Saifur Rahman and M Ilyas Ali

With Saifur Rahman back to the BNP mainstream following a meeting with Khaleda Zia, pro-Saifur leaders in Sylhet got a wake up message after a long period of inaction when pro-Delwar party men kept the field captured here for months.
With this, the long standing rivalry between the two BNP factions in Sylhet will now widen, party insiders said.
One faction is led by party stalwart Saifur Rahman and the other by former lawmaker M Ilyas Ali.
Pro-Saifur party leaders in a press statement issued here Friday night warned their rivals not to 'spread confusion by using the identity of city BNP acting chief in the name of advocate Noman Mahmud'.
The statement signed by city BNP general secretary Nasim Hossain said, as per party constitution, senior vice-president is to chair meetings in absence of the president.
It said, at an emergency meeting of city BNP on August 13, senior ice-president Mahmaud Hossain Manju was made acting president of the committee.
Central acting general secretary Khondker Delwar Hossain was also informed of the decision, it said.
On the other hand the rival faction known to be loyal to former lawmaker and district BNP convener M Ilyas Ali had made advocate Noman Mahmud acting president of the party's city unit weeks ago. The two factions organised several programmes separately in recent days.
The difference between the factions widened after five pro-saifur leaders known as reformists were abused by men of the rival faction at a joint meeting of Sylhet district and city BNP on Tuesday last.
Held at the house of city BNP leader Abdul Quaiyum Jalali, the meeting was chaired by convening committee member Abdul Gaffar.
When asked later, Jalali admitted assault of the reformist leaders but declined to go detail. “Things have been minimized”, he said.
The pro-Ilyas faction yesterday organised a Doa and Iftar Mahfil at the release of party chief Khaleda Zia.
Mentionably, the district convening committee is dominated by Ilyas-led leaders while the city committee is dominated by the other faction for long.
The district committee was reconstituted months ago but the city committee continues as it was.
“There may be a fresh city committee any time”, a senior party leader said yesterday seeking anonymity.
“Strong lobbying by certain leaders is on to be in the new committee”, he said.
“Saifur's return to the mainstream and Khondker Delwar's strong position in the party will intensify the in-fighting on Sylhet”, he said.
The post of Sylhet city BNP is vacant since Ariful Haque Chowdhury was detained in a graft case months ago.