A watershed verdict: The victors' challenges
Time to deliver. Photo: Quddusalam/ Driknews
ON election night, I happened to be in a remote town in the southwest of Yunnan province in China for a conference on education for rural areas and ethnic minorities. As I kept awake late into the night tracking the election results on the internet, a Chinese friend wistfully wondered if it would take a hundred years for China to experience the excitement and suspense of a multiparty election. In the previous days I had the opportunity to observe the magnificent development of the city of Pu-er, the capital of the prefecture in Yunnan with the same name, under the leadership of its slim and attractive mayor, Ding Yanbo, a former professor of philosophy at the local teachers' college. The mayor, a Communist Party member, duly elected and re-elected through the party, during her tenure of over eight years, has presided over the spectacular progress of Pu-er and the surrounding areas. This is symbolised by wide boulevards, dozens of multi-storey housing projects, new schools and hospitals, brightly coloured shop-fronts, and investment and business deals taking advantage of the location of the prefecture on the borders of Laos, Myanmar, and Vietnam. The wide authority given to the local government to mobilise resources and plan investments has been an important factor. We had traveled during the day on the new 100 km, four-lane toll road with numerous tunnels and bridges to traverse the mountainous terrain between Pu-er and Xishuangbanna in this remote corner of Yunnan. I ruefully thought of the absence of a decent highway that could connect the capital with the principal port city in my country. I kept to myself my ambivalence about the brand of democracy practiced so far and how poorly it has served my country. The ninth parliamentary election gave a stunning victory to the grand coalition, especially the Awami League, which alone commands two-thirds majority. The voters clearly rejected the political ideology of the four-party coalition as it was practiced during their rule in the recent past. This must not, however, be seen as a vindication of the past style and substance of Awami League politics in the government and in the opposition. The voters remembered the miscarriage of democracy under the four-party coalition that led to the imposition of the army-backed emergency rule for two years. Voters remembered that the country was spared only by the interregnum of emergency, brought about by a combination of kleptocracy of the Tarique-Babar-Hawa Bhaban clique and ruthless political exploitation of religion by identified war criminals. The voters also saw that there was no hint of contrition in the four-party coalition; rather only a condemnation of the caretaker government for spoiling the game-plan for staged election on January 22, 2007. The false cries of "sovereignty under threat" and "Islam in danger" clearly had no appeal to the voters. A partnership with known anti-liberation forces and alleged prominent perpetrators of war crime in total disregard of popular concerns, especially in the month of remembrance of the killing of intellectuals and the victory day, did not sit well with voters. The overwhelming support to the Awami League-led grand coalition indicated that voters preferred to repose their trust on the positive and forward-looking position of the grand coalition. This position is reflected in the recognition in its election pledge of the need to bring about change in the political culture, time-bound goals to address critical economic and national development problems, its realistic assessment of the caretaker government record, and the assurance to protect the reforms initiated by it. The scale of support to the grand coalition, enabling it to bring about constitutional changes, offers it the challenge and the responsibility to consider changes that would strengthen democratic institutions and practices. More specifically, failings of the parliament, governance and democratic institutions, including the functioning of the judiciary and statutory bodies, point to glaring limitations of the constitution. Previous military rulers at various points altered the constitution at will, undermining its fundamental spirit. But the magnitude of voter support can be seen as the expectation of the citizenry about necessary reforms in fundamental laws and institutions of the country. With the trust and confidence of the people reposed so unambiguously on the grand coalition, it now has the opportunity and the responsibility to make the election a watershed in the development of democracy in Bangladesh.
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