Dear Readers:
I welcome you the following article which is sceduled to be published in a major daily shortly in advane of the others in the nation.
Sincerely,
Mufassil M M Islam
Human Rights Advocate
Truth Commission and National Reconciliation
Mufassil M M Islam
This part of the world which we call '
But we have suffered time and time after for a strong leader imbibed with moral values and love for the nation above self-pride. We have always lacked the fermentation of a concerted effort in developing our own lot by acknowledging the better sides of my competitor in politics and social systems and thus paving the way for a so called unquestionable and holy figure to take the leadership in exchange of unfathomable allegiance in his/her progeny. And we as a nation have suffered owing to the failure in administrative democracy and systematic rules.
We must accept that we have suffered enough to thwart an ever-lasting misunderstanding, sealed ideas against social changes. We must believe that it is our democratic right as citizens of this beautiful peace-loving nation that our leaders, rulers, pathfinders, clergymen, students, politicians, administrative executives, the police, businessmen are all subject to accountability to the nation as a whole.
We must be ready to appreciate and revere the honest and successful business enterprises for their contribution to the national economy and at the same time, we must be strong in demanding the rights of the nation in being reimbursed of the unlawful gains by the tycoon criminals. We are not ready or prepared any longer to silence our rights with tears of poverty as black money works as supply fuel for the evil miscreants of the society including corrupt politicians.
Bangladesh has seen decades of civil unrests, military rules and unsystematic democratic rules where the politicians have gone to the parliaments and have sung the same old song of irreconcilable differences of dogmatic principles of which we have had not voted them for. We have had always hidden our faces in the mud of social shames and hartals and had been kept uninformed about the national and international political views of the politicians. In this vacuum, we have suffered the evil abuse of democracy and capitalism as untouchable financial power houses have grown at the cost of a school teacher's son being deprived of proper education and the illiterate corrupt tycoon's children buying the best education in the land. Our national central nervous system suffered worse affects of an ill-distribution of national wealth which often ended up as hoardings by the super rich instead of roofing the huts of the hermits.
We now need to address the core problems and move on. We need to accept that certain stabs in the social history will never be healed and some injustices may never be punished but we need to seal the pipelines of these vortexes so that repetitions of these vices can be checked. We need to break the vicious underworld mafia circle of these corrupt practitioners and for that a carrot has to be dangled infront of the carriage of the evil and the truth as to their underworld system has to come out.
A Truth Commission can work as a platform or as a confession box for the corrupt or the wrongdoers to help us deal with the pivotal problem of un-traceability of the holes in the national development pipeline.
Truth commissions are generally understood to be "bodies set up to investigate a past history of violations of human rights in a particular country -- which can include violations by the military or other government forces or armed opposition forces." (http://www.beyondintractability.org/essay/truth_commissions/)
Truth Commission generally has the following pivotal features
a. forms to pry into the past;
b. to investigate the patterns of abuse and corruption for a specific period of time;
c. it is a temporary body usually having official sanction and can have judicial or quasi-judicial features;
d. usually formed during transitional period to keep the commission above the influence of any particular political power;
e. declares amnesty in exchange of absolute truth but serious crimes are not above prosecution;
f. corruption is recognised to have connections with human rights abuses;
g. political parties who had ruled in the past have will have certain reservations against the formation of such commissions;
h. an effective commission is usually formed with the unquestionably honest and dedicated national think-tanks and even the UN Secretary General can recommend the forming members of the Commission which may include ex-foreign Presidents and that in no way compromises a nation's sovereignty;
i. several committees including the human rights committee, rehabilitation committee and the amnesty committee can form parts of the Commission;
j. the commission is usually open and accessible to the medias so that its neutrality and effectiveness remains unquestionably dedicated to the cause of public service;
k. the commission can be formed for a particular purpose and for a particular part of the nation.
In history, the South African Truth and Reconciliation (Commission(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_commission) was formed after the apartheid but it failed to bring F W de Klerk to effectively to justice and even though he apologised to the nation, the scar remains against failure to penalise him. A truth commission is prone to be flooded with innumerable cases and most of the allegations being quashed for lack to time and resources to address too many interconnected issues in the cases and allegations. Of the thousands of cases before the commissions only a fraction of the matters end in prosecutions even in developed countries. The Government of Chad failed to deliver an unbiased commission owing to its partial view towards a certain quarter and even in the
The recent food crisis in Bangladesh and price hike in regular needs are not the results of recent global economic recessions only , rather it has coincided with the fact that the years of corrupt practises and the Government's recent endeavours to seal off criminal activities and to bring the corrupts to justice have pushed the business mafias to forge a united underworld brotherhood to cripple the economy with stalemate as many are now reluctant to draw their cashes from their undeclared hideouts and un-traceable bank accounts in and off shores which they had been thus far using to control national economy.
Hence, the nation need to remain vigilant about an honest and effective Truth Commission which is the need of the hour as that would not only pave the way for accountability towards the public at large but will also unmask the distorted faces of the corrupts in the society and thus upholding the dignity of being honest as a nation. A Truth Commission about Food Security should open up our rights to know about what our politicians did when they were entrusted with their duties to monitor and control the basic needs of our society and how and why they failed in their duties. The Truth Commission should also end with a recommendation as to the required changes in the administrative levels and business circles which are now long overdue.
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