DHAKA, Jan 16, 2024 (BSS) - Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina today said BNP did not participate in the January 7 election in fear of defeat and has been searching for dark ways to assume power being rejected by the people time and again.

"They know they are boycotted by the people. That is why, they don't want to take part in the election. So, they are searching for different ways to go to regain power by destroying the electoral process. They are now looking for the ways of darkness bypassing the path of light which is election," she said.

The Prime Minister was addressing expatriate Awami League leaders and activists at her official Ganabhaban residence here.

Sheikh Hasina asked the expatriates to stay alert against conspiracies saying that the plots are still being hatched.

"They (BNP-Jamaat clique) are now demanding to cancel the election," she said.

Referring to 2008 parliamentary election, the premier said the BNP-Jamaat alliance got only 30 seats while the AL alone bagged 233 seats.

"Since then, they don't want any election. They have been setting fire on buses, launches, trains and burning people to death. The more they do terrorist activities and arson violence, the more the people reject them," she said.

Sheikh Hasina came down heavily on the BNP as they have been doing politics with their party office.

"They lock their office and then unlock it. They have lost the keys of their office and ways also and they are now becoming pedestrians of the lost way," she said.

BNP has one virtue and that is arson terrorism, she said.

The premier said BNP are skilled to create trap to kill people referring to withdraw fishplates of the railway track in which several persons were killed.

She said the BNP had distributed leaflets among the people urging people to boycott the election alongside with conducting the violence.

But, the people have casted their balloting spontaneously rejecting their plea to not going to polling centres.

"Not only this time (January 7 election), the people have rejected them time and again. They did not take part in the election fearing to lose," she said.

The Prime Minister thanked the people as they voted spontaneously and sent her party to power again.

She continued participation of women in large numbers in the election a great achievement of the AL awareness campaign to make people understand that casting votes is their constitutional and civic rights.

In this connection, she mentioned that a 130-year-old woman exercise her voting franchise in the January 7 election.

Quoting the old women, she said, "I want to vote Hasina."

She continued: "Getting the trust and confidence of the people in me is my great achievement."

The premier said the victory of Awami League in the election is the victory of the people and democracy as well.

"The victory is also the victory of continuation of the democracy and continuation of the development," she said.

They have realized that the government is the servant of the people after Awami League assumed power, she said.

"I will work as a public servant not as a Prime Minister to change the fate of the people being a daughter of the Father of the Nation," she said.

She said there is no scarcity of food, reached electricity to every house and transformed Bangladesh into a digital Bangladesh since the Awami League had been in power in the last 15 years.

Now, the people of Bangladesh want more developed and improved life.

"We will turn Bangladesh into a poverty and hunger free developed and prosperous Bangladesh by 2041 in the spirit of the Liberation War as envisioned by the Father of the Nation," she said.

The Prime Minister recalled with due respect the contribution of the expatriates in each of the democratic and progressive movement and in building the nation

She said the expatriates played great role in forming public opinions in favour of independent Bangladesh during the War of Liberation in 1971.

"I thank you all as the remittance you send to Bangladesh is the main driving force of our economy," she said.

The premier urged the all Bangladeshi expats to take part in the universal pension scheme to secure their future.

Later, as many as expatriate Awami League leaders and activists from 29 countries that included the USA, the UK and Italy greeted their party chief Sheikh Hasina on her reelection as the Prime Minister for a record fifth term and fourth in a row.