THE QUEST FOR REPRESENTATIVE government has been an important feature
of the history of Bangladesh. The independence struggle of the eastern
Bengali peoples against the British, partition from India in 1947, and
secession from Pakistan in 1971 set the stage for the people of
Bangladesh to create a democratic political system. The Constitution, as
it was initially promulgated in 1972, embodied the democratic yearnings
of the long struggle for independence and guaranteed human rights and
political freedoms within a system of checks and balances similar to
those existing in the British and United States governments. But later
events ended these hopes. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (Mujib), hero of the
1971 war of independence, amended the Constitution and assumed
dictatorial powers. His successors, most of whom were military men who
seized power during various times of trouble, also ruled through
autocratic means. As a result, successive regimes established
single-party systems representing military interests, with the leader
wielding almost absolute power.
Yet the struggle for democracy was still alive in Bangladesh as of
the late 1980s. The single-party system of the 1970s and 1980s was
unable to satisfy the varied political movements and interest groups of
the nation. Opposition parties--although they represented conflicting
views and were as unwilling as the ruling regime to share
power--remained a vital force that commanded the loyalties of a large
proportion of the population.
Socialist and communist parties, centrist parties representing the
policies of defunct regimes, and conservative Islamic parties-- each
with a completely different vision of the path that Bangladesh should
follow but united in their opposition to the rule of President Hussain
Muhammad Ershad--all vied for power in the late 1980s. Their refusal to
participate in parliamentary politics under Ershad, who had seized power
in 1982, relegated the opposition to illegal activities and
demonstrations on campuses and in the streets that periodically brought
economic life to a standstill in urban areas. The ineffectiveness and
confrontational position of the opposition only strengthened the
regime's hold over Parliament and the civil service and allowed the
military to continue its strong autocratic rule.
Remarkably, the policies of Bangladesh's autocratic military rulers
have been characterized by a commitment to democratic ideals and an
adherence to the Constitution. Ershad seized power in the name of the
Constitution, and he sought to legitimize his position by claiming that
he brought stability to the country in order to guarantee democratic
freedom. One of Ershad's most significant moves toward democracy was the
establishment of a system of local elections that allowed voters to
choose members of local representative councils. In the short term, this
democratic reform allowed local elites to control government patronage,
and it also made them docile supporters of the regime. Nevertheless, by
the late 1980s the local councils had become training grounds for new
political leaders and forums for democratic competition throughout the
nation.
Bangladesh has pursued a neutralist policy in international relations
in a continuing effort to secure economic aid from every possible
foreign source. Bangladesh in 1988 was one of the few countries in the
world on good terms with both the United States and the Soviet Union and
their allies and with China, the Islamic world, and most Third World
nations. Bangladesh has played an active role in the United Nations
(UN), the Nonaligned Movement, and other international groupings, and it
was the driving force behind the establishment of the South Asian
Association for Regional Cooperation, which offered promise for economic
cooperation. Bangladesh was neutral, but it was forceful on a number of
international issues. The Cambodian, Palestinian, and South African
issues have elicited strong stands from Dhaka, and complicated bilateral
problems with India have invoked intense displays of hostility and
national pride among Bangladeshis in the years since independence.
<>STRUCTURE OF
GOVERNMENT
Constitution
Constitution
The Constitution of Bangladesh has formed the basis for the nation's
political organization since it was adopted on November 4, 1972. Many
abrupt political changes have caused suspension of the Constitution and
have led to amendments in almost every section, including the total
revision of some major provisions. It is notable, however, that every
regime that came to power since 1972 has couched major administrative
changes in terms of the Constitution and has attempted to legitimize
changes by legally amending this basic document.
According to the Constitution, the state has a positive role to play
in reorganizing society in order to create a free and equal citizenry
and provide for the welfare of all. The government is required to ensure
food, shelter, clothing, medical care, education, work, and social
security for the people. The government must also build socialism by
implementing programs to "remove social and economic
inequality" and "ensure the equitable distribution of wealth
among citizens." These far-reaching goals represented the
viewpoints of many members of the 1972 Constituent Assembly and the
early Awami League (People's League) government, who were deeply
influenced by socialist ideology. Another sector of public
opinion, however, has always viewed private property and private
enterprise as the heart of social and economic development. This
viewpoint is also part of the constitutional principles of state policy,
which equally recognize state, cooperative, and private forms of
ownership. The Constitution thus mandates a high degree of state
involvement in the establishment of socialism, although it explicitly
preserves a private property system. In practice, the Constitution has
supported a wide range of government policies, ranging from those of the
nationalized, interventionist state of Mujib's time to the increasing
deregulation and reliance on market forces under presidents Ziaur Rahman
(Zia) and Ershad.
The framers of the Constitution, after emerging from a period of
intense repression under Pakistan, took great pains to outline the
fundamental rights of citizens even before describing the government's
structure. According to the section on fundamental rights, all men and
women are equal before the law, without discrimination based on
religion, race, caste, sex, or place of birth. The Constitution also
guarantees the right to assemble, hold public meetings, and form unions.
Freedom of speech and of the press are ensured. Persons who have been
arrested must be informed of the charges made against them, and they
must be brought before a magistrate within twenty-four hours. The
Constitution, however, adds that these guarantees are subject to
"any reasonable restrictions imposed by law," leaving open the
possibility of an administrative decision to revoke fundamental rights.
Furthermore, there is a provision for "preventive detention"
of up to six months. Those being held under preventive detention do not
have the right to know the charges made against them, nor to appear
before a magistrate, and a legal advisory board may extend this form of
detention after seeing the detainee. The Constitution does not define
the circumstances or the level of authority necessary for the revocation
of constitutional guarantees or for the enforcement of preventive
detention. During the many occasions of civil disorder or public protest
that have marked Bangladeshi political life, the incumbent
administration has often found it useful to suspend rights or jail
opponents without trial in accordance with the Constitution.
The Islamic religion was the driving force behind the creation of
Pakistan, and it has remained an important component of Bangladeshi
ideology. The Constitution as originally framed in 1972 explicitly
described the government of Bangladesh as "secular," but in
1977 an executive proclamation made three changes in wording that did
away with this legacy. The proclamation deleted "secular" and
inserted a phrase stating that a fundamental state principle is
"absolute trust and faith in the Almighty Allah." The phrase bismillah
ar rahman ar rahim (in the name of Allah, the beneficent, the
merciful) was inserted before the preamble of the Constitution. Another
clause states that the government should "preserve and strengthen
fraternal relations among Muslim countries based on Islamic
solidarity." These changes in terminology reflected an overt state
policy aimed at strengthening Islamic culture and religious institutions
as central symbols of nationalism and at reinforcing international ties
with other Islamic nations, including wealthy Arab oil-producing
countries. Domestically, state support for Islam, including recognition
of Islam as the state religion in the Eighth Amendment to the
Constitution in June 1988, has not led to official persecution of other
religions. Despite agitation by Jamaat e Islami (Congregation of Islam)
and other conservative parties, there was no official implementation of
sharia (Islamic law) as of mid-1988.
The Constitution is patterned closely on the British and United
States models inasmuch as it includes provisions for independent
legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government. When it
first came into effect, the Constitution established a Britishstyle
executive, with a prime minister appointed from a parliamentary majority
as the effective authority under a titular president. In 1975 the Fourth
Amendment implemented "Mujibism" (named for Mujib), mandating
a single national party and giving the president effective authority,
subject to the advice of a prime minister. The later governments of Zia
and Ershad preserved the powers of the presidency and strengthened the
office of the chief executive through amendments and their personal
control of the highest office in the land. Because of this concentration
of power in individual leaders, the Bangladeshi Constitution gives much
greater authority to the executive branch than does the United States
Constitution. In fact, the legislature and the courts have few
constitutional avenues for checking presidential power, while the
executive has many tools for dominating the other branches of the
government.
Bangladesh - Legislature
The legislative branch of the government is a unicameral Parliament,
or Jatiyo Sangsad (House of the People), which makes the laws for the
nation. Members of Parliament, who must be at least twenty-five years
old, are directly elected from territorial constituencies. Parliament
sits for a maximum of five years, must meet at least twice a year, and
must meet less than thirty days after election results are declared. The
president calls Parliament into session. The assembly elects a speaker
and a deputy speaker, who chair parliamentary activities. Parliament
also appoints a standing committee, a special committee, a secretariat,
and an ombudsman.
Parliament debates and votes on legislative bills. Decisions are
decided by a majority vote of the 300 members, with the presiding
officer abstaining from voting except to break a tie. A quorum is sixty
members. If Parliament passes a nonmoney bill, it goes to the president;
if he disapproves of the bill, he may return it to Parliament within
fifteen days for renewed debate. If Parliament again passes the bill, it
becomes law. If the president does not return a bill to Parliament
within fifteen days, it automatically becomes law. All money bills
require a presidential recommendation before they can be introduced for
debate in Parliament. Parliament has the ability to reject the national
budget or to delay implementation. It is therefore in the best interests
of the executive as well as the entire nation that budgets submitted to
Parliament should be designed to please the majority of its members. The
legislature is thus a potentially powerful force for enacting laws over
the objections of the president or for blocking presidential financial
initiatives. In practice, however, because most members of Parliament
have been affiliated with the president's party, the legislature has
typically served the interests of the president.
The Bangladeshi and British parliaments have accommodated political
parties in a similar manner. After elections, a single political party
or a coalition of parties must form a government-- that is, they must
form a block of votes within Parliament that guarantees the passage of
bills they may introduce. Once a parliamentary majority is formed, the
president chooses the majority leader as prime minister and appoints
other members of the majority as cabinet ministers. Parliament can
function for a full five-year term if a single party or coalition can
continue to guarantee a majority. If, however, opposition members
attract enough votes to block a bill, the president can dissolve
Parliament and call for new elections. In order to prevent widespread
bribing of members, or the constant defection of members from one party
to another, the Constitution declares that party members who abstain,
vote against their party, or absent themselves lose their seats
immediately. In practice, whenever Parliament has been in session, a
single party affiliated with the president has been able to command a
solid majority.
Bangladesh - Presidency
The president, who must be at least thirty-five years old, is
directly elected by all voters for a five-year term, and according to
the provisions of the Sixth Amendment (1981) he may be reelected. He is
commander in chief of the armed forces, oversees the conduct of all
foreign affairs, appoints the vice president for a five-year term, and
has the power to convene and dissolve Parliament. The president also
chooses cabinet ministers, who run the government bureaucracy; heads a
secretariat that devises money bills for introduction into Parliament;
and appoints the members of the Elections Commission, who supervise all
aspects of elections. In addition, the president appoints, without the
need for parliamentary approval, Supreme Court justices and lower court
judges. Parliament, in turn, can only impeach the president with a
two-thirds vote and can only remove the president from office because of
malfeasance or illness with a vote of three-fourths of its members.
