DHAKA, OCT 1: In August 2001, while visiting Dhaka
as head of a team sent by the
Washington-based National Democratic
Institute for International Affairs,
former President Jimmy Carter stood
between Khaleda Zia — who had recently
stepped aside as prime minister and
yielded power to a caretaker government
pending parliamentary elections — and
her predecessor in office, Sheikh Hasina
Wazed.
Mr. Carter clasped their arms and
tried to have them shake hands, but the
country's two most powerful political
leaders looked the other way and Mr.
Carter's efforts to mediate between the
two women failed.
In the last three years, more
attempts at mediation by representatives
of the United States and the European
Union have failed to bring Mrs. Zia and
Sheikh Hasina to the bargaining table.
A power struggle between the prime
minister, Mrs. Zia, and the opposition
leader, Sheikh Hasina, which stems from
a bitter personal rivalry, has spun
Bangladesh into near anarchy.
Bombs and guns have trumped politics
and good governance, plunging the
country into crisis.
On Aug. 21, Sheikh Hasina was
injured when an explosion killed 20
persons and injured 300 as she addressed
25,000 of her Awami League supporters at
an opposition rally in downtown Dhaka.
As bodyguards whisked her into her
bulletproof sport utility vehicle,
gunmen peppered the vehicle with
gunfire.
Sheikh Hasina was reportedly being
treated this week by medical specialists
in Singapore for concussion and bleeding
in the ears caused by the explosions.
The dead included senior party
leaders and a bodyguard who shielded
Sheikh Hasina with his body during the
attack.
At the insistence of advisers, Mrs. Zia sought to meet Sheikh Hasina and
offer her personal condolences, but the
latter refused to see her.
U.S. Ambassador Harry K. Thomas said
Washington urgently wanted the two women
to "sit and work together for peace and
stability in the country," but Sheikh Hasina turned down his request, saying
she would never speak to Mrs. Zia
because her government and her
Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) were
involved with those behind the Aug. 21
attack.
Sitting in her Dhaka residence
recently, the Awami League leader said:
"This well-planned assassination attempt
could have never taken place without the
involvement and complicity of the
government.
"They [Mrs. Zia and the ruling BNP]
think they can carry on in power
smoothly if they can eliminate me. It is
impossible to sit with the leader of
this party for any dialogue. There is no
alternative but to topple this
autocratic and terrorist government to
ensure the security of lives and
property."
Although Sheikh Hasina blamed Mrs.
Zia's four-party coalition government,
which includes two Islamist
fundamentalist parties, for the deadly
attack, the government and BNP flatly
deny the charge.
Abdul Mannan Bhuiyan,
secretary-general of the BNP — the
largest party in the ruling coalition —
said: "It is a ridiculous allegation.
There is not an iota of truth in it."
The attack on Sheikh Hasina provoked
an immediate response. Awami League
partisans rioted in Dhaka and fought
pitched battles with police. They set
fire to a train, scores of cars and some
BNP party offices.
Strikes — a traditional form of
protest in the region — called by the Awami League, paralyzed the country for
four days and brought traffic, business
and education to a standstill.
A previously unknown group calling
itself Hikmat-ul-Jihad claimed
responsibility for the deadly Aug. 21
attack on the political rally via e-mail
to news organizations in Dhaka.
However, intelligence officials in
neighboring India, piecing together
evidence from different sources,
suggested that hard-line political
elements aligned with the BNP-led ruling
coalition were behind the assassination
attempt.
 Some South Asian experts on terrorism said the attack could be the
work of Harkat-ul-Jihad-e-Islam, a group
formed in 1992 under the ideological
guidance of Osama bin Laden. An attempt
by that group in 2001 to kill Sheikh
Hasina, then prime minister, failed when
a powerful explosive device was
discovered an hour before she was to
address a public meeting in Bangladesh.
Quoting explosives experts, the
Dhaka daily Dainik Janakantha said the "Arges"
hand grenades used in the attack six
weeks ago were made in Pakistan and were
the same kind used by Pakistani
militants in their attack on the Indian
Parliament on Dec. 13, 2001.
Anwar Choudhury, the British
ambassador to Bangladesh, was the target
of a bomb attack on May 21 this year in
Sylhet, a northeastern district. Mr.
Choudhury sustained injuries but three
others, including his bodyguard, were
killed on the spot.
A British intelligence team
investigating the Sylhet attack
suspected Islamic radicals were behind
it.
In the 2001 Bangladesh parliamentary
elections, the fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami won 17 of the 300 seats
and became a key member of Mrs. Zia's
ruling coalition. Since then, Bangladesh
has experienced an upsurge of Islamist
fundamentalism and terrorism.
Many Taliban-like Islamist groups
have appeared in Bangladesh during Mrs.
Zia's current term. Some have initiated
attacks against movie houses, newspapers
and liberal intellectuals, including
noted writers, journalists and
filmmakers.
Ashish Chakrabarti, an analyst based
in Calcutta, said that the "bomb
culture" in Bangladesh will "spell the
doom" of the country.
"There is a pattern in all [their]
attacks. They are targeted at political
parties, cultural groups and individuals
trying to uphold democracy, secularism
and progressive culture. The attackers,
on the other hand, are associated with
20-odd Islamic fundamentalist groups,
most of which appeared recently and are
relatively unknown."
Seema Mustafa, an Indian journalist
based in New Delhi, said extremism in
Bangladesh has grown to monstrous
proportions, occupying the space vacated
by Mrs. Zia and Sheikh Hasina amid their
bitter rivalry.
"The sharply polarized country is
helplessly watching the extremist groups
grow in strength, partly out of direct
patronage and partly because of the
inability of the mainstream political
parties to tackle any agenda other than
that connected with their own deep
hatred for each other," said Miss
Mustafa.
