Their rallies are picnics

GBNEWS24DESK//

Awami League General Secretary Obaidul Quader yesterday said it would be a blunder for the BNP if seven of its lawmakers resigned from parliament.

“There is no reason to think that parliament will be paralysed if the seven go. The BNP will have to regret [making] this blunder.”

He came up with the remark while addressing an AL rally at the Radio Colony Model School and College ground in Savar yesterday afternoon, hours after the BNP lawmakers made the announcement of the resignations at their party rally in Dhaka’s Golapbagh.

“The BNP has turned their rally into picnic. They have also done this in rallies in other districts. Where does the money come from? We know the businessmen and industrialists who give them money and how much. They are financing the BNP to arrange such picnics,” said Quader, also the road transport and bridges minister.

He claimed that the BNP appointed a British lawyer to lobby in the US and the UK for sanctions on Rab and police. The party’s acting chairman Tarique Rahman is spreading propaganda against Bangladesh by appointing lobbyists abroad.

“We have got news this [Saturday] morning that the United States has imposed treasury sanctions on 40 individuals and entities across nine countries. But Bangladesh is not on the list,” said Quader.

“It’s good news for Bangladesh, but bad news for the conspirators.”

AL presidium member Jahangir Kabir Nanak said the BNP lawmakers were resigning as they felt ashamed for failing to hatch a plot centring their rally yesterday.

AL Joint General Secretary Mahbubul Alam Hanif said, “You [BNP lawmakers] have the democratic right to resign. But the resignations must be submitted before parliament Speaker, not at any field.”

He also urged the BNP men to give up on their movements and return home.

Dhaka district AL organised the rally protesting “the propaganda and conspiracy by BNP-Jamaat”. Savar upazila AL president Hasina Daula presided over the rally, where Muhammad Abdur Razzaque, AL presidium member and agriculture minister, and several other senior leaders also spoke.