The president has a number of extraordinary constitutional means of
wielding power and influence. In the case of a constitutionally defined
"grave emergency" threatening "the security or economic
life of Bangladesh," the president may issue a proclamation of
emergency, which eliminates all restrictions on state power and the
protection of fundamental rights. A state of emergency may last 120
days, or longer with Parliament's approval. If the president determines
that "immediate action" is necessary, he may promulgate any
ordinance he wants, as long as it is laid before Parliament for approval
at its next session--that is, if it has not already been repealed. Added
to the considerable power of being able to place persons in preventive
detention, these are a potent array of powers controlled directly, and
without means for external control, by the president. The Fifth
Amendment (1979) allows the president to amend the Constitution, without
action by Parliament, by conducting a general referendum allowing a
majority of citizens to approve an amendment. Constitutional amendments
approved by Parliament must be passed by a two-thirds majority.
The increase in executive power has been the most important trend in
the development of the Bangladeshi Constitution. This increase has
developed because, in practice, even the very large scope of
presidential authority has proved insufficient to protect civilian
governments from military coups or to provide military leaders with
sufficient legitimacy to preserve their power. Thus Mujib established a
constitutional dictatorship, and both Zia and Ershad ruled for extended
periods as chief martial law administrators in order to consolidate
their hold over the country and to safeguard their influence by
increasing their executive powers. Through the extended periods when
Parliament was suspended, proclamations of the president or the chief
martial law administrator amended the Constitution, not only to
strengthen the office of the president but also to legitimize
presidential acts.
Bangladesh - Council of Ministers
The government operates courts in the regions, districts, and
subdistricts that make up the local administrative system. The judges in these courts are appointed
by the president through the Ministry of Law and Justice or the Ministry
of Home Affairs. Most cases heard by the court system originate at the
district level, although the newer subdistrict courts experienced an
increased caseload in the late 1980s. Upon appeal, cases may go up to
the Supreme Court, but litigation may be very slow; in 1987 there were
29 Supreme Court judges dealing with 21,600 pending cases. The Supreme
Court, as of June 1988, had permanent benches--called the High Court
Division-- in Dhaka, Comilla, Rangpur, Barisal, Sylhet, Chittagong, and
Jessore. It hears appeals from district courts and may also judge
original cases. The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in Dhaka
reviews appeals of judgment by the High Court Division. The judges of
both divisions are appointed by the president.
At the grass-roots level, the judicial system begins with village
courts. An aggreived party may make an official petition, which requires
a fee, to the chairman of the union council (the administrative division
above the village), who may call a session of the village court with
himself as chairman and two other judges nominated by each of the
parties to the dispute. The parties may question the impartiality of the
chairman and have him replaced. The majority of cases end at the village
court level, which is inexpensive and which hands down judgments that
reflect local opinion and power alignments. There are occasions,
however, when the union council chairman may reject an official petition
to constitute a village court or when one party desires a higher
opinion. In these cases, the dispute goes to a government court at the
subdistrict level. Cases may wind their way up from district courts to
permanent benches of the High Court Division. Once cases leave the
village courts, they become expensive affairs that may last for years,
and few citizens have the financial resources to fund a lengthy court
battle.
Rapid political changes in independent Bangladesh have compromised
the court system. The Constitution originally stated that the president
could remove members of the Supreme Court only if two-thirds of
Parliament approved, but the Proclamation (Amendment) Order of 1977
included a clause that eliminated the need for parliamentary
involvement. The clause set up the Supreme Judicial Council, consisting
of the chief justice and the next two senior judges. The council may
determine that a judge is not "capable of properly performing the
functions of his office" or is "guilty of gross
misconduct." On their advice, the president may remove any judge.
In addition, executive action has completely eliminated judicial
authority for long periods. For example, under martial law regulations
enacted in 1982, the Supreme Court lost jurisdiction over the protection
of fundamental rights, and all courts operated under provisions of law
promulgated by the chief martial law administrator; special and summary
martial law courts handed down judgments that were not subject to review
by the Supreme Court or any other court. Furthermore, the Fifth
Amendment and the Seventh Amendment placed martial law proclamations and
judgments outside the review of the court system. In these ways, the
courts have been forced to serve the interests of the ruling regime,
rather than standing as an independent branch of government.
Bangladesh - Civil Service
The implementation of government policies and projects is the duty of
the Bangladesh Civil Service, a corps of trained administrators who form
the nation's most influential group of civilians. The importance of the
bureaucracy dates back to the colonial period, when the Indian Civil
Service provided an elite, educated, and dedicated body of professional
administrators. After the partition of India in 1947, when almost all
administrative organs had to be created afresh, both East Pakistan and
West Pakistan heavily relied on the managerial expertise of professional
managers from the old Indian Civil Service. When Bangladesh became
independent in 1971, the members of the civil service who joined the new
nation brought with them the heritage of the colonial system. This
heritage included administrative competence, which proved invaluable in
running a young Bangladesh, and an expectation by the elite of benefits
and power.
In mid-1988 the civil service was composed of twenty-eight separate
services. There were twenty grades, with promotion to higher grades
based on merit and seniority, dependent on annual confidential reports
filed by the individuals' supervisors. Recruitment to the civil service
occurred through open competition within a quota system. Forty percent
of all new positions were allotted on the basis of merit; 30 percent
were reserved for former freedom fighters (Mukti
Bahini), and 20 percent were allotted to women. The
quotas were distributed among districts on the basis of population.
Eligibility depended on an entrance examination, which included English,
Bangla, and mathematics sections, plus a personal interview. The Public
Services Commission, as mandated by the Constitution, conducted the
examinations for the civil service. The recruitment system attempted to
eliminate the entrenched power of the old elites and to decrease the
bias that favored candidates from wealthy, urban families. Although in
the late 1980s it appeared that the new rules for recruitment and
promotion might widen the backgrounds of civil service personnel and
their supervisors, the older, senior members of the service continued to
dominate the administration.
Since independence, membership in the civil service has been one of
the most desirable careers in the country. For senior civil servants,
benefits included government housing at a standard rate of 7.5 percent
of base salary, transportation, medical care, and a pension. Equally
important were the prestige and influence that accompanied an
administrative career. For example, there was great power in directing a
division of a ministerial secretariat in Dhaka, or one of its attached
departments, subordinate offices, or autonomous bodies. Positions in the
countryside were less popular, but the long tradition of bureaucratic
elitism and subservience to government officials made the local
administrator of the civil service an influential person in the
community. In the late 1980s, the centralization of power and influence
within the civil service remained one of the prime targets of
administrative changes designed to decentralize politics and economic
development throughout Bangladesh.
Bangladesh - Local Administration
During the early British period, when modified versions of Mughal
(1526-1858) and earlier administrations were adopted, the closest the
government came to the rural society was the zamindar, an administrator
with concurrent judicial functions, who ensured revenue flows from the
localities to the central government and handled a wide variety of
official business. Government from the top down was the general rule for
the Indian Civil Service and later the Pakistani and early Bangladeshi
civil services. After 1971 the government of Bangladesh saw the benefits
of involving more people in democratic decision-making and development
programs, but the progress of reform was slow. In 1959 General Mohammad
Ayub Khan's government inaugurated a "basic democracies"
program designed to involve villagers in development programs, with
direct elections to union councils and indirect elections to bodies
serving larger administrative units. Mujib's government held elections
for union councils, but the coup of 1975 prevented their effective
functioning. In 1980 Zia's government announced the Self-Sufficient
Village Government Plan, but this project ended when Zia was
assassinated in 1981. In 1982 Ershad appointed the Committee for
Administrative Reorganization/Reforms, which led to the establishment of
the National Implementation Committee for Administrative Reorganization.
These bodies built a comprehensive plan for administrative
decentralization based on the subdistrict.
Bangladesh is divided into four main territorial divisions. In the
late 1980s, the four divisions were divided into twenty-one regions, and
the regions were subdivided into sixty-four districts (zilas).
Below the district level, there were further urban and rural
subdivisions. Urban areas include four municipal corporations (Dhaka,
Chittagong, Rajshahi, and Khulna, each of which included several
municipalities), eightyseven municipalities (pourashavas) and
thirty townships (thanas). The four divisions had the same name
as the four municipal corporations. The countryside had 460 subdistricts
upazilas, which were further divided into 4,401 unions (the
rough equivalent of an urban ward); these, in turn, contained 60,315 mouzas
(groups of two or more villages--about 20 percent of the total) and
single villages (about 80 percent of the total). A further subdivision,
equivalent to the rural mouza, was the mahalla, which
was found in urban areas. Each mouza or mahalla, the
size of which was determined by census data-gathering techniques,
contained about 250 households. An average village in the late 1980s
contained 1,300 to 1,400 people. An average union contained about 15
villages and a population of about 20,000, and an average subdistrict
had 8 to 10 unions with about 200,000 people.
Throughout its history, one of the main challenges to the Bangladeshi
government has been finding ways to involve people in democratic
politics at every administrative level.
According to the decentralization plan in effect in mid-1988, each
rural mouza had its own council (parishad) of elected
representatives chosen by local voters (persons aged eighteen and over).
At the next administrative level, the chairmen of the union councils
were directly elected by voters within their jurisdictions. The
remaining members of the union council were chosen by the mouza
councils, with each member of the union council representing three or
four villages. The chairmen of the union councils formed the voting
membership of the council at the subdistrict level, along with three
appointed women and another appointed member, usually a former freedom
fighter. The chairman of the subdistrict council was directly elected by
subdistrict voters. Thus the people had a direct electoral role at the
village level, and they had a voice in choosing influential chairmen at
the union and subdistrict levels. In the late 1980s, plans called for
the expansion of representation at the district level, and the
controversial District Council (Zila Parishad) Bill of 1987 was the
first step in this direction. By mid-1988, however, these plans had not
been implemented; the region and division levels remained administrative
units of the civil service and had no political significance.
Local participatory politics met the civil service in the subdistrict
council. In the late 1980s, the chief government official in charge of
local projects and development efforts was the subdistrict project
management (upazila nirbahi) officer, who directed a
staff of about 250 technical and administrative officers. Nirbahi
officers were part of the staff appointed by central authorities in
Dhaka, and they received their pay, benefits, and promotion from the
civil service. Their direct supervisors, however, were the subdistrict
council chairmen. The subdistrict councils, through their chairmen, were
expected to make plans for public works and development projects within
their own territories, spend allocated government funds, and direct the
development activities of nirbahi officers and their staff. Nirbahi
officers and other subdistrict technical personnel were allowed to
participate in subdistrict council meetings, but only as nonvoting
members. Civil service members, heirs of a long tradition of elite
government, took orders from subdistrict council chairmen because the
latter wrote the annual evaluations of nirbahi officers which
served as the basis for promotion within the civil service. In this way,
elected representatives of the people at the local level exercised
direct control over civil servants and government projects in their own
area.
In the late 1980s, the administrative apparatus at the urban level
was comprised of a governing council with an elected chairman, elected
commissioners (no more than 10 percent of whom were women), and several
ex officio members. A mayor and deputy mayors were elected from among
the council members.
