A fractured opposition may leave the nation unprotected

THE 10th Jatiya Sangsad started its journey with a handpicked opposition yesterday raising questions about how such an opposition could hold the government accountable for its actions. The question arises because the main opposition Jatiya Party’s MPs will sit on both the treasury bench and on the opposition to play the double role which, we believe is unprecedented and an outright breach of the norms of parliamentary democracy. Like the January 5 election which was won by the Awami League with the help of Jatiya Party on the basis of mutual seat sharing, JP will play a new double standard role now to destroy the country’s democracy from within parliament. Under the new arrangement the JP’s new leader Raushan Ershad will be the leader of the opposition in the House to hold the government accountable. On the other hand, three of its MPs will sit in the treasury bench as Cabinet Ministers to be part and parcel of the government and defend its policies and action from criticism of their own party men. We believe it will just produce two contrasting faces of the same party to set the example of a subservient opposition to distort the history of the country’s parliamentary democracy.
News reports said, alongside 31 JP lawmakers, 15 independent MPs will also sit on the opposition bench. However, they have won the election with the Awami League’s blessings and almost all of them are also AL leaders. This raises further questions as to whether they will be able to play the role of an effective opposition; the answer is – not at all. Moreover, two minor political parties, BNF and Tarikat Federation are left solely to sit on the opposition but it must be mentioned that the two MPs of Tarikat have won the polls by using the Awami League election symbol and the BNF man won the polls with the backing of the ruling party.
Thus as we see the House is going to get a severely fractured and an unusual opposition against more than 250 strong Awami League MPs sitting on the treasury bench with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina having absolute power to pull the strings. As we see, the treasury bench will also accommodate MPs of the Workers Party, Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal, Jatiya Party-Manju and other three lawmakers. It will get even bigger when more than 40 out of the 50 female MPs of the reserved seats will join the House.
What the latest position suggests is that the country is bracing for a one-party role in all intents without a viable functional opposition in Parliament. In fact the government has created the situation by changing the Constitution and electoral rules to keep the major opposition out of the election race. It won the game but Bangladesh lost its chance to become a true multi-party democracy in the process. We are afraid that in the absence of a viable opposition in the House and in the streets the country may plunge into further chaos where human rights and political liberties of the people may face critical times and become unprotected– such as the growing number of murders and political killings across the country. We believe there is no alternative to a free and fair election to restore normalcy back to the nation.