Frittering away Goodwill in Bangladesh

New Delhi ( edit for Surya May 22)A high profile UN Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC) delegation visits Dhaka from June 3 to 10 to assess Bangladesh's progress in implementing counter-terrorism policies. The visit coincides with a spurt in the activities of Islamist groups like ‘Jadid al Qaeda Bangladesh’ that have claimed responsibility for the May Day bomb explosions at Dhaka, Chittagong and Sylhet railway stations.

The police claim they have drawn a blank so far in their investigations on the Jadid al Qaeda. Inspector General of Police (IGP) Noor Mohammad doubts the existence of any such organisation. His reasoning is that the sleuths have not yet found any outfit with that name. It is possible that the Jadid al Qaeda is a factious name. But what is interesting is that while the police are claiming helplessness in tracing them, this very group has threatened to blow up a bridge that connects south-western Bangladesh with the north of the country. The bridge known as Hardinge bridge was built over the river Padma during the British period. A letter purported to have been written by Jadid al Qaeda Bangladesh was received by the railway police at Ishwardi station close to the Bridge.

The threat has prompted a security alert across the region. Amongst the known militant groups, Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) is openly active. Not a day passes with its activist being rounded up in some corner of the country. There is no dearth of war veterans who had fought shoulder to shoulder with the Taliban during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Most of them have closed ranks under the banner of Bangladesh Khelafat Majlish with Mufti Shahidul Islam and their goal is creation of Islamist state in Bangladesh.

Harkatul Mujahideen Bangladesh and Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami Bangladesh are the other outfits floated by Afghan returnees. While Harkat-ul-Jihad formally launched its activities through a press conference at the National Press Club in Dhaka on April 30, 1992, Harkatul Mujahideen opted for a soft launch simultaneously. Harkat-ul-Jihad subsequently regrouped as Islamist Dewat-e-Kafela.

That the Islamists have secured political cover is public knowledge. For instance Mufti Shahidul entered Parliament five years ago on the ticket of Islami Oikya Jote (IOJ) which is an ally of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) of Begum Khaleda Zia. Some militants have been arrested after the caretaker government headed by former world banker Dr. Fakhruddin Ahmed took office. Frankly these arrests are neither here nor there.

So, the situation report will not please the UN team which will be headed by CTC Executive Director Javier Ruperez. That is bound to be bad news for the regime which has failed to have its way on ‘exiling’ the Begums, and creating a new King’s party. More so, as pressure is increasing to quickly lift the ban on ‘indoor’ politics and fix an early poll date.

President Iajuddin Ahmed, a known BNP loyalist, who is lying low for the past four months, is again flexing muscles in a manner of speaking and has even summoned the CEC to Banga Bhavan to give a bit of his mind on election date issue. The US, EU and UK also have become vocal lately.15 US Senators including Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Rodham Clinton have shot off a letter to .the government expressing their annoyance over delaying elections on one pretext or the other.

Officially, the hiccups in revising voters list and issuing ID cards to voters are held responsible for putting off the poll date. The Election Commission says it needs at least 18 months to do its home work. But reality check shows that the regime, most importantly its prime backer, the army is keen to rejig political parties and create a new King’s party, if possible.

That exercise is taking time because the two mainline parties BNP and Awami League are not amorphous groups and have well entrenched network across the country. Not surprisingly, therefore, the regime’s foot soldiers have started targetting ‘relatively young, popular and honest’ leaders to organise the new organisation at the district level.

To what extent the move will succeed is a moot point but what is abundantly clear is that like all military dictators, the army backed and popped up regime in Dhaka is missing the woods for the trees. It should have learnt a lesson from what had happened in Pakistan where General Musharraf had banked on religious parties and kept the main line Benazir Bhutto’s Peoples’ Party of Pakistan (PPP) and Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz). His efforts to break PPP failed. A significant chunk of Nawaz party became the kings’ party but that has not helped Musharraf to secure a safety net. He is now forced to consider a deal with Benazir Bhutto for a bail out.

The long and short of the story is democracy is the manna for survival in the 21st century and no short cuts will help. Will the powers that be in Bangladesh read the writing on the wall? Otherwise they will fritter away all the goodwill they had earned when they took office in January and launched an ‘operation’ to clean the system the corrupt Khaleda Zia regime had left behind and to round up the Islamists who have been doing their damanest to destroy the secular fabric of the country.