The decentralization scheme implemented under Ershad's government was
the most ambitious attempt in the history of Bangladesh to bring
responsible government to the local level. The system officially began
with elections in 1983 for four-year terms to union councils and with
elections in 1984 for three-year terms to subdistrict councils. However,
there were major problems with this scheme of decentralized
administration. First, the electoral system tended to represent only the
wealthiest and most influential members of society. These persons made
decisions that strengthened their own patronage networks and influence
at the local level; the poorest strata in society had little direct
voice in elected committees. Second, the subdistrict councils were
designed to create and implement development activities in their areas,
but they were typically slow to draft five-year plans or carry through
broad-based development efforts. Most of their projects emphasized
construction or public works, (e.g., school buildings or irrigation
canals, and they sometimes neglected the personnel and training
components necessary for social involvement. Third, civil service
members have long lacked respect for local politicians, looking to their
own advancement from their supervisors in Dhaka. They have often been
slow to cooperate with elected members of local committees. For example,
although the subdistrict council chairman was responsible for writing
the nirbahi officer's annual evaluation, the officer was
expected to submit the evaluation form to the subdistrict council
chairman, and in many cases these forms did not appear, thus preventing
the chairmen from exercising control. Finally, the entire system of
decentralized politics was viewed by opposition politicians as a
patronage network designed to attract local elites to the party of the
regime in power. Observers tended to conclude that instead of furthering
decentralized democracy, the system only strengthened the national party
controlled from Dhaka.
Bangladesh - THE ERSHAD PERIOD
Achieving Stability, 1982-83
On March 24, 1982, the army chief of staff, Lieutenant General
Hussain Muhammad Ershad, seized control of the government in a military
coup. He proclaimed martial law, made himself chief martial law
administrator, and dismantled the structures of democratic government
that the administration of the late president Zia had carefully built
during the previous five years. Ershad suspended the Constitution,
disbanded Parliament, prohibited all political activities, and deprived
the president, vice president, and cabinet ministers of their offices.
Three days after the coup, Supreme Court justice Abdul Fazal Muhammad
Ahsanuddin Chowdhury became interim president. Ershad became chief
minister of a new cabinet, and by December 1983 he had officially taken
over the presidency. He declared that he expected a return to democratic
rule in about two years. In fact, martial law lasted until November
1986.
Ershad cited as reasons for his coup the growing corruption and
inefficiency of the civilian government dominated by the Bangladesh
Nationalist Party. After the assassination of President Zia as part of a
local military rebellion in Chittagong in May 1981, the Bangladesh
Nationalist Party fell into conflicting factions that could not be
controlled by Zia's successor, President Abdus Sattar. Without Zia at
the helm, the powerful leaders of the military distrusted Sattar's
civilian government. Thus, because the major political forces in the
country could not cooperate with each other, there was no resistance to
Ershad's takeover. After establishing control of the country, he had
three main priorities for bringing political chaos to an end and for
governing Bangladesh. His goals were to act against corruption and
reorganize the administrative apparatus in order to implement overdue
reforms, stand as a strong centralizing force while keeping his civilian
opponents at bay, and placate the military so as to prevent further coup
attempts. Through mid-1988 Ershad proved remarkably capable at
accomplishing these goals, and he had become the longest ruling
political leader in the history of independent Bangladesh.
During his tenure as chief martial law administrator, Ershad divided
the country into five martial law zones, each headed by a handpicked
senior army officer. Twenty-four special and summary martial law courts
directly involved the military in local administration. Although the
civilian court system continued to function, violations of martial law
ordinances were handled by these extraconstitutional martial law
tribunals, where active-duty military officers met in secret sessions to
try cases ranging from violations of press censorship to vaguely defined
"antisocial activities." Those convicted of political crimes
had no right of appeal, and defendants were tried in absentia. Martial
law deprived the Supreme Court of its jurisdiction over the protection
of fundamental rights, and criticism of martial law was punishable by up
to seven years' imprisonment.
Ershad moved forcibly to end corruption and reorganize the
government. Several hundred politicians, including six former cabinet
ministers, were jailed on charges of corruption. Ershad announced that
one of his highest priorities was a reorganization of the government in
order to decentralize decision making and development projects. In order
to outline procedures for this decentralization project, he appointed
the Committee for Administrative Reorganization/Reforms, which
instituted sweeping changes in local administration. The Land Reforms
Ordinance of 1984 granted important rights to tenants for the first time
in the history of Bangladesh, and a new plan for the divestment of
government industries promised to move the country away from socialism.
Ershad built on Zia's earlier platform of advocating an increased role
for Islam in the culture and politics of Bangladesh.
Bangladesh - Emerging Opposition, 1983-86
Ershad had a clear political stage for about a year after the coup
because of his severe repression of opposition parties and because of
intense factional fighting within all major political groupings. By early 1983, however, a pattern of
confrontation politics had emerged. This pattern dominated the public
life of Bangladesh until the late 1980s. Paradoxically, the government's
Islamic policies provided a common cause for the first large anti-Ershad
demonstrations. A proposed education program was designed to introduce
English and Arabic as compulsory subjects in primary and secondary
schools. This touched sensitive nationalist nerves, especially among
university students, who saw it as a threat to the Bangla language. Several of Ershad's speeches favoring
a stronger Islamic movement provoked riots on university campuses, which
escalated into battles between students and police on February 14 and
15, 1983. Although the government imposed a curfew and closed the
universities, the student movement stirred the opposition into more
unified coalitions.
Dozens of political parties existed in Bangladesh during the 1980s,
but the two major opposition parties to Ershad's rule were the Awami
League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party. The Awami League, which originated in 1949 and
emerged preeminent at the beginning of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's era,
gradually united around the leadership of Sheikh Hasina Wajed, Mujib's
eldest daughter. A fifteen-party
alliance led by the Awami League began to act in unison during 1983. The
leadership of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party fell to Begum Khaleda
Zia, the widow of President Zia, and the party became the center of a
seven-party alliance distinct from the one led by the Awami League. The
two major alliances distrusted each other intensely, but they formed the
heart of a larger thirty-two-party front, comprising socialist,
communist, and Islamic groups, called the Movement for the Restoration
of Democracy. This movement adopted a five-point program demanding an
end to martial law, restoration of fundamental rights, parliamentary
elections, release of political prisoners, and the trial of persons
responsible for police brutality in the February student protests. The
opposition alliances successfully engineered two general strikes in
November 1983, the second resulting in widespread violence and hundreds
of casualties among demonstrators and security personnel.
Political events for the next several years revolved around attempts
by the Ershad government to move from a military dictatorship to a
civilian government with the cooperation of the political opposition.
Ershad's program called for local elections at the union and subdistrict
levels, followed by presidential and parliamentary elections, while a
national party supporting the government would integrate all political
groups in the same way the Bangladesh Nationalist Party had functioned
during Zia's regime. Ershad relaxed the ban on political activities in
January 1984 and repeatedly called for dialogue with opposition parties,
but the major opposition alliances adamantly refused to cooperate while
martial law remained in effect. The government held elections for union
and municipal councils between December 1983 and February 1984, but
repeated public demonstrations by opposition parties forced the
cancellation of subdistrict and parliamentary elections. A rising
crescendo of violence and civil disobedience led Ershad to reimpose
harsh martial law restrictions in March 1985 and to put under house
arrest Hasina, Khaleda Zia, and other opposition leaders. The
government-sponsored party, Jana Dal (People's Party), had been formed
in November 1983, but it had little chance to become organized before
the new ban on political activity went into effect.
In 1985 the government went ahead with a "civilianization"
program without the participation of the opposition parties. With
martial law being fully enforced, a referendum was held on March 21,
asking voters: "Do you support the policies of President Ershad,
and do you want him to continue to run this administration until a
civilian government is formed through elections?" The official
count of "yes" votes amounted to 32,539,264, while
"no" votes totaled 1,290,217. The opposition had organized a
general strike on referendum day and subsequently claimed that the
results were fraudulent. In May the government conducted subdistrict
council elections. Run on a nonparty, nationwide basis, the elections
featured 2,300 candidates competing for 458 seats as council chairmen.
Keen local contests occurred amid widespread violence and claims of
fraud by the opposition. After these elections, the government released
Hasina, Khaleda Zia, and the other opposition leaders from house arrest,
and on October 1 it canceled the ban on indoor meetings and rallies of
political parties. Meanwhile, the pro-government Jana Dal became the
leading component of the new Jatiyo Party (National Party), which
featured members who had played prominent roles in Ershad's cabinet. By
late 1985, the stage had been set for parliamentary elections. Despite
constant opposition party pressure, Ershad's regime had used its control
over the government and the military to maneuver the country toward
civilian rule.
Bangladesh - Relaxation of Martial Law, 1986-87
In March 1986, Ershad removed military commanders from key civil
posts and abolished martial law offices and more than 150 military
courts in an attempt to ease martial law restrictions. Because these
moves satisfied some of the demands of the opposition, an eight-party
alliance comprising the Awami League and some smaller parties agreed to
participate in parliamentary elections. However, the seven-party
alliance led by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party boycotted the May 1986
elections, and according to the opposition parties the elections were
marred by extensive fraud, including overt support for Jatiyo Party
candidates by Ershad and other government officials, theft of ballot
boxes, and beatings of opposition party workers. Official figures
claimed the turnout at the polls was between 45 and 50 percent of the
electorate, but other observers estimated that only 10 to 30 percent
participated. The elections gave the Jatiyo Party an absolute majority
of 153 seats in Parliament; its close ally, the Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal
(National Socialist Party), took 7 seats. The Awami League gained
seventy-six seats, the Jamaat e Islami took ten seats, and a number of
smaller parties and independents won a total of fifty-four seats. All
thirty seats reserved for women went to supporters of the Jatiyo Party,
giving Ershad's supporters a comfortable majority.
With Parliament under his control, Ershad proceeded with plans for a
presidential election. He resigned as army chief of staff in August 1986
but remained chief martial law administrator and commander in chief of
the armed forces. He officially joined the Jatiyo Party in September,
was elected its chairman, and became the party's candidate for
president. The opposition parties did everything in their power to block
these moves, claiming that the trappings of a democratic process were a
sham while martial law was in effect. Awami League members of Parliament
refused to attend its opening session, and in July Parliament adjourned
for an indefinite period. Leftist parties and the alliances led by the
Awami League, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, and Jamaat e Islami
boycotted the elections and organized widespread demonstrations, leading
to the jailing of many opposition leaders and the house arrest of Hasina
and Khaleda Zia. Yet the opposition's tactics did not prevent the
successful completion of the presidential election in October. Ershad
easily defeated 11 other candidates, officially obtaining 22 million
votes (84 percent) of the electorate. Opposition parties again claimed
that the election results were fraudulent, and they asserted that only 3
percent of the electorate had cast ballots.
