BNP has finally decided to boycott the forthcoming Upazilla election set to be held starting May 8. The party took this decision only after the deadline to submit nomination papers for the 150 upazila elections to take place in the first phase that ended Monday night.

In the end, BNP stands firmly with its position of boycotting any election under this regime and termed those a farce. It is obvious but the decision was not easy to take, considering the party’s strong stance ahead of the national election in January.

The outright rejection of the above-mentioned election brought huge moral success and people showed their strong disapproval of the regime by not participating in it. However, the pressure groups from home and abroad failed to exert enough influence to stop the regime and after a couple of months the political situation cooled off.

Unfortunately, engineering another election made the regime even bolder and probably more confident. Now they know even the foreign powers could not stop it and they have all sorts of apparatus to suppress opposition activists and people.

Already thousands of BNP activists are facing legal hassles. Many of them are jailed and thousands are on the run. There is ample pressure on local leaders to take part in the election so that the regime may legalise it morally. Withstanding these pressures are not easy especially after the setback in the national election.

However, BNP decided to stay firm. The big question is: what’s next? How long can they resist?

It is already proved that the foreign powers will not come to salvage the democracy of the country and the domestic civil society does not seem eager to do so. The only real force is the hapless people and, however cliché it may sound, the only way is to unite them as an effective force.

The next step of the election boycott is boycotting the regime and its supporters at home and abroad. In the era of surveillance capitalism, it will be tougher to get on the street and thwart an unlawful regime. But that is in fact a far cry. BNP has been staying firmly on their ground, now it is time to get further.

The road ahead is extremely difficult, but that must be faced with courage and intelligence and only a firm stance would not be enough.

The Boxer: The author is one of the indefatigable working-class Bangladeshis who have been trying to change the fate of the nation but were betrayed by the ruling elites and autocrats. The name is inspired by a character in George Orwell's 1945 novel Animal Farm.