Strength or Humility? Time to Change Caretaking Approach
Contributed by Gopal Sengupta
Source: The Progressive Bangladesh
February 21, 2008
Bangladesh's caretaker government and its military mentors have indeed done some notable work. The first is bringing charges against certain powerful people, who used to be perceived as being above the law, though one cannot say that the ways of detaining them were adequately lawful.
Then, of course, they have had such vital institutions of the state as the Election Commission, Anti-Corruption Commission and the Public Service Commission reconstituted. Importantly still, they have completed, albeit on paper, the separation of the judiciary from the executive.
Paper vs. reality
Regrettably, the initiatives, however well-intentioned they may be, have thus far yielded hardly any positive results. One need not be a legal expert to understand that the judiciary is still very much under the executive's control. Also, the reconstituted Election Commission, which is ordained and expected to create a level playing field for credible and contested elections to the ninth Jatiya Sangsad, is perceived by many quarters to be pursuing an agenda of complicating the political process.
Finally, the less said about the government's anti-crime and anti-corruption drives, the better. With the High Court's recent judgement, it is now time for the powers that be to ponder the legality and constitutionality of many of the measures they have undertaken in respect to the prosecution of a whole class of individuals. Emergency or not, how can the government bring a case on charges stemming from crimes allegedly committed many years ago under the purview of rules put in place a mere year ago?
The High Court steps in valiantly
In a landmark judgment recently, the High Court in Bangladesh quashed all trial proceedings of an extortion case against Sheikh Hasina, a former Prime Minister. The High Court observed that the sections of the emergency laws curtailing the court jurisdiction to grant bail to the accused persons were ultra vires of the constitution.
The High Court has delivered what the general public would consider an obvious judgment. The Court has indeed upheld a simple legal point that no law covers any offence committed before its enactment. But equally important, the Court has hammered in a reality check and a lesson in humility to the arrogance of the current government.
The wide-ranging implications of the judgment are not hard to see. The accused could have been tried under the existing laws of the country without creating any controversy. We cannot but question the wisdom of the government’s legal advisers who clearly failed to see in advance the weaknesses and limitations of applying emergency laws that they themselves wrote, when the existing laws could have taken care of the corruption cases. The lesson to be learnt from it is that any short-sighted attempt to take a shortcut in a legal matter might backfire and undermine the whole edifice of the justice system.
Losing steam
So the unprecedented anti-graft crackdown by military-led caretaker government (CTG) is gradually losing impetus. Aside from legal shortsightedness, numerous difficulties, including frequent shift in priorities, have made the drive too complex.
Although the drive succeeded in creating an impression that no one is above the law, valid questions were raised about different issues including discrimination in targeting corruption suspects, preparing quality graft cases, and the role of the National Coordination Committee to Combat Corruption and Serious Crimes (NCC) in dealing with other serious crimes.
Taskforce sources said there were discussions among themselves about a trend of discrimination in targeting graft suspects since many influential persons widely known as corrupt still remain out of the dragnet, while others are allegedly targeted for political reasons. This has resulted in a decline in public faith in the ongoing anti-graft drives, and in a permeating sense of frustration among the taskforce personnel.
Moreover, NCC added a new dimension to the drive by bringing into its focus institutional graft, targeting around seven institutions in the first phase, while leaving widely known corrupt institutions and sectors like local government and rural development (LGRD), local government engineering department (LGED), agriculture, and education still untouched. Also The task force sources said that fearing an adverse reaction in the bureaucratic apparatus they could not even proceed to file many graft charges. There are other questions as well, notably those relating to the grant of bail to detained individuals. To what extent prosecution lawyers' appeals against bails granted to detained political figures amount to an upholding of the law is an issue that must now be broadly assessed within the corridors of the administration.
The arrogance of applying laws at gunpoint
It is not just surprising, but mind-boggling as well, knowing that the legal luminaries of the government, of the Anti-Corruption Commission, did not know what people around the country already knew. The recent High Court judgment has simply put paid to a case pursued in a shoddy, unthinking manner. The government must understand that taking a shortcut in legal matters can boomerang. If so, when the state of emergency is withdrawn, even the genuine offenders may well rush to higher courts and get themselves acquitted of the charges brought against them.
Moreover, the manner in which the interim government has employed the army-led joint forces in its anti-crime and anticorruption drives has induced a climate of fear in the business community, which, in turn, has resulted in a sharp decline in investment and business activities, and concomitant fall in export and loss of employment.
All along, the prices of essential commodities have spiralled out of the reach of even the middle-income people. Last but not least, amid all these, the interim government has failed to deliver on its primary mandate, i.e., help the Election Commission hold the stalled general elections within the 90-day constitutional timeframe. Ultimately, the 'good' work of the government and its military mentors seems to have landed the country in a larger economic and political mess than it was in before the incumbents took over the helm of the state.
Bring back humility
The qualities of the present caretaker government -- authority, fortitude, heroism -- sound like the qualities of an autocrat. At this time, Bangladesh needs a leader with not strength and arrogance, but the humility to admit that the country is on the wrong course. Institution after institution have failed Bangladesh -- the presidency, caretaker government and the judiciary. They all endorsed a war to rid Bangladesh of different things like corruption, while trying to keep the same spoils for themselves.
Many reform critics are no different, who are so hyped on their own sanctimony that they will obliterate distinctions, punishing their friends for apostasy and, by so doing, aiding their enemies. If that's going to be the case, then Bangladesh is in a war its critics will lose twice -- once because they couldn't stop it and again at the polls and in handing over power to another group after having caused further damage to institutions, accountability, and transparency.
