Commentary
For God's sake why...?How can 'renaming' be a priority for any govt?
People of Bangladesh gave Sheikh Hasina the best gift possible in a democracy--a massive electoral victory of four-fifths majority in parliament. The young voters became enthused hearing of her "Digital Bangladesh". The professionals, civil society and the intellectual community in general suddenly found something to hope for when the Awami League chief proposed a "Politics of Change"(Din Badaler Rajniti). All this resulted in one of the biggest electoral victories, in December 2008, for any political party in recent history. Even after a year of her being in power, Sheikh Hasina was able to retain much of her support as was revealed by our recent opinion poll.
But just as her electoral victory was grand, her decision to change Zia International Airport's name and remove the former President's name from most public buildings was small, mean and vindictive. Yes, we recall how Khaleda Zia's government changed the name of Bangabandhu Bridge (renamed Jamuna Bridge), Bangabandhu Conference Centre (renamed Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre) and even tried to do the same with Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University till better sense prevailed. We also remember that after the assassination of Bangabandhu in August 1975 till the coming of power of Awami League in 1996, over 21 years a relentless and state supported effort was on to eliminate the country's founder's name from our history. That attempt totally failed. Why? Because political decisions cannot take away the place history grants a leader. History has a way of stamping its own judgments in the long run, that political machinations of the day try to change in the short run. And then, did we vote to change all that? Didn't our PM promise "Din Badaler Rajniti"?
Haven't we learnt that this "name game" is ephemeral and lasts only as long as the regime? With every change of government the names are replaced just as quickly as they were given in the first place. Haven't we also learnt that this is no way of showing respect to our departed leaders but only reducing them to playthings of present day politics? Haven't we learnt that such behaviour only makes us a laughing stock of the world and brings insult to the very leaders we are trying to honour?
Along with the "name game" we now have "is-there-a-body-in-the-grave" game. How can this be in any way a priority for the people of Bangladesh today? How does it, any way, improve our governance, fight the rising corruption and calm the campuses that are becoming increasingly violent? Then again why is this question being raised in the first place? Have any facts been uncovered that lead to such questions? If so, what are those facts? Share them with the public so that we can see some reason, however remote, as to why no less a person than the PM felt the need to raise this question on the floor of no less a place than the parliament.
Pending that we are forced to conclude that it was totally unbefitting, fundamentally unbecoming and basically wrong of the Prime Minister to question whether Ziaur Rahman's grave actually contains his body.
This paper's historic position has been to oppose any boycott of parliament by the opposition. In this spirit we wrote numerous editorials, urging the present opposition to shun their destructive path of boycotting parliament and rejoin the House and raise all relevant national issues there. After having wasted almost a year Khaleda Zia and her MPs along with her allies are finally back. Not that they are doing the nation any favour (they should have been there all along), yet we think that it is a welcome move and everything should be done to keep them there.
However, instead of showing the maturity, magnanimity and sagacity of an alliance that controls four-fifths membership of parliament and of a party that by itself has two-thirds majority, the ruling AL is showing a destructive streak that is making parliament more a place of abuse rather than a place of debate. Our opposition is far from being a saint. Their demand for more front row seats, withdrawal of cases against Khaleda Zia and her sons, assurances that nothing will be done about her cantonment residence, etc cannot be accepted as their preconditions for participating in parliament. That they should do simply because they pledged to represent their constituencies when they sought people's votes.
Having said all that we are constrained to comment that the treasury bench seems to be deliberately provoking the opposition to desist from attending the House and are creating unnecessary and irrelevant controversies so that our quick-on-the-foot opposition goes for a boycott.
We would like to point out to the Prime Minister that to build her "Digital Bangladesh" she needs political peace. Pushing the opposition towards mass agitation, however futile and ineffective it may appear to her analysts, cannot be good for her government. If we analyse the opposition politics from 1991 onwards, it becomes clear that a small number of committed agitators can cause enough disturbance to disrupt the smooth functioning of any government. Huge demonstration of mass outpouring is not necessary to create an image of the government's weakening position. Disruption at a select number of city points over a period of time has been seen in the past to be enough to create unfavourable public opinion against the government of the day. BNP and Jamaat together have that many committed agitators.
It is our view that a sense of over-confidence appears to be permeating the thinking of the ruling party leaders. It is such over-confidence that has led them to open too many political and legal fronts without effectively resolving any. It is such over-confidence that makes them feel nonchalant while student league members openly indulge in gunfights causing death to innocent students, and participate in corrupt activities disregarding the PM's repeated warnings. It is again such over-confidence that has led them to be so reckless, verging on being disdainful, in handling the elected members of the local bodies who have been made to sit idle for the last one year though they have all been duly elected in their local constituencies.
