JSS Larma faction backs the ‘Boat’

MN Larma-led Jana Samhati Samiti (JSS), one of the ethnic group-based political parties in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, has endorsed the ruling Awami League for the upcoming general elections.

Speaking at a meeting of the local administration leaders or headman karbaris at the Marma Unnayan Sangshad auditorium in Khagrachhari town on Sunday, JSS MN Larma leaders said their party will work towards the victory of Awami League in the election.

The leaders said although the CHT Peace Accord had not been completely realized even after two decades of its signing, their party hopes that the current government will be sincere about its progress in the future.

JSS MN Larma is a breakaway faction of Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti (PCJSS), the largest ethnic party in the hills, whose military arm Shanti Bahini fought a bitter civil war against the Bangladeshi government for 25 years, until signing a peace accord with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government in 1997.

“We are frustrated by the failings in implementing the peace accord,” JSS MN Larma’s Youth Affairs Secretary Pritimoy Chakma said at the event.

“As such, the founding president of PCJSS, Santu Larma, often calls for a return to armed resistance in the hills. But that is no longer possible,” he said.

“We are now hopeful that the government will fully implement the peace accord. So we did not float a candidate and are working for the Awami League candidate in Khagrachhari,” he added.

Student Affairs Secretary Shudarshan Chakma called on the people of the hill tracts to boycott United Peoples Democratic Front politically and socially

“They are responsible for the fratricide in the hills,” he said.

Other senior leaders of the party were present at the event.