Monday, March 10, 2008
US terms Huji as foreign terrorist outfit
US terms Huji as foreign terrorist outfit
Ashfaq Wares Khan
Source: Daily Star
March 7, 2008
The US state department on Wednesday formally labelled Harakat ul-Jihad-i-Islami-Bangladesh (Huji-B) as a foreign terrorist organisation (FTO) and as a specially designated global terrorist (SDGT), to allow the US government to target the Islamist terrorist group's finances and operations.
The group, notorious for carrying out armed attacks on unsuspecting targets, is more commonly known as Harkatul Jihad Al Islami in Bangladesh.
Huji, as a global terrorist outfit, was previously put on the list of 'Other Terrorist Oragnisations' in 2003 by the US, but the latest move provides the government of that country with the legal basis for actions against the group.
The designation also signals to Bangladesh, the US government's 'heightened concerns' about Huji-B, and bumps up the outfit's terrorist status by putting it among an elite group of 44 FTOs formally identified by that government.
The move came as a result of the US state department's counter terrorism wing's view that Huji-B has 'engaged in planning and preparations for possible future acts of terrorism' and 'retains the capability and intent to carry out such acts' against US targets.
"The leader of Huji-B signed the February 1998 fatwa sponsored by Usama bin Ladin [sic] that declared American civilians to be legitimate targets for attack. Since then, Huji-B has been implicated in a number of terrorist attacks in Bangladesh and abroad," stated a US news release in Washington.
Signed by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the Executive Order 13224, criminalises providing material support to Huji-B by US citizens or people living under US jurisdictions, and freezes all Huji-B property and interests in the US and in areas under US jurisdiction.
The designation also enables the US to deny visas to Huji-B representatives, and requires US financial institutions to freeze assets held by Huji-B.
The Bangladesh home ministry quickly responded to the announcement, with a senior home ministry official saying, any covert or overt activity by any terrorist organisation will be dealt with an iron fist.
Groups are usually labelled 'specially designated global terrorists' as part of the US government's three-year old campaign to starve out terrorists of funds.
So far, more than 390 groups and individuals have been designated supporters or financiers of terrorism under the programme -- meaning they are subject to seizure of assets and are prevented from doing business with anyone without government permission.
Huji-B emerged with an open declaration of Jihad at a news conference in early 1992. But the then BNP government did not pay any attention to the outfit's dramatic appearance.
The group had been nourished almost unchallenged for years until now detained former premier Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League (AL) government began chasing the fanatic Islamist group in January 1998, as it had carried out an attack on late iconic poet Shamsur Rahman.
Even after the extremist organisation had made an assassination attempt on the then prime minister Sheikh Hasina in 2000, the AL government however failed to check its advancement.
A few of the nine suspected militants held by Rapid Action Battalion in October of last year, with a large amount of arms and explosives in their possessions, admitted to their involvement in another assassination attempt on Hasina on August 21, 2004.
One of the arrestees said Huji boss Mufti Hannan's men had given him the grenades hurled at the AL chief's rally for safekeeping.
There were several reports that the BNP-Jamaat-led immediate past four-party alliance government patronised Huji-B and its leaders.
The alliance government, however, was compelled to take some measures including banning the group and arresting a few of its leaders in October 2005.
The move came in the wake of pressures from home and abroad to take actions against the Islamist terrorist organisation, which investigators also found responsible for perpetrating the August 21, 2004 attack on Hasina.
Interestingly, a few days ahead of banning the organisation the then prime minister Khaleda Zia, also the chief of BNP who is currently in detention, held a meeting with a number of Huji leaders when they, posing as Islamic scholars, called on her at the Prime Minister's Office.
A top Huji leader categorically branded a former BNP minister as his patron to the media, after being arrested.
A year into the banning, a number of top Huji leaders under a different banner held a public meeting in the capital after getting a nod from the government in October 2006.
EMERGENCE
On April 30, 1992, Huji appeared in Bangladesh through a news conference wearing sleeveless olive combat jackets over shelwar-kameez.
Terrorist leaders sat shoulder to shoulder during the news conference at the National Press Club in the capital, and boastfully described how they had fought in the previous Afghan war. They also demanded that Bangladesh be turned into an Islamic state.
A day after the public emergence, they paraded through Dhaka streets after a Juma prayer celebrating their victory over the Soviet forces in Afghanistan.
Although the US had put Huji and Huji-B on the list of 'other terrorist organisations' in 2002 and 2003 respectively, it took the Bangladeshi government three more years to ban the terrorist organisation on October 17, 2005, after much denial of its existence in the country.
The then foreign minister M Morshed Khan said he had not seen 'any activity of such organisation in Bangladesh'.
Lawmakers from Jamaat-e-Islami, who had alleged links with the Islamist terrorists, also denied the existence of Huji in Bangladesh.
Under such leniency and denials, Huji spread its wing in madrasas, setting up training camps in greater Chittagong and in three hill districts, carrying out terrorist activities.
Only after widespread public outrage over near simultaneous bomb attacks nationwide on August 17, 2005, did the BNP-led alliance government ban the Islamist terrorist outfit.
The home ministry note banning Huji read, "Harkat-ul Jihad Al Islami is a self-proclaimed terrorist organisation. Its activities are very sensitive and it is identified as a terrorist organisation. The government is declaring Harkat-ul Jihad Al Islami and all its activities banned on the basis of information received so far.”
Ashfaq Wares Khan
Source: Daily Star
March 7, 2008
The US state department on Wednesday formally labelled Harakat ul-Jihad-i-Islami-Bangladesh (Huji-B) as a foreign terrorist organisation (FTO) and as a specially designated global terrorist (SDGT), to allow the US government to target the Islamist terrorist group's finances and operations.
