The High Court yesterday questioned the legality of the Election Commission's rejection of an application for cancelling the candidacy of 25 Jamaat-e-Islami leaders.
The court issued a rule asking the EC, government and the Jamaat leaders to explain in four weeks why the EC's decision should not be declared illegal.
The HC bench of Justice ABM Hassan and Justice Md Khairul Alam came up with the rule following a petition filed by Bangladesh Tariqat Federation and Amra Muktijoddhar Santan challenging the EC order issued on December 23.
The bench, however, refused to direct the EC to treat the Jamaat leaders as disqualified for the December 30 election as prayed by the petitioners.
The HC order means there is no legal bar for the Jamaat leaders to take part in the election, Deputy Attorney General Motaher Hossain Sazu told The Daily Star.
Of the Jamaat men, 21 are in the race as BNP nominees and four are independents.
During yesterday's hearing, lawyer Tania Amir told the court that the HC in a verdict in 2013 had declared Jamaat's registration with the EC illegal.
The HC verdict is still in force and the 25 leaders have not resigned from the party. Therefore, they cannot be allowed to contest the election, she said.
Jamaat's appeal challenging the HC verdict is pending with the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court, but the Jamaat leaders taking part in the election have not informed the EC about it, which is an obvious fraudulence, she argued.
Ruhul Quddus Kazal, lawyer for two of the Jamaat leaders, said the candidates were not running as Jamaat men. Therefore, there is no legal bar for them to contest.
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Should the trial of a case last for 24 years? What does it say about a judicial system if a case for alleged possession of drugs runs for a quarter of a century, without any hope in sight of its completion? In a country where the rule of law is respected in letter and spirit, this is incomprehensible.
Ahad Ali has been caught in the tangle of our intricate legal process since 1998 on charges of drug possession. This case encapsulates everything that is wrong with our legal system. Firstly, the circumstance of his arrest is dubious. A packet containing heroin was found nearby where he was sitting while waiting in Gabtoli for a bus home in 1998. He was not found in possession of it. Does proximity to a banned substance merit arrest? If so, was he the only one in that area? From his statement, it appears that he may have been framed, the intention of the police being to extort money from him. He failed to pay up the Tk 5000 they had demanded, and that has cost him 25 years of his precious life.
Secondly, should it take a quarter of a century to dispose of the case? We must ask: Why hasn't a single witness been produced after all these years? The case is so old that the current OC of Mirpur Thana knows nothing about it, and for all that he knows, and we can guess, the policemen involved in the arrest may well have retired or be dead by now. And what can be more pitiful than to find that the main witness, the sole one produced after 24 years, knows nothing about the case? So is the case with witness number two.
Admittedly, the case is serious, since possessing heroin over 25 grams is a penal offence which carries the maximum sentence of death. But we wonder why the court has not considered the repeated dismissal petition of the defendant. Is it the fault of the accused if the state fails to prepare the case and conduct it properly in court? We agree that trial judges go by the evidence produced. But if no witness is produced to corroborate the charges even after 24 years, should the ruling of the court not go in favour of the accused, since everyone is innocent unless proven guilty?
We believe this is a case the High Court should take cognizance of. The logic and even the legal position of giving fresh dates every time after a hearing, when no witness has been forthcoming for so long, has to be explained. Such miscarriage of justice should be righted, and be never repeated.
"Although there will be a slight delay as per his (Yunus's) timeline, if this time is used for carrying out meaningful reforms, we will remain patient," Golam told The Daily Star in an immediate reaction.
He emphasised the importance of conducting elections that are "free, fair, transparent, and inclusive," adding, "Holding elections a month or two earlier or later is not as significant as ensuring these principles."
Golam also reiterated Jamaat's willingness to cooperate with the interim government.
"Despite our initial reluctance regarding the delay, we will remain patient as long as the chief adviser honours his commitment to hold the elections. In that case, we are ready to cooperate with him," he added.
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The BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami now seem to be poles apart over when the local and parliamentary elections should be held and the proportional representation system in the House.
The fact that their relationship is strained became clear as day last week when the parties took opposing stances on the timing of the polls and on proportional representation.
Yesterday, both parties made statements that hint at new political dynamics ahead of the 13th national polls.
