Political reform
Mohammed Nawazish, Dhaka
The journal 'Political Parties and Democracy' published by the Johns Hopkins University press and edited jointly by Larry Diamond, a senior research fellow in the Hoover Institute at Stanford University and Richard Gunther, a professor of political science at Ohio State University, reveals interesting facts about the trends of political parties in the global context. Though parties as institutions play a fundamental role in democracy, there is growing evidence of low or declining public confidence in parties in most countries. 'In membership, organisation, popular involvement and commitment, political parties are not what they used to be'. The contributors to this volume cover many regions of the world and evaluate the essential functions that parties perform in different circumstances. Empirically, they analyze the changing character of parties and party systems in post-communist Europe, Latin America, and five individual countries that have witnessed significant change: Italy, Japan, Taiwan, India, and Turkey. They show that political parties are now only one of many vehicles for the representation of interests, albeit they remain essential for recruiting leaders, structuring electoral choice, and organising government. 'To the extent that parties are weak and discredited, the health of democracy will be seriously impaired'. This compels the political barons to go for time-friendly party reforms at a fast pace.Party reform is a universal cry of the day but in Bangladesh the need is singularly imperative for reasons best known to all. The move is seriously on and thanks to the media for their detailed reporting on this topic. It is not our concern how the parties will introduce reforms and how far the reforms will serve the demand of the age, I just emphatically raise one question - for whose benefit are the reforms being made? The categorical reply is, the people, the ultimate political sovereign. The contemptible happenings of the past and the national humiliation that we have had to suffer are two basic postulates round which all reform efforts must revolve. The party leaders are wise enough to know where and how the veiled and open frailties let them down and how to effectively wash up the evils. We hope they will be resolute and fair in their admirable efforts. I feel our leaders should firmly hang on to a five-dimensional core strategy. First, corrupt, convicted and undisciplined elements must never be enlisted as party members; secondly, there must not be any armed or desperado wings in any party; thirdly, the party constitution should be based on basic democratic norms with no single authority to brandish absolute power; fourth, transparency of party funds has to be ensured by annual auditing by established auditors and the report published for public consumption; fifth, each party will have a vigilance squad to monitor all expenditures from public accounts that will report its findings to the parliament. There may be many more additives and subsidiaries to my loud overtures but the intention is clear. We simply long to see the badly overdue reforms come to reality bringing forth a brighter era of politics in the country. The politicians need to get free of their time-worn cocoons.
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