The group, notorious for carrying out armed attacks on unsuspecting targets, is more commonly known as Harkatul Jihad Al Islami in Bangladesh.
Huji, as a global terrorist outfit, was previously put on the list of 'Other Terrorist Oragnisations' in 2003 by the US, but the latest move provides the government of that country with the legal basis for actions against the group.
The designation also signals to Bangladesh, the US government's 'heightened concerns' about Huji-B, and bumps up the outfit's terrorist status by putting it among an elite group of 44 FTOs formally identified by that government.
The move came as a result of the US state department's counter terrorism wing's view that Huji-B has 'engaged in planning and preparations for possible future acts of terrorism' and 'retains the capability and intent to carry out such acts' against US targets.
"The leader of Huji-B signed the February 1998 fatwa sponsored by Usama bin Ladin [sic] that declared American civilians to be legitimate targets for attack. Since then, Huji-B has been implicated in a number of terrorist attacks in Bangladesh and abroad," stated a US news release in Washington.
Signed by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the Executive Order 13224, criminalises providing material support to Huji-B by US citizens or people living under US jurisdictions, and freezes all Huji-B property and interests in the US and in areas under US jurisdiction.
The designation also enables the US to deny visas to Huji-B representatives, and requires US financial institutions to freeze assets held by Huji-B.
The Bangladesh home ministry quickly responded to the announcement, with a senior home ministry official saying, any covert or overt activity by any terrorist organisation will be dealt with an iron fist.
Groups are usually labelled 'specially designated global terrorists' as part of the US government's three-year old campaign to starve out terrorists of funds.
So far, more than 390 groups and individuals have been designated supporters or financiers of terrorism under the programme -- meaning they are subject to seizure of assets and are prevented from doing business with anyone without government permission.
Huji-B emerged with an open declaration of Jihad at a news conference in early 1992. But the then BNP government did not pay any attention to the outfit's dramatic appearance.
The group had been nourished almost unchallenged for years until now detained former premier Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League (AL) government began chasing the fanatic Islamist group in January 1998, as it had carried out an attack on late iconic poet Shamsur Rahman.
Even after the extremist organisation had made an assassination attempt on the then prime minister Sheikh Hasina in 2000, the AL government however failed to check its advancement.
A few of the nine suspected militants held by Rapid Action Battalion in October of last year, with a large amount of arms and explosives in their possessions, admitted to their involvement in another assassination attempt on Hasina on August 21, 2004.
One of the arrestees said Huji boss Mufti Hannan's men had given him the grenades hurled at the AL chief's rally for safekeeping.
There were several reports that the BNP-Jamaat-led immediate past four-party alliance government patronised Huji-B and its leaders.
The alliance government, however, was compelled to take some measures including banning the group and arresting a few of its leaders in October 2005.
The move came in the wake of pressures from home and abroad to take actions against the Islamist terrorist organisation, which investigators also found responsible for perpetrating the August 21, 2004 attack on Hasina.
Interestingly, a few days ahead of banning the organisation the then prime minister Khaleda Zia, also the chief of BNP who is currently in detention, held a meeting with a number of Huji leaders when they, posing as Islamic scholars, called on her at the Prime Minister's Office.
A top Huji leader categorically branded a former BNP minister as his patron to the media, after being arrested.
A year into the banning, a number of top Huji leaders under a different banner held a public meeting in the capital after getting a nod from the government in October 2006.
EMERGENCE
On April 30, 1992, Huji appeared in Bangladesh through a news conference wearing sleeveless olive combat jackets over shelwar-kameez.
Terrorist leaders sat shoulder to shoulder during the news conference at the National Press Club in the capital, and boastfully described how they had fought in the previous Afghan war. They also demanded that Bangladesh be turned into an Islamic state.
A day after the public emergence, they paraded through Dhaka streets after a Juma prayer celebrating their victory over the Soviet forces in Afghanistan.
Although the US had put Huji and Huji-B on the list of 'other terrorist organisations' in 2002 and 2003 respectively, it took the Bangladeshi government three more years to ban the terrorist organisation on October 17, 2005, after much denial of its existence in the country.
The then foreign minister M Morshed Khan said he had not seen 'any activity of such organisation in Bangladesh'.
Lawmakers from Jamaat-e-Islami, who had alleged links with the Islamist terrorists, also denied the existence of Huji in Bangladesh.
Under such leniency and denials, Huji spread its wing in madrasas, setting up training camps in greater Chittagong and in three hill districts, carrying out terrorist activities.
Only after widespread public outrage over near simultaneous bomb attacks nationwide on August 17, 2005, did the BNP-led alliance government ban the Islamist terrorist outfit.
The home ministry note banning Huji read, "Harkat-ul Jihad Al Islami is a self-proclaimed terrorist organisation. Its activities are very sensitive and it is identified as a terrorist organisation. The government is declaring Harkat-ul Jihad Al Islami and all its activities banned on the basis of information received so far.”
Moeen as Bangladesh's Musharraf
Moeen as Bangladesh's Musharraf
By J. Sri Raman
Source: t r u t h o u t
March 2, 2008
In our preoccupation with Pakistan and its embattled president, many of us have almost forgotten another South Asian country and another general encountering another pro-democracy movement. General Moeen U Ahmed, chief of the Bangladesh armed forces, was in New Delhi for a week since February 24 to remind India and the region of his role as the other Pervez Musharraf.
Moeen was supposed to be here on a "military-to-military" mission, and met Indian counterpart Deepak Kapoor and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, reportedly to discuss cooperation in defense. Moeen, however, did not stop there.
