First one hundred days of elected governance
Saturday, 11 April 2009
Enayet Rasul Bhuiyan
There is a Bengali proverb that says and means that an infant bird which will fly well shows its likely true colours to be or zest by flapping its wings vigorously in the nest even before its mother will allow it to takes off in its maiden flight. There is an English saying that 'the morning shows the day' meaning how the weather will be for the rest of the day is indicated by whether it is cloudy or bright in the morning.
The wisdom in the above sayings may not be always right or fully vindicated. The weather may indeed be quite cloudy in the morning to clear up as the day progresses or the energetic infant bird in the nest may not quite grow up to be as strong a flyer as predicted . Thus, early signs are not always the last ones or the best ones. But it is equally true that sometimes the first impressions turn out to be also the enduring last impressions.
In that sense, fears and worries are seen to be the heavier as the Mahajote government led by the Awami League crosses its first one hundred days of governance inviting an assessment of how well this period has been or not for the country and its people. For one thing, there has been a smooth transition of power following the election. So, the Mahajote potentates cannot complain that they were harassed even as they attempted to take up the reins of power. The process of handing over of power was very smooth and very orderly that set the stage for the ones who took charge to give their focused and undisturbed attention to run the country without being distracted by any factor. But the first major step in that direction, seemed to be quite reckless. Under the present system of running the country, the cabinet of ministers, have a very significant role to play. They are looked upon to be the real doers or movers and shakers of things. Thus, selection of the ministers is seen as extremely important for achieving good governance. But the new government surprised all for the manner in which it filled vital ministerial posts in foreign affairs, home affairs and some others with individuals having hardly the appropriate background or competence to run them. So casual was the selection of the ministers that one tended to agree with the view that the cabinet in some areas seemed to be a playground for kids and not veterans. Thus, it is not surprising if the workings of these pivotal ministries are suffering from the poor selection of their helmspersons in the first place.
The BDR mutiny was another eye opener of the relative weakness of the new administration in being proactive to have prior knowledge of the brewing mutinous drift in order to preempt it in time. Although the aftermath of the mutiny was undoubtedly responded to and tackled very sensibly by the Prime Minister, the same does not absolve her government for not being alert and skilled enough to be able to head off the troubles in the first place. What the intelligence wing of the BDR itself or for that matter the various security agencies whose job it is to know well in advance such plots in the making, doing when the mutiny was being planned over not days spontaneously but weeks or probably months, as have been now suggested after investigations ? The agencies or security organizations are directly under the government of the day and, therefore, government cannot delink itself from the former to justify its lack of information about the mutiny that was on the planning boards.
Government is claiming huge success for the falling prices of specially foodgrains and some food items. But it is questionable how much of that is really the outcome of this barely three-months old government. The road to plummeting prices of food grains-- now-- was paved well by the immediate past caretaker government through implementation of a plan to bring the maximum acreage under food grain production that led to the most successful rice harvest the country had ever seen even before the tenure of that government ended. The caretakers also streamlined to satisfaction the supply of inputs to farmers. The system left behind by the caretaker government to massively increase foodgrain production and supports to that end, have been only maintained by the present elected government. Plus, mother nature has continued to be kind. All of these positive developments came together to help in the production of a series of bumper harvests in succession creating substantially increased yields of food grain. Thus, the producers of food grains are holding larger stocks and they have to dispose off stocks even by lowering price to recover production costs and there is no miracle in this normal market process. Therefore, the new government cannot take all credits for this price decrease of food grains and if any credit is to be given, it should go to its predecessor.
The declining prices of other essential but imported foodstuffs such as cooking oil, pulses, ata (flour), is really the reflection of their drastically reduced prices in international markets. In some cases, the prices of such foodstuffs have decreased by more than half compared to their prices some months ago. Thus, the new government cannot really claim that its activities in the main have lead to sharp price decreases of these essential food items although it may claim some credit for market monitoring to ensure that importers find no justification to keep prices of these at artificially high levels.
But whatever relief consumers sensed as coming to them in the form of lower prices of daily goods, the good feeling from that is getting nullified by a rising worry about law and order conditions. While food prices are important to people, law and order is a no less a concern. In fact, it is wider concern embracing all classes of people. While food is a concern directly of the poor, law and order maintenance is a very important need of the poor, the middle classes and the rich. But a deterioration of law and order conditions is noted and it seems to be getting worse by the day.
It is no overstatement to say that law and order conditions are free falling in the context of Bangladesh. The top dons of the underworld who went into hiding or left the country during the rule of the caretaker government, are reportedly back and well entrenched again in their old stamping grounds. Business operators and other resourceful people are getting calls again in the name of these czars of the underworld to regularly pay extortion money or face the consequences of being shot at and killed. Most of the victims of such renewed extortion are intuitively satisfying such demands from a feeling that reporting to police stations would fetch no protection or actions. The few who do report such things to the police find out how accurate the assumption of the majority of their business colleagues have been about the response of the police. Muggings and snatchings have acquired epidemic proportions in many places of Dhaka city and also robberies, drug peddling and other crimes. In sum, it appears as if the floodgates have opened for criminality not only in the capital city but all over the country.
