Awami League chief and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has opened key talks with a Jatiya Oikya Front delegation led by Gano Forum chief Dr Kamal Hossain.

The dialogue kicked-off around 7pm Thursday.

At the beginning of the meeting Hasina welcomed the political leaders, according to a Ganabhaban source.

“Everyone has seen how the country developed during the 10-year rule of Awami League. It’s now time to work together,” the source quoted Hasina saying.

The 21-strong delegation of the new political coalition arrived at the PM’s official residence Ganabhaban around 6.40pm. 

The Oikya Front leaders were received by Awami League Joint General Secretary Mahbubul Alam Hanif, Publicity and Publication Secretary Hasan Mahmud, Special Assistant to PM Saifuzzaman Shekhar and Deputy Press Secretary to the PM Ashraful Alam Khokon.

The crucial talks are expected to ease political tensions between the Hasina-led administration and opposition groups. But history says that these discussions often did not yield any tangible result. 

After the brutal murder of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and most of his family in August 1975, there was a change in the political arena with Ziaur Rahman taking power.

 On Jan 22, 1976, political leaders had a meeting with the president’s special assistant, Justice Abdus Sattar.

In April 1984, the then-president HM Ershad had dialogue with leaders of the seven parties. At that time, the seven parties gave 33 point demands but the talks did not progress and the leaders of the seven parties left. 

The same month, Ershad had talks with Jamaat-e-Islami before holding a dialogue with BNP chief Khaleda Zia. But these discussions were fruitless.

Ershad’s call for talks in September 1987 was rejected by Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina.

In November the same year, Ershad proposed another discussion but did not get any response.

In 1994, a discussion was mediated by the then-Commonwealth secretary general Emeka Anyaoku between the ruling BNP and opposition Awami League but that also did not bring out any concrete result.

A proposal for talks in 1995 by Awami League was rejected by the then parliament deputy leader AQM Badruddoza Chowdhury.

When BNP demanded election under caretaker government in 2001 and the ruling AL rejected it, a crisis developed. 

To reach a compromise, former US president Jimmy Carter came to Bangladesh and had talks with both sides which again did not produce any result.

In 2006, a three-week-long discussion was held on election time government between opposition AL’s general secretary Abdul Jalil and ruling party secretary general Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan.

At that time, 29 points were presented to BNP by AL but the meetings did not end in any understanding.

Prior to the January 5, 2014 election, BNP sat with ruling AL at the end of 2013 and UN special envoy Oscar Taranco also came to Dhaka to mediate talks.

Three meetings were held but the end result was nil.