In a blistering YouTube monologue that has ignited fresh outrage across Bangladesh’s polarised political landscape, veteran journalist Masood Kamal unleashed a torrent of criticism against the interim government led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus.
Labelling the administration’s covert push to lease key national ports to foreign entities as an “evil agenda to sell off the country,” Kamal vowed unyielding resistance, declaring to drive out the looters poised to implement their fourth agenda—handing over the country’s resources to foreigners.
Kamal’s podcast on his channel “Kotha,” uploaded on Wednesday after the controversial signing of two long-term port deals, has amassed over a million views, fueling protests from dockworkers to political heavyweights. Speaking with raw fury, the seasoned broadcaster dissected the government’s much-touted “three goals”—trials, reforms, and elections—before exposing what he called the unspoken “fourth agenda”: a systematic surrender of strategic assets to foreign powers, ostensibly Yunus’s “foreign friends” with dual citizenships in the US, UK, Switzerland, and the Netherlands.
“If you ask any important person in this government who is performing an important duty, ‘What is your main goal?’ then, starting from the head of government to his advisors and spokespersons, everyone will give the same answer,” Kamal began, his voice laced with sarcasm. “They will talk about three goals. Those three goals are—first, trial; second, reform; and third, election. They have been saying these things repeatedly.”
Dismissing the first as a “visible” spectacle with disastrous fallout, Kamal lambasted the trials for Sheikh Hasina’s regime: “The first trial that is being talked about has become fairly visible. They wanted to make the trial visible, and they did. But what has been the result of this trial? You have pretty much felt the chaos that is happening in the country around this trial, what international human rights organisations are evaluating it, and how much Bangladesh’s global reputation has increased or decreased due to that evaluation—all these things. Nowadays, everyone knows about online open media. But I have not yet received any protest or explanation from the government about the comments made by international human rights organisations. So I assume that the government has silently accepted it.”
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On reforms, his tone turned mocking: “Secondly, reform. You know very well how much of a mess the situation has been with the reforms. There has been a lot of discussion, criticism and laughter about what reforms have been made, how they have been made, what the path to implementing the reforms will be, and whether it will go to a referendum or something else. If someone wants to make themselves a laughingstock, then what can I or you do?”
Elections, the third pillar, drew a divine shrug: “The third agenda is the election. The chief advisor said, ‘We will hold the best election in history.’ Only God knows what will happen with the first two, what will happen with the third.”
But it was the “fourth” that provoked Kamal’s deepest ire—a blueprint, he alleged, for Yunus and his circle of expatriate advisors to auction off Bangladesh’s sovereignty. “But today I want to discuss their fourth agenda. You will say, ‘Where did you get the fourth agenda again?’ They did not say it verbally, but we can see it in action,” he thundered, drawing parallels to the ousted Awami League’s subservience to India. “We used to say to the previous government that they have become slaves of India, they have given India a lot. Even the previous head of government himself said, ‘What India did not want, we have given it.’ Are we honoured by saying this? A foreign minister once said, ‘Our relationship with India is like that of a husband and wife.’ That was right, because not everything about a husband and wife’s relationship can be revealed. But what is happening now is much more public and much more worrying.”
Kamal zeroed in on two deals inked on November 17—the very day a court verdict against Hasina triggered nationwide security deployments—handing over Chittagong’s Laldia Container Terminal to Denmark’s APM Terminals for 30 years and Dhaka’s Pangaon Inland Container Terminal to Switzerland’s Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) for 22 years. A third looms: the New Mooring Container Terminal (NCT) in Chittagong, eyed by UAE’s DP World, with a signing slated for December.
“A government that has no mandate from the public, whose term can be a maximum of 18-24 months, is signing contracts for 22-30 years. Do they have the authority to sign these contracts? Has there been any international tender? Does anyone know what the terms of the contract are, except Ashiq Chowdhury and Dr. Yunus? Were these ports running at a loss before? So why should they be given to foreigners?” Kamal raged, questioning the opacity and national security risks.
