Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has placed a series of demands to the chief adviser including formation of a new election commission (EC) on the consensus of major political parties and announcement of polls roadmap. 

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said this to journalists after emerging from the dialogue with Chief Adviser Professor Dr Muhammad Yunus at his official residence on Hare Road today.

“A new election commission should be constituted immediately based on the consensus of major political parties after suspending the Election Commission Appointment Act,” he said.

A six-member delegation of BNP led by its secretary general joined the one-hour dialogue, which began at 2:30pm. BNP joined the talks as the first political party as part of the dialogues with the political parties at the invitation of the chief adviser. Later, Jamaat-e-Islami led by its Ameer Dr Shafiqur Rahman joined a dialogue with the chief adviser.

Mirza Fakhrul said during the Awami League regime, an act was passed in parliament transferring the national identity registration operation from the Election Commission to the Security Services Division, Ministry of Home Affairs.

"We demanded cancellation of the act through imposing an ordinance," he said. BNP also placed a demand that no controversial person to be included in the election commission reform commission, he said.

The party also demanded removal of all public representatives elected in fake elections in union parishads during the fascist government, he added.

"We demanded that all chief election commissioners and other election commissioners to be brought to justice for holding farcical, failed and biased national elections in 2014, 2018 and 2024," said the BNP secretary general.

Mirza Fakhrul said Prof Yunus informed them that the interim government's first priority is to hold the elections.

Asked about the chief adviser's response to their demands, "They are thinking that these are demands of the people and our demands are also theirs as well".

The BNP delegation included the party's standing committee members Dr Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain, Mirza Abbas, Dr Abdul Moyeen Khan, Nazrul Islam Khan and Salahuddin Ahmed.

Terming former Chief Justice ABM Khairul Haque as the mastermind behind scrapping the caretaker government system and ruining the Constitution, Mirza Fakhrul said they demanded sedition charge against him (Khairul).