Only a leftist force can save country

Terming the current political situation unusual due to "absence of democracy" and "presence of fundamentalism", the Communist Party of Bangladesh yesterday said only a left-leaning alternative democratic force could salvage the country.

The CPB leaders said they did not support the squeezing of democratic space in the name of development.     

The comments were made at the inaugural session of the party's 11th congress at Suhrawardy Udyan in the capital. The congress will continue till October 31, and on the last day it will elect its central body for the next four years.

A total of 683 district-level representatives including females and ethnic minorities are expected to take part in the congress, alongside 26 foreign delegates from 12 countries.

The party's last congress took place in October 2012.

Incumbent President Mujahidul Islam Selim and General Secretary Sayed Abu Zafar Ahmed, who were elected in the last congress, are most likely to be re-elected because there are no powerful leaders to contest them, said party insiders.

Earlier in the inaugural session, hundreds of CPB leaders and activists gathered on the rally ground from different parts of the country including the capital, holding party flags and festoons and shouting slogans against imperialism and militancy.     

The speakers said both the Awami League and BNP were bourgeois parties and sharing power alternately.

"The Awami League has failed but BNP is a bigger failure than the Awami League,” said Selim. “We will have to forge a unity, excluding these bourgeois parties."

The CPB chief hoped that the leftists would form the government in the future.

CPB adviser Manjurul Ahsan Khan and labour leader Jashim Uddin Mondol also spoke.

The party will hold an international seminar on "Imperialism, Neo Liberalism and Religious Fundamentalism" at Jatiya Press Club today.