BEYOND THE APPARENT
‘None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free’
NM Harun
The Election Commission and the elections to the ninth parliament have lost all relevance in the quagmire of the reforms adventure of the powers that be. The very holding of the elections and the credibility or otherwise of the elections will depend not on what the election commissioners say or promise or on the so-called election roadmap,
but on the fate of the open-ended reforms programme of the powers that be and the response of the political parties and forces to the policies and actions of the rulers
It is possibly a coincidence that the chief election commissioner, ATM Shamsul Huda, held a press conference on his so-called election roadmap on July 26, the day on which the courts handed jail terms, amounting to a mind-boggling total of 1442 years, to a huge number of 116 accused, mostly politicos, for corruption.
The chief election commissioner, apparently unsure about his assignment, obfuscated on issues like the voters’ roll, political parties, political reforms, local body elections, elections to the ninth parliament etc. The judges acted decidedly to condemn the accused to the purgatory of jails with the gusto of inquisitors; their cumulative feat may even find an entry into the Guinness Book of Records.
Poor Shamsul Huda got negligible coverage in the media; the peaceable election talks were drowned in the stern sentences in the corruption cases.
This brings out starkly the disconnect between the main preoccupation of a constitutional caretaker government proper and the focus of the ruling emergency government run, nominally, by the so-called caretaker government of Fakhruddin Ahmed.
According to article 58D(2) of the constitution, the holding of parliamentary elections which, article 123(3) says, ‘shall be held within ninety days after Parliament is dissolved’, is the prime function of a caretaker government. The scheduled time for holding the elections to the ninth parliament passed in January last as the eighth parliament expired on October 27, 2006.
Though they are already six months behind the schedule and they do not even bother to refer to the constitution to explain this inordinate delay or justify the plan of holding elections as late as the end of 2008, the leaders of the ruling coterie, the chief adviser, Fakhruddin Ahmed, advisers Mainul Hosein and Major General (retd) MA Matin, and army chief, General Moeen U Ahmed, never tire of reiterating that they want to hold as early as possible the elections to the ninth parliament.
But the declared main agenda of the ruling coterie is that they are determined not to allow the old leadership in the political establishment –– to be particular, Sheikh Hasina, the Awami League president, and Khaleda Zia, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson –– whom they denounce as corrupt, to return to power and not to allow ‘corrupt’ politicians to participate in elections. They invoke not the constitution but popular mandate to rule and reform the government as well as the polity. They base their claim on receiving the popular mandate on the state of emergency proclaimed on January 11.
The ruling coterie has clearly strayed far away from the constitutional moorings which envisage establishment and change of governments through elections as usual and has, instead, undertaken an undefined, uncharted mission of experimenting with political engineering and rebuilding of the nation. This is an extra-constitutional undertaking which was, initially, made popular through the convenient slogan of uprooting corruption –– the corruption of politicians.
The constitutional responsibilities of the government have been subordinated to the wayward impulses of the do-gooders in the ruling coterie. The Election Commission has in the process been reduced to a mere adjunct to the reform juggernaut of the ruling coterie.
The irrelevance of the Election Commission: The performance of the Election Commission has hardly improved, if not deteriorated, compared to the days of Justice MA Aziz and Justice Mahfuzur Rahman, with respect to upholding and exercising the powers, authority and prerogatives that the constitution grants to the Election Commission and the election commissioners. During that period, the antics and clowning of the commissioners, however, provided some comic relief. Now, the robotic election commissioners deprive the people of the benefit of that cheap entertainment, but serve, in their dour demeanour, the powers that be more diligently.
Not unsurprisingly, Shamsul Huda said while unveiling his election roadmap on July 15: ‘The Election Commission has undertaken the action plan as per the announcement of the chief adviser to hold elections by the end of 2008.’
The Election Commission and the elections to the ninth parliament have lost all relevance in the quagmire of the reforms adventure of the powers that be. The very holding of the elections and the credibility or otherwise of the elections will depend not on what the election commissioners say or promise or on the so-called election roadmap, but on the fate of the open-ended reforms programme of the powers that be and the response of the political parties and forces to the policies and actions of the rulers.
In his press conference of July 26, the chief election commissioner fielded a question from a reporter on the apprehension that a political vacuum will be created as a sequel to the government’s anti-corruption drive and restructuring of the political parties. He sounded fatalistic and referred to the Aristotelian dictum: Nature abhors vacuum.
The conduct of the ruling coterie and the Election Commission, however, reminds one of the dictum of Plato. ‘Lying, Plato says explicitly, is to be the prerogative of the government, just as giving medicine is of physicians.’
