The ruling Awami League has finally decided to end parliament session on November 20, presumably because the Election Commission will announce the schedules of the parliamentary polls after that.
According to parliamentary practices, the president would prorogue the last session, but not dissolve the House, chief whip Abdus Shahid told the Dhaka Tribune on Saturday.
Unless there was a national crisis such as war or disaster, the House would not meet between November 21 and January 24 next year, he said.
On November 20, Leader of the House and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will deliver her closing speech, which she had earlier decided to give on October 24.
On September 12, the highest committee of the Jatiya Sangsad decided to end the ongoing 19th session on October 24, with Sheikh Hasina disclosing her plan to form an interim government comprising “elected” representatives for overseeing the polls, which must take place by January 24.
“The honourable prime minister and leader of the house has decided to run the session up to November 20. I think the prime minister in her November 20 speech will present an account of our government’s development works in the last five years,” Shahid told the Dhaka Tribune.
Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury on November 10 adjourned the ongoing session of parliament until November 18. According to the constitution, the next parliamentary polls must take place within 90 days before the completion of the five-year tenure of parliament.
The first sitting was held on January 25, setting January 24, 2014 as the date for completion of tenure of the House. Speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury on September 12 ruled in parliament that the “elections must take place between October 25 and January 24.”
Main opposition BNP claimed that the current parliament must be dissolved on October 24 – 90 days ahead of the mandated tenure of the parliament and the government.
The opposition urged its leaders and activists to pour on to the street with “traditional weapons” on October 25 to force the Awami League accept the demand for restoration of “non-party caretaker” government system in the constitution for holding the next polls.
The government shifted from its stance on ending the current parliament.
The Awami League strategists said dissolving the 9th parliament after October 24 would mean “government exit” that would create political havoc.
The prime minister changed her mind saying the House would continue beyond October 24, but no “usual sitting” would be there after the announcement of the polls schedules.
The country’s constitution has no mention whether the legislature should be dissolved before or during the 90-day countdown to polls.
The BNP and its allies say the government must restore the provision for a non-party caretaker government that arranged the last three general elections starting in 1996.
The Awami League on June 30, 2011 annulled the constitutional provision of the non-party caretaker government that used to take office after the completion of a five-year parliament.
The unelected administration, which both the parties blame for rigging in the last three polls, would hold the elections in 90 days, without taking any policy decision.
But the last caretaker government stayed in office for about two years - January 11, 2007 to January 6, 2009.
Both BNP and Awami League alleged that the last caretaker government was out to purge the politicians in the name of launching anti-corruption drives.
Sheikh Hasina said she would form an all-party interim government with the elected representatives to assist the Election Commission to hold the next polls.
But the BNP apprehends a “blue print” of the government to “rig” the polls.