Soft-pedaling on probe report

As an ordinary citizen, we cannot but express our serious concern about the controversy over the share market scam probe report. There is every reason to feel concerned about the fate of the enquiry that has dealt with an important public interest matter and which has to do with the hard earned assets of hundreds and thousands of small investors. A concerted effort is afoot to both discredit the report and its principal author. Petty flaws are being exaggerated to look like big mistakes. Twisting a simple remark about how legal system works in a democracy and giving it a completely opposite meaning, the chair of the enquiry body is being dragged into a controversy, with the aim of diluting the importance of the report. We strongly condemn these efforts which are being orchestrated by people likely to be exposed if the report is followed by a government investigation. The report names a good number of influential people and corporations against whom the findings have established prima facie evidence. Soft-pedaling on the matter or indeed putting the wraps on it will only discredit the government. Now in a strange twist of policy, the government is in the process of finalizing a multi-billion taka loan to augment the finances of the public sector. Why is the Finance Ministry looking at loan to re-capitalise at this point of time? All official and independent evaluations indicate that the nationalized banks and the banking sector as a whole are in the worst shape. Bangladesh has failed to escape the worst of the financial crisis by following its own path, even if the overarching approach remained one of global integration and gradual financial liberalisation. Is our government now preparing to do the opposite of what stood it in good stead? Such transactions go through because there is no meaningful political debate on vital issues within or outside parliament. The public has a right to know of the proposed borrowing. It is strange that our leaders while agreeing, on the one hand, that the financial practices followed by Bangladesh over the last decade have helped the country tide over the impact of global recession, on the other, seek to implement policies that are quite contradictory to their utterances. Gopal Sengupta Canada E-mail : gopalsengupta@aol.com