File photo of Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir
"We are against proportional representation. We will not support proportional representation in any way because people of the country are not accustomed to it."
— BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir
After a Jamaat delegation called on Chief Election Commissioner AMM Nasir Uddin at the Nirbachon Bhaban yesterday morning, its Secretary General Mia Golam Parwar told reporters that the party demanded that the national election be held after completing reforms to the state institutions relevant to the electoral process.
He claimed the people want local government polls before the national election and that his party is with the people. He said they also demanded proportional representation in the House.
An hour later, asked about the Jamaat's stance, BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said, "We are against proportional representation. We will not support proportional representation in any way because people are not accustomed to it."
Proportional representation is an electoral system in which the distribution of seats corresponds with the proportion of the total votes cast for each party. For example, if a party gets 40 percent of the total votes, the system will allow it to get 40 percent of the seats in parliament.
In Bangladesh, the first-past-the-post (FPTP) system is practised, in which the candidate receiving the highest number of votes in a constituency wins a seat in parliament.
The Electoral Reform Commission has proposed having an upper and a lower house. It recommended a proportional representation system for the upper house.
It also cited a strong disagreement among political parties regarding the proportional representation system.
Fakhrul yesterday said that holding local polls before the national election would push the country further into instability.
"The sooner the [national] election is held, the easier politics will become. The people will return to a stable situation," he said at a press briefing at the BNP chairperson's Gulshan office.
He said the election is crucial for two reasons. "Firstly, for restoring stability, and secondly, for improving governance in the country, which is currently facing significant challenges."
Fakhrul also expressed concerns over the state of education at universities and colleges, saying, "It is very difficult to address these issues without an elected government."
Yesterday, Chief Adviser Prof Muhammad Yunus, now in Dubai, said the national election could be held in December this year.
Late last year, he had hinted the polls could be in late 2025 or mid 2026, after which the crack in BNP-Jamaat relationship started becoming more visible.
The BNP and its allies had been saying they want the national election with minimal reforms done so that the elected government can carry out all other reforms. They have also been pushing for the polls to be held in the middle of this year.
The Jamaat has been demanding polls after necessary reforms and without any hurry.
When Yunus on January 8 said they were simultaneously preparing for national and local body elections, it pushed the parties even further apart.
After a BNP delegation met Yunus on Monday, Fakhrul told the press that the government assured the party of working to hold the national election by December this year. "We're making it clear, as we did in the past, there will be no election before the national polls."
Jamaat Ameer Shafiqur Rahman at a rally in Sylhet that day said, "Fundamental reforms are necessary before the election. Without implementing some basic reforms, a fair election will not be possible. If an election is held under the current circumstances, it will be an election genocide. We do not want that. We want elections to be held only after a conducive environment is established."
Yesterday, the Jamaat delegation met the EC even though it is no longer a registered political party. Not being registered with the EC renders the Jamaat unable to run in elections.
Parwar said their appeal to get their registration restored was pending with a court. He hoped they would get justice.
The four-party alliance, including the BNP and Jamaat, was formed in 1999 to strengthen the movement against the then Awami League-led government.
In the 2001 election, the BNP-led alliance won a landslide, and two top Jamaat leaders were made cabinet members.
But the alliance fared poorly in the 2008 election.
In 2012, it became a 20-party combine as several other parties joined in.
The next year, the HC declared Jamaat's registration with the EC illegal on grounds that some provisions of the Jamaat charter went against the country's constitution and election laws.
In the face of widespread criticism for its ties with the Jamaat, which opposed the Liberation War and had sided with Pakistan, the BNP had been keeping a distance from the Islamist party for the past few years.
The 20-party alliance dissolved in December 2022 after the BNP asked its allies not to use the name of the alliance.
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When the Democratic Party came into power in early 2021 after the last US elections, feminists and human rights activists all around the world followed the countdown till the very last minutes, anticipating what changes could occur next. Not surprisingly, very early on in his role as President, Biden rescinded the "Global Gag Rule" – a devastating anti-abortion policy that undermined the health and rights of women around the world. The rule had denied funding for foreign organisations and NGOS/INGOs providing abortion information or services. It also meant that development organisations using funding from USAID would no longer be able to carry out abortion-related work, even with funding from other donors, if they wanted to continue receiving funding from the US. The withdrawal of the Global Gag Rule was a light of hope for civil society organisations around the world.
