It is one thing to chant a slogan that we want a society free from all discrimination and quite another to take practical steps towards establishing a society where there will be no discrimination and injustice.
We are keen to see that no one is harassed any more, nor picked up by plain clothes people and then disappeared. We don’t want to see any extortion or toll collection on our highways and markets nor any bribe-taking in our government offices to obtain services. We don’t want to see local musclemen overpower and grab the property of hard-working honest citizens. We don’t want people to take away crores of taka illegally from the country -- the unending list of our expectations goes on.
We claim to have just gotten our second independence. Many hope that we should quickly get back to a democratically-elected government through a free, fair, and participatory election. Many would be rightly concerned that in the process of restoring our government, we must not violate any constitutional bindings so that at a later stage we run the risk of all our noble efforts being questioned.
Two priority sectors well identified by our advisors and experts for immediate restoration now are security and finance.
With the whole police department lying shattered and bruised, with police stations gutted and plundered, and with police personnel on the run to save their lives, it is most challenging to get back to normalcy. The police claim they were helpless and merely carried out orders. It is encouraging that police personnel are joining their duty stations and by now most of the police stations have been made functional.
We must try to sympathize with our police department; they have suffered immensely and have faced death and destruction at a scale unprecedented. But again, it is well understood that the suffering they are undergoing is also their own creation to a great extent.
We are talking about justice for each and every killing which is going to be an arduous task. Getting data of all deaths during this crisis may not be difficult but identification of the killers will not be an easy task. Transparent investigation employing police will be difficult to unearth such an incident where police personnel themselves have deliberately carried out such inhumane killings.
Think of the banking sector. Take for instance the Islami Bank which was thriving as the largest bank and later systematically robbed and ruined by replacing its top management with selected cronies to best serve the purpose of looting. We know how much money has been siphoned.
We must shun a political culture that runs on anarchy, vengeance and annihilation of the opponents
There is an unending chain of resignation at the top level in banks, universities, and other autonomous bodies. This is not so much because of their devotion and allegiance to the fallen autocrat; rather it is them running from accountability.
It is understood that our institutions will take considerable time to get reorganized and on track again. How about reconciliation at our societal level? There are examples of nations who had suffered severe trauma due to conflicts leading to mass killing and atrocities but again got back to their peaceful coexistence. Rwanda and Sri Lanka are good examples to cite.
The armed conflict in Sri Lanka lasted for decades causing devastation to the society. In spite of this, they managed to successfully reconcile and are now living as a prosperous nation. Skirmishes in Rwanda on the other hand were short lived but very severe, causing deaths and destruction to reportedly millions. They also have reconciled and survived their darkest episode to live in peace and harmony.
In our case, though we have a very homogenous society, we have undergone polarization centring political orientation. One thing is common to both the major parties; extortion and exploitation. For 15 years at a go, beneficiaries of one party have been enjoying everything -- contracts, tenders, job and business opportunity for party cadres -- while keeping the others on the run through false cases.
People not belonging to the party in power cannot even run their normal business and other activities because of total dominance of administration and police by the party in power. This has happened over the decades wherein one party has been exploiting all privileges and even has been using brute force in incapacitating and annihilating the other.
As a consequence, we find one group of people thrive in their pursuit of business and money making during the rule of their preferred political party while the other needing to go into hiding.
We only hope we shall be able to line up and follow the footsteps of our youth in their march towards establishing a society free of corruption and discrimination of all kinds. We must shun a political culture that runs on anarchy, vengeance and annihilation of the opponents.
Brigadier General Qazi Abidus Samad, ndc, psc (Retd) is a freelance contributor.