Cancel appointment of JCD-Shibir men as polls officials: Tofail

Tofail Ahmed

Tofail alleged that the Election Commission (EC) is also working under an 'election engineering' plan on behalf of the government and demanded cancellation of the appointments.

He was addressing a public meeting held at Shahid Abdur Razzak Park, organised by the local unit of the 14-party opposition alliance.

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Tofail said, the 14-party alliance will compel the government to accept its proposals to reform the EC and the caretaker system.

"The ruling parties are not accepting the proposals as they are dreaming of holding a farcical election to cling to power. But people will compel them to accept the reforms", he said.

Addressing the meeting, Workers Party General Secretary Bimal Biswas said the government has failed to deliver anything good to the people. It gave grenade attacks, bomb blasts, murders, repression, unabated corruption and price hike.

The other speakers said, some fanatic forces want to establish a Taleban like government in the country which will destroy democracy and the spirit of the War of Liberation.

Earlier, addressing another public meeting at Khulna Shahid Hadis Park in Khulna on Tuesday, Tofail has said sovereignty of the country will be at stake if the Islamist zealots who are doing violence in the name of Islam are not contained right now.

Under the government's protection, they have already caused a great damaged to the country's image abroad but the government is still in a slumber. The government, in its four years' rule, has made Bangladesh known abroad as a country of fundamentalists and religious extremists.

Islam is the greatest religion on earth, which does not approve violence. "These forces are doing violence and misinterpreting Islam only to capture power".

The former minister alleged that probe into the August 17 serial bomb blasts has tapered off for unknown reasons. Newspaper reports said 40 of those arrested in connection with the blasts admitted their links with a component of the ruling alliance, but the government has not taken any action against its coalition partner. This proves ruling BNP condones the incident, Tofail claimed.