When the strong is the winner by the sword of oppression, people always resort to the language of the weapon, and the losers will scheme against the winner.

Today at the crack of dawn, when I phoned a friend of mine purely for personal reason, he immediately asked me in a fearful tone, if there was any bad news from Bangladesh. To that I replied that the lions were firmly locked in their den, roaring in anger, with little or no sign of coming out to attack their enemy. When I asked him why he had asked me such a question, he replied that when ever I phone him early in the morning, he assumes that something bad may have happened to Sheikh Hasina or somebody may have assassinated her. This maybe a wishful thinking, but the truth is, this is how a lot of people imagine her to end her life. It may not be surprising to find that same feeling may resound across the general masses of Bangladesh.

It is true that when stronger is the winner by the sword of oppression and injustice, the people always resort to the language of the sword, and the losers, the victim of oppression, will scheme against the tyrant winner. Out of the blue, we hear that an outlawed organization posted a video on Bangladesh current state of affairs. Though the context and the content of the video on Bangladesh current affairs maybe true, just to underscore the fact, I would agree that our country is increasingly becoming a jail for the opposition, and Satkhira is witnessed to government killings, abduction, and human rights violations, but the motive of the video, and even its authenticity needs careful analysis. In the past, we have seen that certain intelligence of certain nation shrewdly uses such tactics to further their objective or to manipulate such videos to divert attention of the public from legitimate demand to that of international terrorism and creating fear among secular audience of the world. Bangladesh opposition don’t need an Al Qaeda video to highlight the gravity of government oppression in the country, it is self evident from the one-sided election to the post illegal killings of opposition activists and leaders by Awami government sponsored thugs and law enforcement agency. This video maybe a ploy to imply a link with the opposition by some foreign agency, and use it to justify further killings by the government.

As for current state of BNP, it is my estimation that they are in worse position than Bangladesh Jamati Islam in terms of organizational strength. Their leaders are not forward thinking, and frankly they lack leadership qualities to guide the people to a mass uprising that many people are hoping for. The opposition are living in the past and hoping something may happen out of the blue, such thinking is delusion and far from the reality of the present. They should realize that civil and military administration is not the same as it was 10 years ago. Who would want to do the job and hand over the fruits to Begum Zia. Opposition long time hibernation from active agitation means consolidation for the government. Too much reliance on foreign powers is also a mistake. The western powers to my estimation cares less about democracy in other countries than their own, but cares more about their business interest and power to dictate policy making. To this date, if you look at some of the Middle Eastern country, you will find very little evidence of their support for democracy. In fact, in some places their support for popular will is not out of fancy or as a matter of principle, but it is out of necessity. If you carefully examine senate hearing on Bangladesh, you will find one sentence that stands out and that is securing foreign investment. USA multinational companies are waiting to tap in to Bangladesh business sector in a big way, which is why Dan Mozina talks a lot about old Silk Road, connectivity, and security. Bangladesh human resources, cheap labour, and geopolitical location attract western country. Democracy, popular will, and human rights are a secondary issue to them. In order to secure democracy and rule of law in Bangladesh, the opposition need to speak their mind, address their issue locally and listen less to foreign diplomat, and more heed should be given to the prescription of agitation.

As so for Bangladeshi Jamati Islam, they need to look back at the reason why the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood failed to subsist in power, in spite of winning with a majority mandate. And the opposite could be said about the Islamic revolution of Iran, in spite of huge effort with money intelligence, and sanction by the USA, Iranian Islamic revolution remains in its place increasingly becoming stronger day by day. Dan Mozina often says that violence has no place in democracy; I want him to explain what he means by that. How many democratically elected governments did his country helped to remove by violence let alone undemocratic government. Bangladesh does not have a democracy, and for this reason violence is sometimes needed to restore democratic rights.