It has been made public on his behalf that that he pleaded with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government to help make Bangladesh safe for restored democracy by prevailing upon Bangladesh's two most prominent contenders for civilian power not to return to electoral politics. The reported plea warrants the presumption that the recent events in Pakistan prompted Moeen's India visit, which was put off last year on the officially cited ground of floods in Bangladesh.
The Musharraf syndrome is manifestly obvious here. As Pakistan's military ruler, its present president of uncertain powers had for years tried to prevent the country's two most prominent aspirants for civilian power from returning home and joining electoral politics. He was forced, however, to allow the return of former Prime Ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif - and even of the elections. Musharraf continues to be engaged in a contained confrontation with Sharif and Asif Ali Zardari - Bhutto's husband who is playing her political role after her horrible end.
Moeen, of course, is no president, but he is the power behind the throne in Bangladesh. The army-backed government in Dhaka, too, tried to exile former Prime Ministers Sheikh Hasina Wajed and Begum Khaleda Zia, but failed. Moeen and his men also tried to prevent the return of Hasina from a visit abroad, and failed again under international pressure. The leaders of the Awami League (AL) and the Bangladesh National Party (BNP), however, have been kept away from all political activities through a slew of corruption cases and long spells of under-trial detention.
Indications have been reported of Moeen's possible plans to install himself eventually as the president in the place of Fakruddin Ahmed, in charge of the current caretaker regime. It is not known, however, whether something like Pakistan's National Reconciliation Order, freeing the two leaders from corruption cases, will precede such a move. But there is another respect, certainly, in which Moeen is trying to do a Musharraf.
Musharraf may not really have profited by splitting Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League (PML) and forming a party named after the Quaid-e-Azam (the title of Pakistan's founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah.) The PML-Q has ended up a distant third, after Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and the PML-Nawaz, in the recent general election. The example, however, has not deterred Moeen from making a similar effort to give himself political legitimacy in the Bangladesh general election that the caretaker regime has promised to hold before the year end.
Last year, the army-backed government in Dhaka tried its utmost to push Nobel-winning economist Mohmmad Yunus into politics and help him form a party to end both main parties. The attempt proved abortive, with Yunus seeing through the cynical game. Efforts followed to break the both the AL and the BNP. Not much success has attended these efforts, and the parties as a whole have remained loyal to the harassed leaders with halos of their own.
Moeen and his men, however, have not given up. According to informed observers, he would like to be sure of a two-thirds majority in a new parliament to ratify the 37 ordinances, through which he has ruled the country for the last 13 months. Will two split-away parties give Moeen what a single one could not provide Musharraf? Few observers will answer that in the affirmative.
Moeen would appear to have no illusions about what a real democracy can do for him. Even as far back as last April, he caused more than a few political ripples by declaring at a public meeting that Bangladesh would not return to "an elective democracy." Days ago, he elaborated on the same theme. Asserting that the country had tried "Westminster-type parliamentary democracy for the last 15 years," but could not make it work, he called for "a form of democracy that is suitable for us."
The particular form of democracy he has in mind may suit neither the major political parties nor the people used to polls. Nothing, however, would suit the army more, or the religious parties and forces, particularly the Jamaat-e-Islami, which, as a member of Begum Zia's coalition regime, distinguished itself by its divisive role in the Bangladesh society. The poor electoral showing of the clerical parties in Pakistan has not made their Bangladeshi counterparts ardent partisans of ballot politics either.
Moeen and the army-propped regime were able to delay the democratic process for quite some time with an anti-corruption campaign that brought some of the political luminaries of the past to law. The glamor of the campaign, however, has worn thin, with its perceived excesses hitting the country's economy and with graft in the army and in select political circles appearing to have been placed outside its purview. the anti-corruption crusade has lost its attraction all the more following the recent steep spiral in the prices of rice, pulses and other essential commodities.
All this has not been lost on Moeen and his mandarins in the caretaker regime. They crushed a rebellion of campus origin months ago, but they know that popular discontent can find a dangerous expression again. They have made certain moves to win over the political opposition. This include official initiatives to rehabilitate martyred Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, liberator of Bangladesh and father of Hasina, as the "Father of the Nation," and Ziaur Rahman, former president and husband of Begam Khaleda Zia as a "patriot," besides a promise to try the "war criminals of 1971." By most accounts, however, the moves cannot succeed in stalling the pro-democracy movement.
It is interesting to recall, in this context, that Moeen himself was in Pakistan during the Bangladesh Liberation War and joined and returned to the country's armed forces as a "repatriated officer." The past record itself may not go against his current political ambitions. As in Musharraf's case, however, a massive democratic upsurge can do so.
By J. Sri Raman
Source: t r u t h o u t
March 2, 2008
In our preoccupation with Pakistan and its embattled president, many of us have almost forgotten another South Asian country and another general encountering another pro-democracy movement. General Moeen U Ahmed, chief of the Bangladesh armed forces, was in New Delhi for a week since February 24 to remind India and the region of his role as the other Pervez Musharraf.
Moeen was supposed to be here on a "military-to-military" mission, and met Indian counterpart Deepak Kapoor and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, reportedly to discuss cooperation in defense. Moeen, however, did not stop there.
It has been made public on his behalf that that he pleaded with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government to help make Bangladesh safe for restored democracy by prevailing upon Bangladesh's two most prominent contenders for civilian power not to return to electoral politics. The reported plea warrants the presumption that the recent events in Pakistan prompted Moeen's India visit, which was put off last year on the officially cited ground of floods in Bangladesh.
