Bangladesh is today going through a deep political crisis that the global civil society is yet to fathom. For all practical purposes, the country is under a dictatorial regime that has usurped power through unfair means. Independent institutions like the Judiciary, Election Commission, and the National Human Rights Commission are completely under the control of the Prime Minister’s Office. State agencies like the police and the paramilitary (such as the Rapid Action Battalion), are wantonly used by the incumbent government to silence all forms of dissent, which has created and spread state-sponsored terror across the country.
Independent media and civil society organisations have either ceased to function or their day-to-day work has been severely hampered due to immense and variegated state interference. Human rights defenders and independent journalists are being systematically targeted by the state, with many imprisoned under fabricated charges; those that still remain free repeatedly receive threatening telephone calls or visits by officers of state agencies.
The global civil society, including the international media, has thus far failed to fathom the deep political crisis into which Bangladesh has slipped. A government that is following an administrative policy does not administer the country; the country is being run by a Prime Minister in accord with her unpredictable moods, which can shift on a daily basis. Independent intelligentsia in the country suspect that the Prime Minister, who has unquestionable powers in the country, has embarked upon a vendetta mission, through which she wants to punish the country and its people for the personal tragedy that her family suffered decades ago.
Arbitrary arrest and detention of civilians, exceptional threats faced by human rights defenders and journalists, and complete executive control of the judiciary are some of the defining characteristics of the government of Bangladesh today. The misuse of due process is of such nature that persons targeted by the state face multiple accusations, each registered as criminal cases for which they are detained for indefinite periods. The absolute subjugation of the judiciary is at such a level that judges repeatedly fail to ensure fair trial. It is today hard to find independent judges in the High Court Division or at the Supreme Court, who dare to take actions against the government, even when there are blatant abuses of state power and horrendous negation of fundamental rights of the people.
Shooting people in the leg, extrajudicial executions, arbitrary arrest, and torture in custody have become synonymous with policing in Bangladesh. The crimes recur with an alarming frequency and neither the judiciary nor the civil society, including the country’s media, is able to intervene. Those who have dared to intervene are today either in prison or killed or have been severely injured due to torture in custody. Even small opinion pieces in relatively lesser-known publications can place authors and publishers in extreme peril.
The fear the government has unleashed is such that representatives of civil society refuse to speak about Bangladesh even in international gatherings. Organisations of high repute that have secured donor support have their bank accounts frozen by the government. International private banking companies violating all codes of ethics and professional obligations to their clients have willingly collaborated with the government in this exercise.
Many donor agencies blissfully ignorant of tactics to stifle civilian dissent against the incumbent government continue to insist upon the civil society conditions that cannot be met. The result is such that independent human rights organisations are no more able to function in the country. Those organisations that continue to operate function under exceptionally challenging circumstances. Despite this oppression by the government, against Bangladeshi civil society, the donor community continues to maintain a blind eye to the challenging circumstances faced by civil society.
Hardly any western government is willing to take on the dictatorial nature of the Bangladesh government. Besides, many western governments have concluded bilateral agreements with the Government of Bangladesh where the only language of communication is that of business and profits. It will not be an exaggeration to say that governments that once championed human rights have abandoned the people of Bangladesh and the investment that they have made in Bangladesh for the past five decades.
Countries in the region, particularly India, have a vital role in the deterioration of civil freedoms in Bangladesh. India’s foreign policy on Bangladesh is so intrusive that it is today believed in Bangladesh that it is Indian intelligence agencies that are providing physical security to the Bangladeshi Prime Minister. The bilateral agreements that India and Bangladesh have signed are believed to be exploitative in nature, due to the weak political leadership in Bangladesh. Government actions against civil society and individual freedoms are also believed to be prompted by the Government of India, something that has already begun to accelerate the alienation of the people of Bangladesh vis-a-vis the Government of India.
Hundreds of people have disappeared or killed in Bangladesh since the incumbent government assumed office. The government has successfully played to the western governments the Islamic fundamentalist card in all such cases. The government has also sought and obtained resources, including technical expertise, from western governments, to train state agencies to stem religious fundamentalism. This expertise is, however, used against political opposition and against human rights defenders. In today’s context, one cannot blame the Bangladesh people if they blame western governments for human rights abuses in Bangladesh.
At the core of the political crisis in Bangladesh is the abysmal nature of the country’s criminal justice institutions. Law enforcement agencies are allowed to violate every element of law and engage in the misuse of power with absolute impunity. In today’s Bangladesh, it is impossible even to file a complaint against a state officer. The National Human Rights Commission has reduced itself to an enforcing arm of the government and it has alienated itself from human rights norms; nobody in Bangladesh trusts the Commission or its Commissioner any more.
A similar fate has befallen the judiciary of the country; very recently, the Chief Justice of Bangladesh appealed to the Bar to take to the streets of Bangladesh, having found it unbearable to cope with executive interference. It is the inherent weak nature of the justice institutions in Bangladesh that the Prime Minister of Bangladesh and her government have repeatedly exploited.
Despite being the leader of a dictatorial government in Bangladesh, the Prime Minister has no shortage of international human rights accolades bestowed upon her. The Asian Human Rights Commission is informed that the United Nations has decided to organise an international conference on migrants in Bangladesh this year.
The AHRC is also informed that the Government of Bangladesh has insisted that if it were to agree to become a host for the event, the UN Secretary General must be in attendance in Bangladesh. The civil society of Bangladesh fears that if the mistake is made by international civil society and the UN to hold the event in Bangladesh, the government will misuse the publicity and once again claim that is a human rights friendly state, just as it did in the past, when the Prime Minister was bestowed with the United Nations Environmental Prize for Policy Leadership in 2015.
The AHRC therefore wishes to make a global call in support of the people of Bangladesh and their freedom. It is high time that the global civil society takes note of the deep political quagmire that Bangladesh has slipped into and helps rescue the country from the abysmal depth of fear and persecution that the people of Bangladesh are facing daily. Any further delay in reaching out to the people of Bangladesh may push the country into a civil war like situation, where lives will be lost, and which will result in instability in the region.
