The prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, on Saturday said that the country would have no elections in the next 10 years if an unconstitutional intervention interrupted
the continuation of the current democratic journey.
She warned all concerned that no one should play any dirty game with elections. ‘If any unconstitutional force takes over, there will be no elections in the next 10 years. We have to keep the continuation of the democratic trend,’ she said at an iftar party at the National Press Club.
Recalling the military-backed interim regime of 2007–08, Hasina said that it was the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence that had ruled the country behind the government of Iajuddin, Fakhruddin and Moin Uddin.
‘Brigadier Bari and Brigadier Amin of the DGFI did everything from behind. When I was abroad, they tried to stop me returning home… But later I returned and was put in jail,’ she said.
A faction of the Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists and the Dhaka Union of Journalists hosted the iftar party.
The prime minister, however, said that her party had the courage to hold the next general elections in a free and fair manner as it had proved this by holding the local polls.
In an oblique reference to the demand of the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party for a non-party caretaker government, Hasina said that the AL-led government had proved by the time that it could hold free and fair elections.
‘Local body polls, including those of union councils, municipalities and city corporations, were conducted in a free and fair manner under this government,’ Hasina said.
She called on journalists to criticise the government objectively but not to let anyone destroy democracy.
She said that journalists should uphold the truth and maintain their professionalism. ‘Some media outlets are engaged in yellow journalism and campaigning against us. It will be better if you refrain from such campaigns,’ Hasina said.
The prime minister, however, stressed the need for the freedom of the press to make democracy meaningful.
The information minister, Hasanul Haq Inu, and union leaders Iqbal Sobhan Chowdhury, Abdul Jalil Bhuiyan and Omar Faruk, among others, spoke.
Inu said that the freedom of the press was either curtailed or suppressed during the military regimes in the past.
Hasina said that some quarters were still plotting to halt the ongoing trial of war crimes.
She said that action would be taken against media outlets involved in anti-Islam campaigns in recent times.
-With New Age input
