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Is Bangladesh heading
towards dictatorship?
Sheikh Hasina’s govt performed well on the economic front during
ASIAN DRAMA its previous two tenures. But that was no reason for her to indulge in
Syed intimidating politics and behave like a dictator during the latest polls
NooruzzamaN
he landslide victory of the scale arrest of opposition activists and
Sheikh Hasina-led Awami intimidation of BNP workers besides
The columnist — former League and its allies in the allegedly rigging the elections.
Deputy Editor of The just concluded parliamen- The opposition front, therefore, has a
Tribune, Chandigarh — tary elections in Bangla- point in refusing to accept the “farcical”
specialises in foreign T desh was not surprising. election results, which show that the
affairs. With a career The incumbent Prime Minister’s party League has got 288 seats with 98 per
spanning 41 years, he was using all kinds of tactics, right or cent of the votes cast going in its favour.
keeps close watch on wrong, to ensure the defeat of the jurist Fifty seats are reserved for women in
issues related to South Kamal Hossain-led opposition front Bangladesh’s parliament.
Asian countries. The with the Bangladesh Nationalist Party The League-led alliance blatantly
views expressed are (BNP) as its key member. The BNP was tried to ensure that the opposition had
personal in no position to pose a serious chal- negligible presence in the elected House
lenge to the ruling League with the of the people. The increased bitterness
BNP’s top leader Khaleda Zia, a former between the two sides is unlikely to
Prime Minister, being in jail after having disappear after the electoral battle. It
been convicted in a corruption-related may continue to disturb the peace in the
case, and her son Tarique Rehman, the poverty-stricken nation, causing more
officiating chief of the BNP, running the problems for people.
show from London. All that happened before the elec-
Hossain, a former minister, was the tions shows that Hasina does not believe
right-hand man of the League founder, in having a powerful opposition, though
Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Reh- democracy becomes a farce when the
man, assassinated in August 1975 along opposition is almost non-existent. Her
with his family members except for claim cannot be accepted as the reality
his two daughters, Sheikh Hasina and when she says that the Bangladesh elec-
her younger sister Sheikh Rehana, who tions were “totally free and independ-
were in West Germany at that time. ent” and that “I have nothing to hide.
Hossain, who has been associated with Whatever I do, I do it for the country. My
the League throughout his long political conscience is clear.”
career, has turned anti-Hasina as he There could be no free and fair polls
The League-led feels that she has deviated from the path in Bangladesh under the circumstances
alliance blatantly shown by the Bangabandhu and turned that prevailed. In fact, the circumstanc-
dictatorial in her approach.
es demanded that the elections should
tried to ensure that He is a highly respected intellectual- have been held under a caretaker
the opposition in politician but no match to Sheikh administration denying the ruling party
any opportunity to indulge in coercive
Hasina in terms of popularity among
Bangladesh had the masses. Yet he led the opposition al- politics. The ruling party government
negligible presence liance from the front which could have functioning as the caretaker adminis-
tration in the situation that prevailed in
performed better than winning merely
in the elected House seven of the 300 seats in Parliament Bangladesh only amounted to allowing
the League to recapture power by hook
for which the elections were held if the
of the people ruling party had not indulged in large- or by crook.
Tehelka / 31 january 2019 58 www.Tehelka.com
