BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir’s Bagura-6 constituency has been declared vacant as he failed to take oath within the 90-day deadline.
Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury informed the Parliament of the development on Tuesday (Apr 30).
According to the Constitution the MP’s elect have to take oath within 90 days from the first meeting of the Parliament after being elected.
Article 67 (1) of the Constitution says that a member of parliament shall vacate his seat if he fails to take oath within that deadline.
The Constitution, however, allows the Speaker to extend the deadline upon requests by MPs-elect but the secretariat didn’t receive any letter from Fakhrul by Apr 29.
Fakhrul is the only out of the six elected BNP leaders not going to Parliament and the party said that him not taking oath is a strategic move.
He bagged the Bogura-6 constituency during the Dec 30 national polls which the BNP contested in coalition with Jatiya Oikya Front.
After the heavy defeat to the ruling Awami League, BNP and its Oikya Front alliance said their eight MPs-elect would not join parliament in protest against vote rigging.
The two MPs-elect of its partner the Gano Forum – Sultan Mohammed Mansur Ahmed and Mokobbir Khan – have already joined parliament.
Dr Kamal Hossain-led Gano Forum has expelled Ahmed, but Khan was seen sitting next to other leaders, including its chief, onstage the party’s Special National Council.
The rest of the five BNP lawmakers have taken the oath of office with Jahidur Rahman from Thakurgaon-3 becoming the first to be sworn in.
Rahman has been stripped off his preliminary membership of the party.
Meanwhile, Harun ur Rashid of Chapainawabganj-3, Aminul Islam of Chapainawabganj-2, Ukil Abdus Sattar of Brahmanbarhia-2 and Mosharraf Hossain of Bogura-4 were sworn in on Monday (Apr 29).
They said that they took oath at the order of acting chief Tarique Rahman who has been in self exile in the United Kingdom for over a decade.