Main Page «
Front Page «
Metro «
Business «
International «
Sports «
National «
Editorial «
Home «
Timeout «
Letters «

Archive «
Launch Supplement «
Special Supplements «

IT IS well known that Bangladesh has a major corruption problem, and that many civil society organisations have highlighted that Bangladesh is one, if not the, worst performing countries, sharing its position with such luminaries as Sudan, Iraq, Haiti and Chad. Embezzlement of relief materials, extortion of businesses and evasion of tax have all had a strong prevalence in Bangladesh, making it a consistent underperformer in the global corruption stakes.
   It is true that corruption is a relative concept, and that the criticisms levelled at so-called developing countries like Bangladesh are partly informed by misunderstandings of cultural practice by donors, or the neo-colonial rhetoric of the right-wing policy in North America and Europe seeking ways of reducing development assistance. At the same time, the experience of some donor countries leaves much to be desired: Italy is the only mature democracy that the Economist magazine rates as faltering, whilst the behaviour of the Bush administration has had been a huge threat to the functioning of American democracy. In Britain, Tony Blair has escaped from office before the full outcome of the ‘cash-for-honours’ investigation has become known, but the speculation was sufficient to undermine the integrity of his government. The West is well-versed in criticising much of the rest of the world in its governance practice – Russia, China or Lebanon – but France, Ireland, the Netherlands, Israel, Australia, Canada and Greece have all had recent problems with corruption in various guises.
   However, it is also the case that such countries, whilst having less than perfect democracies and often cynical political cultures, also have successfully established the rule of law and effective, deep democratic cultures that ensure that such events are notable because they are (relatively) uncommon and isolated. In many countries of the South, corruption is an outcome of weak or superficial democratic systems, or the complete lack of these. The systems of accountability are poor and the democratic culture underdeveloped, and this provides the opportunity for graft, favouritism and nepotism, concepts with which most Bangladeshis are very familiar.
   Corruption is possible where democratic governance is weak, and as Bangladesh is one of the world’s most corrupt countries, it follows that it also has a weak, immature democracy, with subsequent impacts on human rights. On one level this is stating the obvious: Bangladeshi democracy has 15 years of history, whereas British democracy has been in development for over 900 years, and took some 800 of those to produce universal suffrage for both sexes. However, on a deeper level this is quite profound, because a weak democracy not only acts to facilitate corruption, it can also act to legitimise it, and this is the case in Bangladesh. The political class in Bangladesh have used the veneer of democracy to produce the conditions under which they can most easily exploit the country for their own gain, just as General Zia and General Ershad produced systems that most enabled them to act.
   Bangladesh’s democracy, as it was until October 2006, did not have many aspects associated with democratic life. Those include the rule of law, a free press, the checks and balances of a separate judiciary, legislature and executive, election by secret ballot, and the right to access representatives at parliament to name but a few. There is no clear definition of what represents a democratic society, but possessing those sorts of institutions and practices is typical of success. The Bangladeshi experience has been democracy in name only, and it is this poor understanding of what democracy and democratic practice means that has led to the widespread corruption that is seen.
   For the Bangladeshi political parties, the practice of democracy is limited to the existence of elections. This is about the only aspect of European governance that has an equivalent in Bangladesh. The major political parties – which do not practise internal democracy – seek ratification of their elite position from the electorate, and then abandon them for five years until the next election occurs. The act of voting is considered by the Awami League and BNP leadership to be sufficient for democracy to exist: a view echoed in the totalitarian regime of the Democratic Republic of Korea, for example. Whilst it would be ludicrous to argue that Bangladesh and its leaders lean close to Kim Jong-Il, there is sufficient distance between their practice and that of Sarkozy, Merkel, Brown and other leaders of deep democratic countries.