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“By next December, an agreement is going to be signed to give the New Mooring Container Terminal (NCT) in Chittagong to another foreign company. Almost all political parties have protested against it, but the government, greedy for elections, is keeping everyone busy and getting its work done.”
“This is not just a question of business; it is a question of national security. What will come in and go out through this terminal, and who will control it? Weapons can come in, and intelligence information can go out. What happened to saying ‘the best company in the world’? Whatever is best for me will be useful to me—be it a bus or a Rolls-Royce,” he added, evoking everyday pragmatism amid elite abstractions.
Kamal’s broadside extends to the advisors’ loyalties: “Many of this government’s advisors have dual citizenship—America, Britain, Switzerland, the Netherlands. By what right are they handing over the resources of a country that they themselves did not consider worthy of living in to foreigners?”
His resolve crystallised in a call to arms: “We can run our port ourselves. If necessary, we will bring in skilled people through open competition, but not outside the interests of the country.”
The video arrives amid escalating domestic and geopolitical tensions. Dockworkers at Chittagong Port launched a hunger strike and nationwide protests last week, led by the Chittagong Port Shramik Union and the Communist Party of Bangladesh (CPB), decrying the leases as a “sovereign surrender.”
A torchlit procession in Chittagong on November 18, organised by the Bandar Rokkha Parishad, drew hundreds chanting against “foreign looting.” BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami leaders have echoed these sentiments, with the former demanding parliamentary scrutiny.
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Army Chief General Waker-Uz-Zaman, a pivotal figure in the post-Hasina transition, has amplified these alarms. In a May 2025 address, he rejected interim policy overreaches like port corridors and leases, insisting, “Corridor, ports and other policy-related decisions will be taken by a political [read elected] government,” and warning of threats to “national sovereignty.” Last week, he reiterated calls for elections by December 2025, amid rifts with Yunus’s camp.
Exiled former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, from her Indian refuge, has long framed her August 2024 ouster as US-orchestrated retribution. In recent interviews, she claimed, “I could have remained in power if I had left St. Martin and the Bay of Bengal to America,” alleging Washington demanded basing rights on the strategic island and that she quit to avert a “procession of dead bodies” after refusing to appease US interests.
Her narrative resonates as US military footprints deepen under Yunus: joint exercises in Chittagong since September, troop surges, and a “secret pact” rumour mill suggesting tariff concessions for sovereignty concessions. Critics decry it as “America has no permanent friends or enemies, only interests.”
Beijing, Bangladesh’s top trading partner, watches warily. Yunus’s March 2025 China visit secured billions in aid, but port deals with US-linked firms like DP World have sparked uneasiness, with state media hinting at a “strategic nexus or sovereign surrender.” Analysts note Dhaka’s pivot risks alienating China, especially as Yunus’s overtures—boasting of Northeast India’s “separatist sentiments” in Beijing—stir regional fault lines.
Complicating the chessboard, a Russian Navy corvette, Gremyashchy, docked in Chittagong on November 17 for a five-day goodwill visit, coinciding with the port deals. This comes amid surging Pakistan-Bangladesh ties: Islamabad’s Navy Chief Admiral Naveed Ashraf’s landmark Dhaka visit last week, a direct cargo ship from Karachi—the first since 1971—and fresh PIA-Biman cargo pacts. “Old rivals, new currents,” as one analyst quipped, signaling Islamabad’s play in the Bay of Bengal power vacuum.
A High Court writ challenging the NCT deal heard arguments on November 18, with another session today; Attorney General AG Mahmoodul Islam assured no progress pre-verdict. Kamal closed optimistically: “The good news is that a writ has already been filed in the High Court regarding the New Mooring Container Terminal agreement. A hearing was held today and will be held tomorrow (Thursday). The Attorney General has said that there will be no progress before the verdict. We hope that our patriotic court will rule in favour of the country.”
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