Govt creating obstacles

The government is obstructing people's participation in the March 12 BNP rally in the capital, claimed party's acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir yesterday.
He said the law enforcers were intimidating Dhaka hoteliers and bus owners to prevent people outside Dhaka from joining the rally.
“The government has started to create obstacles. Police mount pressure on city hotels not to rent out rooms. Even we are not getting buses for hire outside the capital,” he said at a discussion meeting at the Jatiya Press Club organised by Islami Oikya Jote.
He said local ruling party leaders are mounting pressure on bus owners so that the BNP cannot hire necessary numbers of buses to transport its supporters to the rally.
Alamgir said, “We will stay on the streets if hotels are unavailable. People will come to Dhaka on foot if we don't get buses. But none will be able to foil our rally.”
He said the government still has time to meet their demand for a non-partisan neutral caretaker government conducting the next national polls. “Otherwise the people will topple you,” he said.
Other BNP leaders claimed that police gave verbal orders to all residential hotels in the city not to host BNP supporters before the opposition's rally.
They claimed that police told the hoteliers that no more than three people of an area should be allowed to stay in one hotel.
They said the hotel authorities have to provide information including photographs of their guests to the police.
The manager of a hotel in Mohakhali yesterday said photographs and photocopies of voter ID are a must for getting a room in the hotel. “Intention of his of her stay has to be mentioned too,” he said while talking to The Daily Star.
He, however, refused to comment when asked if he had got any directives from law enforcers.
While addressing another discussion meeting, party standing committee member Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain said the city will be flooded by people joining the March 12 rally.
“March 12 rally would be a turning point in the country's politics. People will show no-confidence in the government…,” he added.
BNP chief Khaleda Zia on January 9 at a rally in Chittagong announced the March-12 rally programme in Dhaka.