Firmly in control of a civilian government as well as the military
establishment, Ershad took steps to legitimize his rule of the previous
four years. He summoned Parliament into session on November 10, 1986, to
consider a seventh amendment to the Constitution, which would ratify his
assumption of power in 1982 and all subsequent actions of his martial
law administration. The opposition again took to the streets in protest.
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party, Jamaat e Islami, and a leftist
five-party alliance led a general strike on November 10. The Awami
League, demanding the lifting of martial law, boycotted Parliament and
instead held a "parallel parliament" on the stairs of
Parliament House. Inside, the 223 representatives present for the
session voted unanimously in favor of the Seventh Amendment, and hours
later Ershad announced in a national address the withdrawal of martial
law and the full restoration of the Constitution. Prime Minister Mizanur
Rahman Chowdhury proclaimed these events a "glorious chapter,"
but Hasina described them as a "black chapter" in Bangladesh's
history.
In early 1987, it appeared that Ershad had outmaneuvered his
opponents and made the transition to a civilian leadership. The
opposition was in disarray. By the time Awami League had decided to
participate in Parliament in 1986, its coalition had shrunk from fifteen
to eight parties. As a result, it had lost any opportunities it might
have had for immediate cooperation with the Bangladesh Nationalist Party
and other parties, and it forfeited its claims to moral leadership in
the fight against Ershad's regime. The rift between the Awami League and
other opposition parties widened during the first half of 1987. For
example, the newspapers were full of reports of the insults exchanged
between Hasina and other opposition leaders. Ershad took advantage of
the situation by convening Parliament in June to consider measures to
consolidate his regime further. The most controversial measure was the
District Council (Zila Parishad) Bill. This act expanded representative
government by allowing elected representatives (members of Parliament
and chairmen of subdistrict and municipality councils) to sit on
district councils, but it also made provision for members of the
military to participate as nonvoting members. The opposition viewed this
move as an attempt to install the armed forces in the administration of
the country on a permanent basis, thus favoring Ershad and his military
supporters. The furor raised by the District Council (Zila Parishad)
Bill grew into a storm that reunited the opposition and seriously
destabilized Ershad's government from mid-1987 to mid-1988.
Bangladesh - More Opposition Pressure
Opposition alliances began public protests against the District
Council Amendment Bill in June 1987. The five-party alliance implemented
a half-day general strike in Dhaka on June 23. A week later, another
half-day general strike supported by the parliamentary opposition
paralyzed most cities and towns. Nevertheless, on July 12, 1987, the
Jatiyo Party majority in Parliament passed the bill. Two days of strikes
and public demonstrations followed. Ershad, responding to opposition
pressure, sent the bill back to Parliament for
"reconsideration." The opposition, realizing that its disunity
would allow Ershad to strengthen his hold over the country, intensified
its street demonstrations, and its leaders made moves toward greater
cooperation against the government. The opposition parties called for
Ershad's immediate resignation and new elections under a caretaker
government. On July 24, the longest general strike in Bangladesh's
history, a 54-hour campaign led by the Workers-Employees United Council
(Sramik Karmachari Oikkiya Parishad), ended after 11 people were killed
and 700 injured in street violence between demonstrators and security
forces. In October the Workers-Employees United Council led another
lengthy strike. The strike lasted for forty-eight hours and ended on
October 21.
By the fall of 1987, political events had come to a head. Extensive
flooding from heavy monsoon season rains led to widespread misery in the
countryside and intense criticism of the government's relief efforts. Hasina and Khaleda Zia met on October 28, signaling a new
phase of cooperation between the two leading opposition coalitions. A
liaison committee of the eight-, seven-, and five-party alliances was
formed to coordinate the moves of the opposition. The "final
showdown," known as the Siege of Dhaka, occurred between November
10 and 12, when the opposition parties brought thousands of supporters
into the streets. The government was well prepared for the
confrontation, arresting Hasina, Khaleda Zia, and other leaders and
sending thousands of security personnel into urban areas to control
demonstrations.
Extensive security measures prevented a complete breakdown of public
order, and after a week Dhaka was again under control. However,
continuing agitation prevented a return to normal life throughout the
country, leading Ershad to declare a state of emergency, with familiar
restrictions on civil rights, on November 27. The opposition's tactics
had shaken the government, but street violence and civil disobedience
proved unable to dislodge Ershad's regime.
On December 6, 1987, Ershad dissolved Parliament, which had not met
since July. According to the Constitution, he was required to arrange
for new elections within ninety days. Also scheduled for early 1988 were
elections for union councils and for municipal officials in Dhaka,
Chittagong, Khulna, and Rajshahi. These elections were occasions for
further public agitation by the political opposition. In early January,
five smaller parties joined the opposition coalition, which then
implemented a two-day general strike on January 20 and 21. Another
general strike occurred on February 6, coinciding with the last date for
filing nominations for the municipal elections. On February 13 and 14,
following the union council elections, the opposition held another
general strike. None of these actions prevented the government from
implementing its election plans, but they kept the nation in a state of
constant protest; the opposition may have hoped that Ershad's supporters
in the military would eventually view him as a political liability and
force him to resign.
The elections for union councils on February 10, 1988, were
particularly hard fought, and they became a major security problem for
the government. There were 115,000 candidates vying for 44,000 positions
at 20,000 polling stations throughout the country. Widespread violence
marred the elections. The official count listed 85 dead and about 500
injured, although opposition figures claimed 150 had been killed and up
to 8,000 had been wounded in street battles between demonstrators and
security forces. Election violence forced re-voting at 5,500 polling
centers in early April, bringing another round of violence that left 4
dead and 100 more injured.
After the union council elections, the government deployed numerous
police and paramilitary personnel and army troops for the parliamentary
elections held on March 3, 1988. Schools were closed March 1-5, and a
public holiday was declared during the two days before the elections.
The Awami League's eight-party coalition, the Bangladesh Nationalist
Party's seven-party coalition, the leftist five-party coalition, and
Jamaat e Islami led a general opposition boycott. There were 1,168
candidates competing for the 300 seats. The Jatiyo Party won 251 seats,
and the Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal, a close ally of the Jatiyo Party in the
preceding Parliament, won 21 seats. Other small parties and independents
took only 27 seats. The opposition again claimed a very small voter
turnout in these elections--about 1 percent--while the government
claimed a 50 percent turnout.
Ershad's style of democracy--which did not include the participation
of the opposition--had weathered a long political storm. On April 12,
1988, he lifted the state of emergency, and Parliament duly convened on
April 25 amid another general strike. Ershad took the occasion of his
opening speech to Parliament to advocate Islam as the state religion.
This call grew from Ershad's long-term commitment to Islam as an
integral part of state ideology, but it also brought his party's
position closer to that of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, Jamaat e
Islami, and smaller fundamentalist parties. Again Ershad appeared to be
making overtures for a reconciliation with part of the opposition. On
June 7, 1988, Parliament, dominated by the Jatiyo Party, passed the
Eighth Amendment to the Constitution, making Islam the state religion
and setting up six permanent high court benches outside Dhaka. The
parliamentary opposition voted against the measure, and a general strike
paralyzed Dhaka.
After six years in power, Ershad could look back on a series of major
personal achievements. He had reconciled differences in the armed forces
and prevented further military coups, efficiently managed international
diplomacy and aid programs, and guided the country through a period of
modest economic growth. He served as chief executive of Bangladesh for a
longer period than any leader since independence and, in doing so,
brought a sense of stability to the nation. However, Ershad had also
kept opposition politicians from sharing power, and although he
engineered the change from direct military rule to a civilian
government, he made no progress in reconciling the political opposition
to his regime. Despite the trappings of a democratic system, the
government remained a structure for one-man rule, with a packed
Parliament, a handpicked judicial system, and questionable election
practices. The opposition conducted its politics in the streets and
refused to grant any legitimacy to Ershad. Stability depended on
Ershad's personal survival and his ability to keep street politics under
control.
Bangladesh - POLITICAL DYNAMICS
Local Elites
For the vast majority of Bangladeshis, politics revolves around the
institutions of the village or the union of neighboring villages.
Traditionally, the main base for political influence in rural areas has
been landownership. During the British colonial period, zamindars
controlled huge estates as if they were their personal kingdoms. With
the abolition of zamindar tenure in 1950, a new local elite of rich
Muslim peasants developed. The members of the new elite owned far less
land than the zamindars had once possessed, but they were able to feed
their families well, sell surplus produce, send their children to
school, and form new links with the bureaucracy of East Pakistan and
later Bangladesh. Amid the large majority of poor and generally
illiterate peasants, well-to-do farmers formed a new rural leadership
that dominated local affairs.
Village society is often divided into a number of factions that
follow the lines of kinship. At the center of each faction is a family
that owns more land than most of the other villagers. In the colonial
and Pakistani periods, local leaders were old men, but the trend since
independence is for younger men to head factions as well. The heart of
the local elder's authority is his control over land and the ability to
provide land or employment to poorer villagers, who are often his kin.
Land control may be an ancient prerogative, stretching back to the
zamindars, or it may be the result of gradual purchases since
independence. A village may have only one faction, but typically there
will be several factions within the village, each competing for
influence over villagers and struggling for resources from local
administrative and development offices.
The leaders of local factions exercise their influence in village
courts and as managers of village affairs with other administrative
units. The traditional means for resolving local disputes is through the
village court, which comprises leaders of village factions and other
members of union councils. Throughout Bangladesh, village courts address
the vast majority of disputes, but it is rare for the courts to decide
in favor of a poor peasant over a rich peasant, or for the weaker
faction over the stronger. The relative security of village leaders
makes it possible for some of their children to attend secondary
schools, or even colleges or universities; some factions also base much
of their authority on their knowledge of sharia. Education is much
esteemed in Bangladesh, and degrees are tickets to highly prized
government positions or to urban jobs that give the involved families a
cosmopolitan outlook. These contacts outside the village include
necessary links with bureaucratic institutions that ultimately bring
economic aid and patronage jobs to the village. In these ways, the
factional leadership of the village provides vital links to the
development process, while retaining its traditional position at the top
of village society.
Local leaders who control land, people, and education also tend to
control the disbursement of rural credit and development funds through
their positions in union and subdistrict government. Studies of the
leadership of union council members have demonstrated this dominance of
local elites over rural political and economic life. Among the chairmen
of union councils in 1984, over 60 percent owned more than 3 hectares of
land, with an average of almost 8 hectares. Sixty percent were primarily
engaged in agriculture, 30 percent were businessmen, and 75 percent had
a marketable surplus each year. Eighty percent had incomes greater than
TK40,000 per year, and 50 percent had incomes greater than Tk100,000.
Almost all union council leaders took part in village courts as judges,
and most were heavily involved in the support of local mosques and madrasa
(religious school attached to a mosque) committees. For victorious
campaigns for union council chairmanships, winners spent an average of
more than Tk1 million in 1978; most of them mobilized at least 25 people
for their campaigns, and 20 percent mobilized between 200 and 2,000
supporters. In 1978 only 7 percent of the chairmen of union councils had
college degrees, but the percentage of graduates had increased to 50
percent by 1984.
