Sohel's authority may get curtailed
Amid growing discontent from Dhaka city BNP's new convener Mirza Abbas, party Chairperson Khaleda Zia on Sunday night agreed in principle to redistribute the duties of Habib-un-Nabi Sohel, the member secretary of the crucial chapter.
If it is finally implemented, Sohel will have no authority to sign any document of the party's city related activities including formation of the full-fledged committees in Dhaka city, party insiders said.
“He [Sohel] will not have any signing authority as the member secretary of BNP Dhaka city. Instead, he will remain involved in the office-related activities,” a city BNP leader who was present at the meeting with Khaleda at her Gulshan office, told The Daily Star yesterday.
Asked, Sohel denied any such re-distribution of his responsibilities.
Since announcement of the Dhaka city convening committee on July 18, Mirza Abbas and a number of other BNP leaders have been opposing Sohel's inclusion as member secretary and demanded that the former Jatiyatabadi Chhtra Dal chief be removed from the post.
Apart from Abbas, several other leaders, including the first member of the convening committee, Goyeshwar Chandra Roy, first joint convener Abdul Awal Mintoo and joint-conveners Kazi Abul Bashar and MA Quaium strongly opposed Sohel.
In the last three days, they held a series of meetings with the BNP chief and expressed their discontent for making Sohel the member secretary. They argued that Sohel was too young for the post.
Apart from other reasons, Abbas and others also argued that senior leaders who were included in the convening committee would feel uneasy to work under Sohel.
In spite of Khaleda's argument that Sohel is an educated and qualified person for the post, Abbas and others remain rigid to their stance.
Against this backdrop, Mintoo and Goyeshwar proposed that Khaleda lessen the importance of Sohel's post and not give him any signing authority, regarding formation of the complete committee of the Dhaka city BNP.
Khaleda agreed in principle to this end. She will sit formally with the convening committee tonight at her Gulshan office to settle the issue, party sources said.
Khaleda approved the 56-member convening committee of BNP Dhaka city as part of the plan to strengthen and prepare the organisation to wage a tougher anti-government movement in the capital. But the new committee could not start its activities due to serious rift between Abbas and Sohel causing disappointment of party high-ups.
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