AL will win the January 7 polls: Quader

Awami League General Secretary Obaidul Quader today said the result of the January 7 national election will determine who the opposition in parliament will be.

During a press conference at AL's Dhaka district office in Dhanmondi, a reporter, mentioning that the ruling party was set to win a fourth straight term, asked Quader who he thought would be in the opposition.

"There is no need to say anything about it [opposition] now. We will win the election In Sha Allah, I do not want to mention the margin of the victory," said Quader, road transport and bridges minister.

"People are enthusiastic about the election. Hopefully, we will get decent number of seats, but I don't want to say how many as I don't want to be an astrologer like [BNP Secretary General] Mirza Fakhrul," he added.

Asked whether the 12th parliamentary election would be acceptable to foreigners -- Quader said, "Let the election take place. The foreigners will say whether it is acceptable."

Stating that the polls would have been more competitive if the BNP participated, Quader said, "All we are saying is that voters' participation will be satisfactory. The main opposition party is not here, we regret it. This is regrettable."

Replying to a question on whether the BNP's hartal will affect the presence of voters at the polling centres and whether they will take any special measures to attract voters to the stations, he said, "There is no special arrangement to bring them to the centres. We have teams to communicate with voters and to bring them to the centres. those teams will do that. But many voters, mostly spontaneously, will come."

"A few days ago, we saw heavy traffic on the days of hartal. we did not see any blockade on roads, we witnessed the blockade only in list of their programmes, not in reality," added Quader.