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"See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil"

18 February 2005, 18:00 PM
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
By Shabbir A. Bashar, PhD. San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA
18 February 2005, 18:00 PM
Jameel Musa in his rejoinder of January 14, 2004, accuses me of devaluing Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina for stating "the main reason these two ladies find themselves at the top of the political ladder is Bangladesh's obsession with family names". He justifies his accusation by pointing out that the Bush family in the US also has similar dynastic political legacies. However, he forgets one vital difference between the electoral process in the US and Bangladesh: presidential candidates in the US have to go through a rigorous selection and a primary election process entailing numerous public debates. In most cases, they would have had to prove their leadership through lower public offices that they had to attain by ballot. Some of the fallacies of the Bangladeshi dynastic political leadership were aptly pointed out in AR Shamsul Islam's article titled, "Dynastic leadership and fallout" (DS, February 5, 2004): It discourages talented individuals from entering politics since there is little scope of rising through the party hierarchy. This creates an effective vacuum at the top and corrodes the spirit of democracy within. In turn, both party and the national

leaderships become authoritarian, despotic, exploiting and persecuting. These leaders start to view the party and the nation as their exclusive fiefdoms ordained to be ruled by their families. Thus such parties attract self-seeking yes-men and repel conscientious and dedicated activists. In my opinion, these are not good value propositions for any country.

Mr. Musa unfairly blames me for thinking that Bangla Bhai is a real threat to the world -- I never stated nor implied this. He then draws a parallel between the threat posed by Bangla Bhai to Bangladesh and the threat posed by the fundamentalist Christian Evangelicals to the Muslims. While I am no stranger to publicly expressing my strong distaste for religious fundamentalists wherever they may be, evangelicals in the west still have to abide by the law of the land. On the other hand, renegades, anarchists and parasites seem to be making the most of the weak law enforcement in Bangladesh.ÊCollectively, militants like Bangla Bhai, PBCP and Harkatul Jihad reflect an atmosphere of lawlessness.Ê And that is a genuine concern for a sovereign nation.

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Mr. Musa is wrong to think that the British public is pro-American since the vast majority of them voiced their strong opposition in hundreds and thousands to Bush's illegal invasion of Iraq. Apart from the widely reported global anti-war protests in London and elsewhere in the UK, Blair was twice reprimanded on live British TV for planning to send troops without getting UN approval. The main opposition party continues to state that Blair lied about the pre-war intelligence. The third party is also opposed to the Iraq war.

Finally, I am grateful for Mr. Musa's generous praises for me. He and I both being respectful, responsible yet independent minds and strong believers in democratic values, may in the end have to agree to disagree. However, I do not for a moment question his patriotism and I assure him that I have Bangladesh's best interest at heart.