The alliance for the next election

Apart--quite obviously--from national issues, the alliance will have to consider international issues as well, because the realities of global politics are such today that one cannot just wish away the world outside. Amongst other considerations, two that have become very relevant nowadays are (a) the danger posed by fundamentalism and (b) the western world's reaction to it. Whether we like to admit it or not, the way in which small nations choose to deal with these two realities will largely determine whether they are able to exist or not. This is the reality, and is neither an emotional nor a careless statement, and one has only to look at Afghanistan and who knows, perhaps Pakistan, to realise that.

Forming this alliance will be vital for the Awami League because the government machinery has by now been recast on party lines enough for the ruling party to make a clean sweep, the people's disillusionment with the government notwithstanding. Although the popularity of the Jamat/BNP government has eroded somewhat, voter sympathy has not yet turned towards the AL. It will take a massive switch from the Jamat/BNP vote-bank combine, to override the subtle ways in which the Jamat/BNP operatives in the bureaucracy, the election commission and the caretaker administration are arrayed now to influence the results. Unless people's participation on a mass scale takes place, manipulation in the next general elections is inevitable.

It is quite obvious that the electioneering process will be a different cup of tea the next time around because people, frankly, are disillusioned with the two main political parties. It is also clear that although the following which the smaller parties are able to muster is peanut, the "mass content" required to break the flanks of this arrayed force can be provided only by the combined strength of the AL and other political parties. It is also true that if we look for the moral-fibre which politicians are supposed to be made of, amongst politicians in Bangladesh, more often than not it will still be found in people who have been able to resist the temptation of joining the two major parties. The ordinary citizen knows that and will keep that in mind when he is asked to vote next time. Leaving aside, for the present moment, the BNP's utter mess-up in terms of governance issues, even if one made a comparison between the composition of Bangabandhu's 1971 Cabinet, where more than one third of the ministers could claim impeccably honest records with the composition of the 1996 Cabinet, one can easily find out why voter sympathy waned away from the AL. Another disadvantage that the AL must deal with is that while its support base in rural Bangladesh is still intact, its support amongst the middle class has unquestionably been eroded in the last five years of their rule. This urban middle class will determine the way the country's heart will beat in the next elections and the AL must institute confidence building measures in the middle class. The AL will also do well to remember that elections and politics no longer follow the equations that were valid two decades ago. It only has to take a look at the mistakes the Congress party made in next-door India to draw its conclusions. The AL must understand that that if it fails to make this coalition workfor the long term, going beyond just the next elections--it runs the danger of being a dying party, just as the Congress is in today's India.

It is not only in Awami League's interest that the alliance has become necessary. The stakes for the other parties are even higher. They need the alliance in order just to stay alive. Judging from the way the Jamat is making inroads into the government--infiltrating the various ministries with their cadres--one does not have to second-guess their ultimate goal. Fundamentalist parties do not believe in letting other political voices survive, as is evident in countries where they have assumed power like Iran, Afghanistan and some Arab states. Fundamentalists believe in a theocratic state, and theocracy and democracy are by concept incompatible with each other and it has been repeatedly proved in these countries that a melee of different political voices do not survive in a fundamentalist state.

We must also accept the fact that the Jamat has succeeded in establishing itself as one of the factors in the Bangladesh electoral scenario today and if the Jamat/BNP alliance wins the next elections nothing can stop them from fulfilling their common agenda of erasing the history of the country and rewriting it according to their version. They will do that despite the two-nation theory having failed in Pakistan itself, because such forces are committed to creating an Islamic state on the easternmost frontiers of the subcontinent.

Having identified the need for an alliance, let us turn our minds to the basis on which the alliance can be created--one that is workable and remains viable. All the parties must start from the premise that it is the alliance which is important and not the individual party. However, because the stakes are so high this time, all parties must do a bit of soulsearching before it embarks upon alliance formation. The AL must honestly address the misgivings of the other parties about its propensity of leaving partners in the lurch once the objective is attained. It must also stop the practice of bludgeoning things their way. There will no doubt be many exasperating moments for it--the smaller parties making unjustified moves and perhaps even cheating sometimes. But the AL needs to be the sarbangshaha dharani this time, the epitome of tolerance.

What follows next, after the coalition has been cobbled into shape ? The smaller parties of the coalition must be pragmatic, and realise that what matters this time is the future of the country-- not individual party seats but the coalition. They should not make undue demands, haggling for seats that they cannot win (the deprived AL candidate will stand as an independent and hand the seat over to the opponent on a golden platter). The coalition must insist on three unshakable principles for the long-term future. The first two are highly visible and affect the everyday life of the citizen -- violence and corruption. The coalition must take a moral stand against these two afflictions that are ruining our society. People, of course, know that a society free of violence and corruption in the absolute sense is unattainable but if the coalition makes an honest effort, it can be contained, and that is enough to satisfy the ordinary citizen.

The third principle, secularism, is more notional in character, but equally important. We have seen how Pakistan's espousal of communal principles in the running of a state has served only to deepen the divisions within its population. Secular principles are not for the protection of the minorities, as is commonly believed in our country, but in a profound way it protects the majority. Finally, the coalition must also have an open and declared policy about India. It is lamentable for us, that starting from basically the same status in 1947, while India has been able to catapult itself out of the economic morass that characterises the subcontinent, we are still stuck there pursuing objectives that have long become inconsequential to a modern state. The nation needs to reflect upon this reality when formulating its relationship with India.

The writer is a businessman.