Editorial
Making upazila bodies dysfunctional
This lies at the heart of why development lags behind in rural areas
It is not good news when elected local body officials inform the country that they are not being allowed to play their part in development activities. On Saturday, the Upazila Chairmen and Vice-Chairmen Oikyo Parishad made the complaint that Upazila Nirbahi Officers (UNOs) in their various areas have seen little necessity of contacting upazila chairmen and members on issues related to development on a local scale. The clear allegation they made was that the UNOs have not been cooperating with them. On the other hand, the UNOs have been in regular touch with local MPs in the matter of deciding priorities for the local regions.
It is, obviously, a critical situation here. The perception has grown in the country over the last few years that a strengthening of democracy calls for a development of local government in a way that will fulfil people's expectations. It was expected that with the upazila parishads at the local level and members of Parliament at the national level, the necessary coordination in development and other activities would be arrived at and implementation of plans and programmes would be carried out by UNOs in line with local body recommendations. That does not seem to be happening. And this is not for the first time that we have come across such complaints on the part of elected upazila officials. And what they say is crucial: if locally elected representatives must see their authority undermined by government servants, if UNOs are not at all worried about the complexities they are causing through their non- cooperation with the upazila bodies, the entire process of government by the consent of the governed is put at risk.
We believe it becomes the responsibility of the government as also of all parties represented in the Jatiyo Sangsad to deal with the issue on the basis of immediacy. Elected bodies cannot be made redundant because old, entrenched forces such as UNOs are unwilling to relinquish their hold on authority. The plain and clear fact is that all elected officials, from the upazila chairman to a member of a village council, must be allowed to work without any hurdles being put in their way. Democracy is fundamentally a matter of linkages, from the village to the union to the upazila to the national levels of governance. When any one of these linkages is undermined, it is an entire democratic system that comes under threat.
Let the grievances of the upazila chairmen, vice-chairmen and members be addressed in all seriousness -- if democracy is take the needed roots in Bangladesh. Those grievances, by the way, are also ours.
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