Bangladesh SC grants bail to former PM Khaleda Zia in corruption case
- by Jerome Frank
- in World News
- — May 17, 2018
Bangladesh's Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered the release from detention of 72-year-old opposition leader Khaleda Zia after her lawyers argued she was unwell.
On May 9 last, a four-member Appellate Division bench, led by the Chief Justice, fixed Tuesday for delivering the order after closing a two-day hearing on the two petitions.
The Supreme Court had earlier suspended the lower court's decision to grant Zia bail, prompting her Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) to condemn the move as part of a campaign by Hasina to silence the opposition ahead of a looming national election.
Mahbubey Alam added that the HC could hear and dispose of the appeal filed by Khaleda challenging the trial court verdict that sentenced her to five years' imprisonment in this case.
She was then sent to old central jail at Nazimuddin Road in the city, where she is the only inmate.
The ACC had filed the case on July 3, 2008, against Khaleda, her son Tarique, and four others for misappropriating Tk2.1 crore from the trust fund.
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They had also said that Zia challenged her conviction in the High Court and "let her get acquitted there", but now she did not deserve the bail for her sickness as the medical board, which had examined her, had not recommended that she be hospitalised, which could have been the ground for her bail.
Dhaka Special Judge Court-5 on February 8 convicted Khaleda Zia and five others in Zia Orphanage Trust graft case.
He hoped that the High Court will soon start hearing on the petition.
The 72-year-old Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) chairperson was jailed for five years on February 8 over the embezzlement of 21 million taka (about United States dollars 250,000) in foreign donations meant for the Zia Orphanage Trust, named after her husband late Ziaur Rahman, a military ruler-turned-politician.
On March 19, the Appellate Division stayed Khaleda's bail until May 8 in the graft case in which she was convicted by the lower court.
