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Challenges of Democratic Governance : Who will Bell the Cat?

How to make our two leaders sit together to discuss national problems on a regular basis? Who will really bell the cat? One may not have any ready answer to this most difficult question. But the vast majority of the people of this country want it very much to happen. May be the honourable President has a potential role to play in this regard.

by Monaw-war Uddin Ahmad
In his Inaugural speech delivered at the Conference of Bangladesh Economic sociation on May 29 (published in The Daily Star on June 1. ) Professor Wahiduddin Mahmud has highlighted the crucial role of governance in the economic management of this country. After a careful reading of his excellent piece of work one cannot but agree with what he says : "The politics of agitation and confrontation is perhaps the single-most important factor that explains the lack of investor confidence With economic liberalisation and Increased reliance on private investment and export, the economy is now more susceptible than ever before to a climate of political uncertainty and unrest. Our political leaders must find mechanisms within the democratic system for limiting the degree of political conflict and for building a reservoir of political toleration to draw upon."
Governance Js1 an all-em-bracing term. The question of governance is there in every sphere of our life. Governance is essentially a social engineering, a process to produce some output for the society. It is by no means a simple task.
A large amount of theoretical and empirical literature is available on various issues related to governance. The most important question that arises in the course of such an analysis is : what are the major problems of governance in Bangladesh? Professor Wahiduddin Mahmud in a very succinct way has discussed the problems of governance in eco-nomic management of Bangladesh. Elementary textbook on principles of economics identifies three central Kroblems of a modern economy:
I What goods in how much quantities to produce? (ii) How to produce? and finally (iii) For
whom to produce? Whether we talk about economic liberalisation or investment response of the private sector, in the end the decisions are essentially related to these three central questions. Professor Wahiduddin Mahmud has rather concisely described the current state of the affairs of Bangladesh economy : "The recent macroeconomic developments demonstrate the high degree of fragility of the economic stabilisation process in Bangladesh as well as expose some of the underlying long-run growth constraints facing the economy. Slippages in macro -economic management, poor harvests and political unrest have corfibined to'bring about a deterioration in the macro-economic balances. ■ These trends as reflected in a widening investment-savings gap as well as an increasing trade deficit are not sustainable and warrant appropriate policy responses in macro-economic management."
The governance of economic policy formulation and its implementation lo the most elegant of all governance problems. Professor Mahmud has very rightly emphasized that what is urgently needed is to arrive at a national consensus on major state issues. Unfortunately there is no consensus on most of our national questions. I would not worry here much about economic policy issues as Professor Mahmud has already dealth with those in this paper. I would, rather, like to raise a more fundamental question. In Bangladesh the two major political parties are Awami
League and Bangladesh Nationalist Party. The determination of the exact strength and power base of these two parties are matters of detailed research. However, as a laymen, it appears to me that they are very close to each other in this respect. A rough approximation would be. say. 55:45 depending on whether the party is a ruling one or in the opposition. The relative strength of these two major political parties, as a ruling party and as an opposition one. can be assessed according to the above proportions. It does not matter whether Awami League or Bangladesh Nationalist Party is in power or in opposition — that when is power the ruling party has a little more strength than the opposition for some obvious reasons, if this assumption (which I believe to be realistic) is accepted, a consensus on national issues between the leaderships of these two parties is a necessary condition for promoting socio-economic and overall development of this country.
It is an irony of fate that the very twelfth and thirteenth amendments to our constitution are the symptoms of this lack of consensus, confidence and mutual trust. Let me first elaborate with the help of the twelfth amendment of the constitution. It says that the President of the republic has no function other than making appointments of Prime Minister and Chief Justice as per specific provisions of the constitution. In all other matters the President shall act in accordance with the advice of the Prime Minister. The dissolution of the
Parliament by the President is conditional on a written letter by the Prime Minister. It is very clear to us that the head of the republic under the present arrangement has no residual power even under grave national emergency. Both Awami League and Bangladesh Nationalist Party after the fall of Ershad regime very gladly agreed to introduce such a provision and / or amendment in the Constitution. Have we ever thought that the President as the head of the republic should have some residual power? That a democratic as well as a sophisticated society needs an honourable' President having some ultimate power to deal with grave national crisis.? Perhaps having seen many autocrat Presidents (under Presidential system, of course) in the past and who knows also for safeguarding democratic power' in the early nineties both the major political parties of the country decided to adopt the twelfth amendment of the Constitution wherein the President does not have any power at all. It is. of course, true that President Justice Shahabuddin Ahmed, despite that, has never hesitated to give his learned views/opinions regarding a number of important national issues. By doing so he has indeed exalted the office of the President.
It transpires from the most recent history of this country that if there were any constitutional provision of Presidential intervention, the political crisis during the latter phase of the BNP regime could have been
solved rather at a lower cost. The nation had to pay an enourmous cost, indeed I As the two major political party leaderships do not have mutual respect and confidence, there is virtually no consensus on any issue.
And at last people were on the streets. The BNP government was forced to adopt the thirteenth amendment to the constitution having the provision for a caretaker government to run parliamentary general elections in the country. A careful examination of the thirteenth amendment of the constitution makes it very clear that it is a temporary arrangement for a Presidential form of government with neutral and non-polifical' advisors. We would be sadly mistaken if we believe that tne Chief Advisor of the caretaker government is the chief executive under this new arrangement. On the other hand it is the President who holds the real power during the period of a caretaker government. While there is no denial that the caretaker government has very successfully and effectively conducted a fair and free national election, it has also been proved rather conclusively that the major political parties of this country think each other as "vote dacoits." The Magura incidence spearheaded the movement for a caretaker government. And finally when the goal was achieved, we thought that we were one hundred per cent successful. But success achievement in national life is a long-run phenomenon, while the very existence of this thirteenth amendment of the constitution is a singular example of one hundred per cent distrust, disregard and lack of consensus. It means a political party government cannot be
trusted in Bangladesh because it is believed to be involved in vote rigging.' Both Awami League and BNP think in the same way about each other. In that one may ask a simple question: If they cannot conduct a national election freely and fairly, how can one believe that they would be able to run the administration of the country to lead its people on the path of progress and prosperity. One may then also ask: Why do'nt they leave the administration of the country to a caretaker government for a few years.
Professor Mahmud has emphasized the necessity of establishing national consensus in respect of economic policy matters. I would like to add that Awami League and BNP first should set an example of running a fair and free election by a party government and then they should work out national consensus on other matters. I believe that many of their differences are more imaginary than real. These have arisen because of narrow party approach. The honourable Prime Minister and the honourable Leader of the Opposition should sit together to discuss among themselves the various socioeconomic problems of the country and then they should take up the matters with their team of advisors. An official opposition in the parliament is an integral part of a cabinet form of government, and it must be well understood and appreciated at the very beginning. Failing which any attempt would be rather an exercise in futility. But the real question is : How to make our two leaders sit together to discuss national problems on a regular basis? Who will really bell the cat? I do not have any ready answer to this most difficult question. But I believe that the vast majority of the people of this country want it very much to happen. May be the honourable President has a potential role to play in this regard.
The writed teaches in the Department of Economics. University of Dhaka.