WE would like to extend a hearty welcome to Prime Minister Sheikh Haslna on her return from the three European nation tour. Now (hat she is back we hope she will take stock of the situation of the country she has been elected to govern. We start by drawing her attention to a simple traffic problem. Riding In her SSF guarded long motorcade she Is not likely to realise the near Impossible situation that the common citizens now face. However well rehearsed the PM’s urglngs to the European businessmen may have been, no investor will even think of coming to Dhaka because of the Jungle that our roads have become. It takes hours to reach any destination In the city, and that If you push, shove, break lanes, honk Incessantly, and overtake dangerously to get there. There Is nothing called courtesy In our streets anymore. In addition to the continual Jams the smog, the noise, the indiscipline on the streets make Dhaka out to be one of the most unattractive destinations for FDI

We draw the PM s attention to two stories in Sunday s newspapers, one published In The Daily Star and the other in the Manab Jamin. The stories deal with how the traffic police have set up an alternative system that bypasses all legal Institutions and deprives the government of hundreds of crores of Taka of revenue. If one buys Tk 500 monthly token then he can operate a commercial vehicle such as a bus. mini bus. and the like without any papers or licence either for Ihe vehicle or for the driver. On the other hand a vehicle having all the legal documents but not the Tk 500 token is stopped at almost all the traffic lights of the city and made to pay. Earlier we published a news item quoting DC Traffic saying that more than 94 per cent of the city’s vehicles and drivers ply without authentic documents. The papers they carry are forged and given out for a fee. by people having connection with the traffic police.

Recently some roads have been made one-way and in several turnings right-turn and U-turn are prohibited. In the one-way streets rickshaws are charged Tk 2 by the traffic police for the right to ply in the opposite direction. As for the prohibited turns, cars are allowed to do make them for a fee. varying from Tk 2 to Tk 4. The situation Inside the secretariat is no different. Practically nothing can be done without a service charge’. During the PM’s foreign trip we heard about businessmen in Chittagong sitting with the street criminals and buying’ protection from them for a fee as the police have failed to provide It In Dhaka shopkeepers in the various business*, districts have raised their own vigilante groups to protect themselves.

What we describe is but the tip of the iceberg. The above description of the situation Indicates that the state law enforcement machinery is gradually collapsing at the street level and is being replaced by private groups. Does our government realise what all these mean? This Is the beginning of the collapsing of the State in a functional sense. This must be stopped, and only the government can do it. The Prime Minister must take the task of governance more seriously than she has done so far. Speech making and crowd raising may have their value but they are extremely dangerous substitutes for hard-nosed policy implementation.