Blitz Bureau
DHAKA: Bangladesh’s Army Chief vowed to back the country’s interim government “come what may” to help it complete key reforms after the ouster of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, so that elections could be held within the next 18 months.
General Waker-uz-Zaman and his troops stood aside in early August amid raging student-led protests against Hasina, sealing the fate of the veteran politician who resigned after 15 years in power and fled to neighbouring India.
Zaman told Reuters at his office in the capital Dhaka on September 23 that the interim administration led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus had his full support and outlined a pathway to rid the military of political influence.
“I will stand beside him. Come what may. So that he can accomplish his mission,” Zaman, bespectacled and dressed in military fatigues, said of Yunus.
The pioneer of the global microcredit movement, Yunus has promised to carry out essential reforms to the judiciary, police and financial institutions, paving the way to hold a free and fair election in the country of 170 million people.
Following the reforms, Zaman – who took over as the army chief only weeks before Hasina’s ouster – said a transition to democracy should be made between a year and a year-and-a-half, but underlined the need for patience. “If you ask me, then I will say that should be the time frame by which we should enter into a democratic process,” he said.
Bangladesh’s main two political parties, Hasina’s Awami League and its bitter rival Bangladesh Nationalist Party, had both previously called for elections to be held within three months of the interim government taking office in August.
