Lying about everything our people believed in and wished for, will not make Bangladesh at peace with itself. Whether we are going to face a frightful popular uprising or not as has unfolded in Sri Lanka, we have a lot to learn from the fury against the government. Both the President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and his brother Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa had to run for life. They made democracy a monarchy of family members, allowed the government to be steeped in corruption and caused economic mismanagement beyond repair.
Now the country is bankrupt and without a government. Even for outside aid to help ride over the economic bankruptcy, the IMF, the World Bank and others have to be sure about political stability. The task of ensuring stability will not be easy in the vacuum.
Frances Ryan, a columnist of the British daily The Guardian, analysing the end of the politics of the outgoing British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the politics of moving on with the same politics by the new leader to emerge, sees no effective leadership in the Conservative Party.
Ms. Ryan who also authored the book “Crippled: Austerity and the Demonization of Disabled People” said about the need of political reflection by the Conservative Party on the politics when its was near end. She pointed out, “It is customary, when someone is near death, to reflect on the life that person lived: Was time spent wisely, or wasted? Were good deeds done, or harm caused? It is much the same with a political death”. She obviously was talking of the Johnson’s political death.
With the birth of Bangladesh as a result of India’s war with Pakistan it is not understandable why in free Bangladesh we had to see the death of our people’s long political struggle for democracy led by all Awami League leaders including Bangabandhu. The then leaders of Awami League even did not care to reflect on the
people’s aspiration of democracy against the West Pakistan dictatorship of exploitation, discrimination and abuse of power.
What went wrong in the creation of Bangladesh that the new leaders of Awami League lost confidence and courage to run the country themselves independently?
The attraction for leftist authoritarianism has been found so convenient to rule unaccountably without free election that the present leadership will most likely not accept free election and go peacefully despite the awareness about gross failings of the government.
Though the government feels shaken by the internal economic disarray and rampant corruption side by side outside international pressure for free election of international standard, still the thinking of the government seems to be that with their power base seemingly intact, they can carry on like as they did in the past. The government is eager to believe that Bangladesh is not Sri Lanka, so there is nothing to fear about insurrection or international pressure for holding a free and fair election.
After being in power for more than two decades, there is no reflection among the present leaders of Awami League on the need of giving up authoritarianism in favour of the party’s original ideals of democracy or allowing the people to choose their government. The persons in power in Bangladesh have become used to ignoring the people and continue to be in power for the opulence of the few.
Election robbery speaks for itself. The government’s story of success is not alleviating the hardship of the people.
Most of them live in miseries of joblessness and soaring cost of living.
The aforesaid points and events must be taken into account by the government for pondering over their own position and strength in Bangladesh. Our unity as a people has been replaced by antagonistic disunity and suspicion on the basis of who went to India to come back as freedom fighters and who stayed in the country and gave blood for keeping Bangladesh as their own.
It will be wrong to blame others for the current economic mismanagement and chaos in Bangladesh denying our ability to be ourselves. We have to establish people’s government by people’s vote under democracy free from fear. There is no spirit other than the people’s spirit of democracy.
We have shackled ourselves, and it is a shame for us in the whole world.
