Army backed CTG assumed power a year and a half ago while a general
election was promised to be held within two years. It seems that the
CTG has kept its promise and is trying to meet the originally
promised milestone for election. However, it is observed that both
the army and CTG are facing a host of problems in making the election
happen in due time. Various political parties are buzzing
differently. Some of them declared the election boycotts, some of
them are putting hard and fast conditions, and some of them are
asking to release their favorite people who are now under government
custody for the charges of monetary corruptions. Grabbing political
power by the military of the country is the highest form of political
corruption. But the most arrogant behavior of the incumbent
administration, the most dubious activities of the President, and the
most destructive activities of the opposition compelled the highest
fire-power of the country to step in to stop all those nonsense
activities and save the people of the country from the extreme
violence orchestrated by the so called politicians of both major
parties.
After taking over the administrative power, both the CTG and the
military, made a lot of mistakes one after the other. One dreadful
mistake was lingering the monetary corruption drive for too long time
without starting immediate due process for trial and punishment.
Monetary corruptions are criminal offenses that had to be tried
promptly by the law of the court, and move on. This is haunting this
government severely. How come so many people are imprisoned without
convicting any of the corrupted politicians? The government is
releasing these corrupted politicians now without any legal due
processes. So, what does that mean? Are they all innocent? If so, why
they were in prison in the first place? If they were guilty, they
must be punished. But why they are being released if they were
suspected to be guilty when they were arrested? Does it mean that
this government is whimsical? Where did the law and fairness go? All
the mistakes done by the government have eroded the high praise that
they won by significantly improving the law and order situation of
the country.
No one in the world is without any errors, and not everybody has the
utmost efficiency in their jobs. While the CTG and Army had no
previous experience of running a country, they are expected to make
some mistakes, but that should not let the sky fall. Solutions have
to be searched by the government as well as everybody else in the
country. It is the duty of all citizens of the country to try to help
the government whatever way they can, and the government should make
the environment such that people can interact with the government
facing no troubles. Otherwise, a peaceful transition of power won't
happen.
The present government is composed of two components, a civil CTG and
an armed Military. Army came to power in the form of physical
takeover, just short of declaring Martial Law. Improving the Law and
order situation throughout the country is real praiseworthy. The
country must have, for all times, this type of excellent law and
order situation, no matter, who rules or what type of government runs
the country. If the government can not provide law and order,
everything of the country falls into the puddle. Until RAB was
formed, the street thugs, hoodlums, private tax collectors, robbers,
and illegal arm bearers would reign the entire country, bypassing the
government. Sometimes these bad elements would even have the
influence on the government and the government would have to favor
them. That situation has been tackled wisely by the present
government and so the people of the country started liking this
government quite well. However, the CTG or the Army can not rule the
country for too long time. But it is also true that the people of
this country have not seen this sort of peace in law and order for
the past several decades. Should people give it away soon? I don't
think anybody would like to do it. So, what is the solution that this
present government should look for such that a peaceful transfer of
power would happen and the similar law and order, as we have today,
will continue in the future days also?
It is real hard to find out any real and practical solution to keep
peace as well as to get the democracy back. However, we need to make
transition, and we must keep peace in the country by maintaining the
law and order situation. How it can be achieved?
The existing political parties have already shown that they are
extremely party aligned and the party leaders are not open enough to
cooperate with the other parties. It has been seen in the past that
the political parties are after their part interests only and not for
the benefit of the people of the country. In this situation, if those
old parties come to power again, definitely there will be no peace.
In order to establish the legacy of the lasting peace in the country,
there has to have some other ways, and some other means that the
present government has to follow during the power transfer.
Government should form search committees, commissions, and
enlightened groups to look for various options how the democracy can
be established and the law and order can be maintained
unconditionally. We lost already a lot of lives, properties, economic
progress, fames, and fortunes because of the chaos, conflicts, and
lawlessness in the country for quite a long time. Let's not repeat
those unfortunate happenings in our country again. Reconciliation,
Unity, Mutual Understanding, Ethics, Respect for Law, and to avoid
all anarchism for ever can bring the country together towards a
lasting peace. The traditional democracy is good where society is
bonded and do not erupt suddenly with tiny bit of sparks hitting
somewhere in the country.
