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.