BNP terms Koko cheque handover to ACC a drama

Opposition BNP on Wednesday termed drama the handing over of a 'symbolic cheque' of money laundered reportedly by Arafat Rahman Koko to the Anti Corruption Commission, and said it is an act of undermining BNP and its chairperson, reports UNB. "The Anti Corruption commission has staged a drama through a press conference referring to the verdict of a case against our party chairperson's younger son Arafat Rahman Koko," said BNP acting secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir. "The attorney general against Koko's name handed over a big size fabricated cheque like that of cricket award to the Anti Corruption Commission. Handing over such a cheque in public was aimed at maligning Arafat Rahman Koko, our party chairperson and BNP, he added. The BNP spokesman brought the allegation at a press conference at the party's Nayapaltan central office on the day. Fakhrul alleged that the government staged the drama to divert people's attention from its misdeeds and the ongoing political and constitutional crisis over the next general election. He strongly condemned and protested this act of the government. On Tuesday, attorney general M Mahbubey Alam at a programme at a city hotel handed over a 'symbolic cheque' of the Oversees Bank of Singapore worth US$ 956,387.4 allegedly siphoned off by Arafat Rahman Koko to ACC chairman M Badiuzzaman. On November 22 last year, the anti-graft body in the first phase recovered Singaporean dollar (SGD) 2.041 million (Tk 131.5m) siphoned off by Koko. In January this year, the ACC also recovered an amount of Tk 1.5 million as interest of SGD 2.04 million siphoned off by Koko. Fakhrul also termed the case against Koko false and politically motivated and said it was lodged to defame Zia family. "The verdict in the case was delivered in absence of Koko without giving him any chance of self-defence. He said the government has withdrawn all the cases against ruling party men but they did not pull out any of the cases against opposition leaders and activists only to make political gains. Mentioning that the demand for arranging the next polls under a non-party government has turned into a national demand, the BNP spokesman said the government is now crafting new issues to divert people's attention to a different direction.