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All-party government: It's allies plus allies

Farid Hossain
WHEN a gallon of water is mixed with another gallon of water the result is an increase in quantity. However, it does not improve the quality.
So, the joining of Jatiya Party (Ershad), Workers Party (Menon) and Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal (Inu) with the Awami League-led "all-party government" does not bring any qualitative change in the nature of the government. Simply put, it is allies plus allies. The only change we see is that the Mahajote government has turned into an all-party interim government supposedly to oversee the upcoming parliamentary election. The creators of the formula also like to call it the polls-time government.
The so-called election-time government has started its journey with the swearing-in of six ministers and two state ministers. Five of the new faces are from Ershad's Jatiya Party. JP has also got another berth in the form ofZiauddin Bablu as an adviser to the prime minister with status of a minister. The actual size of the interim government will soon be known.
The prime minister has still kept valid her invitation to BNP and its leader Khaleda Zia to join the "all-party government," an offer Khaleda Zia has rejected. Instead, she led a hign-powered team of her party to meet with President Abdul Hamid on Tuesday evening, a day after Hasina moved fast to name her all-party government.
If Khaleda Zia does not change her mind and finally stays out of Hasina's government, there will be no all-party election-time government. In that case it will be a multi-party arrangement with an ally helping out another ally.
The challenge that Hasina has been facing in overcoming the political crisis remains the same as before. It is how to persuade BNP to drop its demand for a neutral non-partisan caretaker government and join the polls under her administration. Whether BNP joins the interim government or not is irrelevant. Even without joining the polls-time government BNP can make the election credible through its participation. If BNP sticks to its guns and boycotts the election the vote will not be credible, nor will it be universally acceptable.
Khaleda Zia has her own challenges too. If she boycotts the election, but fails to build an effective resistance to it she risks ending up a loser. A mere boycott of the polls does not help her and her cause. Having failed to shake the government through a series of rather suicidal hartals, Khaleda Zia has reached a stage where she must make a brave decision to participate in the voting with or without Hasina in office.
It seems she might take part in the election even under the formula devised by Hasina. But Hasina remains her only stumbling block. Khaleda Zia has announced her firm stand that she will not accept Hasina as the prime minister of an election-time government.
In that case, if Khaleda Zia says yes to election, Hasina may move aside, leaving the office to the Speaker or someone else loyal to her.
Will that work? An answer to this question can be found if the two sides sit across the table with an open mind. This point has been underscored by LIS Assistant Secretary of State Nisha Desai Biswal at a news conference on Monday, ending a two-day official visit to Bangladesh when she met both the ladies separately.
Optimists like us are not giving up hope for a negotiated end to the current political impasse.
A pause in the opposition-sponsored hartals, Khaleda Zia's visit to Bangabhaban to meet the president, Tareque Rahman's acquittal from a money laundering case, in which an FBI agent testified against him, are being discussed in the media and political circles as developments that can lead the feuding politicians to a meaningful dialogue, and a solution.
The writer is former bureau chief, Associated Press (AP).