<div style="text-align: justify; "><b style="font-size: 1rem;">BNP has announced countrywide rally and procession programmes for January 16 to press home their 10-point demand and protest the government’s power price hike plan.</b><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir made the announcement from their party’s sit-in programme at Nayapaltan in Dhaka today.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He said the programme will be observed at all metropolitan cities, district towns, upazilas and municipality headquarters.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">BNP and other like-minded opposition parties, alliances, and organisations organised a sit-in programme today in the capital and other divisions of the county as part of the simultaneous movement against the government.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The programme began at 10 am and ended at 2 pm with the speech of Mirza Fakhrul.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">BNP arranged the four-hour programme with their 10-point demand, including holding the next polls under a non-party neutral government.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It is the second programme of the simultaneous movement after the mass procession by 33 opposition parties on December 30.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">BNP leaders said the programme was worked out for January 11, keeping in mind the political changeover that took place on that day in 2007 -- an episode popularly known as “1/11” in the country.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Earlier on December 30, BNP and 32 other like-minded opposition parties staged a mass procession in different parts of the capital and Rangpur city as the first programme of the simultaneous movement. UNB</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>