Political elites were more varied in urban environments. The
metropolitan areas of Dhaka, Chittagong, Khulna, and Rajshahi had large
numbers of conflicting constituencies and political machines linked to
national parties. In smaller cities and towns serving as district and
subdistrict administrative centers, some leaders emerged directly from
the local social system, whereas others became politically established
as a result of their professional activities. Members of the government
bureaucracy and the military, for example, form an important part of a
district town's leadership, but they typically have roots, and
connections to land, in other parts of the country. Members of the
permanent local elite, such as businessmen, union leaders, lawyers, or
religious figures, are more concerned with strictly local issues and
have strong support from family networks stretching into the nearby
countryside. One of the outstanding characteristics of the urban
leadership is its relatively short history. In the late 1980s, it was
clear that many had emerged from middle-class or rich peasant
backgrounds since 1947 or, in many cases, since 1971. Most retained
close links with their rural relatives, either locally or elsewhere.
Urban elites included professional politicians of national parties, and
the entire social group that made up the urban leadership--military,
professional, administrative, religious, and business
personnel--interacted in a hotbed of national politics.
Bangladesh - The National Party
One of the most salient characteristics of Bangladeshi politics has
been the drive toward the concentration of power in a single party
headed by a strong executive. This process began in 1975 when the Awami
League, even with a huge mandate from the people, proved incapable of
governing the country, prompting Mujib to form a monolithic national
party, the Bangladesh Krishak Sramik Awami League (Bangladesh Peasants,
Workers, and People's League). After Zia consolidated his military
dictatorship, he formed his own Bangladesh Nationalist Party, which took
control of Parliament and attracted opportunistic politicians from the
opposition to a strong, centrist platform. Ershad's regime followed
Zia's model, with martial law succeeded by the formation of a centrist
party-- the Jatiyo Party--and the orchestration of a civilian government
supporting a strong executive. Each time a new
national party came to power, it banished the opposition into illegal
status or manipulated the administrative machinery for its own
advantage, driving the opposition into the streets. Parliamentary
elections mirrored this process. The Awami League, which was dominant in
the early 1970s, progressively moved to the periphery of the electoral
process in the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, despite continuing
support for its programs from large segments of the population. The same
fate was in store for the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, which thrived
while Zia lived but was reduced to boycotting the electoral process
after 1981. The Jatiyo Party, created by Ershad and his colleagues,
became stronger over time as it attracted increasing numbers of
politicians. This process continued into the late 1980s because the
strong executive, who controlled the country's administration, media,
and security forces, was able to keep opposition parties off balance
with a "carrot and stick" strategy.
The party in power periodically offered attractive government posts
to opposition leaders in return for political loyalty or neutrality.
During the presidencies of Zia and Ershad, the number of cabinet
positions steadily expanded, as potentially influential politicians
received rewards for cooperating with the party in power. Before
elections, or at about the time of major parliamentary votes, newspapers
have carried stories about entire labor unions or blocs of opposition
workers who joined the president's party. Reverse currents were observed
in the mid-1980s, as individual leaders fell from favor and lost their
cabinet posts or else left the national party to form their own
political factions, but the overall trend was toward a steady increase
in the membership and influence of the dominant party.
Ershad, following the example of Zia's Self-Sufficient Village
Government Plan, used administrative decentralization to allocate
resources to the grass-roots level, bypassing the local opposition party
apparatus and providing a strong incentive for leaders at the village
level to support his party. This strategy isolated the opposition
parties in urban areas, while the national party disbursed patronage in
rural areas. The local elites were opportunistic, changing their
affiliations in order to obtain the largest amount of aid for their
constituencies. A study of union council chairmen after the 1984
elections revealed that 38 percent had changed party affiliations within
the previous 10 years; 53 percent supported the Jana Dal, which had been
in existence for 12 months, while only 19 percent supported the Awami
League and 8 percent backed the Bangladesh Nationalist Party. In the
1985 subdistrict elections, after the Jana Dal had existed for 2 years,
207 of 460 chairmen supported Ershad's party, and the Jana Dal exercised
political control over 44 percent of the nation's districts. This was
notable progress for a party with a program essentially the same as that
of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (the party in total control only
five years earlier), which controlled only 34 (7.4 percent) of the
subdistrict chairmanships. The Awami League, which had dominated the
nation 10 years earlier, controlled only 53 (11.5 percent) of the
chairmanships.
Military support has been a crucial component of the success of the
national party. In the 1970s, observers were unwilling to predict the
actions of the military because it was torn by internal divisions
between freedom fighters and returnees from West Pakistan, political
groups of the far left and the right, and factional infighting among
leftist factions. Zia moved to stabilize the military through a purge of
unreliable personnel, more than 1,100 of whom were executed, and through
steady progress in professionalizing the services, incorporating
elements from both freedom fighters and returnees. The strong trend
under Zia and Ershad away from the Awami League and the Soviet Union
decreased communist and Maoist influences, which had been very strong
during the 1970s. By the 1980s, it appeared that military officers were
the most interested in adequate financial support for the armed forces
and limitation of civilian political turmoil. The slow expansion of the
military and the opportunity for military leaders to gain administrative
positions under Ershad convinced potential military rivals that he
represented their interests. Ershad at first followed up on his promises
to include the military in civil administration through legislative
means, but when he later backed away from the District Council Bill,
there were no major stirrings within the military. A more difficult
challenge was the Siege of Dhaka in late 1987, with massive street
violence, but again the military did not act. Apparently, Ershad and his
Jatiyo Party were able to keep political disorder within bounds
acceptable to the military leadership.
Bangladesh - Party Politics
The Awami League, which was consistently split during the Zia regime,
underwent further turmoil in the aftermath of Ershad's March 1982 coup
before achieving a new level of unity. In the 1982-83 period, there were
two main groups within the Awami League, one headed by Hasina as
president and another headed by Abdur Razzak as secretary general. In
October 1983, Abdur Razzak left the party to form the Bangladesh Krishak
Sramik Awami League. This group was modeled on the national party of the
same name that briefly held power before Mujib's death in 1975. Hasina
proved to be a formidable politician and retained absolute control over
the Awami League through the 1980s, becoming the major leader of the
political opposition in Bangladesh. For several years, the Awami League
headed a fifteen-party alliance, but its decision to participate in the
1986 parliamentary elections alienated some leftist parties. This
development left the Awami League at the head of an eight-party alliance
whose membership was in a state of flux but at one point included the
Bangladesh Communist Party, the Bangladesh Krishak Sramik Awami League,
the Gana Azadi League (two factions), the National Awami Party, the
Samajbadi Dal (Socialist Party), and the Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal (Sultan
Raja Faction).
The Awami League traces its descent from the party of Sheikh Mujibur
Rahman, and in the late 1980s it continued to advocate many of the
socialist policies of the early 1970s. The Awami League condemned the
denationalization and militarization of Bangladesh that occurred after
1976, and it leaned toward a pro-Soviet stance. These policies often
made it the target of opponents, even those within the alliance, who, in
linking its policies to a pro-Indian program, easily attacked it with
nationalist rhetoric. The Awami League has been the most outspoken of
the opposition parties against the role of the military in government,
and in the late 1980s it was doubtful whether military leaders would
allow it to achieve a large degree of political influence without a
direct military response. Nevertheless, despite the opposition of the
Ershad regime and the military, the Awami League has remained one of the
few parties with a substantial following throughout the country and with
action wings in rural areas. In 1988 its student wing was the Bangladesh
Chhatro League (Bangladesh Students League), and its workers' front was
the Jatiyo Sramik League (National Workers' League).
Bangladesh - Bangladesh National Party
The political left in Bangladesh, represented by a number of
socialist and communist parties, has remained numerically small and
divided by internal dissension. Yet the left has always been a potent
force. The economic difficulties facing workers and peasants and the
persistent alienation of the intellectual community have provided
fertile ground for the growth of radical politics, and such problems
always hold out the potential of massive civil unrest. The socialist
policies of the Awami League during the early 1970s brought the small
Bangladesh Communist Party, with its pro-Soviet tendencies, very close
to attaining political power. More radical groups advocating total
revolution based on the Maoist model were major elements behind the
growing chaos that brought Mujib down. Under martial law regimes,
revolutionary organizational activities became very difficult, and the
decline of Maoist ideology in China left Bangladeshi revolutionaries
without major ideological support from abroad. During the 1980s, leftist
parties were forced into supporting roles within alliances with the
major opposition parties, although some created their own coalitions
centered primarily on urban bases.
The Bangladesh Communist Party continued a generally pro-Soviet
policy in the late 1980s, and it was part of the eight-party alliance
headed by the Awami League. The Bangladesh Communist Party operated a
student wing called the Chhatro Union (Students Union) and a workers'
front called the Trade Union Centre.
A more significant socialist party in the late 1980s was the Jatiyo
Samajtantrik Dal (National Socialist Party). This party began operating
in 1972 after the defection of radical elements from the Awami League.
It organized an armed opposition to Mujib's regime in the mid-1970s and
became very influential among the military during the late 1970s. The
party also had some success in parliamentary elections and became
important in labor unions through its action wing, the Jatiyo Sramik
Jote (National Workers Alliance). By the 1980s, however, it had split
into a number of factions with different strategies. The policies of one
wing, headed by A.S.M. Abdur Rab, were almost indistinguishable from
those of the Jatiyo Party. It cooperated with Ershad's government,
praised his martial law rule, supported the move to include the armed
forces in district councils and the denationalization bill of June 1987,
and participated in the parliaments elected in 1986 and 1988. Another
faction, led by Shajahar Siraj, was the Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal (Siraj),
which participated in the 1986 Parliament but consistently voted against
the government, calling for "unity of left democratic forces."
Still another faction, the Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal (Inu), headed by
Hasan Huq Inu, refused to cooperate with the government and became part
of a highly visible five-party alliance along with the Sramik Krishak
Samajbadi Dal, (Workers and Peasants Socialist Party); the Bangladesh
Samajtantrik Dal (Bangladesh Socialist Party), which comprised two
factions; and the Workers Party. The Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal (Inu)
operated a radical student front called the Jatiyo Chhatro Samaj
(National Students Society). In short, this inability of the various
leftist factions and parties to form a consensus ensured that they would
be kept out of power.
Bangladesh - Islamic Parties
At the other end of the political spectrum were a number of political
organizations that based their platforms on Islamic issues. The group
with the oldest tradition was the Muslim League (established in 1906 as
the All-India Muslim League), which had been the main force behind the
creation of Pakistan in 1947. Because it favored continued union with
Pakistan, the Muslim League was almost eliminated from the political
stage during and after the independence struggle. It began to stage a
comeback during the 1980s and gathered four seats in the 1986
Parliament. The Muslim League supported complete denationalization and
opposed the retention of a 51-percent share of public industries by the
government. Its policies closely resembled those that led to the
formation of Pakistan. Among other things, the party accused the
government of a subservient foreign policy toward India, especially in
the matter of water disputes, and it repeatedly called for Islamic rule
in Bangladesh.
