BNP on Sunday alleged that the government has formed a body that is close to the ruling Awami League in the name of a search committee.
“This committee and those who will be found out by them for the Election Commission are all the passengers of the same boat. They’re birds of a feather,” BNP Senior Joint Secretary General Ruhul Kabir Rizvi said in a media call at BNP’s Nayapaltan central office.
The BNP leader also said all the names that would be proposed by the search committee would be members of the AL family.
Rizvi alleged the intended goal of the search committee will be finding out the tested and genuine AL family members to hold another ‘stage-managed’ election as per a government blueprint.
On Saturday, a six-member search committee, led by Appellate Division Justice Obaidul Hassan, was formed to suggest the names of the Chief Election Commissioner and other election commissioners.
The other members of the committee are High Court Division Justice SM Kuddus Zaman, the Comptroller and Auditor General of Bangladesh Md Muslim Chowdhury, Chairman of the Public Service Commission Md Sohrab Hossain, former election commissioner Muhammad Sohul Hussain and noted writer Anwara Syed Haque.
The tenure of the incumbent commission, led by CEC KM Nurul Huda, will expire on February 14.
Rizvi narrated how the search committee members have links with Awami League.
“Obaidul Hassan, the current head of the search committee, was a member of the previous two search committees and he belongs to a tested Awami League family. He was also an Awami League MP candidate,” he said.
The BNP leader said Sohul Hussain, an expert in election engineering, has become a member of the search committee. “He bought the nomination form of Awami League in 2018 to be a candidate of the party for Sylhet-1 seat.”
He said another search committee member and High Court Division Justice SM Kuddus Zaman is the son of Rajbari’s late Awami League leader Hamiz Uddin Sheikh. “His brother is an important leader of the local Awami League.”
Rizvi said neither the country’s people nor the BNP has any interest in the search committee or in the Election Commission. “People believe that a fair election is not possible without a non-partisan and neutral government.”
He said a polls-time neutral government must be formed to hold the next general election in a credible manner. “Once the polls-time impartial government is formed, it will constitute a neutral Election Commission…people have turned down the Awami private committee in the name of the search committee with hatred.”
The BNP leader said the Election Commission to be nominated by the search committee will be loyal to the government. “So, a mockery with people is going on in the name of formation of the Election Commission through the search committee.”
He urged the government to quit and take steps for holding the next polls under an election-time neutral government to protect the country from a civil war.
