Dhaka:
Bangladesh’s Supreme Court has acquitted former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia in the last remaining corruption case against her, paving the way for the BNP Chairperson to contest elections. Along with Ms Zia, the top court also cleared charges against Bangladesh Nationalist Party’s Acting Chairman Tarique Rahman, and all other suspects in their appeal over the Zia Orphanage Trust graft case.
The verdict was delivered by a bench led by Chief Justice Dr Syed Refaat Ahmed after reviewing 79-year-old Zia’s appeal against the High Court’s ruling on Wednesday.
Ms Zia had faced a total of 17 years in prison– 10 years in this orphanage case and seven in the other corruption case in which she was acquitted in November after the ouster of her longtime rival and former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
The verdict is the latest judicial victory for Ms Zia and BNP, the other main party that has dominated Bangladesh’s politics with Ms Hasina’s Awami League.
Case Gainst Khaleda Zia
Khaleda Zia, the head of the largest opposition party in Bangladesh, was sentenced on February 8, 2018, by Dhaka’s Special Judge Court-5 to five years of imprisonment for alleged embezzlement of $250,000 government funds when she became prime minister in 1991.
The same verdict handed down 10 years of rigorous imprisonment for five other accused, including Ms Zia’s son Tarique and former chief secretary Kamal Uddin Siddiqui. Each of the accused was also fined.
The former Prime Minister appealed the trial court’s verdict to the High Court, but the sentence was increased to 10 years by a High Court bench comprising Justice M Enayetur Rahim and Justice Md Mostafizur Rahman on October 30, 2018.
She subsequently filed a leave-to-appeal petition against this sentence. After years of delays due to legal procedural issues and a lack of initiative from lawyers, an Appellate Division of the Supreme Court accepted Ms Zia’s leave-to-appeal on November 11, 2024.
Delivering the verdict on Wednesday, the Supreme Court noted that the prosecution of the orphanage trust case was “malicious” and motivated by revenge, officially clearing Ms Zia of the charges in the case.
Zia was imprisoned at Dhaka Central Jail from 2018 to 2020, when her jail term was suspended by the Hasina government on health grounds, under the condition that the BNP leader would refrain from travelling abroad and participating in politics. After that, she was put under house arrest. Ms Hasina’s toppling in August prompted Ms Zia’s release from house arrest.
The verdict will enable Ms Zia to contest the next election, as Bangladeshi law prohibits anyone imprisoned for over two years from running for political office for the next five years.
Bangladesh’s Political Landscape
Bangladesh was plunged into a political and economic crisis in August 2024 after months of protests led by students toppled former premier Sheikh Hasina’s government, forcing her to flee to India and ending her 15-year rule.
The South Asian nation of around 70 million people is currently run by an interim leader Muhammad Yunus, who has indicated that the next general election could be held at the end of this year or the first half of 2026 but has been non-committal on a deadline for the democratic exercise.
Ms Zia’s party, however, has been pressing the interim government headed by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus for a clear plan to hold a national election soon. The BNP has demanded that the election must be held by August this year.
Ms Zia, who served as the prime minister of Bangladesh from March 1991 to March 1996, and again from June 2001 to October 2006, is unwell and travelled to London earlier this month for medical treatment.