Bush the soul mate: The self-appointed messiah of democracy and crusader for the cause of the so-called moderate Muslim countries, George W Bush, the United States president, harbours no such scepticism and has welcomed the election roadmap and has given a carte blanche to the ruling coterie.
The day, July 26, the newspapers published the news of the chief election commissioners press conference and the sentencing of the 116 ‘corrupt’ people to 1442 years in jails, was also published the following report:
‘Bush greets polls roadmap in Bangladesh: US president, George W Bush, has welcomed the roadmap to general elections in Bangladesh and praised the caretaker government’s commitment to hold the elections in 2008.
‘He assured of US government’s cooperation in holding the elections….
‘The US president described Bangladesh as a role model among “moderate and tolerant Muslim nations” …
‘Appreciating current reform programmes of the caretaker government, Bush said he supported the anti-graft drive and initiatives to realise tax.’
It is quite likely that the formal support from the Bush administration will be considered a boon by the ruling coterie. May be, Bush is a soul mate of our rulers.
Reflections of an American congressman: In a speech in the US congress on June 27, 2002, congressman Ron Paul, who is a candidate for the Republican nomination in the 2008 presidential election in America, asked: ‘Is America a police state?’
Excerpts from Ron Paul’s 7060-word speech:
‘Most Americans believe we live in dangerous times, and I must agree. Today I want to talk about how I see those dangers and what Congress ought to do about them.
**
‘So far our post-9/11 policies have challenged the rule of law here at home, and our efforts against the al Qaeda have essentially come up empty-handed. The best we can tell now, instead of being in one place, the members of the al Qaeda are scattered around the world, with more of them in allied Pakistan than in Afghanistan. Our efforts to find our enemies have put the CIA in 80 different countries. The question that we must answer some day is whether we can catch enemies faster than we make new ones. So far it appears we are losing.
**
‘But, Mr. Speaker, my subject today is whether America is a police state. I’m sure the large majority of Americans would answer this in the negative. Most would associate military patrols, martial law and summary executions with a police state, something obviously not present in our everyday activities. However, those with knowledge of Ruby Ridge, Mount Carmel and other such incidents may have a different opinion.
‘The principal tool for sustaining a police state, even the most militant, is always economic control and punishment by denying disobedient citizens such things as jobs or places to live, and by levying fines and imprisonment. The military is more often used in the transition phase to a totalitarian state. Maintenance for long periods is usually accomplished through economic controls on commercial transactions, the use of all property, and political dissent. Peaceful control through these efforts can be achieved without storm troopers on our street corners.
‘Terror and fear are used to achieve complacency and obedience, especially when citizens are deluded into believing they are still a free people. The changes, they are assured, will be minimal, short-lived, and necessary, such as those that occur in times of a declared war. Under these conditions, most citizens believe that once the war is won, the restrictions on their liberties will be reversed. For the most part, however, after a declared war is over, the return to normalcy is never complete. In an undeclared war, without a precise enemy and therefore no precise ending, returning to normalcy can prove illusory.
**
‘Most police states, surprisingly, come about through the democratic process with majority support. During a crisis, the rights of individuals and the minority are more easily trampled, which is more likely to condition a nation to become a police state than a military coup. Promised benefits initially seem to exceed the cost in dollars or lost freedom. When people face terrorism or great fear- from whatever source- the tendency to demand economic and physical security over liberty and self-reliance proves irresistible. The masses are easily led to believe that security and liberty are mutually exclusive, and demand for security far exceeds that for liberty.
‘Once it’s discovered that the desire for both economic and physical security that prompted the sacrifice of liberty inevitably led to the loss of prosperity and no real safety, it’s too late. Reversing the trend from authoritarian rule toward a freer society becomes very difficult, takes a long time, and entails much suffering. Although dissolution of the Soviet empire was relatively non-violent at the end, millions suffered from police suppression and economic deprivation in the decades prior to 1989.
‘But what about here in the United States? With respect to a police state, where are we and where are we going?
‘Let me make a few observations:
‘Our government already keeps close tabs on just about everything we do and requires official permission for nearly all of our activities.
‘One might take a look at our Capitol for any evidence of a police state. We see: barricades, metal detectors, police, military soldiers at times, dogs, ID badges required for every move, vehicles checked at airports and throughout the Capitol. The people are totally disarmed, except for the police and the criminals. But worse yet, surveillance cameras in Washington are everywhere to ensure our safety.
