‘How much more bloodshed to understand true nature of Awami League?’ Hasnat asks

National Citizen Party (NCP) leader and Member of Parliament Hasnat Abdullah has questioned how much more violence people need to witness to understand what he described as the true nature of the Awami League.

In a Facebook post on Tuesday evening, Hasnat wrote: “How much more bloodshed, how many more fires, and how much more terrorism do you need to witness to understand the true nature of the Awami League?”

His remarks came amid a series of incidents involving cocktail explosions and violence, including an attack on the Dhaka University campus and a bus fire that reportedly killed a sleeping driver.

Hasnat accused the banned Awami League of continuing acts of violence despite the mass killings during its rule, alleging that the party remained unwilling to abandon its violent methods.

Referring to the July-August 2024 uprising, he said more than 2,000 people had sacrificed their lives to secure the country's freedom and warned against allowing what he called a group of “thieves, looters and terrorists” to undermine it.

He also criticised those advocating the restoration of the Awami League's political rights, questioning whether the violence of recent days had not demonstrated why the party should remain banned.

Hasnat further criticised the government's response to the incidents, saying law enforcement agencies and other state institutions should have taken responsibility for protecting people's lives and property.

Instead, he said, student organisations had once again been forced to take to the streets, detain suspects and guard public spaces overnight.

The NCP leader also raised concerns over what he described as a growing divide between ordinary activists who took part in the July uprising and individuals who later secured influential positions within the movement.

He alleged that ordinary young activists who had faced persecution during the previous 17 years and participated in the uprising were once again at the forefront of resistance, while those holding influential positions remained absent from street protests.

Concluding his post, Hasnat said people should resist the banned Awami League rather than wait for the government to act.

Quoting slain July uprising figure Osman Bin Hadi, he wrote: “We may give our lives, but we will not surrender July.”

He ended the post by declaring that Bangladesh's soil, stained with the blood of thousands of martyrs, must never become a refuge for perpetrators of genocide and fugitive fascists.