Saifur says he is ready to resign for unity

Dhaka, Feb 7 (bdprem.com) – Senior BNP leader M Saifur Rahman Thursday said he would resign from any post of the BNP for the sake of unity in the party, now cleaved by infighting over leadership. "I'll resign from any post including the post of acting chairman to unite the party under the leadership of Khaleda Zia," Saifur said in an interview with Voice of America. Your Ad Here "I received Begum Zia's message and responded to her call for unity," he said. The former finance minister claimed that there was no conflict over leadership in his party and said: "I'm ready to sacrifice everything for unity." "I spoke to many colleagues after receiving the message (from Khaleda) and received positive responses about unity," Rahman said. "I want to say Khaleda Zia is the leader of the BNP. There is no question about it. We wanted reforms to the party to make it more democratic and our leader endorsed it. Khaleda Zia reformed the party in the past as well. There is no misunderstanding over it," he said. Rahman said he was "saddened" by a lack of response from Khandaker Delwar Hossain, disputed secretary general, nominated by Khaleda for the troubled party. But the former minister said Rizvi Ahmed, acting office secretary of the BNP nominated by Delwar Hossain, went to his home and talked one and a half hours about broader efforts to hold the party together. "We had talks on unity." In a message carried through by her lawyer Barrister Mahbub Uddin Khokon on Dec 1, Khaleda asked party leaders to unite and bring the party back from the brink of collapse. On Oct 29, the BNP standing committee had a meeting at Rahman's home and made him acting chairman of the party. Retired major Hafizuddin Ahmed was made acting secretary general in a move which ran into opposition from the faction led by Khandaker Delwar.