Dhaka city needs its own, caring father/s

World over cities and towns do have a father each, heading the municipal or city corporations. Dhaka is one mega city which has a couple of fathers. The city fathers are usually elected by the residents. Here also, Dhaka city has earned a distinction; its fathers are now selected by the government from amongst the bureaucrats who are allowed by law to demonstrate their fatherhood for a maximum period of six months.
But all these unique features, which are viewed more as political experimentations spearheaded by the immediate past government, of the Dhaka city have been taking a heavy toll on its residents.
The residents of Dhaka city are badly feeling the absence of their elected representatives in wards and at the helm of the Dhaka City Corporation/s during the current monsoon.
True, services rendered by the single DCC, headed by an elected mayor, had never been perfect. Residents used to make lots of complaints about the poor road conditions, conservancy service, streets lights, uncontrolled breeding of mosquitoes etc.
But compared to the current state of affairs with the two city corporations that were created with the promise of offering better civic facilities to the Dhaka residents the situation undeniably was better under one DCC, manned by the people's representatives.
The ward commissioners did have an image of villains, mainly because of the muscle-flexing nature of a section of them. Yet, these days, the residents of different wards are feeling their absence. The commissioners, good or bad, were reachable and the residents could at least approach them and seek remedies to problems.
For more than two years and a half since the split of the one DCC at the fag end of 2011, there is none to listen to the grievances of the residents of different city wards. The two city corporations have been getting their 'administrators' after every six months since 2012. For obvious reasons, the administrations can hardly do anything during their brief stints. Their time for leaving the city corporations arrive before knowing the very modus operandi of these important local government entities.
The deplorable conditions of the roads along the construction site of Tejgaon-Moghbazar-Malibagh-Bangla Motor flyover is the glaring example of indifference on the part of the officials of the Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC).
There is no denying that road conditions along the route of a flyover would be poor due to extensive digging for the construction of piers. But there should be a limit to the poor state. The roads have been made outrageously un-pliable. Yet vehicles are seen crossing these roads taking great risks. Rickshaws with their passengers on board do very often get stuck in dirty water-filled large potholes and turn turtle.  
What is condemnable is the apathy of the DSCC towards the safety of the road users. It could at least do temporary repair of the roads to make those pliable.
The problem of water logging in most part of Dhaka city has made the situation even worse. The city corporations and the Dhaka WASA are to share the blame for the city's water logging problem. The city corporations take little effort to keep the surface drains along the roads clean and the WASA has always been indifferent to the need for ensuring the quick flash-out of rain waters. The latter saw the slow demise of many important canals and water bodies in Dhaka city. Now as the problem of water-logging has reached its peak, the WASA is increasingly finding it hard to manage exit routes for rain waters at many places of the city despite its best efforts.
The Dhaka city has already earned notoriety as the world's worst livable city, due to problems of pollution, traffic jam, poor conditions of roads and water logging. Measures of ad-hoc nature are being taking to resolve some of the problems. There is widespread fear that such solutions would give rise to problems of far greater dimensions in the future.
Under the prevailing circumstances, many tend to believe that the people's elected representatives manning the two city corporations should find out appropriate solutions to the problems of Dhaka city. However, holding of the DCC elections depends on the sweet will of the government in power.
Since all city corporations and pourashavas are manned by the people's elected representatives, it does not look proper to deprive the residents of the country's largest as well as capital city of the opportunity to elect their own men for running the affairs of the Dhaka north and south city corporations.
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