Former Jamaat-e-Islami leaders, including those expelled for demanding reforms, have launched a new political organisation headed by ousted leader Mojibur Rahman Monju, who sat on the party’s policymaking forum.
A former president of Jamaat’s student front Islami Chhatra Shibir, Monju made the official announcement during a media call at a Dhaka hotel on Saturday (Apr 27).
He said the intitiative ‘Jana Akankhyar Bangladesh' has is not based on religion or any ideology following a certain theory.
Monju, a former member of Jamaat's central Majlish-e-Shura, is serving as the coordinator of the initiative.
However, no body for the new organisation has been formed yet but leaders said it will be announced later.
Jamaat, which lost its registration as a political party before the 11th general election, removed Monju as a member of its Majlis-e-Shura, on Feb 15, for his calls of reforms within the party.
Jamaat, who has had leaders tried and convicted of war crimes and aiding the Pakistani occupation forces in the Liberation War, suffered a major blow when its former assistant secretary general Barrister Abdur Razzaq quit on Feb 15.
Back in January, Law Minister Anisul Huq said an initiative to amend The International Crimes Tribunal Act has been taken so that Jamaat can be brought under trial as a political party for its role in 1971.
Razzaq had attributed his decision to the party’s failure to apologize to the Bangladeshi people for its anti-independence role during the Liberation War.
Jamaat failing to adopt successful models of reform that have been implemented in other Muslim majority countries was another reason for his resignation, he had claimed.
A day after his resignation, Jamaat issued a nationwide emergency notice ordering its leaders and activists not to follow in the former assistant secretary general’s footsteps.
The notice also announced that the Jamaat would form a new party with the aim of regaining its registration with the Election Commission.
Since Feb 15, at least six Jamaat leaders have stepped down, with Monju ousted from the party for seconding the demand in a Facebook post, hours after Razzak’s resignation.
Jamaat, the controversial party which lost its registration by a High Court order on October 29, 2018, obtained 693,077 votes in 22 constituencies in the December 30 polls, the lowest since the 7th parliamentary election in 1996.
The figure accounts for just around 0.87% of the total votes cast.