The ruling Awami League is not anxious about the opposition’s “March for Democracy” programme as its leaders think the programme will not be able to affect the people and will fail like the blockades and hartals.
Awami League Presidium member Mohammad Nasim even thinks that the activists of Khaleda Zia’s own party will not respond to her call.
A source in the ruling party said the government would not allow the opposition to move towards Dhaka and take necessary measures to stop the march.
On Tuesday, BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia announced the programme, urging people to join the march towards the capital on December 29.
After the announcement, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina discussed the matter with a few central leaders at Ganabhaban and gave hints that necessary steps would be taken to foil BNP’s programme.
“I will do whatever is necessary,” a leader who attended the meeting quoted Hasina as saying.
Referring to the PM’s hints, a central leader who was present at the Ganabhaban meeting told the Dhaka Tribune yesterday that the BNP had previously cut off communication between Dhaka and the rest of the country through blockades, “now we will do that.”
A number of Awami League leaders said they would face the opposition’s programme politically and administratively.
They said the government was examining several options – such as not giving permission to hold the programme, banning all political programmes for the time being, calling counter programmes in the capital or imposing an undeclared blockade in Dhaka before December 29 – to foil the BNP’s march to the capital.
Criticising the programme, senior Awami League leader Suranjit Sengupta said: “It is a march for autocracy, a march for hypocrisy.”
Warning the opposition leader, Suranjit said: “You have the right to holding rallies, but you have no right to damage assets of the country.”