A more important Islamic party during the 1980s was Jamaat e Islami.
This party was temporarily banned in the 1970s because of its opposition
to independence, but it returned in the 1980s as the premier Islamic
party among the opposition. Jamaat e Islami called for a theocracy, not
Western-style democracy, but it simultaneously advocated the resignation
of Ershad and the restoration of democracy. The party drew much of its
strength from dedicated bands of madrasa students and
graduates. As of 1988, its unofficial but militant student front was the
Islami Chhatro Shibir (Islamic Students Camp). It also had a workers'
front called the Sramik Kalyan Federation (Workers Welfare Federation).
Besides the Muslim League and Jamaat e Islami, there were a number of
small parties, possessing little influence, that were oriented toward a
poorly defined Islamic state and an anti-Indian foreign policy. For
example, the Bangladesh Khilafat Andolan (Bangldesh Caliphate Movement)
wanted to launch a "holy war" (jihad) to establish Islamic
rule in Bangladesh and called for a government based on the Quran and
Sunna. In 1986 another one of these parties, the Islamic United Front,
demanded scrapping the 1972 Indo-Bangladeshi Treaty of Cooperation,
Friendship, and Peace.
Bangladesh - Alliances
The disruptive nature of the Bangladeshi political process was the
result of a lack of consensus as to national direction even among the
major political forces. In the late 1980s, for example, the Awami League
viewed the Bangladesh Nationalist Party as a military-based faction that
climbed to power over the bodies of Mujib and his family. The Bangladesh
Nationalist Party saw Ershad's regime as the usurper of Zia's legacy,
and both the Bangladesh Nationalist Party and the Jatiyo Party feared a
return to socialism and the anti-military stance of the Awami League.
Meanwhile, the radical left and the Islamic-oriented right held
diametrically opposed views of social organization. Observers believed
that any one of these groups, if it were established in power, would do
everything it could to eliminate its rivals.
Control of the political process and its resources is a
life-and-death proposition for vast numbers of poor people in the urban
slums and villages of Bangladesh, and in many cases crucial political
decisions, such as local elections or major parliamentary votes,
precipitate massive violence. In the midst of this struggle for
existence, politicians of all persuasions publicly advocate democratic
freedoms but exhibit authoritarian viewpoints and high levels of
distrust for their colleagues. Within their own parties, leaders such as
Hasina and Khaleda Zia have often behaved in a manner as dictatorial as
that for which they have criticized Ershad. In addition, factional
divisions have been a constant feature of party life, as political
opponents excluded from decision making have "headed to the
streets" with their followers. The call for a restoration of
democracy, echoed by all groups out of power, therefore has seemed to be
a call for a political opening through which one of the opposition
parties could seize power. Unhappiness with this state of near-anarchy
has kept the military in power and attracted many middle-of-the-road
politicians to a strong executive that could control political
competition.
Bangladesh - Workers and Students
The most important political organ among Bangladeshi workers in the
late 1980s was the Workers-Employees United Council (Sramik Karmachari
Oikkiya Parishad), an organization of sixteen workers' federations
composed of two factions that represented almost the entire labor front.
When the Workers-Employees United Council decided to act, it could
paralyze urban areas throughout the country. In May 1984, the government
avoided a major confrontation by agreeing to several points set forth by
the council, including a call for no further privatization of industry
or banks, freedom of labor union activities, and a 30-percent raise in
the minimum wage. When the government later reneged on some of these
points, a council-led general strike occurred in November 1984, which
led to government repression. Further strikes in 1987 were coordinated
with anti-Ershad opposition parties. The council developed a platform
calling for restrictions on the import of luxury goods, land reform, and
government support for handicraft industries.
The universities have also been a major proving ground for political
parties since the student protests that led to the war of independence.
Beginning with major riots in 1983, universities during the Ershad
regime were the site of repeated antigovernment demonstrations and
government repression. The Central Students Action Committee, a
coalition of student political groups, coordinated a number of political
actions in support of the opposition's demands, which culminated in a
series of general strikes in 1987. During the Siege of Dhaka, from
November 10 to 12, the government closed the University of Dhaka, and it
shut down all education institutions in the country later in the month
during continuing unrest. Because the major parties--including the
Jatiyo Party and its Jatiyo Chhatro Samaj--had student wings, there were
often violent confrontations on college and university campuses between
rival party members. Gun battles broke out in June 1987 between the
supporters of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party's Chhatro Dal (Students
Party) and the Jatiyo Samajtantrik Dal (Inu)'s Students League over
control of dormitories. Periodic closings of universities after
demonstrations or political riots often kept institutions shut down for
a good part of the year during the late 1980s.
Bangladesh - Women in Politics
Women participated extensively in anti-British agitations during the
1930s and 1940s and were an active force during the independence
struggle. Since 1972 the Constitution and the legal system have
guaranteed equal rights for women to participate in all aspects of
public life. The prominence of the well-known opposition party leaders
Hasina and Khaleda Zia at first sight indicated a national openness to
women's political power. Both, however, were exceptional in Bangladeshi
politics. They originally owed their positions to family connections and
only later skillfully built their own followings and platforms. Women
candidates for political office were a rarity in the 1970s and 1980s,
and female participation was labeled anti-Islamic by conservative men
throughout the country. Secular provisions in Bangladeshi laws
safeguarded the equality of women while "protecting" them and
assuming their dependence.
Women running for office have had little success. In the 1979
parliamentary elections, for example, only 17 women were among 2,125
candidates for 300 seats; none of the women won, and only 3 polled over
15 percent of the vote. At the union council level, the 1973 elections
returned only one woman chairman, and the 1977 and 1984 elections each
returned only four female chairmen. The leaders running the country,
recognizing that women suffer disabilities when competing for office
against men, reserved thirty seats for women in Parliament. The profiles
of the women occupying these seats exemplied the subordinate positions
of women in Bangladesh, even those occupying public offices. In the 1979
Parliament, fifteen women members were formerly housewives, and
twenty-seven had no prior legislative experience. A study of women
nominated to union councils revealed that 60 percent were less than 30
years of age, only 8 percent were over 40 years of age, and only 4
percent had college degrees.
Prior to the 1988 parliamentary elections, the provision for reserved
seats for women had been allowed to lapse. The result was that women
were left practically without representation at the national level,
although there were other forums for political involvement at the local
level. In mid-1988 three women sat on union and subdistrict councils.
Municipal councils also included women, but the law precluded women from
exceeding 10 percent of council membership. Some women's groups, such as
the Jatiyo Mohila Sangstha (National Organization for Women), have held
major conferences to discuss women's problems and mobilization
strategies. Although these women's organizations were the province of
middle-class women, they served as training grounds, as did local
councils, for a new generation of politically active women.
Bangladesh - THE MEDIA
One of the most effective means for the ruling political party to
control the nation was through manipulation of the news media. In the
1980s, the government's National Broadcasting Authority monopolized
telecommunications within the country. Thus the party that controlled
the government effectively decided the content of the country's
broadcasts. Until the early 1980s, the government also ran a number of
daily and weekly newspapers. Such newspapers printed the ruling party's
version of the news. As part of Ershad's policy of divesting
government-owned properties, however, these official sources of
propaganda were removed from government control, thus ending a legacy
left over from the Mujib period. Each major political party in the late
1980s had one or more newspapers that supported it, and each used its
own newspapers to publish its official views.
Bengali society has the longest tradition of freedom of the press in
South Asia, and its dozens of weekly and daily newspapers, press
associations, and publishers guarantee that almost any opinion finds
expression. Ruling regimes have countered this independence by
exercising press censorship. Repression of the media has varied from
banning certain publications for extended periods of time to officially
pressuring publishers to regulate the content of news articles. For
example, the English-language Bangladesh Observer was banned
for three months in 1987, and the weekly Banglar Bani (Bengal's
Message) was banned through much of 1987 and 1988. The weekly Joyjatra
(Victory March) was banned in February 1988 for publishing
"objectionable comments" referring to the possibility of
Ershad's resignation. In 1988 the government closed the Dainik
Khabor (Daily News) for ten weeks under the Special Powers Act of
1974 because the newspaper had released an article with a map making
Bangladesh look like part of India, thus inflicting "injury to the
independence and sovereignty of the country." In addition, the
operations of the British Broadcasting Corporation were banned under the
Special Powers Act from December 14, 1987, to May 2, 1988, and one of
its correspondents was jailed for allegedly having manufactured
"continuing hostile and tendentious propaganda."
Bangladeshi journalists are unionized, and they sometimes strike back
at government censorship. During the 1988 parliamentary elections,
journalists staged a walkout to protest attempts by the government's
Press Information Department to restrict news and photographic coverage
of election violence and opposition demonstrations. The continuing
struggle between the press and the government regularly kept at least
six newspapers on the list of banned publications in the late 1980s.
With a 29-percent literacy rate, newspapers and journals are not
widely read in Bangladesh. For example, despite the publication of 62
daily newspapers, only 22 percent of all urban households in 1982
reported regularly reading them; a dismal 2.5 percent was reported for
rural areas.
Both Radio Bangladesh and Bangladesh Television were established in
1971, and both came under state control in 1972. In 1984 they merged to
form the National Broadcasting Authority. In 1988 the twelve home
service stations and twelve FM stations of Radio Bangladesh offered a
total of eighty-five hours of daily programming. Radio Bangladesh also
transmitted to Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Western
Europe via its shortwave station at Dhaka. Seven and one-half hours of
daily programming were broadcast in six languages: Bangla, English,
Arabic, Hindi, Urdu, and Nepali. The television service operated two
channels, with eight and one-half hours of daily programming, relayed by
twelve stations for reception throughout the country. However, outside
Dhaka the number of television sets was very small, and television was
not yet a significant medium when compared with radio, press, and
word-of-mouth communications. Statistics from the early 1980s indicated
that about 29 percent of the country's urban households had radios, and
only 6.7 percent had television sets. In the countryside, broadcast
communications were even less available: 13 percent of all rural
households had radios, and only 0.2 percent had televisions.
Bangladesh - FOREIGN POLICY
India
Relations between Bangladesh and India have often been difficult.
There was considerable hostility on both sides of the border when East
Pakistan was established in 1947 in the midst of intense communal
struggles among various ethnic groups. As part of Pakistan, East
Pakistan was at war with India in 1947 and 1948 and again in 1965.
During the 1971 war of independence, Bangladeshi freedom fighters were
aided by India, but the country's distrust of its giant neighbor
reemerged as soon as the fighting ended. In general, a considerable body
of Bangladeshi public opinion has viewed India as a bully, throwing its
weight around and threatening the sovereignty of its smaller neighbors.
