AL fears fair polls

BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia yesterday claimed the ruling Awami League did not want elections as it feared to face trial for its irregularities and corruption after leaving power.

"Everyone, including foreigners, opined that a free fair and participatory polls is needed in the country. But the AL does not want to leave power as well as hold the elections,” she said at an iftar programme.

Islami Oikya Jote, a component of the BNP-led 20-party alliance, arranged the programme at a city hotel.

There, the BNP chief said,” The ruling party doesn't want to go to the polls also because it knows that it will face a debacle in it.”

 She claimed people in the three city polls had shown the AL-led regime an example of how they could turn it down.

Khaleda alleged that the leaders and activists of the 20-party alliance were being sent to jail for no reasons, while the ruling party men were not detained even after committing crimes such as killing, robbing and stealing.  

The BNP chief further claimed that the AL men in collaboration with a section of law enforcers were running illegal human trafficking business in the country. “They are trafficking hapless and jobless people abroad, promising the victims of providing good jobs there.”

 Senior 20-party alliance leaders, intellectuals, Islamic scholars and Pakistan's deputy high commissioner in Dhaka attended the iftar party chaired by Islami Oikya Jote chief Abdul Latif Nezami.