FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AS-251-2006
October 13, 2006
A Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission
BANGLADESH: Removing dust is the government’s job
The Daily Star newspaper published a report on October 11 citing the outgoing Minister for Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs of Bangladesh, Moudud Ahmed, as claiming that “progress” had been made in separating the lower judiciary from the government, despite years of failure to fulfil this election pledge, among others. It quoted Moudud as saying that judicial independence “needs only an amendment to the provision of the [Criminal Procedure Code]… which is now pending with parliament”. However, as the current session of parliament had already been concluded, it would not be addressed until the next session or thereafter. When asked why a reporter why the amendment had “gathered dust” waiting before parliament for some six months already, the minister told the journalist, “You go and remove the dust.” He also avoided giving detailed reasons as to why a national human rights commission had still not being established, saying that despite being it “its final stage” it could not yet be established “due to some reasons”.
The minister’s comments expose the contempt with which the government of Bangladesh treats its own parliament, its laws and its country. If the current administration had five years in which to get “only an amendment” to the Criminal Procedure Code through parliament towards fundamental changes in the management of courts in Bangladesh that could bring them closer to compliance with international law, why has it failed to do so? The minister offers the pretext that parliament is out of session. But if the matter were important enough, it would be a simple matter to call another session before parliament is dissolved. Why not do this?
The law minister also seems to have forgotten a ruling of the Supreme Court on this matter. In Secretary, Finance Ministry vs. Masdar Hossain, the Supreme Court on 2 December 1999 ordered the government to separate the lower judiciary from the executive in accordance with 12 points. Among those, point 11 set aside an earlier ruling that it was not necessary to amend the constitution in order to ensure fulfil this obligation. “If the parliament so wishes, it can amend the constitution to make the separation more meaningful, pronounced, effective and complete,” the court ruled. So why has the parliament not so wished? Have its members, together with the minister, suffered collective amnesia of this unprecedented ruling? And why have they spent five years seeking extensions of time, rather than comply with the court’s instructions?
However, the contempt with which the laws and institutions for the rule of law have been treated by the law minister himself is nothing new. After all, it is under him that the prime method of law-enforcement in Bangladesh has been lawlessness. Under him, thousands of military and police officials were indemnified by a 2003 law for killings, assaults, illegal detention and wanton brutality during the 86-day Operation Clean Heart. Under him, the newly-established joint forces Rapid Action Battalion has engaged in a killing contest with the armed police that has escalated to unprecedented levels, as documented recently in a special report by the Asian Legal Resource Centre (Lawless law-enforcement and the parody of judiciary in Bangladesh, online at www.article2.org ).
It is not the job of journalists to remove the dust from laws that have sat before parliament for too long, such as those for the separation of the magistracy, the establishment of a national human rights commission, or otherwise. It is the job of journalists to ask ministers, especially the law minister, as to why they have failed to remove the dust. This journalist did his job. By giving a facetious and belittling answer, the minister failed in his.
So why has the amendment gathered dust? Why has the constitution not been amended? Why has a national human rights institution not been established? These questions must again be asked.
To these, the Asian Human Rights Commission would add the following:
1. Why is the government of Bangladesh continuing with a policy of extrajudicial killings? Why have none of the perpetrators ever been prosecuted?
2. Why has torture not been criminalised as per Bangladesh’s obligations under the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment?
3. Why has political control not been removed from public prosecutors? Why has an independent prosecution department not been established?
4. Why has a properly independent and powerful anti-corruption agency not been established?
5. Why is there as yet no independent body to receive and investigate complaints against the police and other state officers?
6. Why have the following laws, which are contrary to international standards of human rights, not yet been repealed:
a. Section 46 of the Constitution of Bangladesh, which protects state officers from prosecution;
b. Sections 54, 132, 197 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, which again protect state officers from prosecution and allow arrest and detention without warrant on almost any grounds; and,
c. Section 86 of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police Ordinance, which allows for arrest and detention without warrant or trial.
We too are waiting for answers.
