Afsan Chowdhury - Bangladesh: A state of failed politics // Bangladesh Islamist party vows to avenge execution of top leader
For a country born out of political upheavals, the continuing state of affairs in Bangladesh has shrunk the space for the actual practice of politics
It’s not unusual to hear about the failure of the Bangladesh state. Yet, mounting evidence shows that though Bangladesh as a corporate entity has done quite well, its politics have fared poorly. Both national and international media have targeted the sheer failure of its political machinery. Even the tales of horror emanating from the Ready-Made Garment (RMG) sector are about the failed regulatory responsibility of the government. But the state is a more complex entity and, in Bangladesh, the gap between the government and the state is widening.
Bangladesh’s political system is miserable but the social service delivery system— particularly for the poor-—is doing well. Prof Amartya Sen has said, “On a range of development indicators such as life expectancy, child immunization and child mortality, Bangladesh has pulled ahead of India despite being poorer.” He said that what makes this comparison so powerful is that Bangladesh has targeted the position of women, not just through government policy, but also through the work of non-governmental organizations, such as Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) and the Grameen Bank. As a result, “there have been astonishing successes, such as a dramatic fall in fertility rate and girls now outnumbering boys in education. All this has been achieved despite having half the per capita income of India”. One explanation for why this works in Bangladesh, despite low public health spending is that both non-state actors and the community play a much bigger role, compared to neighbours. Few in Bangladesh wait for the government to act.
Bangladesh Islamist party vows to avenge execution of top leader
DHAKA: An Islamist political party has vowed to deepen the role of Islam in Bangladesh to avenge the execution of a party leader who was hanged for war crimes committed during the country's 1971 war of independence against Pakistan. Abdul Quader Mollah, 65, was hanged on Thursday night in a case that has exacerbated the explosive political divide in Bangladesh, an impoverished country of 160 million. Mollah was a leader of the party, Jamaat-e-Islami, and a key member of the opposition. Opponents of Jamaat-e-Islami say it is a fundamentalist group with no place in a secular country. Bangladesh is predominantly Muslim, but is governed by largely secular laws based on British common law. The execution sparked violent protests on Friday as activists torched homes and businesses belonging to government supporters in a fresh wave of bloodshed ahead of elections next month. At least five people died in the violence.
Meanwhile, hundreds of people rejoiced in the streets of the capital, Dhaka, and said justice had been served. In an editorial, Bangladesh's English-language Daily Star newspaper congratulated Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for trying and executing Mollah "40 long years" after he committed his crimes. A Jamaat-e-Islami leader, Makbul Ahmed, said in a statement late Thursday that "people would take revenge on this killing by establishing Islam in Bangladesh, which is stained with the blood of Abdul Quader Mollah." "I urge all the people who support the cause of the Islamic movement to show utmost patience to build a strong resistance," Ahmed said. Jamaat-e-Islami says Mollah's trial was politically motivated and an attempt to eliminate Islamic parties. Those who support the execution say he was hanged for serious crimes, and that the punishment had nothing to do with Islam.
An analyst said attempts by the government to neutralize Jamaat-e-Islami could backfire, and that the party could become more radicalized despite Hasina's determination to suppress fundamentalist groups. "Jamaat-e-Islami as a political party has been in operation for a long time, so it's natural that it will hit back with what it has in its possession when you hit it in an extreme way," political analyst Ataur Rahman said. Mollah was the first person to be hanged for war crimes in Bangladesh under an international tribunal established in 2010 to investigate atrocities stemming from the independence war. Jamaat-e-Islami activists on Friday attacked ruling party supporters and minority Hindus in parts of Bangladesh, torching their homes and shops. At least five people died in the violence, local TV stations reported. Hindus are believed to be supporters of Hasina. In Dhaka, Jamaat-e-Islami activists torched at least four cars and a motorcycle near the country's main railway station, said Shahzadi Sultana, a fire official. Several homemade bombs were detonated during the attack, Somoy TV reported.