   Voting in Bangladesh is seen by the political elite to be purely an act of legitimising their behaviour; indeed, it is conceived as the end in accountability, not the means. Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia, and their associated cliques claim that election by popular ballot is justification for their actions and indisputable proof of their right to rule unchallenged. The lack of accountability between a member of parliament and his or her constituents can be compared more to the early-19th century Britain typified by patronage, rotten boroughs and disenfranchised locals than the modern practice of effective relationships between the people and their representatives.
   This is the crux of the matter. The average Bangladeshi politician does not view him or herself as embodying the wishes of his or her constituents, a servant to the people, but instead uses this as a means to embezzle, steal and scrounge their way to greater riches and comforts at the expense of the vast majority. The law of the last parliament granting tax-free imports of cars to MPs was nothing more than organised theft – theft of important tax revenue by politicians that could have been used to invest in education, health and sanitation, desperately needed in Bangladesh. When Jeffrey Sachs, head of the UN Millennium Project says that Bangladesh needs $4 billion every year until 2015 to meet its Millennium Development Goals commitments, then this sort of action by MPs as a unified political class is even more galling, especially when achieving the MDG would lead to great increases in rights and democracy.
   What could be comfortably termed legal corruption is facilitated by a political culture that sees elected officials viewing such ‘perks’ as entitlements, and not an act of gross arrogance towards their electors who could never afford such a vehicle. It is worth contrasting this with the decision of the Bolivian President, Evo Morales, to halve his presidential salary upon taking office. A populist move yes, but Hasina looks pathetic when claiming to stand by the people in her two Mercedes compared to a real voice for and of the poor and marginalised.
   This is only one example of many that are possible because the sort of democratic institutions that would challenge this elsewhere – the press, a strong civil society, an educated and aware population with the means to challenge it, a second chamber to review decisions and so on. The lack of these make corruption not only an under-the-table practice but possible in the broad daylight of public scrutiny, because there is no public scrutiny.
   This sense of entitlement, and the empty rhetoric of service and duty that Bangladeshi politicians employ, is manifest in the widespread nepotism and favouritism of their practice with public institutions and businesses. The ability to slice a little off the top as money trickles through the system is possible because nobody can challenge it: the population at large is disempowered by the cursory practice of voting, being told that they live in a democracy and have rights even though their daily experience is one that is to the contrary of this image.
   If the new administration is going to really tackle corruption, it must attack the cause, and not the symptoms that it has focused on so far. It must establish the rule of law so that people like Hasina, Khaleda Zia and Ershad are subject to it like every other Bangladeshi, not able to skirt it as they see fit. They must engender a public culture of democracy so that people feel empowered to hold their MPs to account, so that ordinary people can stand for election without facing organised intimidation, so that a civil society that is participatory and active can challenge and question and debate, and they must ensure that the political class ceases to be a class, so that a truly universal participation can emerge.
   Bangladeshi democracy as it has been practised is but the mechanism that best suits the current ruling elite to extort the country and the people at large. The act of voting has been the sole characteristic of what a democracy should be, yet this has been used to tell a population that has suffered generations of hardship, under-education and poverty that they live in a free, democratic society. It is no wonder that the collapse of this so-called democracy since ‘1/11’ has been so uncontested. People have no faith in a system that has enriched the rich further and maintained social divide. If corruption is to be halted, a deep, wide and active democracy must be created: this alone has the mechanisms and actors to prevent the activity that has blighted Bangladesh and its poor for so long.
   Mahbubul Haque is director of Neeti Gobeshona Kendro (Policy Research Centre), conducting research and advocacy on human rights, governance and livelihoods. Tom Wipperman is a British VSO volunteer working with Neeti Gobeshona Kendro. They can be contacted at info@neetigob.org.

