DHAKA: Bangladesh’s two top political parties said yesterday they still doubt the military-backed interim government’s democratic intentions, even though it has set a date for parliamentary elections.
Fakhruddin Ahmed, chief of the interim authority, announced on Saturday night that the parliamentary polls would be held on Dec. 18, within the timeline he had promised after taking charge in January 2007. He said the election would be free, fair and credible, and he would ease or end nearly two years of emergency rules close to the polls to allow free campaigning.
But ex-Prime Minister Hasina Wajed’s Awami League and fellow ex-Premier Begum Khaleda Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) both expressed disappointment the emergency was not lifted immediately, which they say is crucial to set the stage for a fair election.
However, the acting chief of Hasina’s Awami League, Zillur Rahman, welcomed the announcement of the date but criticized the government for not ending the emergency rules immediately.
“It (election date) sounds fine, but I suspect a magical trick on the part of the government, as he (Fakhruddin) did not say anything clearly about lifting the emergency,” Rahman said.
“After the announcement of firm dates for the polls there is no confusion and doubt about the intention of the caretaker regime,” said senior Awami League official Syed Ashraful Islam.
Fakhruddin, in a televised speech before leaving for New York to attend the UN General Assembly meeting, said he had now taken the country toward restoration of democracy, and warned against attempts to thwart his plans.
The mood was upbeat at the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), the country’s prime bourse, after the news. “This is a good sign and we hope that the clouds of uncertainty will now clear gradually, allowing a better business climate,” one Dhaka trader said yesterday, a working day in Muslim-majority Bangladesh.
Even as the major parties hit the government over the election plans, smaller parties have criticized it for what they see as a retreat from its promise to go after top politicians over alleged corruption and abuse of power in the years before the interim authority took over. But political analysts and diplomats say an election without the BNP and Awami League, the country’s biggest parties, would not be credible.
