‘Sheikh Hasina left Bangladesh because…’: What son Sajeeb Wazed said

“It was her dream to turn Bangladesh into a developed country and she worked so hard for it over the last 15 years, keeping it safe from militants and as well as from terrorism, and in spite of all of that, this vocal minority, the opposition, the militants have now seized power,” he said, as quoted by NDTV.

According to Joy, Sheikh Hasina left Bangladesh as she did not want bloodshed on the streets of the country, reported India Today.

Speaking to the news organisation, Joy claimed that Hasina had decided to resign on August 3, but the protesters did not want a peaceful transition.

“She did not do anything wrong…she provided the best government in the country. She fought militancy with iron hands, she is done…She is 77 years old, she will spend time with her grandchildren now,” Joy told India Today.

Hasina, on Monday, resigned from the PM post and fled the country amid the violent anti-government protests in which at least 300 people, including policemen, died. Ending her 15-year rule, she arrived at Hindon Air Base in Uttar Pradesh’s Ghaziabad on a C-130 transport aircraft. Media reports suggested that she is expected to head to London later, where she may seek political asylum.

However, Joy clarified that the reports are not true, adding that no decision has been made on her further plans yet, reported India Today.

Shortly after Hasina left, Bangladesh Army chief Waker-Uz-Zaman announced that the military would form an interim government and pledged that all deaths and acts of injustice during the recent protests would be investigated by authorities.

Joy, however, expressed doubts over the army being able to normalise the situation.

“…Because right now what is happening is that the opposition and the militants, they are not only vandalising, they are also hunting out our leaders, former ministers and even what I hear, minorities. I don’t think the violence has ended,” he told NDTV.

Meanwhile, Bangladesh President Mohammed Shahabuddin announced the dissolution of the Parliament, which was formed after elections in January this year. He also ordered the release of prisoners from the protests, as well as former prime minister and key opposition leader Khaleda Zia – who was jailed by her arch-rival Hasina for graft in 2018.

On Monday, thousands of protesters continued to pour into and out of Hasina’s official residence, where they set fires, carried out furniture and pulled raw fish from the refrigerators. They also ransacked Hasina’s family’s ancestral home-turned-museum where her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman — the country’s first president and independence leader — was assassinated.

Reacting to this, Joy told NDTV that the same powers who killed his grandfather – the minorities that opposed the independence of Bangladesh – are using the current situation to deny and destroy their hard-fought struggle for freedom.