UNDER the Truman administration, the National Security Council was created by Public Law 80-253, approved July 26, 1947, as part of a general reorganisation of the US national security apparatus. The function of the council as outlined in the 1947 Act was to advise the president on integration of domestic, foreign, and military policies relating to national security and to facilitate interagency cooperation. At the president's direction, the council could also assess and appraise risks to US national security, consider policies and then report or make recommendations to the president.
   On his retirement Truman denied any responsibility for 'cloak and dagger operations' but it was during his Presidency that covert intelligence operations in support of foreign policy objectives were undertaken on an ever broadening scale. The council's first action authorised covert action in the Italian elections.
   In 1949, events reinforced the need for better coordination of national security policy: NATO was formed, military assistance for Europe began, the Soviet Union detonated an atomic bomb, and the Communists gained control in China. The Department of State seized the opportunity to review US strategic policy and military programmes.
   The state department won approval of an ad hoc interdepartmental committee under its policy planning head, Paul Nitze. Their report, NSC 68, was submitted directly to Truman in February 1950. An NSC committee authorised to consider costs and broader implications of NSC 68 began its work, but before it could be completed the Korean War broke out.
   During Truman's last year, the council and the senior staff met less frequently and its activities abated. Much interdepartmental planning on the NSC books was never completed by the end of the Truman administration. During this period, the council reflected Truman's sense of frustration as a lame-duck president caught in a stalemated war.
   Sixty years later, Bangladesh stands on the brink of being engulfed by destructive politics, potential terrorist threats, and the possibility of civil war. The August 17 Bombings in 2005 carved us out to the rest of the world as a possibly violent terrain where the sanctity of life somehow gets trivialised by race, religion and opposing viewpoints. These notions may have one day's justification, but decades of history tell tales of a far superior nation which stands up to tyranny and fights for truth and justice. Following the unrest in January 2007, the country has taken a U-turn as far as politics is concerned. Home politics is still banned, and an interim government headed by Fakhruddin Ahmed is now at the helm. Reforms in almost every sector have been devised, some more successful than others. Most are still in development.
   Following a period of hopeful anticipation, there has finally been word that even though the formation of the National Security Council has been delayed, it shall be established nonetheless, during the reign of this interim government. The primary issue which seems to have delayed the already lengthy procedure of formation appears to be a newly surfaced debate centring on who shall head this proposed council.
   President Iajuddin Ahmad received a proposal pertaining to this matter last month, which he is yet to put pen-to-paper on. The proposal contains suggestions that the council should be headed by whomever, be it the president, or the prime minister, so long as he/she is the head of government. Logically, therefore, the chief adviser, who is now leading the government, falls into fray for the debated position. However, the future remains uncertain. Considering that a shift in the powers from the current president to the next prime minister is imminent, this policy is still in question. Conversely, according to reports, corrections are already being made to the proposal, after which it will be resent to the president for approval.
   It has also been heard that, in order to avoid future complications, the president will be vested with this imperative responsibility. The rest is all smoke and mirrors. Talks have also been held regarding other positions in the hierarchy, the first of which is the role of the joint chief, who shall retain the position of chief of staff of the armed forces. The principle staff officer of the army shall be appointed as secretary of the council. Before which, a string of proposals were put forward suggesting that the chief of staff be made joint chief of the council.
   Recently, the original proposal was sent to the law ministry. Following approval, it was directed to the chief adviser who also sanctioned it. The president, however, was reluctant to sign-off on the scheme. Sources indicate that there shall be an additional staff committee, three sub-committees; with a further five-stage committee system, apart from the main committee which would consist of 9-13 members.
   There would also be 10 additional members in the main committee consisting of the leader of the opposition in parliament, the finance minister, home minister, foreign minister, and the defence minister. Until the next parliamentary session begins, some of these positions will remain vacant, while others will be replaced by relevant members of relevant ministries of the current interim government. As the defence and home ministries fall within the responsibilities of the chief adviser, he shall perform the necessary functions of these ministries as required by the council.
   The main committee retains the right to discuss and advice on any matter they see fit. The staff committee, headed by the adviser for national security, shall consist of the chiefs of staff of the air force and navy, and secretaries from a multitude of ministries. During discussions, if it is ever felt that the opinion of a ministerial secretary is essential to reaching a sound decision, that secretary shall be invited to the council to converse on the matter. Other members include the director of the Directorate General Forces Intelligence, the inspector general of police, the director of the National Security Intelligence, as well as the chiefs of the Rapid Action Battalion and the Bangladesh Rifles.
   The adviser for national security has been tipped to be a position equalling that of a government minister, which is to be occupied by an unbiased individual who has no political or bureaucratic ties. The president shall personally appoint him. A great amount of care will be taken so that the adviser may participate in discussions pertaining to all issues, ranging from army studies, home and international politics, to well-devised strategic plans.
   Alternatively, the council will also contain three separate cells, namely the strategy policy cell, the security advisory cell and the joint intelligence cell. The first shall consist of the chiefs of the armed forces, navy, and air force with heads of all law-enforcement agencies. The second cell, although largely driven by trained analysts, shall also utilise the prowess of economists, scholars, experts from various professions, and those individuals who are thought to be of importance by the council.
   Members of the armed forces, intelligence officers from all agencies, including the police, RAB, NSI, Special Branch and the Detective Branch, shall form the joint intelligence cell.
   Further details are yet to be disclosed, but one thing is for certain. The NSC of 2007 must take note of the apparent failings of the corresponding US council, and not fall pray to covert ops, or any form of illegality whatsoever. Otherwise it may head for the same diminishing fate. The success of the council will largely depend on its members and their integrity and unity. To a casual observer, it would be an interesting prospect to see what happens from here on, but Bangladeshis will simply take a deep breathe and pray for the best.

