Sheikh Hasina, 76, quit as prime minister last Monday after a student-led uprising and fled by helicopter to India.
Her government was accused of widespread human rights abuses, including the extrajudicial killing of thousands of her political opponents during her 15-year tenure.
The military announced her resignation and then agreed to student demands that Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohamed Yunus, 84, lead a caretaker administration, charged with ending disorder and enacting democratic reforms.
However, Hasina’s son and former government adviser, US-based Sajeeb Wazed Joy, 53, criticised the interim government as “completely powerless” and composed of “figureheads”.
“Right now in Bangladesh, you have mob rule,” he told AFP in an interview from Washington.
He pointed to the ouster of top officials, including the chief justice, central bank governor and police chief, following protesters’ demands.
“If the mob tomorrow says, ‘no, we want this person in the interim government changed’, they will have to be changed,” he said.
Yunus has said that he wants elections “within a few months”, but Wazed warned of risks if they were delayed.
“It’s in their best interest to hold elections...to have a return to a legitimate government that has the legitimacy of the people and true authority,” he said. “Otherwise, it’s just going to devolve into chaos.”
Hasina swept January elections, but only after a poll denounced as neither free nor fair and boycotted by genuine rivals after a crackdown during which thousands of opposition party members were arrested.
Members of Hasina’s millions-strong Awami League have gone into hiding since she fled.
There have been reprisal attacks against them and party offices have been torched.
However, Wazed said the party is critical to the political future of the South Asian nation of some 170mn people.
“We have tens of millions of followers; they’re not going anywhere,” he said. “You’re not going to be able to establish democracy in Bangladesh without the Awami League.”
“It will never be accepted by half the people of the country at least,” he pointed out.
Former opposition groups such as the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) are rebuilding after years of repression, with the BNP having been holding a peaceful mass rally in Dhaka since last Monday.
“It’s going to be between the BNP and the Awami League,” Wazed said. “We need to work together.”
Wazed sought to divert blame for his mother’s ouster onto others in government.
“Were mistakes made? Of course,” he said. “They were made by people at the bottom, or in the chain of command...blaming my mother for it is unfortunate.”
While accepting that police officers who fired on protesters had gone too far, he argued that there was violence on both sides.
“Some of the police used excessive force but there were attacks on the police too – police members were killed as well. The violence wasn’t one-sided,” he said. “And then as it escalated further, the protesters started attacking police with firearms, weapons.”
More than 450 people were killed in the unrest leading up to Hasina’s fall – 42 of whom were police officers, according to the national police chief.
Wazed alleged that unidentified foreign forces had supported the protests, a claim for which he provided no evidence.
“I believe, at this point, it is from beyond Bangladesh,” he said. “Only an intelligence agency would have the capability of smuggling and supplying weapons to protesters.”
It is not clear what Hasina will do next.
Wazed offered his “gratitude to the government of Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi for saving her life and keeping her safe”.
It isn’t clear how long she will now stay in India but Wazed said that there “has been no such plans as of yet” of her moving to a third country.
“My mother never wanted to leave her country – her dream is to retire there,” he said, adding he spoke to her every day. “This was going to be her last term. She’s 76 years old. And so she just wants to go back home. Whether she’ll be able to, we’re waiting to see.”
Bangladesh’s new interim government has meanwhile said that it is working to resolve attacks on Hindus and other religious minorities reported after the dramatic ouster of premier Sheikh Hasina.
Hindus are the largest minority faith in mostly Muslim Bangladesh and are considered a steadfast support base for the Awami League.
After Hasina’s abrupt resignation and flight abroad on Monday brought an end to her 15 years of rule, there were numerous reports of attacks against Hindu households, temples and businesses.
“The attacks on religious minorities in some places have been noted with grave concern,” the interim cabinet said in its first official statement since its Thursday appointment.
The cabinet said it would “immediately sit with the representative bodies and other concerned groups to find ways to resolve such heinous attacks”.
Yesterday’s statement from the self-styled “council of advisers” tasked with steering democratic reforms in the South Asian nation of 170mn people listed numerous urgent priorities.
The government led by Nobel peace laureate Yunus, ordered “support” for the families of protesters who were killed in the weeks of demonstrations culminating in Hasina’s departure.
It directed public funds to pay for those injured in the unrest, which began in July and killed more than 450 people.
The council also said it would reopen the metro system in the capital Dhaka by the end of the week and soon appoint a new central bank governor, replacing a Hasina loyalist forced to resign.
Earlier in the day a new chief justice was sworn in to office the day after his predecessor, another Hasina ally accused of sublimating the Supreme Court to her government’s will, quit following protester demands.
It is the latest in a string of fresh appointments to replace an old guard viewed as linked to the previous regime, ousted by the student-led uprising.
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