What the Bangladeshi People Want

Let’s get one thing straight: Countries are less developed than they could or should be for one reason and one reason only. And this is poor governance.

It is not to do with overpopulation, or resource constraints, or the legacy of colonialism, although all of these, and many other reasons, certainly can play a part.

This is true for every country in the history of the world, and it is true for Bangladesh.

Yes, we have suffered mightily due to 190 years of British colonialism followed by 24 years of quasi-colonial West Pakistani rule, and yes, with 180 million people squeezed into roughly 55,000 square miles of flood and cyclone-prone delta, the country faces an almost uniquely daunting challenge.

Yet, for all of the above truisms, we have been independent for over 50 years now, and this is plenty of time to right the ship of state.

To the extent that we have been unable to do so, the reason is as clear as it is dispiriting – failure by successive governments who have ruled Bangladesh since independence.

Now perhaps failure might sound like too harsh a term given the striking drop in poverty rates, the improvement in life expectancy from 49 in 1971 to 75 today, and the growth of the economy to above $500 billion. 

There is no question that many things have gone right, that we have many successes to be proud of, and that things could be far worse than they are.

Nevertheless, any government that cannot provide justice, rule of law, and freedom to its people is a government that has failed them. 

Any government that is riddled with corruption and cronyism, where billions can be and are looted from the exchequer with impunity is a failure.

Any government that stands in the way of its people and makes their life more difficult, not easier, is a government that isn’t worth its name.

Everywhere and at every moment in history since we began to organize ourselves into societies with government, the difference between happiness and misery has been the quality of the governance.

Where governance is good, people prosper. Where governance is poor, people suffer. There is no exception to this rule

Such is life in Bangladesh. 

Yes, we are an impoverished, resource-starved nation with too many people crowded into too little space. 

But if you want to ask the question why this is: the answer is not in our genes, or our external circumstances, or our lack of resources, but in the rapacity of those who dare rule in our name.

I will grant that we began life in the most inauspicious of circumstances: 200 years of grinding oppression, a war ravaged country with millions dead or displaced, infrastructure in ruins, institutions needing to be built up from scratch, 80% of the population below the poverty line, every indicator from life expectancy to nutrition to literacy in the doldrums.

But the real tragedy of independent Bangladesh, and the real betrayal of the Bangladeshi people, is how successive governments have focused on enriching themselves and looting the national exchequer far more than they have on developing the nation.

It is not just that they have not provided the bare minimum, it is that they have actively been the source of our misery. 

Everywhere you look in Bangladesh where there is injustice or corruption or criminality, you can see the hand of the government.

Far from improving our lives, it is those in government or close to the government who are looting banks, extracting tolls, robbing and raping. 

It is precisely their closeness to power that allows them to operate with the impunity that they do that creates the hellscape that is life for the everyday Bangladeshi.

Why do we have air that is not fit to breathe, water that is not fit to drink, and food that is often barely fit to eat. These things don’t happen by accident. They happen because someone made them happen, and that someone is the government or protected by the government. 

There is no ill in Bangladesh that cannot at heart be traced back to the malign hand of those in power. 

The Bangladeshi people, of course, have instinctively understood this for centuries. This is what has formed our national character of rebelliousness and fractiousness, and what has driven our recent efforts towards reform.

We have long ago given up hoping that our government would do anything for us, and would be content if it simply reined in its worst excesses.

As the old Bengali adage has it: We don’t want charity. Just please call off your dog.

Zafar Sobhan is the Editor of the weekly Counterpoint.