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Hardinge Bridge

16 June 2005, 18:00 PM
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
By Anis Mrigal 12901 Euclid Street Gardn Grove, CA 02840
16 June 2005, 18:00 PM
In 1915, the British built the Hardinge Bridge across the mighty Padma river with pilings going 160 feet below the water level. Almost a hundred years later we in Bangladesh neither have the confidence, the vision, or perhaps the competence to construct bridges across even smaller rivers, like the Karnaphuli, or take on ourselves engineering projects of any complexity. We depend on foreign consultants, foreign construction companies and engineers, donor money, and greased palms to implement even smaller engineering projects like flyovers, etc. What are the country's institutions producing? Why can't we implement projects with indigenous resources? Why do we have to be so dependent? Why are we so skeptical of our own talents, or are the institutions failing to produce any? Heretical as it may sound, and the preceding was by way of illustration, sometimes one feels like handing over the country back to the British (shudder) to get leadership and progress in many aspects of our national life, be it infrastructure, governance, or law and order.

The populace seems resigned to the current calibre of leadership, be it the one in power or in the opposition. From the look of things, the populace may be subjected to accept more of this mediocrity in the future.

In my opinion, instead of begging for more donor funds, what the country needs is an appeal for a visionary leader to lead it out of the morass. Much like corporate world, where a competent CEO is brought in to deliver results, we should request the world bodies/donor countries to donate a CEO for the country to deliver stated results for the next 5, 10 years-- a Mahathir, or a Bill Clinton, or even a corporate leader like a Jack Welch, by way of an example. That is, they can be persuaded to take on such a task for a limited term to take the country forward and groom future native leaders and institutions that nurture and deliver such leaders at all levels of governance. It may sound like wishful thinking and utopian, but it is difficult to discern any credible, selfless leader of any competence from among those in the field now.

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