Bravo for the stance, but implement it
RECENTLY, many of us saw the bold stand by the minister for works and housing and the Rajuk chairman against land grabbers, encroachers, and owners of illegal structures. When we are used to seeing the bullies and godfathers silencing everybody with money, muscle, and power, these messages of firmness are a welcomed change in a culture of impunity.
Year after year, we have read article after article on these unscrupulous businessmen who have treated the land of Bangladesh like their paternal property. They can occupy, evict, grab, demolish, and build whatever they desire with the aid of a section of corrupt government officials and law enforcers. With their sinful acts, and no respect for rule of law, they have proven that they are beyond the law or accountability.
There are countless stories of people who are either poor and weak or honest and helpless, who have lost their properties and even lives to these pirates of both the land and the water. These merciless gangsters have been thriving on the misery of common people for long. From choking up the much needed water bodies through illegal occupation, from cheating people through fraudulent transactions to unauthorised construction, from using ill gotten money for so called industrial ventures to using media as a means to harass people who stand in their way, these people are a social menace and disgrace to the community. Yet, many of us choose to pretend ignorance or, as the saying goes, "where money speaks, truth is silent."
From some unscrupulous lawyers who can sell their conscience for a couple of extra bucks to some intellectuals, and journalists who don't mind being in their payroll while preaching idealism to the nation in different forums, seminars, and talk-shows, the land grabbers have managed to buy almost everyone who serves their evil design.
We, the ordinary citizens, are a silent witness to this orgy of plunder, loot, and theft as those who could have done something have hardly done anything, Money and power have managed to wrestle their way into a system where honesty and courage are mostly penalised instead of being rewarded.
Against such a depressing background, at least some people have stood up for the rule of law and prevalence of justice, and they deserve all the support we can provide. If nothing else, let's lend them our moral support by boycotting land, apartments, properties, products, goods, services that come from those nefarious and wicked sources. The housing minister already has pleaded for such support, and he deserves it from us in his defiant stand against the organised and largely entrenched criminals.
How long can we afford to be passive and silent when we are losing rivers to the greed of the land sharks, when public roads become narrow alleys due to their encroachment, when there is no parking space due to violation of building code and resulting traffic mess, when small landowners surrender their precious land after being encircled by this mafia, when speaking against them is called yellow journalism. It has to end somewhere and now is the time, and each of us has a role to play in his/her own small way.
The housing minister and the Rajuk chairman have taken a praiseworthy and bold stand. Both of them have publicly stated their willingness to see the end of it in a game which we all know entails high risk in all possible forms. While we criticise corrupt officials, it is also important that we, the citizens, stand by those who have publicly demonstrated their commitment to be firm in their resolve to uphold the laws of the land.
Under normal circumstances, tolerance is a virtue. However, if we are tolerant to acts which endanger the very existence of the city we live in, the air we breathe, the water we drink, the road we walk on, the greenery we cherish it is no longer a virtue, it is a sin. Let's each of us do his/her part by being united in our support to public representatives and officials who have shown the courage to defy the godfathers.
Let's boycott goods and services of those whose money comes out of people's misery and nature's tears. If we don't, then the day is not too far away when the ground below our feet will also shrink. Let each of us come forward and speak aloud instead of being either bought or cowered. We Bangladeshis are courageous people. Let's prove it in our acts, no matter how small or big, and save the land and the country from the goons and thugs.
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