Four years of achievements and failures

We do not know as yet as to what our major political parties are thinking about the looming danger of establishing say, a Taliban type regime in Bangladesh. They must realise that if they continue to fight only to capture power ignoring the danger from the Islamist militants they may not find enough time to lament for their lapse in future.

The BNP-led alliance government has completed four years of their rule. Surprisingly, instead of showing any regret for their huge failures to fulfil their major election pledges like rooting out corruption, improving law and order situation or separation of judiciary from executive they are out to make the people believe that their stay in power for four years was a whacking success. Frankly speaking, no neutral person will hesitate to state that the present regime's performance happens to be worse. In fact one may be prompted to say "Seleukas, this is a strange land" because this country was established through war of independence and run by a bureaucracy which is more than 150-year-old to assist a democratically elected government, but cannot perform even minimum functions of the state properly and effectively because of poor governance by politicians who however loudly proclaim about success.

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For an independent land it is indeed regrettable that allegedly anti-liberation, anti-democratic forces are having best of their time. The heavily politicised corrupt, inefficient, demoralised and bankrupt administration is no match for highly organised Islamist militants who reportedly are regularly receiving various support from some Islamic countries.

The present situation appears to be worse than 1971 in some respects. In 1971 we were fighting against our exploiters. Now we are fighting against a force which may drag us a few centuries back. The conscious citizens of Bangladesh will have to decide as to whether they are ready to sacrifice to save their future generation from the vicious bite of the so-called fundamentalists. In India Advani's all out support to Narendra Modi despite his massacre of Muslims in Gujarat is regarded as the only reason for the loss of power by NDA led by BJP. In fact it was the RSS which resulted in the weakening of BJP.

The people of India, because of their better political perception, better leadership and much longer democratic tradition gave their verdict against fundamentalists. The situation is not similar in Bangladesh because of lower political perception, lower literacy and much shorter duration of democratic tradition as well as lack of proper political leadership. Our moderate Muslim population must realise that vast majority of our rural mass are not only poor they are also highly illiterate and as such they want to surrender everything to the will of the Almighty. They actually think that madrasa educated people can help them in improving their lot because God may be nearer to them (mullahs). They believe that all their sufferings may end if the administration can be run on Islamic line. Because of their illiteracy they fail to understand that wealth cannot come from heaven, it must be earned.

In the election campaign of Awami League in late 1960s, it is alleged that it was stated that rice would be available @ Tk 20/maund if independence could be attained. In reality (naturally enough) we saw a totally different picture after liberation. Thus people's faith in politicians started diminishing. In the present situation the common people of Bangladesh must be made aware about the happenings in Afghanistan during Taleban regime. They must know as to how women were treated there, what was the state of economy, how non-Talebans were seen by the government, how the cultural life was systematically and gradually destroyed to drag Afghanistan a few centuries back. Without visual illustration it may be difficult to convince the illiterate and gullible villagers about the heinous activities of the militants. This can only be done by the government. But can it be done by this alliance government?

Without women's adequate participation in all developmental activities no real progress is possible. It is well-known that our NGOs are doing excellent job through helping the poor rural women to improve their financial and social positions in the society. Thus BNP-led government should extend unhesitating support to the NGOs for the benefit of the nation. Attacks on NGOs such as Proshika or Aarong etc. must be stopped for improving its image. It is time for BNP to realise that as the largest party it must not be afraid of losing support of Jamaat-e-Islami when the question of its ideology comes. With nearing of national election it would be desirable to show their ability to face the serious problems like corruption, law and order, freeing administration from politicisation, handling the problems of judiciary. Simply finding faults with Awami League or claiming false successes will certainly not improve the image of BNP.

During the last four years we see some minor successes of this government like reducing air pollution on the streets of Dhaka, control of adulteration of food, reducing copying in examination halls by the students, increasing remittances by expatriate Bangladeshi wage earners. In completing the projects like some important bridges, or some flyovers etc it cannot claim sole credit. Even new projects of ministry of communication appear to be too ambitious and as such do not appear to have any possibility of their start during the remaining tenure of this government. Law minister has clearly stated about no possibility of separation of judiciary from the executive. We are not sure about the start of operation of ACC. The less said about energy sector's performance the better. The justification of having a ministry of foreign affairs is becoming increasingly weaker. Except an attempt to reduce adulteration in food items ministry of industries cannot claim much credit. In regard to ministry/commerce we do not see anything as such praiseworthy. If any credit is to be given for spectacular growth of export against various odds it should go to the private sector.

The crux of the matter is that BNP made too many commitments in the election of 2001 to capture votes. Many of its commitments could not be fulfilled either because of its wrong assessment of its capability or bureaucracy's capability or sheer lack of sincerity or both. So long as the government fails to show some appreciable success in curbing corruption in administration, in improving law and order (extra judicial killing is no success) sheer propaganda not backed by factual strength can never be effective. Let the alliance government not follow the example of Gen Ayub's decade of development (1958-68) which compelled the powerful dictator like Ayub to abdicate. It is a fact that too many failures in a tenure of a party in power may cause it to suffer a long negative effect. If they realise that mere drum beating cannot bring them good result it would be helpful for them and the people of Bangladesh.

ABMS Zahur is a retired Joint Secretary.