The BNP has begun to stake a claim that it will overthrow the current government using country-wide mass protests.
The Daily Star reports her as saying:
“I will wage a movement and oust the government. I have done it in the past and am ready to take to the street again.”
The last time she was able to oust an Awami League government, she won a plurality of votes after it became apparent that the Awami League had proved itself feckless and inattentive to the people’s concerns. This time around it is too early to tell whether the BNP has any grounds to seek to oust a democratically elected and popular AL government. Moreover the grounds on which the leader of the BNP, former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia has decided to strike–Bangladesh’s rapprochment with India and the broad strategy of investment and engagement with which India expects to approach Bangladesh–seems fairly flaccid and inconsequential given the likely consequences of the rapprochment.
The Daily Star reports that at the rally to stoke support for her plan of protest, she claimed:
“Bangladesh cannot progress by renting out seaports and roads or allowing corridor. It’s a matter of shame that the prime minister has given all the advantages to New Delhi but failed to realise our rightful claim of the Tin Bigha corridor,”
Further, she claimed “The people no longer want to see this government in power as it failed to implement its election pledges including providing rice at Tk 10 per kg, job for one from each family and free fertiliser. Prices of essentials have gone up and law and order has deteriorated, as 10 people are killed every day.”
Leaving aside the global political economic currents in which the price of commodities have risen, most of the Awami League’s pledges always seemed too fantastical to merit derision. These pledges were meant to placate the voiceless many with platitudes, that soon manna would fall from the heavens. Otherwise, Begum Zia’s complaint is entirely without argumentative content and context.
Bangladesh’s rapprochment is likely to yield positive outcomes for both countries though the real pay-offs will be observable years–perhaps decades–down the road. One wonders whether the BNP strategy is to work in the short-run: to link public outcry to India’s still inarticulate investment plan as, obviously, a work of colonization in progress.
Still, sovereignty is an ideal concept; social welfare is a lived experience. I am certain that even were it the case that Bangladesh’s sovereignty might seem to be challenged, the payoffs of India’s investments are very likely to be quite important in the lives of most Bangladeshis. In that case, I’d think public welfare might trump India’s seemingly lordly moves against Bangladesh.
But of course , claimed Begum Zia,”if [the] BNP returns to power, the country’s independence and sovereignty would be protected and the crises of power and gas would be resolved while people would get jobs.”
