Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), the main opposition party, on Saturday threatened to “topple” the Bangladesh government if authorities do not allow BNP's ailing leader Khaleda Zia, the country’s former prime minister, to visit abroad for treatment. The party has been protesting for the last few weeks against the government. 

Khaleda Zia, the country’s two-time prime minister, has been ailing for the last few years. She was sentenced earlier and came out of prison last year on bail on health grounds. Her condition lately worsened, following which she repeatedly appealed to the government to allow her to seek treatment abroad. However, the government denied permission, maintaining that she was getting the best of treatment in the country itself.

On Saturday, during a protest rally, the BNP’s General Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir (retd) threatened to launch a sustained movement to topple the government if it did not immediately allow party chief Khaleda Zia to travel abroad for advanced medical treatment.

"We would like to clearly ask the government to free our leader Khaleda Zia and take steps for sending her abroad for treatment without buying further time,” he was quoted as saying by Dhaka Tribune. 

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who is serving her third consecutive term, has significantly weakened the country’s opposition parties politically. The BNP, the party led by Khaleda Zia, has been struggling for some years now, with its leaders facing several cases. 

Recently, the party has decided to adopt an aggressive approach, putting the cadre on the streets, to pressure the government. In less than a year’s time, the country would go into general elections. However, the prospects are dim for the BNP, experts say. More so, with an ailing leader, who herself is the wife of former President Zia ur Rahman.

Threatening to launch the movement, BNP leader Mirza Fakrul said,  “A movement to ensure your [the government’s] fall will begin and a pro-people government will be installed removing you from power.”

He alleged that the government had been denying permission to Khaleda to go abroad for treatment because it thought that she could work from abroad  against Hasina’s stay in power. 

(SAM)