National Citizen Party (NCP) convenor and opposition chief whip Nahid Islam alleged that the opportunity to bring back the ideology and politics of Awami League is being kept in the name of preserving the continuity of the 1972 constitution.
He said this in the last session of the National Convention on ‘Fuel, Economy, Human Rights, Reforms and Referendum’ held at Mukti Jodha Hall of Diploma Engineers Institute in Kakrail, capital, on Sunday. The convention was organized by NCP’s Reform Implementation Committee.
Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami Secretary General Mia Golam Parwar, Bangladesh Khilafat Majlis Amir Maulana Mamunul Haque, AB Party Chairman Mojibur Rahman Manju and others discussed as panelists in the event. The session will be moderated by NCP Senior Joint Convener Ariful Islam Adeeb.
Commenting on the failure of the first session of Parliament, Nahid said, ‘In the first session, there was supposed to be a discussion on how to implement various reform proposals. But instead of doing that, the government ran the Parliament like itself. If we do this, the movement with the people will be our only way.’
Nahid said, ‘We have to fight for the implementation of democratic aspirations for 54 years. Democracy was supposed to be established after the liberation war. But Sheikh Mujibur Rahman composed his grave and established Bakshal. BNP talks about multi-party democracy. But after the election I saw them campaigning with the people.’
Nahid Islam said, ‘We have said that an upper chamber will be needed. Because when any government comes to power in Bangladesh, it amends the constitution in its own way. So a balance is needed. There should be a referendum in case of constitutional amendment. We have said that the constitutional institutions should not be party-led, the appointment should not be in the sole hands of the Prime Minister. A caretaker government should be established with the consent of all parties, the judiciary should be separated. It is not that a democratic state will be established with these. But we want to proceed step by step.’
Nahid said, ‘We talked about constitutional reforms. It will not be sustainable through revision. If BNP wants to change the basic principles of the constitution, it will not be sustainable, it can be repealed at any time. I said in the parliament, Ziaur Rahman made this historical mistake, as a result of which the door is being kept open to bring back the ideology and politics of Awami League in the name of continuation of the constitution of 72.
Nahid also said, ‘note of descent has been mentioned many times. In any decision of the Note of Dissent, you will see that many decisions have been made in the Parliament, there is a lot of opposition here, many people say that they do not agree with this decision, those Notes of Dissent are written and recorded. But the decision was passed. A note of descent was given to remain as a historical document. It will not influence the decision. But on the day the July Charter was signed, notes were written separately on all of them. Which means that the party that comes in, that party will reform themselves like them. Then the July Charter no longer has reality, no relevance. From that place the July order was given, the referendum was given.’
Nahid also said, ‘July declaration has been promised to be added to the constitution. We still hear about it. Struggling to build a democratic state, people have to take to the streets again and again. We don’t want that.’
