Democracy and Bangladesh

We have seen 15 years of democracy in its most primitive form in Bangladesh. The majority of the MPs in the parliament are nowhere near their counterparts in India or Pakistan when it comes to understanding democracy.

Lately, we have heard both the US and British ambassadors preaching us on the positive side of sustaining and prolonging democracy. I think the US, Britain and EU can easily play a vital role in this regard if they expose the wealth of the ruling parties and their next of kin that has been accumulated in the West over the last 15 years. The US and Britain seem to value sheer monetary worth over brain no matter how it is acquired. That is why you will see so many of the corrupt high profile members of both the Awami League and Bangladesh Nationalist Party leaders and their relatives owning luxury homes, expensive cars, hotels, fast food restaurants and businesses in major cities like Alexandria, New York, Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles, to name a few. It is an irony that some the former ministers preached nationalisation at home while laundering money abroad.

If democracy means flight of capital, then I think it is time for us to look for an alternative for the commoners who are repeatedly cheated by these hypocrites. I hope the US and EU will stop rendering lip services to the cause of democracy. Otherwise, there will be further rise of JMBs as clearly pointed out by General Musharraf of Pakistan. Poverty is a curse. Extremism can only be wiped out by economic development. Economic development can only occur if bleeding of economy by corrupt means of the ruling mafia clans is stopped.