Bulldozing constitutional amendments
Such unilateral action is self-defeating
The PM's statement in Parliament on Tuesday and the placement of the report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on law ministry before the House last evening make it abundantly clear that the AL government is hell-bent on abolishing the caretaker system.
We feel that the speed with which the whole thing is being done trivialises both the Constitution and its amendment process. The PM's claim that she has waited 11 months for the opposition's response cannot hold good for the CTG issue surfaced only after the SC verdict on May 10 making it less than a two-month old issue.
What surprises us even more is that the full verdict of Supreme Court is not yet out and the nation does not know the full extent of the ruling given by the SC. The very fact that an issue of such national importance as a constitutional amendment on CTG is being implemented without the full verdict makes the process extremely questionable, especially when it is being done by showing the SC judgment as its main justification.
The PM's positioning is that with the ruling party's two-thirds majority in parliament the constitution maybe re-amended to accommodate the opposition viewpoint on the CTG issue, if need be. This is doublespeak; only very recently she had invited the opposition to talks but now she is bent upon abolishing the CTG system unilaterally.
The ruling party's hasty handling of the caretaker issue is patently inexplicable when it has more than two years to go before the next general election.
By fast-tracking the amendment process, the ruling party is making a blunder. The prime minister cited instance of an autocratic regime carrying out amendments at a breakneck speed. Actually, that has been the bane of the constitution leaving it distorted beyond recognition, which it is now the prime responsibility of a democratic government to set right -- through a consensus.
We think the ruling party is using its brute and overwhelming majority to bulldoze a whole set of constitutional amendments which have far-reaching implication both for democracy and the country.
We feel the government is underestimating BNP whose strength should not be merely judged by its number of seats in the JS but rather by the size of its voter support.
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