliance, according to party insiders.
AL also feels that the government's move might necessitate a change in the party's earlier position of co-operating with it, the sources said.
Meanwhile, with Khaleda's possible release on the threshold, AL President Sheikh Hasina might return to the country from the US on September 22 or 23, She might pul pressure on the caretaker government for holding the parliamentary election by December before any other poll on her return, the sources said.
With the release of Hasina on June 11, the relationship between AL and the government had warmed up a little, and the party participated in the August 4 polls to four city corporations and nine municipalities in return, the sources added.
According to AL leaders, the party is not against Khaleda's release, but • the way the government allowed BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami secretary generals Khandaker Delwar Hossain and Ali Ahsan Mohammad Moiahid to have about a 3-hour long political talk with her in jail was no t at all fair.
The leaders observed that the government and BNP struck a deal for the release of Khaleda and her 'corrupt' sonTarique.
"Awami League never thought that the government would show its real face like that. We are very unhappy with the government's move of allowing Khandaker Delwar and Moiahid to have a three-hour political talk with Khaleda,” AL Presidium Member Motia Chowdhury told The Daily Star last night
"Certainly BNP negotiated with the government. When Sheikh Hasina is released, it becomes a deal, but when Khaleda 3a is released, it becomes a result of a democratic movement'" quipped Motia alleging the government of protecting BNP from public wrath 'inclined by their wide scale corruption and misnile'.
The meeting among Khaleda, Delwar and Mojahid proved that it is not AL but BNP which struck a deal with the government said AL Acting General Secretary Syed Ashraful Islam.
In the changing situation, AL presidium, ihe highest policy making body of the party meets today in Acting President Zillur Rahman's Gulshan residence to finalise fresh strategies.
The party will also hold its central working committee (ALCWC) meeting tomorrow in party chief Sheikh Hasina's political office in Dhanmondi.
In both meetings AL will elaborately thrash out its possible strategies for the aftermath of Khaleda's release.
In the ALCWC meeting the party is likely to decide on the next course of action, which might be a reversal from its earlier position on upazila elections, with a new rigid position for the parliamentary poll before the upazila ones.
As soon as Tarique will be released, AL might take to the street demanding immediate release of its presidium members Sheikh Fazlul Karim Selim and Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir, Joint General Secretary Obaidul Quacler, and two detained mayors ABM Mohiuddin Chowdhury and Badar Uddin Ahmad Kamran, the sources said.
"There is a possibility of Sheikh Hasina’s return on September 22 or 23," said her physician Prof ModasserAli.
He told The Daily Star that Hasina has a medical check-up scheduled for September 3 and she might want to return home after that. Earlier, she confirmed a return ticket for September 10.
Dr Modasser lambasted the caretaker government for allowing BNP and Jamaat secretary generals to have a long political talk with detained Khaleda.
His patient was not allowed to even see her doctors, he complained asking both the government and jail authorities under .which laws the BNP and Jamaat leaders were allowed to have a political talk inside a jail'.
Meanwhile, AL leaders during a discussion in the National Press Chib in the capital yesterday alleged that the government and the Election Commission are playing with the holding of national election, making the poll's fate uncertain.
"The government and the Election Commission have been the biggest obstacles for the national election," said Ashraful Islam. He was addressing a discussion meeting marking the fourth death anniversary of Ivy Rahman who had succumbed to her injuries from the August 21,2004 grenade attack on an AL rally in the capital.
Chaired by President of Ivy Rahman Parishad Prof AAMS Arefin Siddique the discussion was also addressed by Zillur Rahman, Motia Chowdhury and Dr Dipu Moni, amongothers.
Motia said the people will wait until December to see whether the national election is held and after that if the election is not held no body knows what will happen.
"The government is just pretending to weigh Awami League and BNP on the same scale. Their anticorruption drive has failed and that's why they are being forced to release real corruptionists," Ashraf said adding that the country will have an image of a failed state if the national election is not held by December.
He however also said if BNP contests in the poll, it will be good for the country.