In 2021 alone, the United States provided over USD 96 million to support the Covid response in Bangladesh. While the US has helped fund "public health" in Bangladesh for the last five decades, abortion rights have not fallen under this. And now the overturning of Roe v Wade has taken us backwards, not just in the US but around the world, and curtailed the progress that had been made on women's rights and abortion access globally.
You might think the overturning of Roe v Wade has not made much difference in the context of Bangladesh, but a deep dive into the matter tells us differently. At a recent round-table, Marcia Soumokil, the Indonesia country director at Ipas, an international NGO that works to increase access to safe abortions and contraception, said, "The overturning of Roe v Wade could affect broader legislation across the world as well. When access to abortion is severely restricted in the US, it will send signals to the rest of the world governments, in Indonesia and other countries, that abortion rights are not part of human rights."
"Conservative factions in society and government will interpret this change as a declaration that government does not oblige to protect abortion rights," she added. And so, in the current situation, not only will funding opportunities for abortion rights from the US become a diminishing possibility, stigma and barriers to safe abortion access will also be aggravated worldwide.
Under Bangladesh's penal code of 1860, induced abortion is illegal except to save a woman' life. Menstrual regulation (MR), however, has been part of Bangladesh's national family planning program since 1979. Despite the availability of MR services, many women resort to underground (and unsafe) abortions because of stigma and lack of availability of information/resources. According to the Center for Health and Population Research at ICDDR,B, the incidence of abortion was 35 times higher for unmarried women in Bangladesh than for married adolescents. Additionally, there is a huge data gap, especially with regard to younger women getting abortions, so how big a problem access to safe abortion is remains largely underrepresented.
In 2020, a high court ruling asked why the abortion related sections in the Penal Code of Bangladesh should not be declared void as it is contradictory with the fundamental rights guaranteed in Bangladesh's Constitution. At present, if rape victims become pregnant, they are unable to abort the unwanted foetus, and since 2020, things have not moved in this regard.
Although we tend to focus on the positives, like our achievements in bringing down fertility rates and maternal mortality, the fact remains that due to a number of circumstances, women will get abortions. And unsafe routes to abortion results in several complex problems, including endangering the life of both the woman and the child, suicide, and negative impacts on mental health.
Needless to say, marginalised groups such as young women, rural women, women with disabilities and queer people are doubly and triply affected by such issues. To say that Roe v Wade does not affect us is simply untrue. Asking "if we have the option of MR, why do we need abortion rights?" may help us escape from reality for a while, but it will not help strengthen the fight for reproductive health and justice in the long run. We must fight head on – socially, legally and individually to get past the stigma and oppression that limit women's bodily autonomy, agency and rights, and we must hold decision-makers accountable. As feminists and activists, we should bring back the movement of "My body, my rights," and use data-driven advocacy to do so.
Syeda Samara Mortadais a feminist activist, working as a Coordinator in Bonhishkha, an organisation working to remove gender-based stereotypes.
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A Dhaka court today allowed the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) to interrogate four members of North South University's (NSU) board of trustees at the jail gate for a day, in a Tk 304 crore money laundering case.
The accused are: MA Kashem, Benajir Ahmed, Rehana Rahman and Mohammed Shajahan.
Judge KM Emrul Kayesh of Dhaka Metropolitan Senior Special Judge's Court passed the order after ACC Deputy Director Farid Ahmed Patwary, also the investigation officer of the case, produced them before it with a forwarding report.
In the forwarding report, the IO said that all four, including the NSU Board of Trustees Chairperson Azim Uddin Ahmed, were directly involved with the money laundering. So, they should be interrogated at the jail gate for collecting more information.
Defence lawyers submitted four separate petitions for providing them with first class division in jail on grounds that they were holding high-profile social status in their respective position.
Upon hearing both the sides, the judge sent them to jail and allowed the ACC to interrogate them at the jail gate for one day.
The judge also directed the jail authorities to provide them with first class division in jail as per Jail Code.
Yesterday, the four were arrested after the High Court rejected their anticipatory bail petitions in the case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) on May 5.
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