Hasina asks party not to contest polls without her
Says she will not retire from politics
Courtesy New Age 28/4/08
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The detained Awami League president Sheikh Hasina on Sunday said neither her party would participate in any polls without her nor she would retire from politics under any pressure.
Hasina, also a former prime minister, said this as she talked with her lawyers and relations in a makeshift courtroom on the Jatiya Sangsad complex after appearing in the special judge’s court for hearing in the framing of charges in the MiG-29 corruption case.
‘I have been asked to quit politics; but I will not retire from politics under any pressure,’ she said.
‘The people will decide whether I will be in politics,’ said Hasina, adding that it would not be wise for her to quit politics as the people were being repressed.
Her counsel Quamrul Islam, also the acting general secretary of the city Awami League, told reporters after the talks that the party chief had advised the party leaders not to participate in any national elections without her.
Quamrul Islam, Sahara Khatun and Abdul Mannan briefed reporters after coming out of the court and they had one-to-one consultations with Hasina during the talks, for 20 minutes as allowed by the court.
‘We asked our leader about the party’s stand if she was barred from taking part in elections and she said the Awami League would not participate in any national elections without her,’ Quamrul said.
Referring to the military-controlled government, the former prime minister said, ‘They do not mean trial in any case, but want to convict me at any cost to bar me from taking part in the elections.’
Hasina said that she had challenged the Anti-Corruption Commission’s notification asking her wealth statement and the High Court declared it illegal saying that the law was faulty. The commission amended the law after the High Court verdict which the chief justice struck down.
‘If the law was not faulty, then why was it amended? If this is the independence of the judiciary, how can we expect justice?’
When the lawyers called her attention to the remarks of the Gana Forum president, Kamal Hossain, where he had said the people who were calling for movement to free the detained offenders should to be tried as their associates, Hasina said, ‘How can he [Kamal] speak against corruption after whitening Tk 102 crore?’
‘What are the sources of the money?’ Hasina said.
‘I ensured rice for people for Tk 10 a kilogram and oil for Tk 40 a litre and now they are selling for Tk 40 and Tk 120… It proves who are the corrupt,’ she said.
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