Tyranny of "Ek Mukher Ek Kotha" - would the latest example of stubborn-ness come from Dr. Fakhruddin?
The nation has been in trouble from the stuborn politics of BNP and AL. Now the current government, which was supposedly took over responsibility in an emergency situation to remedy the problems arising from stubornness, is about to present us a new kind of stubornness. Have you ever seen doctors attempt force-feeding a patient who is not ready to take food in a natural method? Well, the Dr. is about to show you something similar, the only problem is that you are the patient!
Which behaviour would be called stubborn? Depending on to whom you talk to, each of the following could be argued as something similar to being stubborn on the part of current government:
1. To keep the date of election of December 18, even if every other symptom indicates that cure has not been achieved yet;
OR
2. To hold the election of under emergency, even if every other political parties wants it to go;
OR
3. To postpone the national election, after a good assessment of the activities of the political parties and their unwillingness to talk to each other which are a strong indication that this generation of politicians are incapable of delivering the governance style that we need for the 21st Century Bangladesh.
But which one would actually be adopted by current government, it remains to be seen. Whatever they do, based on the judgement and information they have, will have to be accepted by us and live with the consequences. At the end of the day, the goal should be to build a "
Simple, sustainable democracy" that is enough to spur economic growth.
Dr. Fakhruddin never forget to reiterate his "Mukher Kotha" of leaving his responsibility by the end of the year. But have you heard him talking about how his government is going to make sure that they have corrected the problems that caused the situation which promted the President to declare emergency? Its important that we get out of this situation as soon as possible, also imporant is that we are convinced that we will not go back to the same situation which led to the current situation.
More importantly, what is the natural tenure of an emergency government that is allowed in the constitution? Certainly, everybody including Dr. Fakhruddin will agree that his government is NOT a caretaker government, rather it is a emergency interim government that had to be installed during a time when another caretaker government was in power. So, in effect, the interim government had to simultaneously take the responponsibility of "CARETAKING" in addition to the "EMERGENCY" role. At best, this hybrid government could be called a caretaker and interim emergnecy government. However, the bureaucrats in the Banga Bhaban didn't realize the full extent the situation. No wonder, if one looks at the article numbers of the constitution under which Dr. Fakhruddin's government took oath of office, does not reflect this situation. Thats another issue, but let us stick to our main focus here.
By definition, the current government has two major role. "CARETAKING" role and "EMERGENCY" role. Under caretaking role, the government has the responsibility to hold a free and fair election. Under emergency role, the government has to make sure that it has done everything to remedy the problems that have led to the situation of emergency. The two roles seems to have conflicting implications as far as timing is concerned by which these two responsibilities has to be delivered.
The constitution puts a time-limit of 90 days by which the government has to perform its caretaking role. For the other role, the constitution requires the government to take time "as much as needed".
With this apparently conflicting guideline from the constitution, the government off course have to first determine the priority of the two roles. Which one takes precedence in comparison to the other?
We leave it upto our readers to decide which one comes first - to make sure that the lives and basic needs of the citizens are protected or to make sure that a good governance framework is evolved and practiced to ensure the sustainability of ongoing security and well-being of the citizens. On the same paragraph we should emphasize that both these priorities have overlapping area and one can-not be completely achieved without the other.
It is upto the leaders of the helm to use their judgement based on the information available to make sure that the EMERGENCY ROLE of the current government gives way to the CARETAKER ROLE. It is also needs to be emphasized that while making the judgement, we should not forget the regime of "Ek Mukher Ek Kotha" style of policy making of Hasina or Khaleda that brought us here in the first place. Fakhruddin government should never forget the lesson of those two ex head of governments.
If you thought some of the ideas are worth of your reading time, please forward it to others. If you have an ear to the columnists in regular traditional media, please forward it to them. If you have an ear to the journalists and news editors of the electronic media, discuss it with them. Hope they would look at the suggestions and give due diligence.
Thanks for your time,
Innovation Line
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Note: This is a freelance column, published mainly in different internet based forums. This column is open for contribution by the members of new generation, sometimes referred to as Gen 71. If you identify yourself as someone from that age-group and want to contribute to this column, please feel free to contact. Thanks to the group moderator for publishing the article as Creative Commons contents.
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