Bangladesh’s Supreme Court has acquitted former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia in the last corruption case against her, paving the way for the BNP president to contest the elections. Along with Ms Zia, the top court also approved charges against Bangladesh Nationalist Party acting president Tariq Rahman and all other suspects in their appeals in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case.
A bench led by Chief Justice Dr Syed Refaat Ahmed delivered the verdict after reviewing 79-year-old Zia’s appeal against the High Court verdict on Wednesday.
Ms Zia faced a total of 17 years in jail – 10 years in this orphanage case and seven years in another corruption case, in which she was acquitted in November after the ouster of her longtime rival and former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Had happened.
The ruling is the latest judicial victory for Ms Zia and the BNP, the other main party that has dominated Bangladesh politics along with Ms Hasina’s Awami League.
Case against Khaleda Zia
Khaleda Zia, head of Bangladesh’s largest opposition party, was on February 8, 2018 sentenced to five years in prison by Special Judge Court-5 in Dhaka for alleged embezzlement of $250,000 of government funds when she became prime minister in 1991.
In the same verdict, five other accused, including Ms Zia’s son Tariq and former Chief Secretary Kamal Uddin Siddiqui, were sentenced to 10 years of rigorous imprisonment. A fine was also imposed on each accused.
The former prime minister appealed to the High Court against the trial court’s decision, but on October 30, 2018, the High Court bench of Justice M Inayatoor Rahim and Justice Mohammad Mustafizur Rahman increased the sentence to 10 years.
He later filed a petition for permission to appeal against this sentence. After years of delay due to legal procedural issues and lack of initiative by lawyers, the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court accepted leave of Ms Zia’s appeal on November 11, 2024.
Delivering the verdict on Wednesday, the Supreme Court said the prosecution of the orphanage trust case was “malicious” and motivated by vendetta, officially acquitting Ms Zia of charges in the case.
Zia was imprisoned in Dhaka Central Jail from 2018 to 2020, when her prison sentence was suspended by the Hasina government on health grounds, under the condition that the BNP leader refrain from traveling abroad and participating in politics. . After this he was put under house arrest. Ms Zia was released from house arrest after Ms Hasina was overthrown in August.
The decision will enable Ms Zia to contest the next election, as Bangladeshi law bars anyone sentenced to more than two years from running for political office for the next five years.
Political scenario of Bangladesh
Bangladesh was plunged into a political and economic crisis in August 2024, when months of student-led protests toppled the government of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, forcing her to flee to India and ending her 15-year rule. It’s over.
The South Asian nation of about 70 million people is currently run by an interim leader, Muhammad Yunus, who has indicated the next general election could be held later this year or the first half of 2026, but has made no commitment. Time limits for democratic practice.
However, Ms Zia’s party is pressing the interim government led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus for a clear plan to hold national elections soon. BNP has demanded that elections should be held by August this year.
Ms Zia, who served as Prime Minister of Bangladesh from March 1991 to March 1996 and again from June 2001 to October 2006, is unwell and flew to London earlier this month for medical treatment.
