Bangladesh News

Detained BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia will file two petitions with the High Court (HC) today for bail in Gatco and Niko graft cases filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC).

If she is granted bail in these two cases, there would be no legal bar to her release, her lawyer Nasiruddin Ahmed Asim told The Daily Star yesterday.

Khaleda, also former prime minister, stands accused in four cases. She has already secured bail in two–Barapukuria coalmine and Zia Orphanage Trust graft cases.

Meanwhile, her lawyers Mahbub Uddin Khokon and Naushad Jamir yesterday visited her at the sub-jail on Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban complex to discuss the bail issue.

Coming out of the jail, Khokon said it might take two to three days to complete the legal procedures for bail.

On September 2 last year, the ACC filed the first case against Khaleda on charges of graft in awarding Global Agro Trade (Pvt) Co Ltd (Gatco) a contract for container management at Dhaka and Chittagong inland depots.

The following day she was arrested at her cantonment residence.

Then on December 9 last year, the anti-graft body filed the Niko case against her and four others. The charge is abuse of power in awarding a gas exploration and extraction deal to Canadian company Niko.

On May 5, the ACC pressed charges in this case against 11 people. Besides Khaleda, former law minister Moudud Ahmed and former state minister for energy AKM Mosharraf Hossain are among the charge-sheeted accused.

In response to writ petitions filed by the former prime minister, the HC in July this year stayed the proceedings of Gatco and Niko cases.

It also ordered the government and the ACC to explain why the case proceedings should not be quashed.

The ACC filed the Barapukuria coalmine case against Khaleda and 15 others on February 26. The other accused include 10 former ministers from BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami.

In the case, the 16 are charged with causing a loss of over Tk 158.71 crore to the public exchequer by awarding a Chinese company a production, management and maintenance contract through abuse of power.

The accused former ministers from BNP are M Saifur Rahman, Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan, Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain, M Shamsul Islam, MK Anwar, Aminul Haque, Altaf Hossain Choudhury and AKM Mosharraf Hossain, and from Jamaat are Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojahid and Motiur Rahman Nizami.

On July 3, the ACC filed another case against Khaleda, her elder son Tarique Rahman and five others on charges of embezzling over Tk 2.10 crore meant for Zia Orphanage Trust.

Former BNP lawmaker Qazi Saleemul Huq Kamal, Sayeed Ahmed, Gias Uddin Ahmed, Sharfuddin Ahmed and Khaleda’s nephew Mominur Rahman are the other accused.

The bench of Justice Sharif Uddin Chaklader and Justice Md Emdadul Haque Azad on August 26 granted ad interim bail to the BNP chairperson in the Zia Orphanage Trust case.

The same bench on August 28 granted her ad interim bail in Barapukuria coal mine case.

All four cases that were later brought under the emergency power rules remain pending with the special courts set up to try high-profile corruption cases.