Integrative Government not Differential Government

Every couple of days, the different political groups are sitting with the election commission (EC) (yes another desh post) to discuss proposed rule changes and make suggestions. Here is the meeting schedule.

33% lady quotas and the material sceince of ballot boxes arent my favourite issues, instead this is about democratic civilians pissing away vital opportunities at the EC and integrative cabinet government.

I had a vain hope that some of these chaps would have had some thinking or learning experiences since this time last year, but unfortunately not. Given an opportunity to contribute constructively to the rules, an opportunity that these gimps would not normally get, a lot of these politicos have fallen into the self pleasuring habit of railing against religion in politics, war criminals and most telling of all, the use of scales as the electoral symbol for JI, given its association with justice.

Rather than, admit that the war is over, surpass JIs appeal with greater organisational prowess, clarity of purpose and depth of resonance, they seek to cheat.

The playing field must be tilted, otherwise I shall throw all my toys out of the Cot.

JI's political baggage is not a factor that its adherants take lightly when considering allegiance. Most of them have nothing whatsoever with rape, loot, pillage with the pakistan army, and the new one 'collaboration with the British'.

Perhaps everybody with the last name, Choudhury, Talukdar... should be banned too?

One of the problems of the existing system is that its very good at promoting the scum of the earth into power and authority. ('we live in a globalised world' is not an excuse) Your party wins, and you give your lads ministries to 'play with', irrespective of their expertise, fairness of mind, preparedness and state of knowledge. That is the parliamentary system, which is plodding along in the UK, but only because HM Govt did the lions share of loot and plunder and nation building a long time ago, and the average level of education is high.

Theres a lot of work being done by the govt, and id like for it to be better, for us to settle down and get down to sodding work. Any minister needs to have a degree of talent and intelligence to battle the beurocracy, comprised at the top of people who actually studied hard at university.

We would be better suited to a system that allowed the best man for the job to get the job, at the fundamental layer. A judgement call delegated to a man or 'panel' judged worthy by the Bangladeshi voterhood. Basically can somebody who is not Gen Mueen U Ahmed make a strong case for some of that Presidential Administration flavour.

The late General Zia has some virtues, one of which was integrating talented people into government and assigning responsibilities to competant people. He didnt care whether they came from Secular or Islamic forces. Some refused because they had issues with not being elected, for which I hope they get reward in the akhira.

Anyway back to the rules lark, I really dont hold up much hope that anybody other than the AL (if they bother to show up) or JI (who can be credited for the now failed CTG system) coming up with anything interesting that the beurocrats havent already pondered upon. I hope the AL start on a new page and dont just regurgitate their Moha Jote agenda and take the 'kill Zamaat' agenda to a higher level of drunkenness.

Decentralisation
The gulf between the Union Council level and the National parliament level of politics is too wide. There are two important layers of administration, the Upazila (covering ~12 unions) and the District(spatially covering ~5 MP constituencies) both headed by first class BCS officers. To stick two layers of elected government in one go would be stupid, so for Fugstarnagar its a question of whether a new layer would go in at a smaller or larger scale.

I think the higher scale might work better, and attract a higher quality specimin of politician into the fray for a few afternoons a week. Like a headmaster or two. At present the Upazilas arent 'grown' enough for that scale of election to acheive anything other than thousands of construction tenders all at once.

Decentralisation at the administration level got done by Ershad, now we have 64 districts rather than 19. Not all districts have the same adminstrative legacy, for example Gaibandha was carved out of the Greater Rangpur in 1984, whist neighbouring Bogra has been on the cards since 1821.

Then economic, political and environmental bits of geography come in to accentuate the difference between regions. We remember how economic disparity can pull regions apart and perpetuate itself from the Pakistan Era. Cultivating district identities further might be a good laugh.... to death.

The main road from Bogra to Rangpur skips Gaibanda Town making it a pocket district, the Rivers Jamuna and Teesta are making a meal of Gaibandha District and withing a decade or so could easily be asking for the keys to the town(though its a lovely place and host the best primary school in the country). On the other hand Bogra has a Cantonment, a 'Banani', a 'Shatmatha' junction and has produced a Prime Minister of Pakistan Md Ali Bogra, a President of Bangladesh General Zia as well as a national liability.

So who is likely to to come on top if districts start getting testosterony with eachother? What if I the finance 'growth centres on my mind' ministry reason that 100 crore investment in Bogra has a much better return for the national interest than 100 crore in Gaibandha.. all the time? With the good leaders of Bogra restrain me from acting in their interests.

As a testing ground for wannabe MPs and ministers and as a forum to think through and resolve localish problems outside dhaka, the elected district/division/hydrological zone councils would be something to look forward to.