Court bars GM Quader, wife from leaving country amid graft probe

A Dhaka court has imposed a travel ban on Jatiya Party leader GM Quader and his wife Sharifa Quader amid an Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) investigation into allegations of graft and money laundering.

The order was issued on Thursday in response to an ACC application, according to the agency’s spokesman Akhtarul Islam.

The graftbusters allege that Quader, who previously served as leader of the opposition in Parliament, benefitted from a Tk 181 million kickback after the 2018 general election in exchange for a nomination to a reserved women’s seat.

When part of the payment was not made, the then nominee, Prof Masuda M Rashid Chowdhury, was reportedly sidelined, and Sharifa was nominated and later became an MP in her place.

Investigators also allege that Quader fraudulently consolidated his control of the Jatiya Party and amassed large sums by selling party posts and nominations, with some of the proceeds laundered abroad.

The party’s central committee, meant to have 301 members, swelled to more than 600, which the ACC cited as evidence of “post trading”.

In his 2024 election affidavit, Quader declared nearly Tk 5 million in cash, Tk 3.6 million in bank deposits, and a luxury jeep valued at Tk 8.5 million. Sharifa’s assets included Tk 5.9 million in cash, Tk 2.8 million in the bank, a jeep worth Tk 8 million, and property holdings in Lalmonirhat and Dhaka.

The ACC is examining whether the family’s declared wealth reflects illicit gains.

Quader, the younger brother of former Jatiya Party chairman and military ruler HM Ershad, has been a fixture in Bangladeshi politics since first entering Parliament in 1996.

He has served in cabinet posts, including as commerce and civil aviation and tourism minister in the Awami League government, between 2009 and 2014, and assumed leadership of the Jatiya Party after Ershad’s death in 2019.

The travel ban comes at a time when Quader is already grappling with internal strife in the Jatiya Party, where factional feuds and legal challenges have repeatedly threatened his authority as chairman.

A court injunction in July temporarily stripped him of party authority following mass expulsions of senior figures, including Anisul Islam Mahmud, ABM Ruhul Amin Howlader, and Mujibul Haque Chunnu. That injunction was lifted in August after one of the plaintiffs withdrew the case.