‘The terrorist attacks only provided the cover for the do-gooders who have been planning for a long time before last September to monitor us “for our own good.” Cameras are used to spy on our drug habits, on our kids at school, on subway travelers, and on visitors to every government building or park. There’s not much evidence of an open society in Washington, DC, yet most folks do not complain- anything goes if it’s for government-provided safety and security.
**
‘The Congress would never agree that we are a police state. Most members, I’m sure, would argue otherwise. But we are all obligated to decide in which direction we are going. If we’re moving toward a system that enhances individual liberty and justice for all, my concerns about a police state should be reduced or totally ignored. Yet, if, by chance, we’re moving toward more authoritarian control than is good for us, and moving toward a major war of which we should have no part, we should not ignore the dangers. If current policies are permitting a serious challenge to our institutions that allow for our great abundance, we ignore them at great risk for future generations.
**
‘Mr. Speaker, what, then, is the answer to the question: “Is America a Police State?” My answer is: “Maybe not yet, but it is fast approaching.” The seeds have been sown and many of our basic protections against tyranny have been and are constantly being undermined. The post-9/11 atmosphere here in Congress has provided ample excuse to concentrate on safety at the expense of liberty, failing to recognize that we cannot have one without the other.
**
‘In a free society, the government’s job is simply to protect liberty- the people do the rest. Let’s not give up on a grand experiment that has provided so much for so many. Let’s reject the police state.’
John Wolfgang von Goethe warns: ‘None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.’
NM Harun is contributing editor of New Age. He can be reached at: badrun123@dhaka.net
Impeach Bush or suffer
a US police state
House can, should, and must impeach President Bush Jr. for war, lying about war, and threatening more wars… Failing this, the alternative is likely to be an American Empire abroad, a US police state at home, and continuing wars of aggression to sustain
both, Francis A Boyle writes from Washington
Since the US Supreme Court’s installation of George W Bush as president in January of 2001, the peoples of the world have witnessed a government in the United States of America that demonstrates little if any respect for fundamental considerations of international law, international organisations, and human rights, let alone appreciation of the requirements for maintaining international peace and security. What the world has watched instead is a comprehensive and malicious assault upon the integrity of the international legal order by a group of men and women who are thoroughly Machiavellian in their perception of international relations and in their conduct of both foreign policy and domestic affairs. This is not simply a question of giving or withholding the benefit of the doubt when it comes to complicated matters of foreign affairs and defence policies to a US government charged with the security of both its own citizens and those of its allies in Europe, the Western Hemisphere, and the Pacific. Rather, the Bush Jr. administration’s foreign policies represent a gross deviation from those basic rules of international deportment and civilised behaviour that the United States government had traditionally played the pioneer role in promoting for the entire world community. Even more seriously, in many instances specific components of the Bush Jr. administration’s foreign policies constitute ongoing criminal activity under well-recognised principles of both international law and US domestic law, and in particular the Nuremberg Charter, the Nuremberg Judgment, and the Nuremberg Principles.
Depending upon the substantive issues involved, those international crimes typically include but are not limited to the Nuremberg offences of crimes against peace, crimes against humanity and war crimes, as well as grave breaches of the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the 1907 Hague Regulations on land warfare, torture, disappearances, and assassinations. In addition, various members of the Bush Jr. administration committed numerous inchoate crimes incidental to these substantive offences that under the Nuremberg Charter, Judgment, and Principles were international crimes in their own right: viz., planning, preparation, solicitation, incitement, conspiracy, complicity, attempt, aiding and abetting, etc. Of course the great irony of today’s situation is that six decades ago at Nuremberg, representatives of the US government participated in the prosecution, punishment and execution of Nazi government officials for committing some of the same types of heinous international crimes that members of the Bush Jr. administration currently inflict upon people all around the world. To be sure, I personally oppose the imposition of capital punishment upon any person for any reason no matter how monstrous their crimes: Bush Jr., Tony Blair, Saddam Hussein, Slobodan Milosevic, Vladimir Putin, Ariel Sharon, my former client John Wayne Gacy, etc.