The story of Hedi Boudhiba, a 46-year old Tunisian, who has been abandoned in Spain after being extradited from the UK and cleared of all charges against him in the Spanish National Court, calls into doubt the quality of British and pan-European intelligence about activities related to terrorism, and also raises uncomfortable questions about the apparent absence of human rights safeguards in the ‘fast-track’ extradition agreements for terror suspects that have been negotiated between various countries in the European Union.
   A refugee, who fled persecution in the country of his birth, where he was tortured, and where the dictatorship presided over by Zine El Abidine Ben Ali has long waged a dirty campaign of intimidation, imprisonment and torture against even moderate political and religious opponents, Boudhiba was arrested at Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport, en route to Barcelona, on August 20, 2004. Held for 20 months in the notorious Belmarsh prison in south-east London, which gained a reputation as Britain’s own Guantánamo, because of the number of Muslim terror suspects held there without charge or trial, he suffered from psychosis and depression, and on one occasion attempted to commit suicide by slashing his throat and forearm. Speaking at the time, Boudhiba said, ‘Here I am tortured mentally and I suffer every day and I can’t find help from anyone. When I’m ill they don’t send me to hospital.’
   While in Belmarsh, Boudhiba was interviewed not only by British intelligence agents, but also by representatives of the American, Portuguese and German authorities. Despite allegations that he was part of a terrorist network linked to 9/11, that he was involved in providing funding for fighters in Iraq, and that he was also involved in the now-discredited ricin plot in Britain, the British, American, Portuguese and German authorities all declined to either prosecute him or seek his extradition, but he became ensnared by the rules of the new, ‘fast-track’ European Arrest Warrant – which eases the extradition of suspects between EU countries – after the Spanish authorities also turned up to interview him, and he refused to speak to them.
   His lawyer, Julian Hayes, explained that, having previously spoken to representatives of the four countries mentioned above, Boudhiba said, ‘Well, I’ve spoken to all these other authorities, you can see what I’ve said to them and I don’t frankly want to speak to you about it,’ and added that, as a result, ‘one has to question the validity of that particular warrant.’ Questioned for the BBC by Gerry Northam, who asked, ‘Are you saying that you suspect the Spanish are on a fishing trip and they just want to pull him in too see what he knows?’ Hayes replied, ‘That is the suspicion,’ and countered Northam’s follow-up question, ‘Well, why not let them fish?’ by pointing out that ‘there’s been a free flow of information between these authorities and the Spanish can easily obtain that information.’
   Despite assurances that the ‘fast-track’ extradition programme would live up to its name, it took 20 months until Boudhiba was extradited to Spain. When he lost an appeal in the High Court in April 2006, Julian Hayes again complained, pointing out, ‘We have no guarantees given to us by the Spanish authorities that he would be allowed to stay in their country,’ and adding that Boudhiba ran the risk of being returned to Tunisia, ‘where at the very least he’ll be tortured and at the very worst he’ll be killed.’
   Speaking at the time, Boudhiba reinforced his lawyer’s complaints, saying, ‘They want to extradite me to Spain, as they could not find anything against me. The Spanish police could send me to Tunisia, and once I arrive in Tunisia, they can torture me and do to me whatever they like.’ Denying the allegations against him, he added, ‘I swear, I have done nothing bad to anyone. I am not a terrorist. They want to accuse me no matter what, I can’t understand why. Is it because I am a Muslim or because I knew some people, and they have suspicions against these people? This isn’t justice. This is not a war against terrorists; this is a war against Muslims.’
   Once in Spanish custody, where, as CBS News reported in January 2005, the Spanish anti-terror judge Baltasar Garzon claimed that he had travelled from Hamburg to Istanbul a week before 9/11 with a member of the Hamburg cell run by lead hijacker Mohammed Atta, Boudhiba effectively disappeared off the radar, only to resurface a few days ago, when Marianne Kremer, a human rights activist in Luxembourg, who is in contact with him, emailed me to request assistance.
   Kremer reported that, after being held for 15 months in Spain, where he was unable to contact his family and was, on one occasion, set upon by another prisoner who bit off part of his nose (after which the authorities promised him plastic surgery, but failed to do so), Boudhiba was acquitted in July of all the charges against him in the Audiencia Nacional (Spain’s National Court), but was then ‘simply released from prison near Madrid with no money, no place to stay, and no passport.’ She explained that Boudhiba’s passport is still held at the Audiencia Nacional (and that everyone there is on vacation). As a result, despite being cleared, he has been reduced to something akin to a ‘ghost’ presence in Spain, having not yet received an ‘official written verdict’ from the trial, and is unable even to receive donations because the court still holds his passport.
   While this seems to me to be a rather shocking indictment of the ways in which the European Arrest Warrant has facilitated the movement of unwanted refugees around Europe without any oversight regarding the justice of their treatment, Kremer added a more worrying postscript, noting that Boudhiba remains terrified that the Spanish authorities, with the collusion of the British government, will attempt to return him to Tunisia. She reports that, during his extradition trial in the UK, ‘the Spanish Prosecutor Pedro Rubira signed a document stating that the Spanish cannot deport Hedi to a third country without the consent of the UK authorities.’
   Although the BBC reported in October 2005 that Home Office minister Andy Burnham, citing Boudhiba’s case, pledged that extradited suspects would ‘remain absolutely protected from the death penalty or torture’, and that the British government ‘would not permit anyone it had surrendered to another European state to be sent on to a country which violated these human rights’, recent cases make it clear that, despite these apparent assurances, the British government is at the forefront of attempts to return unwanted refugees to countries where they face the risk of torture or death, having signed worthless ‘memoranda of understanding’ with Jordan and Libya, allegedly guaranteeing the ‘humane’ treatment of returned suspects, and having entered a similar agreement with the Algerian government.
   In April and July, attempts by the UK government to return two Libyans and three Algerians –held without charge or trial in the UK – were turned down by the Special Immigrations Appeal Court and by appeal court judges, who ruled that all five faced the risk of torture, but the United States, another partner in this concerted effort to bypass international safeguards preventing the return of inconvenient individuals to countries where they face torture, recently opened a new front in this unprincipled diplomatic game by entering into a similar agreement with Tunisia.
   In June, two Tunisian detainees in Guantánamo, Abdullah bin Omar and Lofti Lagha – cleared for release by a military review board, which had concluded that they no longer represented a threat to the United States and no longer had any intelligence value – were returned to the country of their birth, where they were promptly imprisoned, and where, according to human rights observers, bin Omar ‘has already been tortured, and has been told that if he does not confess falsely to crimes, his wife and daughters will be raped’.
   As he paces the streets of Madrid, awaiting the return of his passport, Hedi Boudhiba – finally liberated after three years of imprisonment based on ‘evidence’ obtained through hearsay or torture that has evaporated like a mirage – must be hoping that his persecution is now at an end, and that he, unlike Abdullah bin Omar, is not destined to become what bin Omar’s lawyer, Zachary Katznelson of the London-based legal charity Reprieve, described as ‘a guinea pig in a potentially deadly diplomatic experiment’.
   Counterpunch, September 1-2. Andy Worthington is a British historian and the author of ‘The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison’ (to be published by Pluto Press in October 2007)

