Controversy arises over Hasina’s resignation

Further controversy arises over the resignation of deposed prime minister Sheikh Hasina as president Mohammed Shahabuddin in an interview with a Bangla daily has claimed that he did not receive any resignation letter from her.

Mohammed Shahabuddin in an interview with Manab Zamin chief editor Matiur Rahman Chowdhury, published in the daily’s political magazine ‘Janatar Chokh’ on Sunday, said that he heard Sheikh Hasina had resigned as the prime minister.

‘I tried [to collect the resignation letter] many times but failed. Maybe she did not get the time,’ the president was quoted to have said in the interview.

President Mohammed Shahabuddin on Monday urged all to refrain from destabilising or embarrassing the interim government centring on ‘media publicity’ by quoting him regarding the resignation of former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, said a release from the president’s press wing.

‘The clear statement from the president is that all the questions that have arisen in the public mind regarding the resignation and departure from the country of the prime minister in the face of the student-people uprising, the dissolution of the parliament, and the constitutional validity of the incumbent interim government are answered in the order of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the Special Reference No-01/2024, dated August 8, 2024,’ said the release.

Invoking the Article 106 of the constitution, the Appellate Division gave this opinion as the president sought the opinion of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court on August 8, 2024, it mentioned

Law, justice and parliamentary affairs adviser Asif Nazrul on Monday said that president Shahabuddin had made self-contradictory statement by saying he did not get the resignation letter of the ousted prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who fled to India on August 5 amid a student-led mass uprising.

Terming the president’s statement as a lie, he said it amounted to misconduct and violation of his oath.

‘The president himself in his address to the nation in presence of the chiefs of the three forces at 11:20pm on August 5 said that the former prime minister had tendered her resignation letter to him and he accepted it. So by saying he doesn’t have the resignation letter of former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, the president has made a self-contradictory statement,’ the law adviser said while talking to reporters over the matter at his office at the Secretariat.

He said that the president himself asked for the Supreme Court’s opinion applying its advisory jurisdiction as per Article 106 of the constitution to determine the next course of action of the state in the situation that arose on August 5.

Questioning the president’s mental capacity to continue as the head of the state, Asif Nazrul said, ‘We know that the constitution says that if you don’t have the physical or mental capacity, or if you commit a serious misconduct, the constitution provides a scope to take steps.’

Referring to the president’s interview with the Manabzamin editor, the adviser said that the president contradicted what he had said himself while addressing the nation.