BNP to sit with govt Oct 15: Siddiqui

BNP to sit with govt Oct 15: Siddiqui

Dhaka, October 9 (bdnews24.com)—BNP has decided to sit with the caretaker government on Oct 15 for a special dialogue, said BNP standing committee member Chowdhury Tanveer Ahmed Siddiqui Thursday.

Siddiqui briefed reporters after attending a meeting of a special BNP committee held Thursday.

Members of the special committee included BNP vice-chairperson MK Anwar, joint secretary general Nazrul Islam Khan, former lawmaker Abdul Mannan and office secretary Rizvi Ahmed.

The two-hour meeting discussed the probable dialogue agenda and the demands BNP would place with the government to be met before they agreed to participate in the polls.

Siddiqui, who chaired the special committee, told reporters: "BNP will sit with the government for a dialogue on October 15. This committee is carrying out the preparatory tasks prior to that dialogue."

"We are preparing a long list of the discussion points and developing a set of recommendations as well," he said.

He said they would submit a report on the same to the party secretary general Khandakar Delwar Hossain.

"BNP is an election-oriented party, wanting to play a positive role in joining the polls. The specialist committee is working to take that goal forward," said Siddiqui.

Mentioning the five-point demands previously raised by the four-party alliance, he said: "Our report will uphold those demands too."

The demands include lifting emergency, certain further amendments to the new RPO, withdrawal of all cases against BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia, release of all political prisoners and deferring the upazila polls.

Asked if BNP will go for registration by the Election Commission's deadline of Oct 15, joint secretary general Nazrul Islam Khan said: "We hope our dialogue with the government will help remove all the hurdles we are facing as regards registration."

While four advisers of the caretaker government met with the BNP chairperson at her residence on Sept 11 following her release from detention, Khaleda had talked about going for a further dialogue with the government.

Subsequently, at the Sept 7 standing committee meeting, she finalised a decision on meeting with the government.

The special committee members told reporters that the government also welcomed the opportunity for accord through dialogue.