‘National’ or ‘caretaker’ government?

There is no controversy. General Moeen U Ahmed is spot on; by constitution the present government is caretaker though it has extended its assigned duration. It is a bit ambitious to claim it is a ‘national’ government, which it clearly is not. But then it could be a personal impression or opinion by the learned adviser, yet nothing more. That does not change the official or legal position. By exigency or necessity this caretaker government could extend itself indefinitely. No need to wear a new label or gift wrap. So where is the need to invent a controversy yet again?
   Husain
   Dhaka

In the last few years we have seen how corruption has engulfed the entire admission process. I was never in favour of admission test. Admission tests for tertiary level education must go including all public universities, technical universities, engineering universities and medical colleges. I vehemently oppose the idea of the chairman of the UGC that ‘The technical universities may take the admission tests but not the general one’.
   My humble question is: why do we need admission test? In the USA, UK, Australia we do not see any student getting admission in any field through the so-called admission test. So why should we? The only solution is to improve the system of our higher education.
   Finally, the government has realised it and we hope the education ministry will soon pass an order in favour of this. This would relieve the tension and worries of the students and their guardians.
   Monawar
   On e-mail

Princess Diana was a very special person who should be remembered for her warmth, her special gift in making so many people happy and her association with her charity work. Above all, she was a loving mother who was never afraid to show her feelings in public. She will never be forgotten, but now should be left to rest in peace.
   Lira
   UK

Next on Quick Comments

a. Khaleda barred from paying homage to Zia on party founding day: Bhuiyan terms it unfortunate (New Age, September 2) b. Three detained RU teachers hospitalised (New Age, September 2) c. Police seek people’s help in chasing leads to DU protests (New Age, September 2) d. Government plans $52 million ZIA modernisation project (New Age, September 2) e. EC confused as ban issue pits Sakhawat against Huda f. Talks with Musharraf stalled: Benazir (New Age, September 2)