Why are we being led towards a political confrontation which appeared eminently avoidable just the other day? Whose interest will such confrontation serve? Not Sheikh Hasina's government's. That is for sure.
http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=126806
But just as her electoral victory was grand, her decision to change Zia International Airport's name and remove the former President's name from most public buildings was small, mean and vindictive. Yes, we recall how Khaleda Zia's government changed the name of Bangabandhu Bridge (renamed Jamuna Bridge), Bangabandhu Conference Centre (renamed Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre) and even tried to do the same with Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University till better sense prevailed. We also remember that after the assassination of Bangabandhu in August 1975 till the coming of power of Awami League in 1996, over 21 years a relentless and state supported effort was on to eliminate the country's founder's name from our history. That attempt totally failed. Why? Because political decisions cannot take away the place history grants a leader. History has a way of stamping its own judgments in the long run, that political machinations of the day try to change in the short run. And then, did we vote to change all that? Didn't our PM promise "Din Badaler Rajniti"?
Haven't we learnt that this "name game" is ephemeral and lasts only as long as the regime? With every change of government the names are replaced just as quickly as they were given in the first place. Haven't we also learnt that this is no way of showing respect to our departed leaders but only reducing them to playthings of present day politics? Haven't we learnt that such behaviour only makes us a laughing stock of the world and brings insult to the very leaders we are trying to honour?
Along with the "name game" we now have "is-there-a-body-in-the-grave" game. How can this be in any way a priority for the people of Bangladesh today? How does it, any way, improve our governance, fight the rising corruption and calm the campuses that are becoming increasingly violent? Then again why is this question being raised in the first place? Have any facts been uncovered that lead to such questions? If so, what are those facts? Share them with the public so that we can see some reason, however remote, as to why no less a person than the PM felt the need to raise this question on the floor of no less a place than the parliament.
Pending that we are forced to conclude that it was totally unbefitting, fundamentally unbecoming and basically wrong of the Prime Minister to question whether Ziaur Rahman's grave actually contains his body.
This paper's historic position has been to oppose any boycott of parliament by the opposition. In this spirit we wrote numerous editorials, urging the present opposition to shun their destructive path of boycotting parliament and rejoin the House and raise all relevant national issues there. After having wasted almost a year Khaleda Zia and her MPs along with her allies are finally back. Not that they are doing the nation any favour (they should have been there all along), yet we think that it is a welcome move and everything should be done to keep them there.
However, instead of showing the maturity, magnanimity and sagacity of an alliance that controls four-fifths membership of parliament and of a party that by itself has two-thirds majority, the ruling AL is showing a destructive streak that is making parliament more a place of abuse rather than a place of debate. Our opposition is far from being a saint. Their demand for more front row seats, withdrawal of cases against Khaleda Zia and her sons, assurances that nothing will be done about her cantonment residence, etc cannot be accepted as their preconditions for participating in parliament. That they should do simply because they pledged to represent their constituencies when they sought people's votes.
Having said all that we are constrained to comment that the treasury bench seems to be deliberately provoking the opposition to desist from attending the House and are creating unnecessary and irrelevant controversies so that our quick-on-the-foot opposition goes for a boycott.
We would like to point out to the Prime Minister that to build her "Digital Bangladesh" she needs political peace. Pushing the opposition towards mass agitation, however futile and ineffective it may appear to her analysts, cannot be good for her government. If we analyse the opposition politics from 1991 onwards, it becomes clear that a small number of committed agitators can cause enough disturbance to disrupt the smooth functioning of any government. Huge demonstration of mass outpouring is not necessary to create an image of the government's weakening position. Disruption at a select number of city points over a period of time has been seen in the past to be enough to create unfavourable public opinion against the government of the day. BNP and Jamaat together have that many committed agitators.
It is our view that a sense of over-confidence appears to be permeating the thinking of the ruling party leaders. It is such over-confidence that has led them to open too many political and legal fronts without effectively resolving any. It is such over-confidence that makes them feel nonchalant while student league members openly indulge in gunfights causing death to innocent students, and participate in corrupt activities disregarding the PM's repeated warnings. It is again such over-confidence that has led them to be so reckless, verging on being disdainful, in handling the elected members of the local bodies who have been made to sit idle for the last one year though they have all been duly elected in their local constituencies.
Why are we being led towards a political confrontation which appeared eminently avoidable just the other day? Whose interest will such confrontation serve? Not Sheikh Hasina's government's. That is for sure.
http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=126806
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