Dhaka: Jatiya Party chairman HM Ershad has argued that his presidency was legal and he will always be regarded as a former president of Bangladesh.

Ershad’s remark came as a response to a recent comment of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina who on 26 November at a meeting with Awami League leaders at Ganabhaban, her official residence, said that both Ziaur Rahman and Ershad grabbed power illegally and, thus they couldn’t be addressed as former presidents.

‘I was a president, I will be (regarded as a former) a president,’ Ershad said on Monday while talking to the journalists at his Rangpur residence. Ershad said he was a legal president in power from 1986 to 1990.

‘I don’t know why the prime minister said so. She put me and Zia in the same bracket. Zia and I are not same, this statement is not legally right,’ Ershad said.

The Jatiya Party chief will visit his ancestral home which is located at Cooch Behar district in the Indian State of West Bengal. He expected set off for the five-day visit on Tuesday.