Chintito

Divided us they stand united, they fail

Chintito

One of the greatest coincidences of recent decades has been the arrest of Sa-Ka-Chow on Victory Day 2010. Now those of you who do not know the date of the Victory Day or the import of that statement are advised herewith to join MFMP* in jail. Indeed he is also an MP, giving dubious credence to the saying that janagan never make a mistake. What janagan, how many janagan, how janagan... these are questions that require thorough inquiry. For we do believe that indeed the real janagan never make a mistake.

Whether the erstwhile minister shall accept you as roommate depends on your Pakistan (government) connectivity, that according to newspapers has been his mainstay and the cause of his 'respect' in his party to which he has been welcomed and from which he has been expelled almost as many times as national elections have been held. The rest of you roomie applicants, presumably from the jote, can forget it because according to press reports the FMP is in a fuming mood, what with only a district half-hartal urged in his honour after he was held from a Banani hideout, which observers say he mistook for a forest, bon in Bangla, in his state of delirium that is the order each December.

A tale of his oral vulgarity refers to the dog-and-tail anecdote on Khaleda Zia and his son Tareque, and another to a gold-related retort on Sheikh Hasina. Despite the oft quoted defence of errant and opportunist politicians in search of mou (honey) and dud (milk) that 'politics make strange bedfellows', few would share a table or a party with persons of such insanitary speech; yet for the past forty years he has created a political niche based on the shoulders of kattar anti-liberation forces and anti-Awami Leaguers.

It is a deadly curse on our political culture that many have espoused in their ulterior interest that being against Awami League politics one has to be against our independence, our national symbols, our War of Liberation, 1969 movement, language movement... One has to understand for the sake of this nation that one can be against the politics of a party and still be in favour of everything Bangladesh, everything Bangalee. You have to be if you believe in Bangladesh, if you are a citizen of this country.

It is this crafty conspiracy, the assemblage of all anti-Muktijuddho influences to counter Awami League that has also drawn under the same umbrella other political parties which are politically against Awami League. In the process pro- and anti-liberation forces have to sit together in late-night meetings, after which the war criminals have a big laugh when they meet even in later night meetings. Sadly, such meetings see some valiant freedom fighters share nashta with the very men against whom they took up arms in 1971. More sadly, those meetings have culminated in giving mandate to those war criminals and villains against humanity to fly the very Jatiya pataka that is wrapped around the martyrs they slayed or abetted to kill.

It is this interdependence of anti-Awami League parties that has given rise to terrorism in this country.

Muktijoddhas in politics and in other parties must realise that they can practice politics against Awami League without going against the country, its independence, and its very spirit. Often they try to separate the two but people do not take their view in earnest; rather their dualism is regarded as a ploy to catch votes which is no longer acceptable to the electorate, learned as they are, given their long political pedigree.

If the freedom-fighter and pro-independence politicians who are against the politics of Awami League divorce the anti-liberation forces and began to criticise issues on merit, there shall be two major national gains, and the possibility of one major party gain.

Such realisation shall firstly, see the end of anti-liberation forces as a force and secondly, the culture of issue-based politics shall be established, giving the parliament the status it seeks and deserves, setting up Bangladesh as the truly emerging tiger. At the moment, this squabbling among pro-Bangladeshis is eating into the core of our progress. As far as the gain for the party is concerned, they may turn out victorious in national elections when it is their issues that the people would support.

In reiterating our demand for the punishment of those who caused parents to be separated from their children, wives to see their husbands vanish for good, mothers to have lost their sons, women to lose their solemnity, men and women to be maimed for life, physically and mentally, let us pray that that is only way to find partially some solace in the losses that are irreparable.

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* MFMP: most foul mouthed politician

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