BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia cannot bank on her senior colleagues for making important decisions as she believes those leaders are acting as agents for the government.
Khaleda Zia strongly believes that her senior party colleagues pass party information on to the government, said party insiders.
The former premier is so sceptical about those senior leaders that she is taking advise from pro-BNP intellectuals on important issues especially when she devises any strategy.
A party leaders close to Khaleda Zia said her scepticism is so strong that she, in almost all cases, makes decisions alone especially after the two-month-long abortive violent protest across the country.
She is so perturbed that she even refused to hold any standing committee meeting, the highest policy-making body of the party, after backtracking from the movement.
A senior leader seeking anonymity told the Dhaka Tribune that Khaleda Zia did not disclose to any of her party colleagues the outcomes of her recent one-to-one meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
He also said that she alone had finalised the delegates and did not listen to anyone and disclosed it just a few hours before she set off for meeting Modi.
Another senior leader said the party had a plan to enforce a three-day shut-down when Khaleda Zia was prevented from coming out of her office but she declared the non-stop blockade programme.
“We do not know who she had talked to before announcing the programme, he told the Dhaka Tribune.
About throwing its weight behind the Hefazat rally, he said, the BNP did not make the decision in the party forum.
In last December at a standing committee meeting Goyeshwar Chandra Roy told Khaleda that there were many agents inside the party.
“There are many leaders within the party who earned huge money when we were in power. But those leaders have never been seen in the movement.”
Those leaders have had no liaison with party activists. Those leaders are basically government’s agents lurking in the party just to save their property, said Goyeshwar.
As Khaleda can not put her faith in senior leaders, she is now taking advice from pro-BNP intellectuals and important decisions are taken without any consultation with standing committee members.
A senior leader in exchange for anonymity said mistrust had not grown in a day or two.
“On December 29 when Khaleda called the March for Democracy none of the senior and even mid-ranking leaders was seen on the street. After that those who assured that they would lead the movement were even out of reach over phone. Basically they went into hiding leaving Madam alone.”
A standing committee member said many leaders from top to the grass-roots have a strong hunch that there are many government agents inside the party and a few of them always accompany Khaleda Zia.
“On January 3, there was a plan that Khaleda will take position in Nayapaltan office and that was highly confidential but that news was leaked out too leading to Khaleda’s confinement to the office..
Mistrust, doubt and suspicion have gripped the party so much so that no one believes anybody.
When a leader is arrested others think that the imprisonment is a result of a secret deal with the government and similarly when someone is freed from jail others term it a negotiation.
A few days ago Khaleda held a meeting with senior leaders but did not say anything rather told off the senior leaders for their anti-party comments.