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CROSS TALK

Who is hiding behind the mask?

Mohammad Badrul Ahsan
IF understanding the problem is half the solution, the study unveiled last week by the Center for Policy Dialogue has done a heck of a job. The findings have given a list of problems and the suggestions have enumerated a list of solutions. But the accomplished half is now haunted by the ghost of its missing equal. In other words, the problem doesn't lie in those problems and the solution doesn't lie in those solutions. The study is yet another affirmation that this nation can't make up its mind. Should it treat the disease or should it go after the symptoms?
This particular study went after the symptoms. True, the ruling party has monopolised state power. Politics has been criminalised by the deadly race for money and influence. The politicians don't practice what they preach. And, the businessmen have reduced this nation into Pavlov's experiment. Everybody salivates at the clink of coins.
The solutions suggested are relevant. Half the problems would have been gone only if the national parliament had functioned properly. Yes, the political parties should be disabused of private money, which creates the greenhouse effect of moral degradation. It definitely would have been ideal if our ruling parties could segregate ruling from party. Most important is the question of choosing leaders. They can't take us through a democratic process unless they have first come out of one.
James Mathew Barrie, the creator of Peter Pan, writes that every time a child says he doesn't believe in fairies, there’s a little fairy somewhere that drops down dead. For us that principle works in reverse. Every time the politicians say they believe in something, somebody somewhere goes missing or gets killed. The real danger for this country is not mistake but mischief.
That has been the sand in our grease. Rights are wronged and wrongs are righted. Murders are mopped out. Scandals are sanitised. Nobody gets punished. If condoning is one side of the coin, the other side has absence of accountability. Between these two extremes, this country is seething with hypocrisy. Everybody is deceitful and nobody is accountable. There is so much crime, yet nobody is culpable.
The CPD study in so many words has touched those issues, but it has touched them through a membrane. It distributed the burden of one whole truth over the loadbearing pillars of its many findings. The monopolisation of power, criminalisation of politics, marginalisation of democracy, and commercialisation of the country are nothing but manifestation of double standard consorting with corruption.
That brings us to the genesis of the crisis. People are regularly propping up fronts to hide their misdeeds. First, the individuals disappeared behind these fronts, eventually taking the institutions with them. The legislative is in a limbo, and the executive is estranged because neither the individuals nor the institutions are what they appear. Identity crisis and credibility gap have turned this country into its own nemesis.
In short, this nation can be compared to a masquerade ball. Everyone is in costume, wearing a mask. Everybody visible is hiding. Everybody dubious is credible. These facts are also true the other way around.
This is where the CPD study failed to sink its teeth. It hit the symptoms alright but missed the disease, writing prescription before diagnosis. If this study has unveiled anything in its unveiling, it's the immense power of packaging that can turn common sense into an uncommon thing.
One of the politicians attending the unveiling ceremony for the study tracked down the source of political malpractices to the military rule after 1975. He said it as if our politics was a clean slate before that time. Another politician gave us a start when he said that the politicians are now busy spreading falsehood as if the politicians before were doing otherwise. Yet a third one said something earth shattering. He said democracy wouldn't flourish if political parties continued to run on the whims of one ora few individuals.
These are three examples of the Liar Paradox. When the semi-mythical seer Epimenides said that all Cretans were liars, he had contradicted himself. Being a Cretan, he was a liar if his statement was true. Again, his statement was false if he was being truthful.
The three politicians spun a web of similar paradox, leaving us confused if they created the system they criticised, or criticised the system that created them. This is where the CPD study withered in its force. It attempted to show us the mask without exposing the face.
That's the problem of our problems. As simple as that, this nation has lost its ability to fight pretensions. All its affairs embody an incessant struggle in which everybody desperately clings to the mask. The solution of the solutions simply lies in finding out the face.
The writer is the Editor, First News and an opinion writer for The Daily Star. Email: badrull51@yahoo.com