In
search of the bottom:
Focus on the top
Dr.
Mohammad Omar Farooq
July 30, 2002
Recent events, such as the one in case of Shamsunnahar Hall, makes one
nauseate. It also makes many among us as Bangladeshis wonder as to how low can
we go? Where is the bottom? Is there any, at all?
Wall Street, the capital of global capitalism, is currently in search of
the bottom of the stock market. Not too long ago, thanks to the
cyber-revolution, sky seemed to be the limit as the stock market values were
going through the roof and to the stratosphere. It seemed unstoppable in its
upward journey. Now, everyone who has an interest in the U.S. stock market is
desperately searching for the bottom, which is not quite in sight yet.
Fundamentals of the market analysis has to be adjusted in light of some new
fundamentals, that is, the veracity of the financial statements and credibility
of the business executives, the captains of "capitalism" ship. But
there are good reasons to expect that the bottom of this cycle of the
U.S. stock market would be found, probably in not so distant future. But what
about the bottom of Bangladesh as a nation?
Lack of infrastructure, frequent and massive natural calamities, lack of
resources and other factors led Dr. Henry Kissinger to dub Bangladesh at
its inception a "bottomless basket. We, the Bangladeshis, never
liked such humiliating characterization. We would like to think that we
have proven him wrong, at least in the economic sense in which Kissinger used
such label. For example, referring to this characterization, Zaidi Sattar and
Frederick Temple, both with World Bank, comments in "Approaches
to Poverty Reduction in Bangladesh"
[May 22, 2002]: "Time has proved him wrong. The progress achieved to date
indicates that Bangladesh has the potential to win its war on poverty..."
They identified several key areas where Bangladesh has made significant
progress, which include fertility reduction, child survival, communicable
disease control, development of community nutrition interventions, improvement
in life expectancy, almost eradication of polio, elimination of
leprosy, improvement in nutritional status of children, and so on. Of course,
the list must also prominently include achievement of near-self-sufficiency in
rice, the main crop of the country, women's participation on economic
development and reducing vulnerability of the poor through various
poverty-alleviating projects, especially through microcredit.
It should be a great solace for us to be able to say that we have proved
Henry Kissinger wrong. However, there is a revealing statement in the same essay
of Sattar and Temple. "The largest concentration of the poor is in South
Asia. After China and India, Bangladesh has the largest number of poor people. Sadly
today Bangladesh has almost as many poor people as its entire population at the
time of independence." If Bangladesh now (i.e., in 2000) has almost
as many poor people as its entire population at the time of independence, and if in
thirty years we would have as many poor people as the entire
population now, have we really proven Kissinger wrong?
Bangladesh definitely has serious potential to break out of the
vicious cycle of the poverty. But there are very difficult constraints that
are non-economic. Toward translating into reality the potential of Bangladesh to
win the war against poverty, Sattar and Temple does acknowledge that "it
will take strong political leadership, good policies and sustained
commitment", all of which are non-economic factors. The real challenge
or battle for Bangladesh needs to be understood in terms of these
non-economic factors. Whether we have proven Kissinger wrong in regard to his
labeling, in terms of the non-economic problems that are holding the country's
present and future as a hostage, we seem to be really bottomless, until we
prove otherwise.
Without going too far back in our history as an independent
nation, there were several new lows made in recent times. The nation has not
forgotten -or has it not? - one of the most shameful cases of crimes in
Bangladesh. During the Awami League/Sheikh Hasina rule, the report of one
of the leaders of Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) "celebrating" his
completion of "century of rapes" at Jahangirnagar University
surfaced. Didn't we hear about "judicial inquiry" and "exemplary
punishments" from our politicians at that time? Was there any follow up,
when the country, in our search for the bottom, stooped to a new low, through
this unheard of kind of crime?
Earlier in 2002, a ghastly crime was committed when Khandakar Shihab
Ahmed (13), son of a spinning mills owner, was kidnapped after school hour for a
not-so-high ransom demand of 20 lakh taka and subsequently his body
was found hacked to pieces. The nation, if not already shocked enough, was
further shocked. Kidnapping, demand for ransom, or killing is hardly a shocking
thing in our country. But it was the ghastly nature of the crime that sent a
tremor through our national sentiment. But we have recovered from making this
new low for our society, low in terms of our vulnerability, insecurity and
inhumanity. Haven't we? But, we should probably ask whether this kind of
incident was altogether unexpected. With Shihab incident, did we hit our bottom
as a nation?
Our psyche has taken enough hit so that we are
almost desensitized to the possibility of almost anything. During the AL rule,
didn't the nation galvanize to rid itself of the tyranny and lawlessness of the
ruling party and its goons? Absolutely. But if by switching from AL to BNP and
its bed-partners, anyone expected any real change, then it is only those fools
and simpletons are to be blamed for their unreasonable expectation.