The fact that the two nations are so closely intertwined--with 2,400
kilometers of border, common river systems, and numerous transborder
cultural or economic contacts--has provided numerous opportunities for
bilateral disputes that often reinforce Bangladeshi fears. Conversely,
the fact that the two countries are so closely interconnected has
sometimes forced them to come to terms with each other, and as of
mid-1988 bilateral problems had not escalated into a major armed
conflict. Indeed, relations between Bangladesh and India have been
diplomatically proper, with a trend toward increasing cordiality and
cooperation over time.
Mujib's government, which lasted from 1971 to 1975, owed a large debt
to India for aid to Bangladesh during its independence struggle, and
relations were initially positive. In March 1972, the Indo-Bangladeshi
Treaty of Cooperation, Friendship, and Peace pledged each nation to
consultations if either were attacked. This was an important safeguard
for the new nation, but critics have pointed out that the treaty does
not specify the external threats to either nation, suggesting the
possibility that India could use the treaty as an excuse for
intervention in Bangladesh. The series of coups that replaced Mujib's
government brought bilateral relations to their lowest level and led
many Bangladeshis to fear Indian intervention. The Indian government,
then controlled by Indira Gandhi's Indian National Congress, looked with
misgivings on the anti-Indian and anti-Soviet stance of the new military
regimes. For several years, pro-Mujib guerrilla forces operating along
the Indian border reportedly received covert support from Indian
sources. In 1977, however, Gandhi's government fell, the new Janata
Party leadership took a more accommodating stance toward Bangladesh, and
Zia's government stabilized. Indian forces cooperated with the
Bangladesh military in disarming Bangladeshi rebels in the summer of
1977, and a number of bilateral agreements were signed shortly
thereafter. When Gandhi again became prime minister in 1979, she
continued a policy of accommodation with Zia's regime. Subsequently, she
recognized Ershad's government, and she met with Ershad in October 1982.
After Gandhi's assassination in 1984, her son and successor as prime
minister, Rajiv Gandhi, encouraged cooperative agreements with
Bangladesh and enjoyed a good relationship with Ershad.
Events during the 1980s suggested the prospect of a new era in
Indo-Bangladeshi relations. In 1981 both countries drew up the
Memorandum of Understanding on Technical Cooperation. In 1982 the first
meeting of the Joint Economic Commission was held, and in 1987 the
bilateral Cultural and Exchange Programme was renewed for two years. A
bilateral trade pact was extended from 1986 until October 1989. In
addition, an inland trade and transit protocol, allowing Indian vessels
to pass through Bangladesh, exemplified a maturing cooperative
relationship, necessitated by Bangladesh's geographical position. The
original protocol was signed in November 1972, renewed in 1984, and
extended in 1986 on a quarterly basis. The agreement was later
renegotiated and, according to its provisions, stayed effective until
October 1989. India agreed to pay transit charges and port fees, while
Bangladesh agreed to maintain its own waterways. The ability of both
governments to compromise on economic issues boded well for the
possibility of future bilateral agreements.
Despite considerable progress in expanding contacts between the two
countries, a number of serious issues concerning river waters and
borders continued to stir up anti-Indian emotions in Bangladesh during
the late 1980s. These issues involved national honor and
sovereignty--strongly charged topics in both nations--and progress
toward resolving them was extremely slow. Every delay in resolving
bilateral problems provided fuel for a steady stream of anti-Indian
editorials in the Bangladeshi press and for statements by political
parties of all persuasions condemning Indian foreign policy. The most
difficult long-term bilateral problems revolved around water disputes.
These problems surfaced during the 1950s and 1960s, when the major
Indian port of Calcutta on the Hooghli River experienced siltation
problems. The Indian government decided that the solution was to divert
the Ganges River water into the Hooghli River during the dry season,
from January to June, in order to flush out the accumulating silt. By
1974 the Indians had built a major barrage, or dam, across the Ganges at
Farakka, near the Bangladeshi border. Before the Farakka Barrage went
into operation, the Bangladeshi government repeatedly expressed concern
that the diversion would adversely affect water resources along the
course of the Ganges through Bangladesh. After the Farakka Barrage began
operating in 1975, dry-season water levels dropped precipitously in
western Bangladesh, and studies showed that salinized water from the
Indian Ocean was creeping inland. In 1976, despite Indian opposition,
Bangladesh managed to place the dispute on the agenda of the UN General
Assembly; this strategy resulted in a consensus statement in which both
parties agreed to resolve the issue according to international law.
A bilateral agreement signed in 1977 set up a schedule for sharing
the dry-season flow of water controlled by the Farakka Barrage, and it
arranged for continuing consultations by the Joint Rivers Commission.
The mandate of the commission was to monitor the water availability and
needs of the two countries and to study proposals for a more
comprehensive plan for water control in Bangladesh and northeast India.
A Bangladeshi proposal concentrated on the enormous potential of
untapped rivers in Nepal; dams there, it was argued, could provide
adequate hydroelectric power well into the twenty-first century and
regulate water levels throughout northeastern India and Bangladesh. The
Indian proposal concentrated on controlling the wild Brahmaputra River
and called for a major canal to divert water from the Brahmaputra to the
Ganges, west of the Farakka Barrage; this, the Indians claimed, would
help to regulate water levels throughout Bangladesh. India was slow to
involve Nepal in what it viewed as a bilateral issue, while Bangladesh
refused to agree to the construction of a large canal that would
obliterate valuable land and dislocate hundreds of thousands of people.
In the absence of an agreement on a comprehensive plan, the two nations
were forced to renew previous agreements on the flow of the Ganges at
Farakka for periods of six months or two years at a time. In 1986,
however, Indian negotiators invited Nepali officials to tripartite
planning conferences, opening up the possibility of a future agreement.
Water-sharing disputes have arisen with regard to other rivers as
well. India has constructed and operated on the Tista River a barrage
similar to the one on the Ganges. India and Bangladesh drew up interim
agreements on the sharing of Tista River waters beginning in July 1983.
These agreements were renewed in 1985 and 1987, without a final
allocation of waters to either party.
In 1974 the borders between India and Bangladesh were settled in a
treaty that became the Third Amendment to the Bangladesh Constitution.
Since that time, questions over small pieces of territory not covered by
the 1974 treaty--such as silt-formed islands (chars) that have
emerged in frontier waters and Bangladeshi enclaves accessible only from
India--have grown into minor military confrontations.
In the late 1980s, the unauthorized movement of people across
Indo-Bangladeshi borders continued to cause tensions. In 1979 two days
of communal rioting in the Indian state of West Bengal forced 20,000
Indian Muslims to flee into Kushtia District in Bangladesh. Although
they were later repatriated, the incident rekindled transborder communal
hatreds. During the 1980s, attempts by Bangladesh military and
paramilitary forces to pacify tribal groups in the Chittagong Hills
forced thousands of Chakmas to flee into Indian territory. Bangladesh
accused India of sheltering tribal guerrilla forces and preventing the
voluntary return of the Chakmas. India, in turn, accused Bangladesh of
harboring guerrilla bands of the Tripura National Volunteers, a
secessionist organization fighting for independence from India. A more
significant long-term movement of people across the Indo-Bangladeshi
border has involved thousands of Bangladeshis who have illegally moved
to neighboring Indian states in search of land and employment. By 1982
the steady influx of Bangla speakers sparked a major ethnic backlash in
the Indian state of Assam, leading to the slaughter of thousands of
non-Assamese. In order to placate Assamese public opinion, the
governments of Indira and Rajiv Gandhi promised to stem illegal
immigration, and in order to do so India constructed barbed-wire fencing
along the Indo-Bangladeshi border in the area. The fence was seen as an
outrage among the Bangladeshi public, and the government of Bangladesh
has made repeated protests to the Indian government over the matter.
Bangladesh - Pakistan
Pakistan was hostile to Bangladesh in the early 1970s, but by 1974 it
was apparent that the new nation would stand on its own, and in February
Pakistan recognized Bangladesh. Diplomatic relations were established in
January 1976, followed by the reestablishment of communications and
transportation links later in the year. As Bangladesh subsequently
adopted a cooler stance toward India, began to move closer to China and
the West, and stressed its Islamic cultural heritage, its interests
became increasingly similar to those of Pakistan.
Throughout the 1980s, Bangladesh consistently supported Pakistan's
policy of opposing Soviet actions in Afghanistan. In 1983 Pakistan's
foreign minister signaled the end of an era of animosity when he visited
Bangladesh's National Martyrs' Monument at Savar, near Dhaka, which
commemorates those killed by Pakistan's armed forces during the war of
independence. Pakistan's president Mohammad Zia ul Haq later presented
Ershad with the country's highest civil award during the Bangladeshi
president's visit to Islamabad in 1986.
After the establishment of diplomatic ties, Bangladesh and Pakistan
entered into a wide variety of bilateral agreements. A 1979 cultural
agreement arranged for the exchange of teachers, scholars, musicians,
folklore troupes, art works, films, and books. Joint economic,
commercial, and technical pacts signed after 1978 provided for the
exchange of major exports of both countries: jute and tea from
Bangladesh, and cotton and cloth from Pakistan.
Two major areas of disagreement remained between Bangladesh and
Pakistan as of mid-1988, and both stemmed from the dislocations
resulting from the independence struggle. The first issue concerned the
finances of united Pakistan. After the war, Bangladesh claimed that it
deserved a share of the US$4 billion worth of preindependence exchange,
bank credit, and movable assets protected in West Pakistan during the
war. In a 1975 agreement, Bangladesh accepted half of Pakistan's
pre-1971 external debt, but assetsharing issues remained unresolved. The
second issue concerned the emigration of large numbers of people, mostly
Biharis (non-Bengali Muslims), to Pakistan. After the war, the
International Red Cross registered nearly 540,000 people who wanted to
emigrate to Pakistan. By 1982 about 127,000 had been repatriated,
leaving about 250,000 people still demanding repatriation. Thousands of
people who desired to emigrate lived in poor conditions in so-called
"Pakistani Relief Camps," where they received monthly food
allotments. In 1985 there was some progress in this area when Zia ul Haq
agreed to accept the "stranded Pakistanis." In 1986 Pakistan
arranged for their immigration as soon as Ribatat al Alam al Islami
(Union of the Islamic World), a voluntary organization based in Saudi
Arabia, could mobilize sufficient funds.
Bangladesh - China and Other Asian Nations
China firmly supported Pakistan during Bangladesh's war of
independence, and for several years thereafter it remained, along with
Pakistan, hostile to the new state. In the years immediately following
independence, Bangladesh was close to India and the Soviet Union--two
foes of China--and as a result it was grouped with them by Beijing as an
enemy state. In 1972, for example, a Chinese veto blocked Bangladesh's
entry into the UN, but by the mid-1970s China and Bangladesh had
developed proper relations. When Pakistan formally recognized Bangladesh
in 1974, the Chinese were able to move closer to Bangladesh without
antagonizing their ally. After Mujib's death in 1975, when Bangladesh
distanced itself from India and the Soviets, it left the camp of China's
adversaries. A preliminary agreement to establish relations in late 1975
led to an exchange of diplomatic missions in 1976. The trend in China
toward a more open foreign policy during the 1970s also paralleled the
Bangladeshi move toward neutralism under Zia, who visited Beijing in
1977.