The power supply situation has turned simply bewildering. The conditions in this regard were not significantly better under the caretaker government or the one before it. But in the ongoing summer season, all records have been beaten in poor performance in the power sector. Load shedding has become too acute and too frequent for power users; the likes of it were never before seen in the past. Not only common people are suffering tremendously from the lack of power, economic activities have been exceptionally hard-hit as a result. Nobody expected the new government to magically achieve remarkable improvement in power supply in three months. But it was only expected that it would not allow power supply to deteriorate any further or at least to successfully carry forward the various short term measures started by the caretaker government-- from establishing small power plants to repairing power plants -- aimed at improving power supply. But there are no signs that even this minimum expectation will be fulfilled by this government when people in one voice would identify the deplorable source of power supply as the source of their greatest torment today.
The closing down of the violence-infested premier campuses of the country one by one is another deep concern. Higher education related institutions in the country have been engulfed by the disorder in the last three months caused by student groups claiming to be the supporters of the ruling party. The way the government has allowed the violence to linger and failed to restore normalcy in the campuses, has surprised all who realize how important normal functioning of the campuses are for the country's future in every sense.
The first session of the new parliament was adjourned recently. But its achievements have been little. It was expected that the parliament would only approve of certain ordinances promulgated by the caretaker government for the country to get lasting benefits from them and for democracy to become stronger. One of them was the ordinance regarding the upazillas that would help decentralization and democratic values. But that ordinance was adopted in parliament only after amending it that makes it useless now for satisfying the aspiration for strong local governance and even flouts democratic values. The same can be said about some other ordinances which, if adopted in their full forms and spirit, would truly advance people's interest and democratic objectives. But these were also approved only after amending them in a manner that would undermine their effectiveness. But the parliament's time was well used to discuss measures to further increase the perks and privileges of the MPs.
The latest manifestation of the misplaced priorities of the government is seen in the bid to take over Khaleda Zia's cantonment residence when the only fallout from this step would be creating political instability afresh when government only requires a period of tranquility to address the real issues or main issues causing sufferings to people and begging to be addressed by the government.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina indeed appealed effectively to the imagination of the people--before and after the election - that voting her party to power would set the stage for things to change in Bangladesh. But no sign of that change has been noted in the last three months and that is causing disillusionment and disappointment to creep back again massively into the national psyche.
There is a Bengali proverb that says and means that an infant bird which will fly well shows its likely true colours to be or zest by flapping its wings vigorously in the nest even before its mother will allow it to takes off in its maiden flight. There is an English saying that 'the morning shows the day' meaning how the weather will be for the rest of the day is indicated by whether it is cloudy or bright in the morning.
The wisdom in the above sayings may not be always right or fully vindicated. The weather may indeed be quite cloudy in the morning to clear up as the day progresses or the energetic infant bird in the nest may not quite grow up to be as strong a flyer as predicted . Thus, early signs are not always the last ones or the best ones. But it is equally true that sometimes the first impressions turn out to be also the enduring last impressions.
In that sense, fears and worries are seen to be the heavier as the Mahajote government led by the Awami League crosses its first one hundred days of governance inviting an assessment of how well this period has been or not for the country and its people. For one thing, there has been a smooth transition of power following the election. So, the Mahajote potentates cannot complain that they were harassed even as they attempted to take up the reins of power. The process of handing over of power was very smooth and very orderly that set the stage for the ones who took charge to give their focused and undisturbed attention to run the country without being distracted by any factor. But the first major step in that direction, seemed to be quite reckless. Under the present system of running the country, the cabinet of ministers, have a very significant role to play. They are looked upon to be the real doers or movers and shakers of things. Thus, selection of the ministers is seen as extremely important for achieving good governance. But the new government surprised all for the manner in which it filled vital ministerial posts in foreign affairs, home affairs and some others with individuals having hardly the appropriate background or competence to run them. So casual was the selection of the ministers that one tended to agree with the view that the cabinet in some areas seemed to be a playground for kids and not veterans. Thus, it is not surprising if the workings of these pivotal ministries are suffering from the poor selection of their helmspersons in the first place.
The BDR mutiny was another eye opener of the relative weakness of the new administration in being proactive to have prior knowledge of the brewing mutinous drift in order to preempt it in time. Although the aftermath of the mutiny was undoubtedly responded to and tackled very sensibly by the Prime Minister, the same does not absolve her government for not being alert and skilled enough to be able to head off the troubles in the first place. What the intelligence wing of the BDR itself or for that matter the various security agencies whose job it is to know well in advance such plots in the making, doing when the mutiny was being planned over not days spontaneously but weeks or probably months, as have been now suggested after investigations ? The agencies or security organizations are directly under the government of the day and, therefore, government cannot delink itself from the former to justify its lack of information about the mutiny that was on the planning boards.