The Musharraf syndrome is manifestly obvious here. As Pakistan's military ruler, its present president of uncertain powers had for years tried to prevent the country's two most prominent aspirants for civilian power from returning home and joining electoral politics. He was forced, however, to allow the return of former Prime Ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif - and even of the elections. Musharraf continues to be engaged in a contained confrontation with Sharif and Asif Ali Zardari - Bhutto's husband who is playing her political role after her horrible end.
Moeen, of course, is no president, but he is the power behind the throne in Bangladesh. The army-backed government in Dhaka, too, tried to exile former Prime Ministers Sheikh Hasina Wajed and Begum Khaleda Zia, but failed. Moeen and his men also tried to prevent the return of Hasina from a visit abroad, and failed again under international pressure. The leaders of the Awami League (AL) and the Bangladesh National Party (BNP), however, have been kept away from all political activities through a slew of corruption cases and long spells of under-trial detention.
Indications have been reported of Moeen's possible plans to install himself eventually as the president in the place of Fakruddin Ahmed, in charge of the current caretaker regime. It is not known, however, whether something like Pakistan's National Reconciliation Order, freeing the two leaders from corruption cases, will precede such a move. But there is another respect, certainly, in which Moeen is trying to do a Musharraf.
Musharraf may not really have profited by splitting Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League (PML) and forming a party named after the Quaid-e-Azam (the title of Pakistan's founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah.) The PML-Q has ended up a distant third, after Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and the PML-Nawaz, in the recent general election. The example, however, has not deterred Moeen from making a similar effort to give himself political legitimacy in the Bangladesh general election that the caretaker regime has promised to hold before the year end.
Last year, the army-backed government in Dhaka tried its utmost to push Nobel-winning economist Mohmmad Yunus into politics and help him form a party to end both main parties. The attempt proved abortive, with Yunus seeing through the cynical game. Efforts followed to break the both the AL and the BNP. Not much success has attended these efforts, and the parties as a whole have remained loyal to the harassed leaders with halos of their own.
Moeen and his men, however, have not given up. According to informed observers, he would like to be sure of a two-thirds majority in a new parliament to ratify the 37 ordinances, through which he has ruled the country for the last 13 months. Will two split-away parties give Moeen what a single one could not provide Musharraf? Few observers will answer that in the affirmative.
Moeen would appear to have no illusions about what a real democracy can do for him. Even as far back as last April, he caused more than a few political ripples by declaring at a public meeting that Bangladesh would not return to "an elective democracy." Days ago, he elaborated on the same theme. Asserting that the country had tried "Westminster-type parliamentary democracy for the last 15 years," but could not make it work, he called for "a form of democracy that is suitable for us."
The particular form of democracy he has in mind may suit neither the major political parties nor the people used to polls. Nothing, however, would suit the army more, or the religious parties and forces, particularly the Jamaat-e-Islami, which, as a member of Begum Zia's coalition regime, distinguished itself by its divisive role in the Bangladesh society. The poor electoral showing of the clerical parties in Pakistan has not made their Bangladeshi counterparts ardent partisans of ballot politics either.
Moeen and the army-propped regime were able to delay the democratic process for quite some time with an anti-corruption campaign that brought some of the political luminaries of the past to law. The glamor of the campaign, however, has worn thin, with its perceived excesses hitting the country's economy and with graft in the army and in select political circles appearing to have been placed outside its purview. the anti-corruption crusade has lost its attraction all the more following the recent steep spiral in the prices of rice, pulses and other essential commodities.
All this has not been lost on Moeen and his mandarins in the caretaker regime. They crushed a rebellion of campus origin months ago, but they know that popular discontent can find a dangerous expression again. They have made certain moves to win over the political opposition. This include official initiatives to rehabilitate martyred Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, liberator of Bangladesh and father of Hasina, as the "Father of the Nation," and Ziaur Rahman, former president and husband of Begam Khaleda Zia as a "patriot," besides a promise to try the "war criminals of 1971." By most accounts, however, the moves cannot succeed in stalling the pro-democracy movement.
It is interesting to recall, in this context, that Moeen himself was in Pakistan during the Bangladesh Liberation War and joined and returned to the country's armed forces as a "repatriated officer." The past record itself may not go against his current political ambitions. As in Musharraf's case, however, a massive democratic upsurge can do so.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
No new brand of democracy
Source: UPI Asia Online
Rater Jonaki
Februrary 25, 2008
HONG KONG, China, The chief of the Bangladesh army, General Moeen U Ahmed, has been calling for the country to have its "own brand of democracy" for a long time. The concept, reiterated in the general's recently published book, is a burning topic in the country.
The general has not publicly clarified exactly what he means by his "own brand of democracy" theory; thus people are both curious and suspicious about what it would entail. Would this be another militarized brand of democracy?
In some of his recent media appearances Moeen has emphasized this undisclosed type of democracy in order to criticize current practices of the government of Bangladesh, as well as that of Britain, by calling them "Westminster democracy." In Moeen's view, there are only two political parties in Britain, which do not represent the whole range of public opinion. On the other hand, Bangladesh had been ruled by an extraordinarily powerful prime minister, who has always been supported by the ruling party and opposed by the opposition.
The reality of democracy in Bangladesh is basically that the government is formed through an election in which many voters are deprived of the right to cast their vote, and others are forced to vote a certain way, by the musclemen who control different areas of the country. It is almost more a feudal society than a democratic one.
Sometimes candidates have felt they were defeated as a result of vote-rigging or other malpractice and have lodged complaints with the Election Commission. In some such instances, the commission has failed to reach a judgment until after the current session of Parliament was over. By that time, the person who was elected -- legally or illegally -- has already enjoyed all the perks and privileges of being a member of Parliament, including participating in making legislation.
