Public interest submerged in WASA lagoons
Friday, 6 July 2007
Abul Ehsan
Any long-time resident of Dhaka city, who regularly buys fishes from the city markets for family consumption, is increasingly disgusted on reading the continuing newspaper reports about fish culture in the WASA's sewer lagoons in Narayanganj near Dhaka. These reports make one deeply frustrated at the irresponsibility of BNP's Secretary General Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan, who held the chair of the minister of local government and rural development (LGRD) until the other day.
The WASA is a public sector entity under the Ministry of LGRD. It was his job as an elected leader and minister in charge of LGRD to ensure that these filthy lagoons could not be used for raising fishes that could be sold to the unaware publics in the city markets and elsewhere within the country. But he did not. Seemingly, he either colluded with the greedy, unscrupulous and irresponsible elements who cultured fishes in the sewer lagoons for their political support or some bad money or he was grossly indifferent to public interest and thus glaringly irresponsible.
Most people of Dhaka city and the adjoining urban centers are now suspecting whether they have had consumed the abominable fishes of WASA's filthy sewer lagoons. Many of them become upset and feel like vomiting when they think over it. Quite a large number of people, who are psychologically sensitive, might eventually become mentally sick by this haunting thought in them.
In the western world, where they care for public health, this single case of WASA sewer lagoons having been passively allowed to be used for fish culture would have led to numerous damage suits and harsh administrative and judicial actions against Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan and the high officials of the WASA and the Ministry of LGRD who served under him.
The BNP Secretary General, who has suddenly turned into a political reformist, now talks about introducing real democracy. His past performance records, as explicit from this single case of fish rearing in WASA sewer lagoons, give no reason for one to believe in his new words. Democracy is for the genuine welfare of the people and not for some bad people to scale the staircase of power for climbing to its top using false words and empty promises about public welfare as ploys.
Mr. Bhuiyan definitely owes an explanation to the people, many of whom are terribly angry with him on the said count. One suspects that a public apology of his will not suffice to heal the wounds he has inflicted upon the people by leading them to unknowingly consume the filthy fishes of WASA's sewer lagoons.
The nation should not forgive the top executives of the WASA either who have run this body over the years. Their waywardness in permitting the obnoxious fish culture in the lagoons through active involvement or passive connivance is far more serious than that of the detained forest officials in terms of hidden, unenumerated costs in terms of injuries to public health. The lagoons' fishes were unfit for consumption not only for having been reared in obnoxious waters but also for being contaminated with high level of cadmium, iron and other mineral contents.
All of those who were at the helms of the WASA and the Ministry of LGRD should be charged for the offences of causing the avoidable injuries to public health. They should be brought to the dock to mean that reforms should essentially mean reform of conduct and not barely reform of the political parties.
Any long-time resident of Dhaka city, who regularly buys fishes from the city markets for family consumption, is increasingly disgusted on reading the continuing newspaper reports about fish culture in the WASA's sewer lagoons in Narayanganj near Dhaka. These reports make one deeply frustrated at the irresponsibility of BNP's Secretary General Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan, who held the chair of the minister of local government and rural development (LGRD) until the other day.
The WASA is a public sector entity under the Ministry of LGRD. It was his job as an elected leader and minister in charge of LGRD to ensure that these filthy lagoons could not be used for raising fishes that could be sold to the unaware publics in the city markets and elsewhere within the country. But he did not. Seemingly, he either colluded with the greedy, unscrupulous and irresponsible elements who cultured fishes in the sewer lagoons for their political support or some bad money or he was grossly indifferent to public interest and thus glaringly irresponsible.
Most people of Dhaka city and the adjoining urban centers are now suspecting whether they have had consumed the abominable fishes of WASA's filthy sewer lagoons. Many of them become upset and feel like vomiting when they think over it. Quite a large number of people, who are psychologically sensitive, might eventually become mentally sick by this haunting thought in them.
In the western world, where they care for public health, this single case of WASA sewer lagoons having been passively allowed to be used for fish culture would have led to numerous damage suits and harsh administrative and judicial actions against Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan and the high officials of the WASA and the Ministry of LGRD who served under him.
The BNP Secretary General, who has suddenly turned into a political reformist, now talks about introducing real democracy. His past performance records, as explicit from this single case of fish rearing in WASA sewer lagoons, give no reason for one to believe in his new words. Democracy is for the genuine welfare of the people and not for some bad people to scale the staircase of power for climbing to its top using false words and empty promises about public welfare as ploys.
Mr. Bhuiyan definitely owes an explanation to the people, many of whom are terribly angry with him on the said count. One suspects that a public apology of his will not suffice to heal the wounds he has inflicted upon the people by leading them to unknowingly consume the filthy fishes of WASA's sewer lagoons.
The nation should not forgive the top executives of the WASA either who have run this body over the years. Their waywardness in permitting the obnoxious fish culture in the lagoons through active involvement or passive connivance is far more serious than that of the detained forest officials in terms of hidden, unenumerated costs in terms of injuries to public health. The lagoons' fishes were unfit for consumption not only for having been reared in obnoxious waters but also for being contaminated with high level of cadmium, iron and other mineral contents.
All of those who were at the helms of the WASA and the Ministry of LGRD should be charged for the offences of causing the avoidable injuries to public health. They should be brought to the dock to mean that reforms should essentially mean reform of conduct and not barely reform of the political parties.