Muhammad Yunus (84 years old), the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner chosen to lead the transitional government in Bangladesh, landed in Dhaka on Thursday from Paris, where he was receiving minor medical treatment. A few hours later, he announced the names of his cabinet of advisers, with whom he will try to stabilise the country of 170 million inhabitants and call elections, after the resignation and flight to India of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina last Monday after 20 years in power, 15 of them uninterrupted. Among the 16 advisers selected by Yunus are Asif Mahmud and Nahid Islam, two representatives of the Students Against Discrimination movement that led the protests that began in July against the quota system for public contracts. The strong repression of the demonstrations caused more than 300 deaths, thousands of injuries and arrests, and triggered the political crisis.
“The brutal and autocratic regime has disappeared,” Yunus declared in a televised address to the nation after taking office. “Tomorrow, with the rising sun, everyone will enjoy democracy, justice, human rights and full freedom of expression without fear, regardless of party affiliation. That is our goal.” To achieve this, he himself will take charge of most ministries, including Defense, Armed Forces, Food and Education, according to the local newspaper. Dhaka Tribune.
Of the student advisers, Nahid Islam will be in charge of the Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology, while Asif Mahmud will be given the Youth and Sports portfolio. Of the rest of the cabinet, only four are women and five are from the development and human rights sector. No member of Hasina’s party, the Awami League, is in the interim government.
In a Facebook post, Hasina’s son Sajeeb Wazed Joy, who had previously claimed that his mother would not return to politics, wrote that the party had not given up and was ready to hold talks with the opposition and the interim government. “I had said that my family would no longer participate in politics, but the way they are attacking our party leaders and workers, we cannot give up,” he said on Wednesday. Speaking to the Daily Mail on Wednesday, Times of India, He said his mother would return to Bangladesh when the interim government called elections, without specifying whether she would stand. However, he hinted that he himself could take over the reins of the Awami League. “I never had any political ambitions and was based in the US, but the events of the last few days show a leadership vacuum. I have had to act for the good of the party,” he told the newspaper.
The main opposition party, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which boycotted two national elections after the arrest of its leaders, has demanded new elections within three months.
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Yunus, a harsh critic of Hasina who had already tried unsuccessfully to form his own political party in 2007, became emotional and seemed to hold back tears at Dhaka airport as he spoke of a student who he said was shot dead during the protests. A sacrifice, he said, that could not be forgotten. “I feel good to be back home,” said the economist, who was greeted by senior military officers and student leaders. “All the students are happy, because he is a real idol for us,” Sanjit Mahamood, a student at Siddheswari University, told Efe, hoping that a return to normality would prevent new clashes in the streets.
Known as the “banker to the poor,” Yunus is a pioneer of the global microcredit movement. The Grameen Bank he founded won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for helping lift millions out of poverty by providing small loans to impoverished rural people who cannot afford traditional banks. Now international human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International are calling on him to repeal or reform the country’s repressive laws against freedom of expression and others that have restricted the space for civil society activism in recent years.
Violence against the Hindu minority
Hasina’s flight from the country she ruled for 20 of the past 30 years after winning a fourth term in January sparked jubilation and violence as mobs stormed and ransacked her official residence. She remains in New Delhi and Indian media say she plans to seek asylum in Britain. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said only that her future is a private decision and has asked Bangladeshi authorities to protect the country’s Hindu minority.
Hundreds of Hindus, who make up 8 percent of the country’s 170 million Muslim-majority population, have tried to flee to India in recent days because of the attacks they say they have suffered since Hasina left the country. However, both countries have increased border surveillance to stop them from crossing. The Bangladesh Christian, Hindu and Buddhist Unity Council says that in 45 of Bangladesh’s 64 districts there have been acts of violence against homes, businesses and Hindu temples, in which a teacher was killed and 45 other people were injured, according to the organisation.
Mohammad Rakibul Hasan, a local government official in Thakurgaon district in northwestern Bangladesh, estimates that 700 to 800 Hindus tried to cross into India on Wednesday afternoon after some of their homes were attacked and looted. “They returned home after we provided them protection,” Hasan told Reuters. The Hindu community has traditionally supported the former prime minister’s secular Awami League party over an opposition bloc that includes a hardline Islamist party.
In the raging river of violence that continues, at least six inmates have died and 200 others have escaped after a riot in the high-security prison of Kashimpur, in the centre of the country. The director of the prison, Subrata Kumar Bala, reported that the incident occurred on Tuesday afternoon. According to his account in the Bangladeshi daily The Daily New Nationsecurity guards opened fire when they were attacked while a group of prisoners were climbing the walls, so the army had to intervene.
In Dhaka, the absence of law enforcement on the streets has prompted students to form groups to manage the chaotic traffic in the capital. “Since there is no police, we have taken responsibility,” said Sanjit Mahamood of Siddheswari University, which has been closed for the past few days, along with all other educational institutions in the country. Despite the recent appointment of a new police chief in the city, Moinul Islam, and an ultimatum from him for officers to report to their posts, many members of the security forces remained absent on Friday, having become the target of attacks in retaliation for their actions during student protests.
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