From the local government to the national elections, the use of excessive muscle power is more or less the same. It does not represent the opinion of the electors.
In decision making, whether in Parliament or at various levels of government, might is right! For instance, according to section 70 (1) of the Constitution of Bangladesh, a member of Parliament will be deemed absent if he votes against his party's position, even if the proposed bill is unrealistic or controversial or contradicts fundamental rights provided in the Constitution. Nothing more is necessary to show how arbitrary is the Constitution in supporting party politics, especially the ruling party. This cannot be called democracy in any sense.
The question is how democracy is perceived and practiced and participated in by society. Democracy requires the rule of law, not the rule of bureaucrats or politicians or the police.
What happens in Bangladesh if someone's civil rights are violated? Can the person lodge a complaint without paying a bribe at the police station? Is there any acceptable institution working to monitor what the police are doing and undoing? Will there be any impartial and honest investigation by the police unless both parties bribe the investigating officer as well as the concerned officials?
Is there any guarantee that there will be no interference by any of the influential groups, including public representatives and public servants, if any of the parties are in a position to involve them? Is there any guarantee that prosecution will take place without any bias or exploitation, by extracting money or delaying the matter if it doesn't serve the interest of the related professionals to resolve it?
Is there any guarantee that the judge or magistrate will be honest during the trial? Is there any guarantee that the order of the court will be implemented, if it requires intervention from any other government institution? Is there any guarantee that authorities will be held responsible for ignoring their jobs or failing to prove their accountability to the citizens?
Unfortunately, the answers to all the above questions will be a frustrated "No." That's why democracy does not work and people do not get the real benefits of it; rather the Bangladeshis are forced to learn how to suffer more and more.
If anyone truly wishes to benefit the people, he or she must make a credible attempt to change the existing system that runs the country. Bangladesh does not need to give birth to any "mule" type of democracy.
Democracy has its own qualities and characteristics, and these include accountability on the part of elected officials. Militarization of all sectors of the country should be avoided. Rather than discussing "reformation" in mocking tones, truly concerned leaders should throw out the repressive systems of government and replace them with effective and functioning institutions that accord with the laws of the land and serve the real needs of the people.
Bangladesh is overwhelmed by the black hands and arbitrary attitudes of the rulers and their associates. This rubbish needs to be removed from the nation forever.
(Rater Zonaki is the pseudonym of a human rights defender based in Hong Kong working at the Asian Human Rights Commission. He is a Bangladeshi national with a degree in literature from a university in Dhaka. He began his career as a journalist in 1990 and engaged in human rights activism at the grassroots level in his country for more than a decade. He also worked as an editor for publications on human rights and socio-cultural issues and contributed to other similar publications.)
Rater Jonaki
Februrary 25, 2008
HONG KONG, China, The chief of the Bangladesh army, General Moeen U Ahmed, has been calling for the country to have its "own brand of democracy" for a long time. The concept, reiterated in the general's recently published book, is a burning topic in the country.
The general has not publicly clarified exactly what he means by his "own brand of democracy" theory; thus people are both curious and suspicious about what it would entail. Would this be another militarized brand of democracy?
In some of his recent media appearances Moeen has emphasized this undisclosed type of democracy in order to criticize current practices of the government of Bangladesh, as well as that of Britain, by calling them "Westminster democracy." In Moeen's view, there are only two political parties in Britain, which do not represent the whole range of public opinion. On the other hand, Bangladesh had been ruled by an extraordinarily powerful prime minister, who has always been supported by the ruling party and opposed by the opposition.
The reality of democracy in Bangladesh is basically that the government is formed through an election in which many voters are deprived of the right to cast their vote, and others are forced to vote a certain way, by the musclemen who control different areas of the country. It is almost more a feudal society than a democratic one.
Sometimes candidates have felt they were defeated as a result of vote-rigging or other malpractice and have lodged complaints with the Election Commission. In some such instances, the commission has failed to reach a judgment until after the current session of Parliament was over. By that time, the person who was elected -- legally or illegally -- has already enjoyed all the perks and privileges of being a member of Parliament, including participating in making legislation.
From the local government to the national elections, the use of excessive muscle power is more or less the same. It does not represent the opinion of the electors.
In decision making, whether in Parliament or at various levels of government, might is right! For instance, according to section 70 (1) of the Constitution of Bangladesh, a member of Parliament will be deemed absent if he votes against his party's position, even if the proposed bill is unrealistic or controversial or contradicts fundamental rights provided in the Constitution. Nothing more is necessary to show how arbitrary is the Constitution in supporting party politics, especially the ruling party. This cannot be called democracy in any sense.
The question is how democracy is perceived and practiced and participated in by society. Democracy requires the rule of law, not the rule of bureaucrats or politicians or the police.
What happens in Bangladesh if someone's civil rights are violated? Can the person lodge a complaint without paying a bribe at the police station? Is there any acceptable institution working to monitor what the police are doing and undoing? Will there be any impartial and honest investigation by the police unless both parties bribe the investigating officer as well as the concerned officials?
Is there any guarantee that there will be no interference by any of the influential groups, including public representatives and public servants, if any of the parties are in a position to involve them? Is there any guarantee that prosecution will take place without any bias or exploitation, by extracting money or delaying the matter if it doesn't serve the interest of the related professionals to resolve it?
Is there any guarantee that the judge or magistrate will be honest during the trial? Is there any guarantee that the order of the court will be implemented, if it requires intervention from any other government institution? Is there any guarantee that authorities will be held responsible for ignoring their jobs or failing to prove their accountability to the citizens?
