ABSTRACT
When Khondakar Mushtaque Ahmed and General Ziaur Rahman took power, there was general relief and a widespread belief that things under Sheikh Mujibur Rahman had been so bad and the November 1975 coups so violent that there was a justification for change. Vice president Justice Abdus Sattar, unlike General Hussain Muhammad Ershad and Zia in 1975, had been legitimately elected president; Ershad was a usurper who had overruled the people's democratic expression. Ershad justified his action, which most but not all of the military supported, in terms reminiscent of many a military coup. Ershad had declared earlier, on July 8, 1983, that a program of local elections at the union council, municipal corporation, and upazilla levels would be completed by March 24, 1984. This announcement came after a hartal (general strike) against martial law on November 1 and just before a twelve-day demonstration scheduled to begin on November 16.
