The BNP will launch a movement to resist polls the very same day the Election Commission announces schedules, from an apparent realisation that the Awami League cannot be persuaded to bring back the caretaker government.
The main opposition party is calling it the “unilateral polls resistance movement” that will span the next three months and be divided into three phases.
As a prequel, the party is likely to enforce three days’ blockade or hartal from November 4 and go for non-stop hartals after November 10. The announcement about these programmes may come today.
The plan is to primarily play with two ideas: making it tough for the government to run the country; and discouraging people from casting votes to make the election controversial.
BNP leaders believe the window of negotiation will remain open until the last day for submitting nomination papers, and it will contest polls if the two parties reach consensus by that time.
Party leaders predict that around 40 days are left to reach that date and hence negotiations will have to take place before that. That is why they say the BNP will have to play their strongest card over those 40 days to make the ruling party give in to the demand for a neutral polls-time government.
A standing committee member of the party said: “If we wage non-stop action programmes like hartals and blockades, Dhaka will be isolated from the rest of the country. That will lead to rocketing of prices of essentials and the farmers losing out. Eventually, the government will find itself in an awkward position.”
Having been tired of being on the field and checking non-stop unrest, the members of the law enforcement agencies might not continue to play along with the government. The administration might also withdraw support, the BNP leader said.
He claimed that responding to party chief Khaleda Zia’s call for not cooperating with what she said was an illegal government, the administration and law enforcers had already started turning away.
Moreover, since the party is not fully confident about stopping the elections, as a backup plan, it is looking to ensure the slimmest possible turn out at the polling centres if the elections eventually take place.
“If less than 50% votes are cast, then the election will be deemed controversial in and outside the country,” said a senior leader.
Standing Committee Member Khandakar Mosharraf Hossain told the Dhaka Tribune: “People are already participating spontaneously in our all-party polls resistance committees around the country. Let the government hold the elections. The government will see what happens then.”
The Election Commission intends to hold the national polls by the second week of January.
According to the next three months’ action plan, the polls resistance movement will be divided into three phases.
The first phase will continue to press the demand for non-partisan polls-time government till the Election Commission announces poll schedules. In this phase, there would probably be breaks between agitation programmes because of the final examinations in educational institutions. The efforts for a dialogue would also go on simultaneously.
The second phase will start with the announcement of poll schedules and end with the completion of nomination submission. The party would continue to hold talks with the government in this phases as well. The transition to a polls resistance movement will occur at this phase if there is no dialogue.
The third phase will begin as the candidates start electioneering and end on election day. During this period, BNP will wage non-stop programmes, much like what the Awami League staged against BNP in 1996. During this period, the all-party election resistance committees will work all over the country to resist unilateral polls.
Senior BNP leaders have hinted at a fourth phase that would start if the unilateral polls eventually happen. However, the party is still not clear about what will be the action plan for that phase.
Why government is illegal
The main opposition party believes that the incumbent government has become illegal on October 27. It also believes that continuing parliament sessions after that date is also illegal and therefore all the laws passed since are devoid of legality and will result in a constitutional crisis.
On Thursday night, senior party leaders and pro-opposition lawyers held an hour-long meeting with BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia at her Gulshan office to discuss the ins and outs of the constitution.
Reportedly, they agreed to brief the media soon to clarify why the party believed that the government was illegal.
In the meeting, pro-BNP lawyers said as per the constitution, the election time government would have become active on October 27 and so parliament session could not continue after that date.
“As per the constitution, no partisan government can hold office when election time starts. Although the prime minster has said the parliament would be dissolved on October 24, that had never happened,” MK Anwar told the Dhaka Tribune.
A senior pro-BNP lawyer said the EC should have started getting prepared for elections; but instead, it had been busy keeping the government happy.