Government is claiming huge success for the falling prices of specially foodgrains and some food items. But it is questionable how much of that is really the outcome of this barely three-months old government. The road to plummeting prices of food grains-- now-- was paved well by the immediate past caretaker government through implementation of a plan to bring the maximum acreage under food grain production that led to the most successful rice harvest the country had ever seen even before the tenure of that government ended. The caretakers also streamlined to satisfaction the supply of inputs to farmers. The system left behind by the caretaker government to massively increase foodgrain production and supports to that end, have been only maintained by the present elected government. Plus, mother nature has continued to be kind. All of these positive developments came together to help in the production of a series of bumper harvests in succession creating substantially increased yields of food grain. Thus, the producers of food grains are holding larger stocks and they have to dispose off stocks even by lowering price to recover production costs and there is no miracle in this normal market process. Therefore, the new government cannot take all credits for this price decrease of food grains and if any credit is to be given, it should go to its predecessor.
The declining prices of other essential but imported foodstuffs such as cooking oil, pulses, ata (flour), is really the reflection of their drastically reduced prices in international markets. In some cases, the prices of such foodstuffs have decreased by more than half compared to their prices some months ago. Thus, the new government cannot really claim that its activities in the main have lead to sharp price decreases of these essential food items although it may claim some credit for market monitoring to ensure that importers find no justification to keep prices of these at artificially high levels.
But whatever relief consumers sensed as coming to them in the form of lower prices of daily goods, the good feeling from that is getting nullified by a rising worry about law and order conditions. While food prices are important to people, law and order is a no less a concern. In fact, it is wider concern embracing all classes of people. While food is a concern directly of the poor, law and order maintenance is a very important need of the poor, the middle classes and the rich. But a deterioration of law and order conditions is noted and it seems to be getting worse by the day.
It is no overstatement to say that law and order conditions are free falling in the context of Bangladesh. The top dons of the underworld who went into hiding or left the country during the rule of the caretaker government, are reportedly back and well entrenched again in their old stamping grounds. Business operators and other resourceful people are getting calls again in the name of these czars of the underworld to regularly pay extortion money or face the consequences of being shot at and killed. Most of the victims of such renewed extortion are intuitively satisfying such demands from a feeling that reporting to police stations would fetch no protection or actions. The few who do report such things to the police find out how accurate the assumption of the majority of their business colleagues have been about the response of the police. Muggings and snatchings have acquired epidemic proportions in many places of Dhaka city and also robberies, drug peddling and other crimes. In sum, it appears as if the floodgates have opened for criminality not only in the capital city but all over the country.
The power supply situation has turned simply bewildering. The conditions in this regard were not significantly better under the caretaker government or the one before it. But in the ongoing summer season, all records have been beaten in poor performance in the power sector. Load shedding has become too acute and too frequent for power users; the likes of it were never before seen in the past. Not only common people are suffering tremendously from the lack of power, economic activities have been exceptionally hard-hit as a result. Nobody expected the new government to magically achieve remarkable improvement in power supply in three months. But it was only expected that it would not allow power supply to deteriorate any further or at least to successfully carry forward the various short term measures started by the caretaker government-- from establishing small power plants to repairing power plants -- aimed at improving power supply. But there are no signs that even this minimum expectation will be fulfilled by this government when people in one voice would identify the deplorable source of power supply as the source of their greatest torment today.
The closing down of the violence-infested premier campuses of the country one by one is another deep concern. Higher education related institutions in the country have been engulfed by the disorder in the last three months caused by student groups claiming to be the supporters of the ruling party. The way the government has allowed the violence to linger and failed to restore normalcy in the campuses, has surprised all who realize how important normal functioning of the campuses are for the country's future in every sense.
The first session of the new parliament was adjourned recently. But its achievements have been little. It was expected that the parliament would only approve of certain ordinances promulgated by the caretaker government for the country to get lasting benefits from them and for democracy to become stronger. One of them was the ordinance regarding the upazillas that would help decentralization and democratic values. But that ordinance was adopted in parliament only after amending it that makes it useless now for satisfying the aspiration for strong local governance and even flouts democratic values. The same can be said about some other ordinances which, if adopted in their full forms and spirit, would truly advance people's interest and democratic objectives. But these were also approved only after amending them in a manner that would undermine their effectiveness. But the parliament's time was well used to discuss measures to further increase the perks and privileges of the MPs.
The latest manifestation of the misplaced priorities of the government is seen in the bid to take over Khaleda Zia's cantonment residence when the only fallout from this step would be creating political instability afresh when government only requires a period of tranquility to address the real issues or main issues causing sufferings to people and begging to be addressed by the government.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina indeed appealed effectively to the imagination of the people--before and after the election - that voting her party to power would set the stage for things to change in Bangladesh. But no sign of that change has been noted in the last three months and that is causing disillusionment and disappointment to creep back again massively into the national psyche.