Amid deteriorating flood situation forcing hundreds of thousands to flee their homes, the government has initiated no measures for the victims, says the BNP.
“The Awami League is isolated from the people as it stole their rights to vote to assume power. And that’s exactly why they are not seen standing by the disaster-hit people,” its Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said on Saturday (Jul 20).
Rain-swollen rivers broke through at least four embankments, submerging dozens of villages and doubling the number of people fleeing their homes overnight to 400,000 in one of the worst floods in recent years, officials said on Friday.
Heavy rains and overflowing rivers have swamped 23 districts in northern and northwestern Bangladesh.
Addressing a rally in the port city of Chattogram to press their demand of party chief Khaleda Zia’s release, Mirza Fakhrul came down hard on the government for “destroying the constitutional bodies”.
“If you have read the newspapers, then you know that the chief election commissioner has been included in the Hajj delegation ... Look what have they done to a constitutional posts! He [the CEC] is off to supervise the Hajj leaving the elections!” said the senior BNP leader.
The law and order situation in the country has hit a new low, he claimed before adding: “It’s simply anarchy. Murder inside courtrooms, people hacked to death in broad daylight. And it’s all because of lack of accountability.”
The Awami League brags of development, but in reality Bangladesh is set to fall in a debt trap, according to Mirza Fakhrul.
“The banks have been looted ... The stock markets destroyed. Prices of gas and every single commodity have gone up,” he said.
Blaming the Awami League of marring the administration, police and judiciary with partisan elements, the BNP secretary general said, “Even they have intruded into the journalist community in an effort to control the media.
Reiterating the demand for fresh polls, Mirza Fakhrul demanded the dissolution of the existing election commission.