Family members of the detained Teknaf municipal mayor have demanded his release upholding a High Court (HC) verdict.
At a press conference at Reporters Unity in the city yesterday, Shaheen Akhter Chowdhuray along with her four-year-old son Arman and six-year-old daughter Sumi said Teknaf municipal election was held on April 2, 2002 but her husband Abdur Rahman Bodi took oath as its mayor after one year and three months on July 23 in 2003 when the Supreme Court passed an order in this regard.
She said during the immediate-past four-party alliance government her husband could not discharge his duty properly as former BNP lawmaker Shajahan Chowdhury with the help of his cadres used to collect tolls from the hats, bazaars and other establishments under the municipality.
Besides, Shajahan had harassed her husband by implicating him in false cases, she added.
Shaheen said her husband was granted an interim bail for three months by the HC on August 20 but on the following day another extortion case was filed against him by Teknaf police at the instigation of Shajahan and showed him arrested in the jail gate.
She said 11 cases had been filed against her husband on different charges by the cadres of Shajahan since the present government took over the charge.
Shajahan, his younger brother and Secretary of District Jamaat Shajalal Chowdhury, and another younger brother and Chairman of Okhia sadar union parisad Shah Kamal Chowdhury, are involved in grabbing several shrimp enclosures, salt fields and became owners of over 12 flats and plots in Dhaka and Chittagonj during the last four-party alliance government, but they remained untouched by the ongoing anti-corruption drive, she added.
Shaheen said when the 14-party grand alliance declared her husband as its candidate from Okhia-Teknaf constituency in the stalled parliamentary election scheduled on November 22, 2007, Shajahan being relative of a high-ranking army official set his people to destroy his rival politically by implicating him in false cases.
She said the present military-backed government took over charges on January 11, 2007 and Teknaf police being influenced by Shajahan arrested her husband four days after on January 15.
Cox's Bazar District AL Secretary Salauddin and President of Teknaf Upazila AL Alam Chowdhury were present at the press conference.