Furthermore, according to basic principles of international criminal law, all high-level civilian officials and military officers in the US government who either knew or should have known that soldiers or civilians under their control committed or were about to commit international crimes, and failed to take the measures necessary to stop them, or to punish them, or both, are likewise personally responsible for the commission of international crimes. This category of officialdom who actually knew or at least should have known of the commission of such substantive or inchoate international crimes under their jurisdiction and failed to do anything about it typically includes the secretary of defence, secretary of state, director of central intelligence, the national security adviser, the attorney general, the Pentagon’s joint chiefs of staff and regional CINCs, and presumably the president and vice president. These US government officials and their immediate subordinates, among others, were personally responsible for the commission or at least complicity in the commission of crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, and war crimes as specified by the Nuremberg Charter, Judgment, and Principles –– at a minimum. In international legal terms, the Bush Jr. administration itself should be viewed as constituting an ongoing criminal conspiracy under international criminal law.
Consequently, on Tuesday 11 March 2003, with the Bush Jr. administration’s war of aggression against Iraq staring the American People, Congress and Republic in their face, Congressman John Conyers of Michigan, the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee (which has jurisdiction over Bills of Impeachment), convened an emergency meeting of forty or more of his top advisers, most of whom were lawyers. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss and debate immediately putting into the US House of Representatives Bills of Impeachment against President Bush Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld, and then Attorney General John Ashcroft in order to head off the impending war. Congressman Conyers kindly requested that Ramsey Clark and I come to the meeting in order to argue the case for impeachment.
This impeachment debate lasted for two hours. It was presided over by Congressman Conyers, who quite correctly did not tip his hand one way or the other on the merits of impeachment. He simply moderated the debate between Clark and I, on the one side, favouring immediately filing Bills of Impeachment against Bush Jr. et al. to stop the threatened war, and almost everyone else there who were against impeachment for partisan political reasons. Obviously no point would be served here by attempting to digest a two-hour-long vigorous debate among a group of well-trained lawyers on such a controversial matter at this critical moment in American history. But at the time I was struck by the fact that this momentous debate was conducted at a private office right down the street from the White House on the eve of war.
Suffice it to say that most of the ‘experts’ there opposed impeachment not on the basis of enforcing the Constitution and the Rule of Law, whether international or domestic, but on the political grounds that it might hurt the Democratic Party effort to get their presidential candidate elected in the year 2004. As a political independent, I did not argue that point. Rather, I argued the merits of impeaching Bush Jr., Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Ashcroft under the United States Constitution, US federal laws, US treaties and other international agreements to which the United States is a party, etc. Article VI of the US Constitution provides that treaties ‘shall be the supreme Law of the Land.’ This so-called Supremacy Clause of the US Constitution also applies to international executive agreements concluded under the auspices of the US president such as the 1945 Nuremberg Charter.
Congressman Conyers was so kind as to allow me the closing argument in the debate. Briefly put, the concluding point I chose to make was historical: The Athenians lost their democracy. The Romans lost their Republic. And if we Americans did not act now we could lose our Republic! The United States of America is not immune to the laws of history!
After two hours of most vigorous debate among those in attendance, the meeting adjourned with second revised draft Bills of Impeachment sitting on the table.
Certainly, if the US House of Representatives can impeach President Clinton for sex and lying about sex, then a fortiori the House can, should, and must impeach President Bush Jr. for war, lying about war, and threatening more wars. All that is needed is for one Member of Congress with courage, integrity, principles and a safe seat to file these currently amended draft Bills of Impeachment against Bush Jr., Cheney, Rumsfeld, and now Attorney General Albert Gonzales, who bears personal criminal responsibility for the Bush Jr. administration torture scandal. Failing this, the alternative is likely to be an American Empire abroad, a US police state at home, and continuing wars of aggression to sustain both –– along the lines of George Orwell’s classic novel 1984. Despite all of the serious flaws demonstrated by successive United States governments that this author has amply documented elsewhere during the past quarter century as a Professor of Law, the truth of the matter is that America is still the oldest Republic in the world today. ‘We the People of the United States’ must fight to keep it that way!
ZNet, July 26, 2007. Francis A. Boyle is a Professor of International Law and a human rights attorney. He is the author of ‘Destroying World Order’
Responsibilities of UGC
by Sheikh Hafizur Rahman Karzon
Education creates the knowledge capital of a country, which determines whether the state could ensure true development of the country, whether it could keep the state connected with the progressive current of ongoing globalisation. Simply put, education determines the economic, cultural, social and political destiny of a state. Given this reality, the future of Bangladesh has a very dim prospect to flourish, unless it puts proper emphasis on its education system.
For long the public universities have been providing graduates working in the public and private sector, though the universities, to our profound mental anguish, are not fully successful in giving scholarly support to the policy making of the state through their research and creation of new knowledge. It is not only the failure of the universities, the state also did not intend to exploit the potentialities of the universities. The political parties, which were at the helm of the state power, politicised the universities even at the cost of the education.
