New political party set for July launch

A new nationalist political party styled Bangladesh Democratic Party is set to break into the political landscape in July amid widespread speculations that the military-backed government is floating a political platform, reports bdnews24.com.

Several leaders involved with the policy formulation have confirmed the looming launch of the party.

The party would be formally floated into the political mainstream once the ban on parlour politics is lifted, a leader said.

No-one said anything on record although there have been swirling rumours for the last one month that a new political party is in the offing.

Political leaders of different hues have been holding a frenzy of meetings to put final touches to the make and vision of the new party with umbrella being its symbol.

A party source said as many as eight meetings have been held in Dhaka in the last three weeks.

Leaders from the Big Two- the Awami League and BNP-and other political parties including Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), Jatiya Party (JP), Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal (JSD) and National Awami Party (NAP) are set to join the party, sources said.

Bigger chunks of the JP, except former president HM Ershad and Kazi Zafar, and the LDP, leaving former president AQM Badruddoza Chowdhury and retired colonel Oli Ahmed, would join the party.

Besides, a good number of former Awami League and BNP lawmakers would join the party, the source said.

Primarily, a 15-member nucleus committee has been formed as unlike others, the BDP, as it has been initially styled, would not have all powers with a single party chief.

The committee includes former ministers Sheikh Shahidul Islam (JP-Monju), Kazi Firoz Rashid (JP) and Tajul Islam Chowdhury (JP), former whip Ashraf Hossain (BNP), former state minister Anwarul Kabir Talukder (LDP), former state ministers Noor Mohammad Khan (LDP), Abul Hasan Chowdhury, who has resigned from Awami League, and Kamrun Nahar Jafar (BNP).

Bangladesh Krishak Sramik Janata League general secretary Fazlur Rahman, former DUCSU vice president and president of East Pakistan Student League Ferdous Ahmed Qureshi and former lawmaker MM Shahin (BNP) are also on the committee.

The committee is preparing a draft constitution and manifesto, sources said.

"The new party will pursue nationalistic politics. We are working to form the party uniting patriotic, progressive and democratic forces," Noor Mohammad Khan, a committee member, told the bdnews24.com.

"The aim of the party is to remove the barriers to make Bangladesh a developed country. The previous governments under the dynastic leadership established a reign of corruption and criminalisation.

"As a result the fate of the common people did not change. Inefficient and dishonest people using dynastic rule made fabulous money illegally through sycophancy and corruption."

Khan, a front ranking leader of the 11-point movement of 1969, sounded upbeat that the culture of criminalisation in the guise of politics would end forever.