Unfortunately, the answers to all the above questions will be a frustrated "No." That's why democracy does not work and people do not get the real benefits of it; rather the Bangladeshis are forced to learn how to suffer more and more.
If anyone truly wishes to benefit the people, he or she must make a credible attempt to change the existing system that runs the country. Bangladesh does not need to give birth to any "mule" type of democracy.
Democracy has its own qualities and characteristics, and these include accountability on the part of elected officials. Militarization of all sectors of the country should be avoided. Rather than discussing "reformation" in mocking tones, truly concerned leaders should throw out the repressive systems of government and replace them with effective and functioning institutions that accord with the laws of the land and serve the real needs of the people.
Bangladesh is overwhelmed by the black hands and arbitrary attitudes of the rulers and their associates. This rubbish needs to be removed from the nation forever.
(Rater Zonaki is the pseudonym of a human rights defender based in Hong Kong working at the Asian Human Rights Commission. He is a Bangladeshi national with a degree in literature from a university in Dhaka. He began his career as a journalist in 1990 and engaged in human rights activism at the grassroots level in his country for more than a decade. He also worked as an editor for publications on human rights and socio-cultural issues and contributed to other similar publications.)
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Tasneem Khalil's Interview at VOA
Source: Voice of America
Date: February 23, 2008
In an exclusive interview with VOA Bangla Service, Tasneem Khalil, a journalist from Bangladesh alleges that the Defense Intelligence in Bangladesh has a link with the extremist Islamic Terrorists in the country.
He thought that one of the reasons why he was picked up from his home without any official allegations against him was his investigations on their links with the terrorist. A reporter for the respected English language newspaper The Daily Star, Tasneem Khalil also worked on projects for Human Rights Watch and was CNN’s news representative in Bangladesh.
On May 11, 2007, the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI) arrested Khalil, apparently for his outspoken criticism of the military’s role in extrajudicial killings, torture, arbitrary arrests, and other abuses. Khalil had also publicly expressed concern through his blog and in newspaper interviews that the military was using the interim government as a cover for de facto army rule. A recently published report of the Human Rights Watch gives a detailed account of the way Tasneem Khalil was tortured in custody.
Listen his interview here at VOA:
Date: February 23, 2008
In an exclusive interview with VOA Bangla Service, Tasneem Khalil, a journalist from Bangladesh alleges that the Defense Intelligence in Bangladesh has a link with the extremist Islamic Terrorists in the country.
He thought that one of the reasons why he was picked up from his home without any official allegations against him was his investigations on their links with the terrorist. A reporter for the respected English language newspaper The Daily Star, Tasneem Khalil also worked on projects for Human Rights Watch and was CNN’s news representative in Bangladesh.
On May 11, 2007, the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI) arrested Khalil, apparently for his outspoken criticism of the military’s role in extrajudicial killings, torture, arbitrary arrests, and other abuses. Khalil had also publicly expressed concern through his blog and in newspaper interviews that the military was using the interim government as a cover for de facto army rule. A recently published report of the Human Rights Watch gives a detailed account of the way Tasneem Khalil was tortured in custody.
Listen his interview here at VOA:
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Tuesday, February 26, 2008
The Roadmap to Parliamentary Elections?
Press Release from London:
February 25, 2008
Bangladesh reminded of its obligation to hold a free and fair election
A seminar attended by distinguished speakers on Bangladesh titled ‘The Roadmap to Parliamentary Elections? was held today (Monday 25 Feb 2008) in The Moses Room
at the Houses of Lords, organised by the International Bangladesh Foundation and chaired by Lord Avebury, the Vice Chair of All Party Parliamentary Human Rights Group and Chairman of International Bangladesh Foundation. The seminar was attended by MPs, MEP, Peers, Councillors and representatives of human rights organisations including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Global Human Rights Defence, Jumma Peoples Network, Nirmul Committee and the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council.
Lord Avebury in his opening remarks said, we are concentrating on the conditions that will enable free and fair elections to be held as scheduled before the end of the year. He reminded that according to the electoral roadmap published by the caretaker government, talks with political parties were to be completed by the end of 2007, and the reforms to the laws on elections were to be passed by March. These targets have slipped. It would surely be useful if a revised roadmap were to be published with new deadlines for the remaining stages of the process.
Saida Muna Tasneem, Counsellor of the Bangladesh High Commission in London, gave a presentation and an overview of the caretaker government’s commitment to the roadmap to parliamentary elections by Dec 2008 & progress in vote registration and various reforms it has already implemented including the separation of the judiciary and the formation of independent election commission, anti corruption commission and an independent national human rights commission. Ms Tasneem called for continued support from international partners to successful completion of the caretaker government’s roadmap and reforms which was followed by respondents from Baroness Pola Uddin, Chairman, Britain-Bangladesh All Party Parliamentary Group, Anne Main MP, Chairman, Conservative Friends of Bangladesh, Jeremy Corbyn MP, Britain-Bangladesh All-Party Parliamentary Group & Vice-Chair, All-Party Parliamentary Human Rights Group, Robert Evans MEP, Chair of the European Parliament’s South Asia Delegation, Dr Charles Tannock MEP, Conservative Friends of Bangladesh. Vice-President, European Parliament's Human Rights subcommittee, Tim Parritt, Deputy Asia Programme Director, Amnesty International, Brad Adams, Asia Director, Human Rights Watch, Sultan Shariff, Awami League
Joshna Miah, BNP, M A Rauf, Gano Forum and Dr Ahmed Ziauddin, Bangladesh Centre for Genocide Studies, Belgium. Ms. Sally Kebble MP also attended the seminar.
