Civil society stance comes under fire

A group of economists and experts yesterday slated some civil society organisations for urging the Election Commission to postpone the January 5 parliamentary elections.
Their criticism came at a discussion on the current political situation in Bangladesh, organised by Bangladesh Economic Association (BEA) at the city's Lake Shore Hotel.
A week ago, four leading development organisations and think tanks had expressed concerns over holding of the elections amid a boycott by the main opposition party, and urged the EC to postpone the electoral process considering the worsening law and order.
The December 28 meeting of Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), Ain o Salish Kendra, Shushashoner Jonnyo Nagorik and Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) at the same venue had called for immediate cessation of violence and drawing a roadmap to inclusive elections by formulating an acceptable package solution through further discussion among the major political parties.
Speaking at the discussion yesterday, former Bangladesh Bank governor Mohammed Farashuddin said some quarters have called for stalling the election, which would have meant to give in to the anarchists. He thought that it would have also created constitutional crisis.
He blasted the “winner-takes-all” system in the country's election, which, he said, offers opportunity to the winner party to establish absolute influence.
“We've to admit that there is no practice of democracy within the parties. So, we'll have to bring some balance in the powers of the president and the prime minister," he mentioned.
Information Commissioner Sadeka Halim said civil society organisations were run by money from the development partners. “But which citizens they represent? And whose voices are they raising?”
Slating the development partners, she said, “Had they ever been a friend of Bangladesh? They were opposed to the birth of Bangladesh in 1971. Now they've come forward to save the war criminals. They've even phoned the prime minister.”
Prof Salimullah Khan of Stamford University complained that the “so called” civil society was engaged in a conspiracy as they never praised the government for its achievements.
“They even criticise the achievements of the government,” he mentioned, adding that without doing much homework the country will not be able to counter the conspiracy of the foreigners and the civil society.
Historian Mejbah Kamal said a section of intellectuals are talking in a way nowadays that they want to implement the “minus-two formula,” and they also are saying that the two leaders are useless.  
“They are virtually trying to say that the battle is actually between the two ladies. But I clearly think that it is not a battle between the two ladies. Rather, it's a battle between two ideologies,” he added.
Dr Iftekharuzzaman, executive director of the TIB, clarified the position of the global civil society movement against corruption.
“The position of the TIB and me is very clear when it comes to the trial of war criminals: we have always wanted and still want the trial of the war criminals in this soil,” he pointed out.
“We've urged the opposition parties to abandon violence as we believe that no political parties have the rights to disrupt the lives of common people on the    issue of elections,” mentioned the TIB official.
Syeda Rizwana Hasan, executive director of Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers Association, said the government of BNP between 2001 and 2006 and the incumbent Awami League government, despite winning a majority, have failed to defuse the influence of Jamaat, who got less than 3 percent votes in those two elections.
“Are there no problems within these parties?” she questioned.
The civil society has not been able to reach the people and it has to shoulder the responsibility for the failure to de-criminalise politics, added Rizwana.
“We've to keep the government and the opposition under constant pressure, telling them that they are not on the right track when they deviate from there.”
Eminent writer Prof Muhammed Zafar Iqbal, poet Syed Shamsul Haque, BEA president Abul Barakat and Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation chairman Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad, among others, also spoke.