DHAKA: Ousted Bangladeshi lawmaker and cricketer Shakib Al Hasan was given permission on Wednesday to play a test series in Pakistan after the government of Hasina Wajid was toppled following massive protests.
Shakib, a former Bangladesh skipper, took office in January as a parliamentarian for ousted ex-premier Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League party after the elections staged without any opposition.
The cricketer lost his job last week when parliament was dissolved after Hasina resigned abruptly and fled to India by helicopter due to a student uprising.
One of the student leaders, Asif Mahmud, is now the sports minister in the interim government who allowed Shakib to play with the team.
“We presented the team before the sports adviser,” Iftekhar Ahmed, a director of the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB), told Western media. He noted that the cricket team should be formed on merit.
Mahmud was a key member of Students Against Discrimination, a protest group that held rallies to oust the former Bangladeshi prime minister.
He and fellow student leader Nahid Islam are both members of the interim cabinet led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus.
Shakib, 37, reached Lahore on Wednesday and is training at the Gaddafi Cricket Stadium. He joined the Bangladeshi cricket team straight from Canada, where he was playing in a Twenty20 competition.
After Hasina fled on August 5 many members of the Awami League party have gone into hiding.