By the 1980s, the domestic and foreign policies of China and
Bangladesh had become somewhat similar. The governing parties of both
countries opposed ultra-left and ultra-right political systems, while at
the same time opposing "bourgeois" economics. Each country
called for an international dialogue on debt problems between the
developed and developing nations, and each expressed concern over Soviet
policies in Afghanistan and Cambodia. By the mid-1980s, China had become
the staunchest international friend of Bangladesh, cementing the
relationship with numerous trade and cultural agreements, construction
projects, and military transfers. In addition, Ershad was warmly
received during his visit to Beijing in July 1987.
Friendly political relations with Japan and the Republic of Korea
(South Korea) accompanied steadily increasing economic ties with both
nations. Bilateral trade and joint economic projects with South Korea
increased during the late 1980s. Japan was a prominent source of
economic aid as early as 1973, when Mujib traveled to Tokyo to conclude
arrangements for a substantial loan and to discuss trade issues. By 1980
Japan had become the largest aid donor to Bangladesh. After the
devastating floods of 1988, Japan was a major relief contributor,
providing an emergency contribution for food assistance of US$13
million.
Bangladesh - The Islamic World
In the immediate aftermath of the war of independence, the Muslim
nations of the world mourned the blow to the sundered Pakistan, an
avowedly Islamic state. For several years thereafter, Pakistan
threatened to cut off diplomatic relations with nations that recognized
Bangladesh, thus discouraging other Muslim states from helping the new
nation. Mujib's socialist policies were not in tune with the viewpoints
of most Muslim states, especially the conservative Arab states of the
Middle East. Malaysia and Indonesia recognized Bangladesh in 1972, and
after Pakistan did so in 1974, other Muslim countries eventually granted
recognition and provided aid. The growing role of Islam in Bangladesh,
symbolized by the adoption in 1988 of a constitutional amendment
recognizing it as the state religion, indicated a major effort to widen
ties with the Islamic world.
Bilateral ties between Bangladesh and the oil-rich Arab states were
becoming increasingly important in the mid- and late 1980s. These ties
had both economic and political components. The Arab states, especially
Saudi Arabia, had become a growing source of development funds (mostly
loans) since 1975, with much of the aid channeled into Islamic education
and culture. The Saudis donated money for the construction of an Islamic
university, mosques, and other religious centers, and Bangladesh
exported labor to several Middle Eastern countries.
Politically, Bangladesh supported the international policies of the
Islamic nations of the Middle East. For example, Bangladesh strongly
condemned Israeli policies and favored the creation of a Palestinian
state. It supported the Palestine Liberation Organization under the
leadership of Yasir Arafat, whose visit to Bangladesh in 1987 elicited a
warm welcome from Ershad and other major government figures, as well as
favorable press coverage. In 1987 the government reported that 8,000
Bangladeshi youths had volunteered to fight for the Palestine Liberation
Organization. The government of Bangladesh, however, had made no
official moves to send arms or personnel to Palestine as of mid-1988.
Bangladesh has expanded its ties with the worldwide Islamic community
through the Organization of the Islamic Conference, a group of
forty-five Muslim countries and eleven other nations with Muslim
minorities. Bangladesh became a member of the conference in February
1974 and thereafter played a prominent role in setting up economic
programs. The sixth annual meeting of the Islamic Development Bank and
the Islamic Finance Ministers' Conference were held in Dhaka in 1985. In
addition, Ershad attended the 1987 meeting of the Organization of the
Islamic Conference in Kuwait, where nineteen Bangladeshi economic
initiatives were accepted as joint ventures. Bangladesh was also part of
a three-member committee trying to mediate an end to the Iran-Iraq War,
and Ershad made several trips to the Middle East in an attempt to
achieve peace.
Bangladesh - The Superpowers
Soviet Union
Relations with the Soviet Union were cordial in the years immediately
following independence. The Soviet Union supported Indian actions in
aiding the war of independence, and after the war the Soviet Navy sent a
floating workshop to Bangladesh for clearing Pakistani mines from the
Chittagong and Chalna harbors. Mujib visited Moscow in 1972, and
high-level officials from both countries made numerous reciprocal visits
until 1975. The Soviets supported the socialist programs of the Mujib
government and its close ties with India. Early Soviet aid was limited,
however. During the first four months of its existence, Bangladesh
received economic aid worth US$142 million from India, but only US$6
million from the Soviet Union.
After the 1975 coup, relations with the Soviet Union rapidly cooled.
The military regimes of Zia and Ershad deemphasized socialist policies
and encouraged closer ties with the United States, Arab states,
Pakistan, and China--all of which were politically distant from the
Soviet Union. Bangladesh condemned Soviet support for Vietnam's
occupation of Cambodia and Soviet military actions in Afghanistan. A low
point in Bangladeshi-Soviet relations came after the expulsion of nine
Soviet diplomats from Dhaka in December 1983 and January 1984. Moscow,
in turn, refused to accept the new Bangladeshi ambassador and canceled a
Bangladeshi trade mission visit to Moscow.
Bangladeshi-Soviet relations rapidly improved in 1984 and regained a
level of cordiality in the mid- and late 1980s. In 1985 the Soviet
Cultural Centre reopened in Dhaka. In 1986 a Soviet special envoy
visited Dhaka, and later the Bangladeshi foreign minister visited
Moscow. Although Soviet aid to Bangladesh was still small compared with
assistance from Japan, the United States, or even China, by 1987
Bangladesh had entered into sixteen different economic accords with the
Soviet Union. Soviet assistance has concentrated on the energy sector,
especially several power plants at Ghorasal, near Dhaka.
Bangladesh - United States
The United States and Pakistan were allies when Bangladesh became
independent in 1971. The Pakistan Army used United Statessupplied
military equipment, and the movement of the United States Seventh Fleet
into the Bay of Bengal during the war signaled support for Pakistan. Because Pakistan
was closely tied to the economic policies of the United States and its
allies, the Awami League saw a link between the economic collapse of
East Pakistan and United States policies. Under these circumstances, the
United States had a negative image in independent Bangladesh. After
April 1972, when the United States formally recognized Bangladesh,
relations remained cool, and there were frequent public anti-American
demonstrations, including the burning of the United States Information
Service library in Rajshahi in December 1972.
After Mujib's asassination, the government of Khondakar Mushtaque
Ahmed was closely tied to the United States, and there was increased
cordiality during the Zia and Ershad administrations, as
denationalization widened the economic linkages between the two nations.
Bangladesh's positions on some international issues, including the
China-Vietnam border war of 1978, Cambodia, and Afghanistan, came to
resemble those of the United States. In 1979 Bangladesh signed the
Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, clearing the way for
United States help in setting up a nuclear research reactor near Dhaka.
During the 1980s, a new level of cooperation began, signaled by the
visits to Washington of Zia in 1980 and Ershad in 1983.
By the late 1980s, the United States had become one of the closest
international friends of Bangladesh, a major international donor, and a
partner in 133 different accords. United States agencies operated a wide
variety of development projects in Bangladesh, including programs to
increase agricultural production, create new employment opportunities,
and reduce population growth. Only disagreements on Bangladeshi garment
exports to the United States clouded bilateral relations.
Bangladesh - Western Europe, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand
After Pakistan and China entered into friendlier relations with
Bangladesh in 1974, the way was open for its admission into the UN in
September of that year. In 1978 Bangladesh was elected to a twoyear term
on the Security Council, and during this period it took strong stands,
reiterated on many occasions, concerning Vietnam's involvement in
Cambodia, Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, Israeli policies in the
Middle East, the Iran-Iraq War, and apartheid in South Africa.
Bangladesh was elected as a member of the Security Council's Human
Rights Commission in 1985 and as president of the forty-first session of
the UN General Assembly (1986-87). In 1987 Ershad received the UN
Population Award on behalf of his government.
Before its formal admission into the UN, Bangladesh had been admitted
to all of its specialized agencies, and after formally joining the world
body, it adopted a high profile in these agencies. The Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) has operated projects in Bangladesh since
1975, in areas ranging from irrigation to rubber production to mangrove
afforestation. Bangladesh became a member of the forty-nine-member FAO
Council in 1977, served on the FAO's Finance Committee from 1975 to
1979, and has participated in a number of FAO commissions. It was
elected vice chairman of the FAO in November 1987. Representatives of
Bangladesh also have participated in various specialized UN conferences.
Bangladesh joined the Commonwealth of Nations in 1972--a move that
prompted Pakistan to withdraw from the organization--and has remained
prominent at its meetings ever since. Along with other South Asian
members of the Commonwealth, Bangladesh has used its meetings to push
for sanctions against apartheid and South African's occupation of
Namibia, and it has even offered military training facilities to
anti-South African guerrillas.
Keenly aware of his nation's economic problems and observing the
benefits of regional economic cooperation in Western Europe, Zia began
to seek opportunities for multilateral development among the nations of
South Asia in 1977. In 1981 the foreign secretaries of the seven nations
of South Asia met in Sri Lanka to set up the basic framework of a
regional development organization that was formally founded in New Delhi
in August 1983. With continuous effort by Bangladeshi diplomats, these
preliminary steps culminated in December 1986 in the first summit
conference of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation
(SAARC), which was convened in Dhaka. The choice of this site was in
recognition of Bangladesh's crucial role in forming the SAARC.
Subsequent summits in Bangalore, India, in 1986 and in Kathmandu, Nepal,
in 1987 established the SAARC as a functioning international body.
The agenda of the SAARC specifically removes bilateral issues and
political programs from the organization's debates, confining committee
and summit discussions to areas where member nations may find common
ground for achieving mutual economic benefit. However, no large-scale
economic projects had emerged from SAARC discussions as of mid-1988.
Because many of the most difficult economic problems in South Asia
involve long-standing political differences at the bilateral level (for
example, Bangladesh's Ganges water dispute with India), the SAARC has
not been an effective mechanism for solving problems. Nevertheless,
through the mid- and late 1980s, the SAARC's summits have provided its
members with a forum in which to exchange ideas and positions and
discuss bilateral issues.
Bangladesh's presence in the Nonaligned Movement has provided it with
an international reputation as a voice of moderation and compromise.
Bangladesh's prime minister, Mizanur Rahman Chowdhury, was elected vice
chairman of the Nonaligned Movement summit held in Havana in 1986. This
international reputation served Bangladesh well in courting the goodwill
of potentially hostile neighbors and attracting economic aid from donor
countries with diverse political systems. Although the Ershad regime was
politically repugnant to many opposition leaders and was looked at
critically by some foreign governments, the regime had brought a new
sense of stability to Bangladesh as it made a tenuous transition to
civilian rule in the late 1980s.