In the general discussion that followed contributors from the floor included Cllr Ayub Korom Ali, former Cllr M A Rohim, BNP President Md Kamar Uddin, Communist Party of Bangladesh representative Dr Rafiqul Hasan Khan, Westminster Cllr Mustaq Qureshi, Jenny Lundstrom of Global Human Rights Defence, Lord Bew, Koysor Syed of Mukti Joddha Sangsad, Murad Qureshi, Member London Assembly, Sally Keeble MP and Simon Lever from the Foreign Office.
Speakers expressed their deep concern at the human rights abuses under the country’s state of emergency and the caretaker government’s failure to restrain the security forces. Other speakers raised the issue of the trial of war criminals and the failure to bring the perpetrators that has led to culture of impunity. Speakers also appreciated the various steps taken by the present government against corruption, terrorism and welcomed Dr. Fakhruddin Ahmed's recent comments against the war criminals but stated that it is the duty of the government to initiate the cases and take initiatives against the alleged war criminals.
All the UK and the European parliamentarians reminded Bangladesh government as friends of a free and democratic Bangladesh, the caretaker Government should live up to its political obligation by lifting emergency rule to allow political activities and political reform. Human rights violations, lifting of emergency rule must be placed on the reform agenda as a top priority and the government must respect human rights of its citizens and ensure no torture takes place.
Lord Avebury in his concluding remarks said, “There has to be freedom of expression and of assembly if elections, are to be free and fair. Elections aren’t only about having the right laws, an accurate register and impartial officials. They depend on the preconditions in the months before polling day, and crucially, on the maintenance of a peaceful environment during election campaign
February 25, 2008
Bangladesh reminded of its obligation to hold a free and fair election
A seminar attended by distinguished speakers on Bangladesh titled ‘The Roadmap to Parliamentary Elections? was held today (Monday 25 Feb 2008) in The Moses Room
at the Houses of Lords, organised by the International Bangladesh Foundation and chaired by Lord Avebury, the Vice Chair of All Party Parliamentary Human Rights Group and Chairman of International Bangladesh Foundation. The seminar was attended by MPs, MEP, Peers, Councillors and representatives of human rights organisations including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Global Human Rights Defence, Jumma Peoples Network, Nirmul Committee and the Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council.
Lord Avebury in his opening remarks said, we are concentrating on the conditions that will enable free and fair elections to be held as scheduled before the end of the year. He reminded that according to the electoral roadmap published by the caretaker government, talks with political parties were to be completed by the end of 2007, and the reforms to the laws on elections were to be passed by March. These targets have slipped. It would surely be useful if a revised roadmap were to be published with new deadlines for the remaining stages of the process.
Saida Muna Tasneem, Counsellor of the Bangladesh High Commission in London, gave a presentation and an overview of the caretaker government’s commitment to the roadmap to parliamentary elections by Dec 2008 & progress in vote registration and various reforms it has already implemented including the separation of the judiciary and the formation of independent election commission, anti corruption commission and an independent national human rights commission. Ms Tasneem called for continued support from international partners to successful completion of the caretaker government’s roadmap and reforms which was followed by respondents from Baroness Pola Uddin, Chairman, Britain-Bangladesh All Party Parliamentary Group, Anne Main MP, Chairman, Conservative Friends of Bangladesh, Jeremy Corbyn MP, Britain-Bangladesh All-Party Parliamentary Group & Vice-Chair, All-Party Parliamentary Human Rights Group, Robert Evans MEP, Chair of the European Parliament’s South Asia Delegation, Dr Charles Tannock MEP, Conservative Friends of Bangladesh. Vice-President, European Parliament's Human Rights subcommittee, Tim Parritt, Deputy Asia Programme Director, Amnesty International, Brad Adams, Asia Director, Human Rights Watch, Sultan Shariff, Awami League
Joshna Miah, BNP, M A Rauf, Gano Forum and Dr Ahmed Ziauddin, Bangladesh Centre for Genocide Studies, Belgium. Ms. Sally Kebble MP also attended the seminar.
In the general discussion that followed contributors from the floor included Cllr Ayub Korom Ali, former Cllr M A Rohim, BNP President Md Kamar Uddin, Communist Party of Bangladesh representative Dr Rafiqul Hasan Khan, Westminster Cllr Mustaq Qureshi, Jenny Lundstrom of Global Human Rights Defence, Lord Bew, Koysor Syed of Mukti Joddha Sangsad, Murad Qureshi, Member London Assembly, Sally Keeble MP and Simon Lever from the Foreign Office.
Speakers expressed their deep concern at the human rights abuses under the country’s state of emergency and the caretaker government’s failure to restrain the security forces. Other speakers raised the issue of the trial of war criminals and the failure to bring the perpetrators that has led to culture of impunity. Speakers also appreciated the various steps taken by the present government against corruption, terrorism and welcomed Dr. Fakhruddin Ahmed's recent comments against the war criminals but stated that it is the duty of the government to initiate the cases and take initiatives against the alleged war criminals.
All the UK and the European parliamentarians reminded Bangladesh government as friends of a free and democratic Bangladesh, the caretaker Government should live up to its political obligation by lifting emergency rule to allow political activities and political reform. Human rights violations, lifting of emergency rule must be placed on the reform agenda as a top priority and the government must respect human rights of its citizens and ensure no torture takes place.
Lord Avebury in his concluding remarks said, “There has to be freedom of expression and of assembly if elections, are to be free and fair. Elections aren’t only about having the right laws, an accurate register and impartial officials. They depend on the preconditions in the months before polling day, and crucially, on the maintenance of a peaceful environment during election campaign
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