Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh Naib-e-Ameer and Rangpur-2 (Badarganj-Taraganj) lawmaker ATM Azharul Islam said corruption, irregularities and arbitrary rule are devouring the country.
He made the remarks Monday afternoon while speaking with reporters after distributing tree saplings to people with disabilities at Badarganj Upazila Health Complex in Rangpur.
He said mismanagement, irregularities and an inability to break free from corruption are holding this beautiful country of Bangladesh back, because leaders make promises and don’t keep them, and no one is thinking about the country’s people. He said lawlessness keeps growing because of a lack of coordination and because people’s interests are ignored in favor of self-interest.
On the 11-party alliance’s long march, ATM Azhar said the alliance marched from Dhaka to Chattogram on Sept. 5. The demands the 11-party alliance has taken to the streets over, he said, are the people’s demands, not any personal demand of the alliance. He said people are suffering in the heat because of power outages, that erratic and abnormally rising fuel prices have people gasping, that industries and factories are shutting down because gas cannot be supplied on time, and that farmers are desperate because fertilizer cannot be supplied and remains unavailable even at higher prices.
He said this mismanagement, arbitrary rule and corruption have become clear to everyone.
He said two votes were cast in the election held in the spirit of the July uprising. But despite repeated promises, the government is showing no interest in implementing the July charter. It talks one way in parliament but does the opposite in practice. Three sessions of parliament have already passed. Even after the 11-party alliance walked out of parliament over its demands not being met, the government passed several bills of its own choosing. Ordinary people, having understood this government’s tactics and conduct, have forced the opposition to take to the streets.
ATM Azhar said the 11-party alliance received an overwhelming public response during the long march. Hundreds of thousands of people took part alongside the 11-party alliance on the roads and in open grounds, declaring their full support for its demands and pledging to stand by the movement. That, he said, is why they took to the streets alongside ordinary people.
He said that before taking to the streets, however, his party’s Ameer and 11-party alliance leader Dr. Shafiqur Rahman had written to the Speaker seeking a resolution through discussion in parliament. The letter proposed, if necessary, convening an emergency parliamentary session to resolve the demands through discussion between both sides. But the government did not respond to that call and did not listen to them. That, he said, is why they took to the streets to press for the implementation of the people’s demands.
He said two votes were cast in the national election on Feb. 12 — one was the ballot vote determining who would come to power, and the other was a vote in support of the July uprising. Seventy percent of people voted in favor of July in the referendum. But after coming to power, the government has forgotten that verdict, even though it had earlier signed on to implement every word of July at the Consensus Commission.
On the constitution, ATM Azhar said the constitution is created by the will of the people, so the people come before the constitution. Addressing the government, he asked: if you talk about the constitution, was the election held on Feb. 12 itself constitutional? He said invoking the constitution to dismiss the referendum and the demands of July, and to mock the July fighters and ordinary people this way, is something the people will never accept.
He said the 11-party alliance has begun its long march, and that they will hold a Dhaka-to-Rangpur long march on the 19th. If the government still does not accept the people’s demands after that, he said, a movement to topple the government will begin with long marches through every divisional city followed by a rally in Dhaka.
Earlier in the morning, as chief guest, he released fish fry into a pond at the Badarganj upazila grounds and distributed fish fry to local fish farmers. Also present were former lawmaker and acting district BNP general secretary Parimal Chakraborty, upazila executive officer Anjuman Sultana, upazila Jamaat Ameer Kamruzzaman, Naib-e-Ameer Rustam Ali, upazila health officer Dr. Arefin, district fisheries officer Rashidul Islam, veterinary surgeon Dr. Abu Musa, and administration officials and leaders of various political parties.