BANGLADESH – A FRAGILE DEMOCRACY

I recently spent some time in Bangladesh as a member of a team organised by the National Democratic Institute (NDI), an American-based group that promotes democracy and provides technical assistance, monitors elections, and in this case, visited to provide an impartial pre-election assessment of the electoral environment in anticipation of parliamentary elections in January, 2007. Former Senator Thomas Daschle, and Mu Sochna, a former Cambodian Minister of Women’s and Veterans’ Affairs, were the other members of the team.

Life is not easy in Bangladesh, 145 million people in a land area about the size of New York State, half the population earns less than a dollar a day. Bangladesh’s short history since independence from Britain, and then independence as a separate state from Pakistan, has been savage and sad. The reason so many women have power in the region is not because of any love of women’s rights but simply because so many of the male leaders have been assassinated and their political brand has been taken up by their widows and children. Both the Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition are women and have their positions because of assassinations. Listening to the complaints, each of the main parties in Bangladesh, the BNP (Bangladesh National Party), and the Awami League sound exactly like each other. Both list murders, assassination, intimidation, corruption by the others as a reason for non co-operation and mistrust. Parliament is often boycotted, each taking their turn when in opposition, general strikes, over twenty in one year, organised by each side in turn, is the strongest display of political power and force. The police move in and activists’ street action harassed! Mass detentions not unusual before protests. This has escalated over recent years with an attempted assassination on the life of the British High Commissioner, a multiple grenade attack on an opposition Awami League rally killed 24 people and injured the opposition leader.

A new and sinister development has been the intrusion of extreme Islamic influence with the first suicide bombing of two judges, a well-organised, simultaneous detonation of 500 small bombs in August last year shocked both sides. A leaflet released that day described the election as un-Islamic because they were man-made. The Government acted decisively with many arrests. The small Islamic party in Parliament condemned the attacks. In short, all this constitutes the conditions for a “perfect storm”. In light of all this, Bangladesh has instituted some unique constitutional arrangements. For 3 months before an election, a non-party, caretaker Government is installed to put at arms’ length an administration to whom the army, police and electoral officers are answerable. Good ideas, but claims have emerged that the caretaker Government will not be independent, may not be decided by political consensus. The Government claims the opposition parties are not prepared to negotiate a consensus in good faith, that they want reasons to walk away, even boycott the election, go to the streets and make the country ungovernable, and then take power one way or another. This has happened before. There is a so-called independent Electoral Commission and its Chief Executive is an ex-Supreme Court judge who, when we met, saw no problem in voter lists that had 10 million too many names when compared to the census.

Despite all this, Bangladesh has enjoyed three reasonably clean elections, power has been transferred peacefully. It’s still not too late for a free and fair election to be held. The electoral lists of voters need to be cleaned up, confidence needs to be built, civil society needs to be involved, and the new caretaker Government needs to be independent and appointed after honest consultations based on good faith discussions. The overwhelming view is that the army will stay out of politics, they value their independence and cherish their successful role in international peace-keeping, something they could lose if they were to involve themselves in domestic politics.

Most seem a little too relaxed about the threat of Islamic extremists because Bangladeshis do cherish democracy, and are mainly secular. Let’s see. The core problem is with the political elites, they won’t talk, each have attractive and ambitious sons who seem to want to carry on their family name and hatreds. Everyone has a party political affiliation, from doctors, lawyers, students, and workers on the streets. These are differences, not based on race, religion or geography. There’s no appreciation of the role of the loyal opposition in Parliament or in the country. There’s a difference between democracy and demagogy. It’s staggering that the economy is growing at 5% despite all this. Somehow a mechanism must be established to deliver a reconciliation between party leaders and their families. It will be a close-run thing.