Bangladesh is still far away from reaching to that state. A lot of
cultural and social traditions and bindings make that to happen. We
need some time to learn those things.
Reforming the administrative structure of the government is necessary
to be able to perform good governance for the country. One suggestion
would be to modify the administrative structure of the government
from one layer to three different layers. If the multi-layer
government could be instituted, it would be very beneficial for the
general public in order to be able to provide public administration
services effectively creating a check and balance amongst the layers.
The first layer shall be county level, second layer shall be the
district level, and the third level shall be the federal level for
the entire country. Each level shall have the fully independent
government, not being the part of the other levels. All districts
shall be divided into four, five or six counties. Thereby the whole
country would be divided into about 250 to 300 counties. Set up a
local government for each county. This local County Government shall
be responsible for all local administrations such as local
legislative houses, local administrative boards, police, court,
schools, land record and revenue, real estate development and zoning,
taxation, business licensing and controls, roads, bridges, and other
development works, hospitals, transportation, safety, security,
public welfare, child protection, social work, industry, fishery,
animal husbandry, agricultural, forestry, mining, water, electricity,
gas, and other supplies, etc.
All elementary, middle, and high schools in the county shall be run
with the personal property taxes and other taxes collected form the
county including the grants from the district government and federal
government. All other components of the county government shall be
run by the tax collected from the residents and businesses of that
county plus the district and federal government grants and aids.
Let the District Administrations have the coordination, training and
supervisory duties to look after the county administrations. District
administrative employees shall be highly trained and well rounded
professionals but the District Government shall be lean, less people
but highly efficient at work with impressive compensation. The
District Government shall have the administrative council and
legislative bodies including the counterparts of each of the
departments of the counties. Only at times of need they should deploy
their respective teams to help the counties, should any need or
crises arise. District administration should be able to collect
moderate amount of tax from the incomes of the citizens and
businesses in the district.
Districts may set up model institutes, extra-ordinary schools and
colleges. The universities shall be run by the districts. Inter-
county commerce shall be controlled by the district. Districts shall
build all transportation and communication highways, railways,
airports, river and water development projects, research institutes,
large scale hospitals, highway traffic police, district courts,
district prisons, utility oversight boards, regulatory bodies, parks,
museums, zoos, etc.
The federal government shall be the ultimate administrative,
legislative, and regulatory body in the country. The administrative
head may be a president or a prime minister based on whether
parliamentary or presidential democracy is chosen by the people of
the country. It can be decided by the polls or primary elections.
Federal Government shall be in charge of key issues of the nation
such as Military, Money, Foreign Policy, Inter-District and Foreign
Commerce, National Affairs & Policies, Drug and Gangs Control,
National Safety-Security-Homeland Protection, Industry Regulation,
Financial & Market Economy Safeguarding, Deregulating and Privatizing
Public Utilities, Foreign Aid Collection-Distribution-Payment,
National highways & Transportation, and establishing Counterpart
Departments to train and provide supports to the same in the district
governments and in the county governments. Two tier legislative
houses (upper & lower) would prepare laws of the country.
Why should we have this three tier governments in lieu of the present
on tier Government of Bangladesh? The main reason is the focus of the
government. It is always better to be the master of a trade instead
of being the jack of all trades. When a one tier government takes
care of all affairs in a nation, none of the affairs can be taken
care of well. It puts the government into the situation of the jack
of all trades. If the government has three tiers/layers then each
layer can focus on the issues differently. The local government can
take care of all peoples' affairs in its own territory such as public
protection, law & order, schools, real estates, businesses, banking,
transports, roads & highways, agriculture, industry, markets, health,
hospitals, child welfare, land, forestry, fishery, animal husbandry,
minerals, mining, and so on and so forth.
When area becomes smaller, most people know each other. Almost
everyone knows who is a good person and who is a bad person. With
this public knowledge, people can elect or select good people in the
politics and administration. Bad, greedy, thugs, and cheats can be
stopped this way to take the advantage of coming into politics and
ruining the political environment. While public is administered by
all these local county governments, the district and federal
government can focus on support and policy making jobs. Since the
district and federal government will not directly handle the real
estates, properties, industries, and public directly, it will provide
them an opportunity to be less greedy for real estates, properties,
bribes, and hoarding. Also, the law & order and public protection
services will be provided by the local government and so the district
and federal government won't have to spend too much time on these
crucial issues which will provide a very good opportunity to spend
more time on researching and making public policies for the national
stability and upliftment.