Bangladesh says Pakistani soldiers, aided by local collaborators including Mollah, killed at least 3 million people and raped 200,000 women during the nine-month war against Pakistan. The case remains politically volatile because most of those being tried are connected to the country's opposition. Mollah was a key member of Jamaat-e-Islami, which is barred from taking part in next month's national elections. But the group is closely tied to the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party. The special tribunal convicted Mollah of killing a student and a family of 11, and of aiding Pakistani troops in killing 369 other people during the war. The court had stopped his execution at the last minute Tuesday night - just hours before he was due to be hanged - before rejecting his final appeal. The execution could complicate an already tense political situation in Bangladesh, where the opposition has carried out violent protests that have left nearly 100 people dead since October, demanding an independent caretaker government to oversee the Jan. 5 general election. The government has rejected that demand, and an opposition alliance led by former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia plans to boycott the vote.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/south-asia/Bangladesh-Islamist-party-vows-to-avenge-execution-of-top-leader/articleshow/27305611.cms
It’s not unusual to hear about the failure of the Bangladesh state. Yet, mounting evidence shows that though Bangladesh as a corporate entity has done quite well, its politics have fared poorly. Both national and international media have targeted the sheer failure of its political machinery. Even the tales of horror emanating from the Ready-Made Garment (RMG) sector are about the failed regulatory responsibility of the government. But the state is a more complex entity and, in Bangladesh, the gap between the government and the state is widening.
Bangladesh’s political system is miserable but the social service delivery system— particularly for the poor-—is doing well. Prof Amartya Sen has said, “On a range of development indicators such as life expectancy, child immunization and child mortality, Bangladesh has pulled ahead of India despite being poorer.” He said that what makes this comparison so powerful is that Bangladesh has targeted the position of women, not just through government policy, but also through the work of non-governmental organizations, such as Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) and the Grameen Bank. As a result, “there have been astonishing successes, such as a dramatic fall in fertility rate and girls now outnumbering boys in education. All this has been achieved despite having half the per capita income of India”. One explanation for why this works in Bangladesh, despite low public health spending is that both non-state actors and the community play a much bigger role, compared to neighbours. Few in Bangladesh wait for the government to act.
This may be because politics in Bangladesh have been unstable from its very inception. When Bangladesh’s founding President, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, took over, he didn’t succeed in ensuring stability. Post-war reconstruction was a gigantic task, made worse by nepotism and instabilities generated by the new aspirations of an entire people. The Left in various shapes and forms emerged to contest the state and the law and order situation was terrible. One way to handle this crisis was to repeatedly deploy the military in combing operations, both against ‘criminals’ and the ‘Naxals’. Meanwhile, a paramilitary force known as ‘Rakkhi Bahini’, and directly loyal to Rahman, was constituted with technical assistance from India. It formalized extrajudicial arrests, interrogations and disappearances, which have now become traditions upheld by both ruling parties. More important, the regular army saw Rakkhi Bahini as a rival, creating further resentment.
By 1974, Mujibur Rahman had declared emergency, barely two years after a Constitution promising democracy, secularism, socialism and nationalism was enacted. Within a year of this one-party move, a rogue group of army personnel aided by a section of Rahman’s colleagues slew him and his family members and took over power. This takeover was supported by the US and China.
This group lasted barely three months before another group from the mainstream army, led by a war hero, Col. Khaled Musharraf, threw them out and took over. But their rule lasted barely three days before another group led by Col. Abu Taher, a retired war hero, led another coup on September 7. Taher was linked to the Leftist Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal (JSD) party and relied on the non-commissioned officers. It was partly fueled by rage against the army brass, and in the ensuing chaos many officers were killed.
However, this takeover barely lasted a night. Col. Taher released the chief of army staff, General Ziaur Rahman, from army jail— who had by then become very popular for not joining Musharraf’s coup, which many thought was pro-Indian. He promptly arrested Taher and his coup colleagues, thus beginning the Zia era. In 1981, Zia was killed in the port city of Chittagong by a group of officers who were unhappy with his rule. Another war hero, General Abul Manzur was responsible for the assassination. Then army chief Gen. Hussain Muhammad Ershad mobilized his troops against them, sending the rebels on the run.
Ershad, too, came to power by pushing out President Justice Abdus Sattar in 1982, on a plank of ‘jihad against corruption’. Later, Ershad himself was to be known as a symbol of corruption to most. He ruled from 1982 to 1990, when a mass movement finally dislodged him from power, after all political parties rallied against him. However, since no power transfer occured, the political parties decided to set up a “caretaker government system”—led by then Supreme Court chief Justice Shahbuddin Ahmee—to oversee the elections. Subsequently, this became the system—a caretaker government headed by a SC Justice with members drawn from non-politicians—when elections were to be held. Basically, no party trusts any other, and the Election Commission’s power, rather than its integrity, is held in question. The practice of normal political democracy has no history in Bangladesh.
