Bangladesh opposition warns of instability if December elections are delayed

Earlier this month, a former ministerial colleague of Yunus, student leader Nahid Islam, said elections this year would be difficult as policing and law and order have not yet been fully restored. But the opposition BNP wants a return to democracy this year, said Abdul Moyeen Khan, a member of the party’s highest decision-making body and a former minister of science and information technology.

“We will try to convince them that the best way for them is to call an election as soon as possible and go for an honourable exit,” Khan told Reuters in an interview on Saturday, referring to the interim government.

What else did Abdul Moyeen Khan say?

“December is a generally agreed-upon schedule. Beyond December would make things more complicated,” said Khan, speaking from Washington DC, where he is seeking meetings with US officials to discuss Bangladesh. “There will be strong resentment within the people of Bangladesh. That means some instability maybe… Time will decide.”

Khan is the first senior BNP figure to warn of consequences if elections are not held this year.

An unelected interim government has been running the country since August, after deadly student-led protests forced the then Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to flee to New Delhi.

Hasina’s Awami League has largely disintegrated with the prime minister and other senior leaders out of the country or on the run.

BNP’s main rivals in the next election are likely to be Islam’s newly launched student outfit, Jatiya Nagorik Party or the National Citizen Party. Student leaders have said Bangladeshis are tired of the two established parties and want change.

But Khan said internal BNP surveys show the party would win an easy majority in any election held within the next year and that acting party chief Tarique Rahman would return to Dhaka from his self-imposed exile in London when elections are announced.

Several court orders against him and his mother, former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, have been overturned in recent months, potentially allowing him to return.

Khan said the BNP had no plans yet to contest the election as part of any coalition, but once elected, it would be open to working with other parties, including the students’ Jatiya Nagorik Party.

“After the election, we’d be happy to form a government with everyone who is in favour of democracy,” he said, as per Reuters.

(With inputs from Reuters)