Bangladesh’s interim government chief advisor Prof Muhammed Yunus may want to take his time for implementing reforms needed to institutionalise democracy in South Asia’s youngest nation. But indications are that he will not only come under pressure to go for early polls but also to withdraw the ban on the nation’s leading Islamist groups, Jamaat-e-Islami.
The leading Opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has already demanded a ” clear roadmap” for holding parliament elections. Its longterm ally, Jamaat-e-Islami, wants to first restore itself as a recognised political party and its lawyers are preparing to move the court to get the ban on it lifted.
The Supreme Court upheld the ban on Jamaat-e-Islami just before the ouster of the Hasina government, in which its highly motivated cadres, alongwith those from other Islamist groups, played a pivotal role once the student agitation against job quotas morphed into a mass upsurge. The Jamaat’s party constitution was seen as incompatible with Bangladesh’s largely secular polity but its lawyers described the ban as politically motivated by the Awami League.
The BNP and its allies have been out of power since 2006 and its leadership view the current anti-Awami mood in the country as a golden opportunity to return to power. Hence its secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir’s pitch for a ” clear road map for elections”. Alamgir expressed discontent that Yunus , in his second address to the nation this week, did not mention any election roadmap but skirted the issue.
The Jamaat would want to avoid the hurry for three reasons — (a) it would first want the ban lifted so that it can contest the forthcoming elections as a legitimate political party with a clear message for turning Bangladesh into a theocratic Islamic state (b) it would be keen to put together an Islamist coalition with other such groups like the Hifazat-e-Islam so that the BNP does not get to monopolise the coalition (c) it would quietly like to put its own favourites in key administrative positions with an eye on both elections and the future running of the country.
The BNP and the Islamist groups would have very little reason to be interested in structural reforms that Nobel laureate Yunus may conceive to set things right after what he describes as long fifteen years of authoritarian rule. ” For them , reforms would just mean putting their own people in the right places,” said a top lawyer close to the Yunus circle of civil society do-gooders.
The lawyer said , but condition of strict anonymity, that the BNP and specially its hardline Islamist allies would want the real changes to be ushered in after they have taken power with little or no Opposition in view of the demoralised Awami League , which faces severe retribution and possibly an attempt to ban it.
” They have no patience for Western style democratisation which Yunus may seek because their longterm vision is an Islamist Bangladesh. So they would want changes to be ushered in by an elected parliament where they hold majority,” the lawyer said.
Yunus has given indication of succumbing to radical pressure when his administration let off Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT) chief Jashimuddin Rahmani on bail . The ABT has close links with the MiddleEast-based Islamic State and Rahmani was serving a prison sentence after conviction for murder of a secular blogger Rajiv Haider . There are also indications that the Jamaat-e-Islami may get back its registration as a political party sooner than later.
If Yunus sticks to his guns and pitches for a long tenure to bring in reforms ( and perhaps set up his own party) , the BNP and its hardline Islamist allies are likely to turn against him and mobilise its footsoldiers to push for an early elections. It would be interesting how the pro-democracy student groups react in such a situation. The one thing the BNP and its Islamist allies does not want, like the Awami League, is a ” third force” capable of providing an option to Bangladesh voters beyond the Awami League-BNP binary.
