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Vendetta Might Boomerang in Bangladesh

Date: 19 April 2020 - 21:20

News ID: ۷۷۶۱۷

By: Kayhan Int’l Staff Writer

It seems Bangladesh, or more properly, its government has trapped itself in an unending political vendetta that might have a catastrophic backlash on those who at the moment are tracking down and killing persons accused of treason.
The recent execution of Abdul Majed, a former military captain and diplomat, who was hanged at the central jail at Keraniganj near the capital, Dhaka, for the assassination of the country’s founding father Sheikh Mujib ur-Rahman during a military coup 45 years ago, has shocked many in the country.
Majed was rehabilitated in civil service during the subsequent administration of President General Zia ur-Rahman, as an ex-cadre official and posted as the director of National Savings Department. He later fled the country while serving in the finance ministry along with other 1975 coup plotters as the 1996 general elections brought Awami League back to power under Mujib’s daughter, Hasina Wajed, who vowed to punish her father’s killers.
Hasina whose first 5-year tenure ended in 2001, was back at the helm of affairs in Dhaka as the 10th prime minister of Bangladesh in 2009 and has since continued to be in office – albeit through heavily rigged elections as the opposition claims.
Many Bangladeshis are of the opinion that Majed’s case could have been overlooked in a spirit of Islamic clemency as the 73-year old posed no danger and had returned to his homeland after over two decades of living in neighbouring India.
Critics think that Prime Minister Hasina Wajed has inflicted many injuries on Bangladesh’s democracy. They point out that other than targeting Islamic figures, fiddling with the national constitution to remove Islamic clauses, kowtowing to India in vital economic and security matters, she has pursued a dogged vendetta against her main rival for the job of Prime Minister, Mrs Khaleda Zia, by hounding her supporters and persecuting her party.
She has also executed prominent persons on allegations of collaboration with Pakistan during the independence struggle of 1971, thereby dismembering the country’s main Islamic party.
Though 90% of Bangladesh’s 161 million population is Muslim and the constitution guarantees freedom of religion, the less than 9% Hindus who enjoy all civil liberties, have been awarded many prominent jobs, including chief justice of the Supreme Court – to the resentment of the country’s overwhelming majority.
At the same time peaceful public protests are heavily suppressed. All this means the moment the wheel of fortune would turn, the Awami League will have a torrid time in Bangladesh, and may face the same vendetta from the new rulers as it is currently pursuing against them.
It is still not too late to rectify the wrongs of the past by adopting a conciliatory attitude towards all in order to build a strong and independent Bangladesh that could be a bastion of Islam in the region.