"The polarization has affected the
judiciary, bureaucracy, universities and
even the army. Even journalists are now
politicized to a point where individual
editors and newspapers are known better
for their political affiliation and less
for the content of their writings," she
added.
A senior editor of a popular Bengali
daily in Dhaka said: "Until a few years
ago, you would find most of us with
independent views, but now we are either Khaleda Zia supporters or belong to
Sheikh Hasina's camp."
Writers and journalists deploring
the growing Islamist fundamentalism,
crime and violence in Bangladesh are
often attacked by criminals and
religious fanatics shielded by powerful
politicians.
Since 1997, seven journalists have
been murdered and many others have been
injured in violent attacks in
Bangladesh. The New York-based Committee
to Protect Journalists recently called
Bangladesh the most dangerous Asian
country for journalists.
For the third year in a row,
Transparency International, in its
Global Corruption Report, last year
identified Bangladesh as the "most
corrupt country in the world."
Observers say that frequent national
strikes — such as the four general
strikes called by Sheikh Hasina that
paralyzed Bangladesh this year — are the
outcome of Sheikh Hasina's and Mrs.
Zia's no-holds-barred enmity and burning
desire to drive the other from office.
An executive of Dhaka's chamber of
commerce said a one-day strike costs the
impoverished country more than U.S. $60
million in lost production and exports,
but that doesn't seem to bother the two
powerful women.
"Vendetta, at the cost of good
governance, has topped Begum Zia's list
of priorities since she become prime
minister last October," said Haroon
Habib, a leading political commentator
in Dhaka. [Begum is a title for the
spouse of a high-ranking Muslim leader,
and is routinely used in Bangladesh for
Mrs. Zia.]
The law-and-order situation
deteriorates every day amid an
unprecedented increase in murders,
rapes, lynching and kidnappings across
the country, Mr. Habib said.
"On the economic front, growth has
slowed down, exports have slumped, while
prices of essential commodities
including rice have risen sharply,
making life increasingly unbearable for
the common man," he said.
Some time ago, Mrs. Zia called
Sheikh Hasina "beadab," (uncivilized)
after Sheikh Hasina called her "golapi"
— the Bengali word for "pink" but also
slang for a woman wearing too much rouge
and lipstick.
Mrs. Zia also likes to call the
former prime minister an "Indian
stooge," while Sheikh Hasina calls the
present holder of that office an
"accomplice" of Osama bin Laden.
Political observers say the
antagonism between the two leaders is
not political at all, since
ideologically, the Awami League differs
little from the Bangladesh Nationalist
Party. Moreover, the fundamentalist
Jamaat-e-Islam, now an ally of the
ruling BNP, was an ally of the Awami
League until some years ago, they say.
The conflict, the observers say, is
personal.
Many believe the reason for the
enmity between the two women stems in
part from their feud over who played a
greater role in the country's
independence — Sheikh Hasina's father or
Mrs. Zia's late husband.
Sheikh Hasina's father, Mujib-ur
Rahman, who led Bangladesh to
independence in 1971 and became its
first prime minister, was named "father
of the nation" in the country's 1972
constitution. Sheikh Mujib, along with
his wife, three sons and 16 other family
members, were assassinated by
disgruntled military officers in a 1975
coup.
Sheikh Hasina, who was visiting West
Germany at the time, remained there as
an exile. In 1968, she married M.A.
Wazed Miah, a scientist from Bangladesh.
Mrs. Zia's late husband, Gen. Zia-ur
Rahman, who became president of
Bangladesh in 1976, was assassinated by
rival army officers in 1981. That year,
Sheikh Hasina returned to Bangladesh and
took the leadership of the Awami League.
 In the 1980s, Sheikh Hasina and Mrs.
Zia, at the helm of BNP, emerged as the
country's most powerful leaders. Toward
the end of the decade, the two women
locked horns.
Mrs. Zia became the country's first
female prime minister when her party won
the 1991 elections.
Sheikh Hasina apparently believes
Mrs. Zia's late husband did nothing to
prevent the assassination in 1975 of her
father, Sheikh Mujib, and the rest of
her family.
After assuming power, Mrs. Zia
downplayed Sheikh Mujib's role in the
independence of Bangladesh. This year,
her government amended the constitution
to delete the reference to him as father
of the nation.
Mrs. Zia pushed the idea that her
husband, an army major in 1971 who
revolted against Pakistan, had a greater
role in the creation of Bangladesh.
Holidays marking the birth and death
of Sheikh Mujib were canceled by Mrs.
Zia's government. A navy frigate named
after him has been decommissioned to
change its name. A Dhaka conference hall
named after him has also been renamed,
and currency carrying his image has been
withdrawn from circulation.
Calcutta-based analyst Manojit Mitra
says Mrs. Zia's obsession with Sheikh
Hasina and anybody or anything
associated with her is costing
Bangladesh dearly.
The family martyrdoms have kept the
two women dominant in the country's
politics and prevented the rise of new
leaders, analysts say.
Added a Western diplomat: "They are
obsessed with one another. And they are
unlikely to bury the hatchet in the
foreseeable future. Unless the parties
decide to replace the two heads of their
parties, the country will turn into
another Afghanistan soon."
(By Shaikh Azizur Rahman, The Washington Times)
|
Articles/Opinions
IMMIGRATION NEWS
Bangladesh:
Uncontrolled chaos
DHAKA,
OCT 2: The Berlin-based Transparency
International (TI) has decided to award
Bangladeshi journalist Manik Chandra Saha and
slain NHAI Indian engineerSatyendra Kumar Dubey
with its International Honesty Award for their
courageous attempt to report wrong doings in
their respective countries.
