The decline of parliament
Shakhawat Liton finds much sense in a work on it
The prevailing situation is really very funny--- the interest of MPs in discharging their parliamentary functions has been declining alarmingly while donors' interest in the strengthening of parliament is still on the rise. Many of us do not have any real idea about the ongoing activities by different donor agencies toward strengthening the Bangladesh parliament. In the view of Nizam Ahmed, a leading researcher of parliamentary affairs, numerous actors and agencies are now involved in parliament development activities. Their number has increased over the years. So also have their programmes. What are the actors and agencies doing now to strengthen parliament? And what did some other agencies do in the past to this effect? Nizam Ahmed, professor of public administration at the University of Chittagong, has made efforts to answer the questions in his latest book, Aiding the Parliament of Bangladesh: Experience and Prospect. He wrote the book by carrying out a comprehensive research. He has directly worked a number of times in different initiatives to strengthen parliament. Therefore, his personal experiences, of course, assisted him in making the efforts successful in analysing the overall situation. In this work, Prof Nizam Ahmed examines the scope and limits of donor-assisted parliament strengthening programmes in Bangladesh. He has made efforts to identify the types of activities undertaken by different donors to strengthen parliament and explores the factors that account for the gap between the expectations of project planners and the actual outcome. Aiding the Parliament of Bangladesh is almost as old as the country itself, writes Prof Ahmed, with a brief description of projects by different donor agencies since 1975. The scope of such assistance, however, has varied in recent years, particularly from the 1990s, witnessing a major surge in donor interest in the strengthening of parliament. In his view, probably the most important reason underlying the surge in international interest in parliament strengthening in the 1990s was the emergence of a large number of Third Wave democracies in different parts of the world. Of course, Bangladesh was one among those countries where the Third Wave of democracy emerged. After the fall of the autocratic regime-led by HM Ershad in 1990, people had envisaged the restoration of a true democracy in the country. As the struggle to topple the autocratic regime was hard and long, their expectation also appeared to be skyrocketing. And in line with the people's expectations, the country switched over to a parliamentary form of government from a presidential one through a unanimous amendment to the constitution in the fifth Parliament in 1991. The Jatiya Sangsad, in the parliamentary form of the government, was supposed to be the centre of all political activities. But the reality turned out to be quite something else. Since the restoration of parliamentary democracy, the ruling parties' 'winner takes all attitude' and the opposition parties' mindless boycotting of parliaments only worsened the situation. MPs now seem to feel less interest in performing their real functions. Rather they, if they join the House proceedings, feel comfortable in spending hour after hour in parliament praising their parties' 'supreme leaders' and blasting their political rivals, instead of discussing important issues of public concern and government policies. And the result has been a deterioration in the quality of parliament, typified by its failure to contribute to establishing the rule of law and good governance in the country. However, one thing is crystal clear: through donor funded projects parliament may be strengthened in terms of logistics. Through projects, many reform proposals may even be prepared as was done in past. But for qualitative changes and implementation of reform proposals, political will on the part of the ruling and opposition parties is a must. The political will is the driving force for any qualitative change. And we have a severe lack of the political will.
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