Word: sattar
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...months the question in Bangladesh was not if, but when, the military would seize power again. Ever since he was elected last November, President Abdus Sattar, 76, a former justice of the supreme court, had resisted demands by the military for power in his government. Last week, in a predawn coup, Lieut. General Hossain Mohammed Ershad, 52, army chief of staff, ousted Sattar and in stalled himself as strongman. "I have no political ambition," the general asserted in a radio and television broadcast announcing the takeover. "My whole and sole aim is to re-establish democracy...
...rule ended abruptly when Sheik Mujibur Rahman, who led the independence movement and subsequently became the country's first elected Prime Minister, was assassinated in 1975. In a trio of coups, Lieut. General Mohammed Ziaur Rahman emerged as strongman, only to be assassinated by junior officers last May. Sattar, who was then Vice President, became acting President and led the country into elections...
...Sattar had been the generals' hand-picked candidate. But after the election, Sattar resisted the military's attempts to have an active role in government. In February he was forced by the generals to dissolve his Cabinet and name ministers more acceptable to the army. On the day before the takeover, Sattar again angered Ershad by swearing in a civilian as Vice President-a defiant move that led Ershad to seize power himself. "Sattar is an honorable man," the general said, "but he couldn't supply the leadership...
...assassination of the popular leader, who had retired from the military in 1977 in order to take office as President and lead Bangladesh back to civilian rule, left a power vacuum in the poverty-stricken country that acting President Abdus Sattar, 75, a mild-mannered moderate, was not likely to fill for long...
Manjur's confident proclamation of a coup seemed premature. The official Bangladesh radio in the capital of Dacca assured the country's 90 million people that the government was safely in the hands of Vice President Abdus Sattar. The government declared a state of emergency and called upon the rebels to surrender. Moreover, stressed the state radio, all international agreements remained in force...