Awami hopeful of forming govt with Jatiya support

Awami hopeful of forming govt with Jatiya support

By Nadeem Qadir

DHAKA (AFP): Sheikh Hasina Wajed, the daughter of Bangladesh's founding leader, is set to become the nation's second female prime minister, following the confirmation that the Jatiya Party (JP) will throw its weight behind her.

Party sources Monday said Wajed's Awami League was now confident of forming Bangladesh's next government after the JP of jailed former president Hussain Muhammad Ershad reaffirmed its support Sunday night.

"Yes, of course, we have lent support to (the) Awami League," JP secretary-general Anwar Hossain told reporters late Sunday.

He added: "Those who expressed different views did that in their personal capacity, (and) it is sure that those views in no way can undo the statement issued by myself and party acting chief Mizanur Rahman Chowdhury" on Saturday.

His comments, which ended a day of confusion over the party's role when it emerged as the power broker after the June 12 general elections, followed 90-minute talks with Awami League chief and prime minister-apparent Wajed.

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Wajed's father, led Bangladesh to independence from Pakistan in 1971. He was killed and his post- independence government toppled during a 1975 bloody military coup.

Ershad's brother, G.M. Kader, also elected on a Jatiya ticket, was at the talks along with other senior leaders.

The JP leader's wife, Raushan, met Ershad at prison Sunday night and later told the Janaknatha newspaper: "I have no objection to the statement issued, but it would have been better to have arrived at such a decision in a party meeting."

Ershad, who ruled Bangladesh with an iron fist for nearly nine years, is serving a 13-year prison term for graft. He won five seats, the maximum permitted for each candidate, in the June 12 elections.

In a handwritten letter, published in the Banglabazar Patrika newspaper, Ershad said he was authorizing Hossain and his brother to negotiate the support for the Awami League.

It was still unclear what the conditions were, but apparently Ershad's release was a key consideration.

However, a League spokesman told AFP that Wajed maintained her government would allow "the laws of the land to take its own course" in the case.

A presidential palace source said diplomats and politicians from leading parties had held talks with President Abdur Rahman Biswas over the past few days. "We have no fascination for any party, but we would like to see the constitutional process followed," he quoted the diplomats as telling Biswas.

The source added that Biswas, a member of former prime minister Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), maintained that he would follow the constitution and call upon the majority party to form the new government.

"Most likely, if all goes well, the new government will take the oath of office around June 24," he said, referring to the end of the election process after repolling on Wednesday in 27 constituencies.

Newspapers reported the BNP was still trying to woo the JP, but political commentators said it was unlikely that Ershad would reverse his stand, as he held the BNP responsible for his jailing.

The Awami League now leads a bloc of 167 seats in the 300-seat parliament -- 134 of its own, plus the support of one independent MP, the JP's 29 seats and two seats held by two smaller ally parties.

A total 151 out of 300 parliamentary seats is needed for an absolute majority.

Zia's BNP holds 104 seats.

MPs will select another 30 seats reserved for women when parliament convenes.

The election commission has gazetted 273 results, despite the BNP's demand that results be withheld until their complaints regarding irregularities in 111 constituencies were investigated.