Ershad slams Khaleda for accusing him

Jatiya Party Chairman HM Ershad yesterday criticised BNP chief Khaleda Zia for accusing him of killing former president Ziaur Rahman, saying she made the comments out of frustration.
"I've become surprised after hearing her comments over Zia's killing," he said, adding that she made such comments all of a sudden because her party had observed that their "future is dark".
The BNP has no political programmes, it is not in parliament, not in movement, and it has no strength to stage agitation, the former military ruler said in an interview with Samoy Television.
Ershad said he did not want to blame Khaleda, wife of Ziaur Rahman, for this remarks, as he believed "frustration over her party has led her to make this kind of comment".
While speaking at a programme in the capital on May 4, Khaleda called Ershad the “killer” of her husband Zia and Maj Gen MA Manzur, who were assassinated in Chittagong two days apart in 1981.
This was for the first time in many years that Khaleda accused Ershad of killing her husband, said BNP leaders.
 “Ershad has to be tried. Why the verdict [in the Manzur murder case with Ershad being one of the main accused] was postponed?” said Khaleda, adding that the deferment aimed at keeping Ershad with the government.
In his yesterday's interview, Ershad alleged that after 1990, he could not carry out his political activities freely due to the Manzur murder case. The case was filed about 14 years and nine months after the incident only to harass him politically, he said. They have succeeded in this, the JP chief said, adding that the case had been running for 19 years, and 22 to 23 judges had been changed so that it could not be finished.
Ershad alleged that the incumbent and former governments did this so that he could not make himself free from the case.