The federal government will also get more opportunity to interact
with the foreign government and international institutions such as
IMF, World Bank, UNO, and other international organizations. This
will greatly facilitate the federal government in bringing more
international helps to build and progress the nation.
Aside from governance, this three tier government system in the
country will provide a great opportunity to the people of the country
to run the country with less dependence and helps from the
politicians. It has been seen in the past that the election and
politics in the third world countries in Asia and Africa has become
the means of grabbing the state power and hoarding the wealth of the
nation. When politicians fail, military takes over, and do the same
thing. So, it is necessary to reduce the dependence of the public on
the politicians and on the military of the country for public
administration.
A one tier government grabs all affairs of the administration in the
country and so leaves no alternatives to public other than fully to
depend on who grabbed the power (politicians or military).
Alternatively, in the three tier/layer government, the local county
government is composed of mainly the locally known famous persons
regardless of their political affiliations. Military take over of the
local government is highly unlikely mainly because the military
always belongs to the central government and at the time of national
crises, military takes over the central government.
If the three tier governments exist, even if the military takes over,
the local government must remain functional and the military won't
have enough manpower and resources to replace all the local civil
governments to local military governments. So, even in the event of
military takeover, all public will be basically administering the
local county civil governments. This will affect very less the public
and business lives of the country. Country will remain lot more
stable as far as the public lives, economic and business operations.
Moreover, a head of the county can be elected by the local people of
the county who will better know who is a good leader, good social
worker, honest, and basically a good person, no matter what party
he/she is in or even an independent person. This way if the county
people locally employ 250 to 300 county heads (with designation such
as administrator, supervisor, chairman, president or CEO) in the
entire country and they are given the status of being the member of
parliament then this group of county administrators initially can
engage into discussions with the present CTG and military rulers to
formulate a permanent settlement on the transfer of power of the
federal government to a settled civilian federal government.
If this power transfer job is handled by the political parties only,
definitely there will be a lot of games on muscle, greed, power
grabbing strategies, chaos, confusions, and it is feared that the pre
one eleven situation will come back again to the country. This must
be avoided al all costs by all patriotic honest people of the
country. Only the dishonest traitors, cheaters, hoarders, and
musclemen will be benefited by the repetition of the situation of pre-
one eleven. The old politicians are all corrupt, dubious,
inefficient, greedy, and outrageously dishonest. It is only hope that
the new politicians out of new blood will emerge in future in the
country to take the country into the right direction but it will
definitely not happen if the pre-one eleven situation comes back in
the country.
So, the suggestion to the CTG and the Military Government leaders to
think about and form this three tier/layer government in the country
before transferring the power to any other government. Elections did
never solve our national problems, and will never do it unless it is
done properly in a proper environment. Definitely elections will be
needed for us to assume the democratic government but the situation
of Bangladesh is at present in such a condition that a mere election
will not resolve our acute national strife.
We must first put the nation in order. Create appropriate situation
which I believe can be achieved by establishing this three tier
government in the country now, leaving behind all other national
power transfer activities. It is almost guaranteed that if it is not
done today, it will never be done by the other governments in future
mainly for the reason that the present condition of Bangladesh will
not support or give birth to selfless politicians, rather will all be
corrupt. The corrupt politicians will not adopt the three tier/layer
government because it will stop them from looting and hoarding the
state money and properties and will not provide the scope of reigning
with their own gang of terrors and tax collectors (chadabuz). A
country like ours must avoid going down the spirals of these
unfortunate pitfalls for ever. It must be stopped somewhere and try
to re-run with fairness, honesty and aptitude. The political bullies
keep the good and honest people to take part in administration of the
country politically or otherwise. So, if their scope of capitalizing
the political muscle in public administration, they will try to
adjust themselves also. So, let us try to establish these
institutions for the good governance of the country before any other
changes.
Let the public administration be run by these local governments for a
test period of two, three or five years to see how effectively they
are running the administration. In the mean time let all these 250 to
300 honest and independent county heads attend the temporary
parliament and give their consensus on future national adoptions,
policies and changes for the country; and see where they can take us.
We have seen the politicians for long time; let us give chance to the
independents to give a test run for the bright and stable future of
our country.
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