AL plans street protests against price spiral

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Awami League (AL) plans street agitation to press the government to check the skyrocketing prices of essentials and resolve the crises of food, fertiliser and power without delay.

At the same time, it will make every effort to build up pressure on the military-backed caretaker administration for parliamentary elections as per the Election Commission’s (EC) roadmap.

The party policymakers are now devising strategies for the agitation programmes amid the state of emergency when every kind of anti-government demonstration is banned.

In view of the restrictions, they are working to come up with programmes that will not fail to draw popular support across the country. They will focus on issues like price hike of essentials, food and fertiliser shortages, load-shedding, unemployment and closures of mills and factories, said AL sources.

“At first, we will announce token agitations like forming human chain on a limited scale,” a leader told The Daily Star after a meeting at AL chief Sheikh Hasina’s political office in Dhanmondi.

“We’ll confine our programmes to issues of public interest. Even release of our detained president won’t be among those,” added the leader requesting not to be named.

Some other leaders however said the matter [Hasina's release] would naturally come to the fore once the masses would begin participating in the agitation.

The AL Central Working Committee (ALCWC) will meet on March 29 to finalise the strategies and programmes.

“Our strategies will seek to keep up with the change of time and situation. We will continue pushing the government to resolve the present crises and hold the national election as per the electoral roadmap,” said another leader preferring anonymity.

After the ALCWC meeting, the central leaders will meet those at the grassroots level to exchange views. They will also seek opinions of metropolitan, district and upazila unit leaders before announcing the programmes on a limited scale.

Besides, there would be meetings with representatives from different front organisations to give them necessary directions.

AL Publicity Secretary Asaduzzaman Noor, who attended yesterday’s meeting, told The Daily Star, “We are a people’s political party, so if we don’t talk about their crises then why they would depend on us.

“We want measures to alleviate public sufferings as early as possible.”

Meanwhile, yesterday’s meeting decided it will soon form a committee dedicated to maintaining discipline within the party. The organisation and its wings have lately been badly affected due to internal disorder, according to the party insiders.

The meeting also decided that the AL will not make its position clear about the local body elections until the government arranges for those.

It also reiterated its call for the government to free Hasina immediately and send her to the US for treatment.

The meeting decided to boycott the president’s programme on the Independence Day protesting invitation to the war criminals and anti-Liberation War forces there.

BRIEFING
Briefing journalists after the meeting, Syed Ashraful Islam said, “We are strongly urging the caretaker government to consider our demand for steps to send our leader [Hasina] to the US for treatment.

“They must not delay when the specialist doctors have already said treatment of her ears is not possible here.”

The country has been going through a very critical time as, the AL leader said, food price inflation has gone up by 70 to 80 percent. He urged the government to take immediate steps to bring the prices within people’s reach.

Syed Ashraf said both the caretaker government and the EC have been making contradictory statements over the national and local government elections. He asked them to “stop talking and go for the parliamentary polls first”.

The acting AL general secretary demanded that the government withdraw the curb on trade union. If the right to organise is not given back, the country’s image as one of the signatories to the International Labour Organisation (ILO) convention would be tarnished, he observed.

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