The quality of higher education has subsided because of the appointment of vice-chancellors, pro vice-chancellors, treasures and new teachers on political consideration, making them total misfits to their role. The University Grants Commission has already drafted an Umbrella Act for all the 26 autonomous public universities, providing rules for stopping clientele teachers’ and students’ politics and dean election of the faculties. The Commission has already submitted draft rules to the education ministry to introduce uniform recruitment and promotion rules for teachers, officials and employees of all public universities to check political appointments and ensure quality education.
The University Grants Commission has so far been disposing of the role of an intermediary institution of taking money from the government and disbursing that money among the public universities. From the name of the Commission, the function of the institution is well assumed, though its constitution conferred wide jurisdiction on it. Now the government has asked the organisation to take the problem ridden universities, both public and private, back to their moorings. Professor Nazrul Islam, newly appointed Chairman of the University Grants Commission, closed 52 unauthorised private universities, which through their fraudulent activities choked the channels of higher education, just as polythene bags choke our drains and sewers. Professor Nazrul Islam deserves high appreciation for taking very courageous and valiant role by putting education business into complete debris.
Under section 5 of the University Grants Commission of Bangladesh Order, 1973,
the Commission has many jurisdictions which include, inter alia, (a) to assess the needs in the field of University education and formulate plans for the development of such education; (b) to determine the financial needs of the universities; (c) to receive funds from the government and allocate and disburse, out of such funds, grants to the universities for their maintenance and development; (d) to evaluate the programmes under implementation for development of University teaching departments, institutes and other constituent institutions; (e) to examine all kinds of university development plans; (f) to collect statistical and other information on university matters. Under the same section the Commission shall have the right to visit the universities or to have them visited by teams of experts as arid when necessary for evaluating their programmes and assess their needs and requirements.
There are two streams, under the present dispensation, of higher education, namely public and private universities. In spite of the slow decline of the academic standard, public universities still remain the first target of bulk of the students, who after failing to get admitted into public universities go to private universities, where admission test is a mere requirement-fulfilling procedure. Though recently it has been defiled because of the detection of some fake students, but the fairness of the admission tests of the public universities are well-accepted. With its low tuition fees and residential facilities, the subsidised education of public universities keeps the flow of higher education and research, though weak, on current.
The public universities could not accommodate all students who wanted to pursue their higher education. In this context the then government passed the Private University Act, 1992 under which the private universities were established. It has brought to the fore a debate—whether education is right or commodity. In the public universities the education is under-paid, making the government to give 55 thousand taka subsidy for every student per year. In private universities the education is costly, making this very basic right of the people as a commodity, which people have to buy with high price. Their profit making reality has been recognised by the government by imposing VAT on them, which sparked serious debate and resentment among the authorities of private universities.
In spite of private universities’ overt image of money making enterprise, they should be credited for creating a separate stream of session-jam-free education with teachers’ evaluation and high salary of pedagogues, enabling people to make a comparison of government funded and private funded higher education.
The public universities are autonomous bodies and regulated by University Order. Keeping in our mind the context in which the public universities were endowed with university order for their smooth regulation, I do not think the University Order is beyond the ambit of review. But the motive behind the change must be serene and the changes should be brought after sufficient discussion with the teachers, students, researchers, educationists, and civil society members. As a teacher of public university I enjoy the freedom given by the 1973 Order and feel the environment of university is quite different from civil and military bureaucracy, and any other institution of the country. I do request to the policy makers not to harm the freedom enjoyed by the academicians, which is very much required for research and creative work, but provide some mechanism so that the teachers could not abuse their freedom.
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father of this nation, delegated Dr. Kamal Hossen to prepare laws for universities, which he did as per the recommendations of highly qualified academicians. The policy makers thought every teacher as sentinel of conscience, and oracle of knowledge, therefore did not feel the necessity to introduce formal evaluation of teachers by the students. I want to put forward, as I did before, some proposals for elevating the quality of higher education and keep the environment of public universities knowledge-friendly.
The vice-chancellors, pro vice-chancellors, treasures, and new teachers must be appointed on the basis of their merit and credentials. If the trend of appointing teachers to the key positions of the universities and recruiting freshers on political consideration can be stopped, together with the introduction of English as mandatory medium of instruction and evaluation of teachers by the students, the quality of higher education will attain some sustainable standard within couple of years.
Sheikh Hafizur Rahman Karzon is an assistant professor, Department of Law, University of Dhaka. hrkarzon@yahoo.com
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