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Criminals' ominous presence in politics vL

JAMILUR RAHMAN
THE ruling alliance claims it has run the two-year lap with a lot of vigour and verve, but the opposition sees it limping. The prime minister calls it an unmixed blessing to the nation; the leader of the opposition doesn't see anything beyond an unqualified setback. They don't see alike.
Prime Minister Khaleda Zia has admitted that her government's score on the law and order account has not been particularly good. She promises to do more to make a dent in the crime situation and assures us of stern action against corrupt elements responsible for plundering of national assets. The prime minister says what is expected of her.
Law and order has indeed been a sore point in the government's scheme of things. There were special drives and operations, but the overall situation remains more or less unchanged, except for periodic disappearance of listed criminals.
The two major parties are still blaming each other with the same consistency for the slide in law and order. But the question that remains unanswered is what they are doing to deal with the criminals having a political hue. It is no longer a secret that professional goons and killers derive much of their clout from political patronage. That is a truth acknowledged by all and sundry, but the parties concerned have still not done much to clear their houses of the unwanted elements. Call them unwanted or most wanted, the criminals have an ominous presence in politics.
The prime minister could hardly finish making a fresh pledge on combating crime when this newspaper carried a report on two most wanted criminals' rapport with some young leaders of the ruling BNP. The report is not the first of its kind. Politicians have been facing similar charges for many years, if not decades.
That also brings into focus one of the most glaring incongruities of our politics--while there is no dearth of commitment and lip-service to the need for fighting crime, a section of political leaders are thriving on muscle-power. This undercurrent of criminal-politician nexus has had a dampening effect on all anti-crime drives. Speaking a bit more philosophically, it may amount to sowing seeds of self-destruction, though its immediate goal is to destroy opposition.
The opposition is doing as much as it can to unsettle the government. The Awami League celebrated the two years of alliance's rule by publishing a detailed account of the government's failures. Sheikh Hasina again asks the government to step down.
The BNP's reaction to Hasina's tirade has been one of contemptuous disdain. The party expresses its dismay and shock with the way Hasina has rated it, but hastens to add that it is not surprised by the opposition leader's 'filthy' attack.
The leader of the opposition has appealed to all progressive forces and professional bodies to unite against the government ' steeped in abysmal corruption'. She has also promised to learn from past mistakes if her party is voted to power again in future.
That is rhetoric, simple and plain. People may ask themselves whether they have seen many politicians learning from mistakes when given a second chance. They must belong to a fast-vanishing, if not extinct, species.
Commonwealth Secretary General Don McKinnon has left a message for the emerging democracies still struggling to define government-opposition relations often crossing the limits of 'permissible' belligerence. McKinnon gave a realistic interpretation of how the relations get sour and democracy loses its way, despite being "theoretically sound".
He has been straight and clear. The attitudinal problem of the ruling party was the focal point of his deliberation, but he was no less severe on the negative politics of opposition. McKinnon's observations might lead one to wonder whether he was talking only about our political context that shows many of the symptoms of the maladies identified by him.
For example, McKinnon talked about the typical third-world syndrome of winners-take-it-all, or treating election victory as the licence to grab everything, including state institutions. The theories, need we say, will surely test positive if applied to our political reality.
The political parties, regardless of what they are saying or doing, have not yet done anything to prove McKinnon's observations wrong.
Jamilur Rahman is an Assistant Editor of The Daily Star.