Bangladesh’s indomitable former prime minister Khaleda Zia has been released from years of house arrest after her arch-foe Sheikh Hasina was ousted as premier and she fled after protesters stormed her palace.
The fierce rivalry between the two women – born in blood and forged in prison – has defined the politics of the Muslim-majority nation for decades.
Zia, 78, was sentenced to 17 years in jail for corruption in 2018 under Hasina’s rule.
Hasina, 76, was ousted on Monday following massive protests, with the army chief announcing that the military would form an interim government.
Following this, orders were issued to release Zia along with the prisoners involved in the protest.
Zia is the chairperson of the main opposition Bangladesh National Party (BNP). Party spokesman AKM Wahiduzzaman told AFP on Tuesday that she “has now been released.”
Her health is poor, she is confined to a wheelchair because of rheumatoid arthritis and suffers from diabetes and liver cirrhosis.
Decades-old feud
The rivalry between Zia and Hasina is popularly known in Bangladesh as the “Battle of the Begums”, with “Begum” being a Muslim honorific for powerful women in South Asia.
Their feud is rooted in the assassination of Hasina’s father – the country’s founding leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman – along with her mother, three brothers and several other relatives in a 1975 military coup.
Zia’s husband, Ziaur Rahman, was the deputy army chief at the time and took control himself three months later.
He introduced economic reform in poverty-stricken Bangladesh through privatization, but was assassinated in another military coup in 1981.
The reins of the BNP were handed over to his widow, then a 35-year-old mother of two young sons and dismissed by critics as a politically inexperienced housewife.
Zia led protests against dictator Hussain Muhammad Ershad, boycotting fraudulent elections in 1986 and leading street protests.
He and Hasina together ousted Ershad from power in a wave of protests in 1990 and then faced off in Bangladesh’s first independent elections.
Zia won and led from 1991-96, and again from 2001-2006 with he and Hasina alternating in power.
Mutual dislike
Their mutual dislike was blamed for a political crisis in January 2007, which led the military to impose emergency rule and set up a caretaker government. Both were detained for more than a year.
Hasina won the election by a landslide in December 2008 and maintained her lead until she fled to India by helicopter on Monday.
He consolidated his grip on power by detaining thousands of BNP members. Hundreds also disappeared.
Zia was convicted and jailed in 2018 on corruption charges, which his party dismissed as politically motivated.
She was later placed under house arrest on the condition that she would neither participate in politics nor go abroad for treatment.
Son in exile
Zia’s first cabinet was praised for liberalising Bangladesh’s economy in the early 1990s, leading to decades of growth.
However, his second term as prime minister of an Islamist-allied coalition was marred by corruption allegations against his government and sons.
In addition there were several Islamist attacks, one of which killed over 20 people and almost claimed Hasina’s life.
The anti-crime Rapid Action Battalion police unit formed by Zia has been accused of hundreds of extrajudicial killings.
While she was in jail, her eldest son Tarique Rahman led the BNP from exile in London, but he was convicted in absentia and sentenced to life imprisonment for his alleged role in a bomb attack on Hasina’s rally in 2004.
The BNP says the allegations were a politically motivated attempt to exclude Zia’s descendants from politics.
Zia earned respect for her determination, though her inability to compromise left her unable to reach agreement with key allies at home or abroad.
This defiance continued even when his youngest son died of a heart attack in Malaysia in 2015.
Haseena went to her house to express sympathy and condolences but Jiya did not open the door.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
