Non-representative peoples' representatives
Saturday, 4 December 2010
It is a tragedy that people in Bangladesh like in many other developing countries could never really choose the right men or women to be elected as their right representatives in the parliament because they could never have a chance to select their representatives from among a group of individuals who they truly liked or who were like what they were.
A government "of the people, by the people and for the people" should guarantee that elected representatives share similar lives to the majority of the people in their respective jurisdictions and engage their devotion only for the welfare of the electors. Not only does this not happen, it may be an impossible model in Bangladesh based on what we have witnessed in the past. Not only the representatives are unlike the people they represent, they, immediately after being elected, get busier in making their own fortunes than in changing the fate of the people who elected them.
If it is so, one may ask: why did the people elect those representatives in the first place? The answer is simple: people did elect them alright, but they did not select them.
The select few who are elected by people did pass through a selection process by a political party where general people do not have any say and the selection process is done in dictatorial styles by the party stalwarts who own their status more on their own legacy or on their money power. This selection process in its entirety precludes the possibility that a candidate for office will be like the average person in the constituency. As the level of representation gets higher, such as in the parliament, the likelihood of a candidate having much in common with the average voter is even lower.
When it is time to consider party leaders, prime ministers and presidents, the elite from which these people are chosen have little in common with the lifestyle and personal life of the average person. The elite belong to a different economic and social class. A wealthy parliamentarian, for example, will likely have little empathy for a poor person who leads an impoverished life in his hut in a rural area.
Because the lives of electoral candidates are nothing like the lives of many of the people he or she hopes to represent, there is a disconnection between the elected and the elector. The elector believes he has nothing to vote for because no one represents the values, the beliefs and the lifestyle he leads. He doesn't necessarily believe that his one vote will not count, but that there will be no one on the ballot who really understands his life. People are offered only to vote for a stranger who has nothing in common with them and will not likely start once elected, not to judge whether the select few are to their choice or not.
As a consequence, people of Bangladesh are now compelled to submit to the tyranny of a handful of political parties on whom depend who are going to be the leaders in the future. And, as the most powerful political parties in Bangladesh are run and managed in not truly demonstrate fashion, the lucky few, who derived the chairmanship more on their fate than on their merit the possibility of evolving right leadership in Bangladesh, and for that matter selection and election of true representative in the parliament, will remain thin and a far cry from peoples' expectations.
E-mail : maswood@hotmail.com
A government "of the people, by the people and for the people" should guarantee that elected representatives share similar lives to the majority of the people in their respective jurisdictions and engage their devotion only for the welfare of the electors. Not only does this not happen, it may be an impossible model in Bangladesh based on what we have witnessed in the past. Not only the representatives are unlike the people they represent, they, immediately after being elected, get busier in making their own fortunes than in changing the fate of the people who elected them.
If it is so, one may ask: why did the people elect those representatives in the first place? The answer is simple: people did elect them alright, but they did not select them.
The select few who are elected by people did pass through a selection process by a political party where general people do not have any say and the selection process is done in dictatorial styles by the party stalwarts who own their status more on their own legacy or on their money power. This selection process in its entirety precludes the possibility that a candidate for office will be like the average person in the constituency. As the level of representation gets higher, such as in the parliament, the likelihood of a candidate having much in common with the average voter is even lower.
When it is time to consider party leaders, prime ministers and presidents, the elite from which these people are chosen have little in common with the lifestyle and personal life of the average person. The elite belong to a different economic and social class. A wealthy parliamentarian, for example, will likely have little empathy for a poor person who leads an impoverished life in his hut in a rural area.
Because the lives of electoral candidates are nothing like the lives of many of the people he or she hopes to represent, there is a disconnection between the elected and the elector. The elector believes he has nothing to vote for because no one represents the values, the beliefs and the lifestyle he leads. He doesn't necessarily believe that his one vote will not count, but that there will be no one on the ballot who really understands his life. People are offered only to vote for a stranger who has nothing in common with them and will not likely start once elected, not to judge whether the select few are to their choice or not.
As a consequence, people of Bangladesh are now compelled to submit to the tyranny of a handful of political parties on whom depend who are going to be the leaders in the future. And, as the most powerful political parties in Bangladesh are run and managed in not truly demonstrate fashion, the lucky few, who derived the chairmanship more on their fate than on their merit the possibility of evolving right leadership in Bangladesh, and for that matter selection and election of true representative in the parliament, will remain thin and a far cry from peoples' expectations.
E-mail : maswood@hotmail.com