On June 8, 2000, the nation hit a new low when
Sabiqunnahar Sony, a second year BUET student, was killed in a crossfire between
two rival factions of Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal (JCD) on the BUET campus. The
nation was shocked again. But was it unexpected? In our nation of
"democracy", there is no intraparty democracy and therefore the
disputes get resolved in basically one way - in the culture and tradition of
organized crimes. "Judicial inquiry", "exemplary punishment"
- weren't those cliché repeated again? But once again, was such event
unexpected? Our political arena is laden with inter-party and intra-party
violence, with complete and unconditional blessing of the party machinery and
leadership. The violence is also literally violent with full power of guns and
ammunitions in "Wild Wild West" style, except that the ending of the
episodes are usually unscripted and tragic.
On the heel of this comes the Shamsunnahar Hall
incident. Every time our country hits a new low, one's
heart fills with hope that we probably have hit the bottom, only to be further
disillusioned and disappointed. But no low is too low for us and no low seems to
be our bottom.
If anyone tries to make any sense
of what happened at Shamsunnahar Hall of DU two nights ago, it would be a waste,
because it is senseless. I have mentioned this before and I repeat, this
coalition government with all of its constituents and BNP at its leadership is
no different than the evil of the previous government of Awami League. Removal
of VC is a must and, probably, a foregone conclusion. But if anyone thinks that
our deep-rooted problem would be solved with just a VC removed, dream on. And,
stay tuned ... nightmare continues.
Actually,
this is an event that should cause the current PM to resign. But again, now I am
probably dreaming. Sorry. There isn't anything at all that could happen that
would ever cause someone in power to take responsibility for their actions.
Otherwise, by now, at least we would have our home minister sacked. Actually, if
we want to be serious, then such people should not have been appointed for such
responsibility.
What do you think? By the
political standard of Bangladesh, what wrong really has been done by the VC? Was
his behavior really inconsistent with the political environment, culture and
framework of our country? Everyone up the ladder of the political alley (top
University positions are not excluded) must tow and promote the political line.
Accommodating non-student leaders in university dormitories is not new.
AL-BCL-lovers would raise a hue and cry in such case, of course, but it is a
sheer hypocrisy, as they used to do the same AND SHOULD OPPORTUNITIES
PRESENT, THEY WOULD DO IT AGAIN.
That
people like such VCs are appointed and expected to pursue the narrow, parochial
(and even criminal) political line of their respective party is a responsibility
of the highest political leadership. Our political culture sanctions it. Our
political leaders condone or, worse, patronize it. That this VC is still holding
onto his position is hardly any surprise. That JCD cadres are serving as cohorts
of the police against the agitating students of DU should not be surprising
either. The VC might be the scapegoat. So what, even if the "judicial
inquiry" is done and "exemplary punishment" is meted out, do we
expect the problems like this to disappear?
When the AL-operatives during the
regime of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman tyrannized the country, Sheikh Mujib was more
AL-Bandhu than Bangabandhu. Has the political landscape - that is now the
arena of organized political crime - since then changed?
If we are to break out of this
vicious cycle, there are few things that are essential for us to
acknowledge before we can expect any positive and healthy change in our society. (a)
The existing political parties/apparatus function in a way organized crimes do.
Therefore, they need to be treated as organized political crimes. (b) None of
the existing major participants, especially AL and BNP (with its constituent
partners in the alliance), can be expected to undertake fundamental changes that
are requisite for our desired change. (c) A new third force is needed that would
be independent of any family baggage (such as, Mujib and Zia's baggages), and
whose orientation would be more professional and political.
Toward rejection of what is
going on in the name of politics and self-serving, sloganeering patriotism
on the one hand and facilitating of a new alternative in our political arena,
those who are at the bottom - the people, the victims, the society - need to
insist on a new political culture of non-violence, non-partisanship, and respect
for the rule of law. Unfortunately, while those in authority and power took us
to another new low through this Shamsunnahar incident, those agitating students
who damaged private or university property are not our future hope either.
We need a new leadership with a
new vision and direction, a kind of leadership that can inspire us and channel
our energy, as reflected in our anger, frustration and hope of a
better future, toward a firm and clear commitment to a culture of
construction, not destruction; of creativity, not anarchy; of rule of law, not
lawlessness; of hope, not despair.
Until
we have started taking our baby steps toward that alternative leadership, vision
and culture, we must not just yield. The current rule of the game, as
illustrated through this current incident, is that the VC was appointed to be a
political lackey. If and when the usefulness of such lackeys ends, they would be
made scapegoat to serve as "exemplary punishment". The real problem
will continue unabated, until we have another new low.
The accountability must rest with
the HIGHEST level of leadership - individually and party-wise. If we are to find
the bottom, we need to focus on the top.