Several coup leaders of the 1975 takeover were hanged by the Awami League government. Khaled Musharraf was killed while fleeing from soldiers after his coup collapsed, while Col. Taher was tried and hanged by Zia. Gen. Zia was killed by his soldier colleagues and later the killers were tried and hanged by Gen. Ershad. Gen. Manzur was mysteriously killed as he tried to escape with his family when the coup failed.
Bangladesh Islamist party vows to avenge execution of top leader
DHAKA: An Islamist political party has vowed to deepen the role of Islam in Bangladesh to avenge the execution of a party leader who was hanged for war crimes committed during the country's 1971 war of independence against Pakistan. Abdul Quader Mollah, 65, was hanged on Thursday night in a case that has exacerbated the explosive political divide in Bangladesh, an impoverished country of 160 million. Mollah was a leader of the party, Jamaat-e-Islami, and a key member of the opposition. Opponents of Jamaat-e-Islami say it is a fundamentalist group with no place in a secular country. Bangladesh is predominantly Muslim, but is governed by largely secular laws based on British common law. The execution sparked violent protests on Friday as activists torched homes and businesses belonging to government supporters in a fresh wave of bloodshed ahead of elections next month. At least five people died in the violence.
Meanwhile, hundreds of people rejoiced in the streets of the capital, Dhaka, and said justice had been served. In an editorial, Bangladesh's English-language Daily Star newspaper congratulated Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina for trying and executing Mollah "40 long years" after he committed his crimes. A Jamaat-e-Islami leader, Makbul Ahmed, said in a statement late Thursday that "people would take revenge on this killing by establishing Islam in Bangladesh, which is stained with the blood of Abdul Quader Mollah." "I urge all the people who support the cause of the Islamic movement to show utmost patience to build a strong resistance," Ahmed said. Jamaat-e-Islami says Mollah's trial was politically motivated and an attempt to eliminate Islamic parties. Those who support the execution say he was hanged for serious crimes, and that the punishment had nothing to do with Islam.
An analyst said attempts by the government to neutralize Jamaat-e-Islami could backfire, and that the party could become more radicalized despite Hasina's determination to suppress fundamentalist groups. "Jamaat-e-Islami as a political party has been in operation for a long time, so it's natural that it will hit back with what it has in its possession when you hit it in an extreme way," political analyst Ataur Rahman said. Mollah was the first person to be hanged for war crimes in Bangladesh under an international tribunal established in 2010 to investigate atrocities stemming from the independence war. Jamaat-e-Islami activists on Friday attacked ruling party supporters and minority Hindus in parts of Bangladesh, torching their homes and shops. At least five people died in the violence, local TV stations reported. Hindus are believed to be supporters of Hasina. In Dhaka, Jamaat-e-Islami activists torched at least four cars and a motorcycle near the country's main railway station, said Shahzadi Sultana, a fire official. Several homemade bombs were detonated during the attack, Somoy TV reported.
Bangladesh says Pakistani soldiers, aided by local collaborators including Mollah, killed at least 3 million people and raped 200,000 women during the nine-month war against Pakistan. The case remains politically volatile because most of those being tried are connected to the country's opposition. Mollah was a key member of Jamaat-e-Islami, which is barred from taking part in next month's national elections. But the group is closely tied to the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party. The special tribunal convicted Mollah of killing a student and a family of 11, and of aiding Pakistani troops in killing 369 other people during the war. The court had stopped his execution at the last minute Tuesday night - just hours before he was due to be hanged - before rejecting his final appeal. The execution could complicate an already tense political situation in Bangladesh, where the opposition has carried out violent protests that have left nearly 100 people dead since October, demanding an independent caretaker government to oversee the Jan. 5 general election. The government has rejected that demand, and an opposition alliance led by former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia plans to boycott the vote.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/south-asia/Bangladesh-Islamist-party-vows-to-avenge-execution-of-top-leader/articleshow/27305611.cms
