Untold Facts

ACC Toothless Tiger Being Made Clawless too!

Helplessness
The current or seating Anti Corruption Commission Chairman Mr. Golam Rahman in a press briefing on the 14th October lamented that the Commission is a toothless tiger and now being made clawless too. He has, however, blamed the judiciary for sloth procedural and for peripheral lacunas of the system of administering law that he wished to have reformed immediately for promptly punishing the corrupts from the society. May be he was right.

Age old
Before venturing into the issue possibly as old as human civilization and of very much intricate nature, as an old man and in knowledge of anti-corruption issues of these days but also of the 1950s, I may begin with the instance of about five decades old I recall very much accurately.

An old instance
In mid fifties the Minster in charge of Ant- corruption happened to be the then young fiery speaker Sheikh. Once I heard him speaking in a public meeting in Paltan Maidan, Dhaka (then spelled Dacca), ‘DURNITIR KONO KHOBOR KARO JANA THAKLE AMAKE EKTI TIN POISAR POST CARD LIKE JANABEN’ or in English language the content may be something like this: Should any one knew of any fact of corruption, let me have the information by writing in and mailing to me a post card of three Paisa (cost of a post card was then three Paisa). Later on we knew that many such post cards reached his office from many simple folks for some redress but none had any action, but in some cases the fact mailer had been pursued for ‘wrong’ and ‘false’ information. The other and curious fact was that the same one time fiery speaker minister had been pursued for many corruption cases. Unfortunately one Investigation Officer, a DSP, well known to be a very honest police officer happened to be a maternal uncle of my wife! He gave me in informal occasions some of the information about some cases of grave nature, not all, in late 1960s, but all withered away in political turbulence in the then East Pakistan!

Ask yourself
Mr. Rahman may be right in his passionate discontent about the judiciary in handling the corruption cases. Should he not ask himself who and what elements made the Commission toothless? Could that be judiciary alone? Second, who are now active to make the organization, in addition, clawless too? Is it at all possible to make the Commission effective having had the judiciary changed with all other factors keeping unchanged?

Nothing new
Corruption based on immoral human action is almost an integral part of human traits. Morally elevated human soul can be antidote to immorality and corruption, in close restrain of the rule of law. It is thus not alone the judiciary that can fully eliminate corruption in any society.

Colonial legacy
The judiciary in force in Bangladesh is not very old but started operating back about 150 years by the Englishmen and the foreign colonialist rulers. Previously we had the Muslim judiciary for centuries that had been quite smart and speedy in disposing cases at the minimum possible time. Whether that Islamic system of justice could be re-introduced or not at this time is another matter of useful debate.

Christian values
The English or British justice system originated not only for harsh punishment of offender but also as deterrents to wrongdoing. In addition, the sources of laws are conventions and usages that came to practice over centuries and deeply embedded in Christian ethics, morality and values. In introducing the English judiciary here the lacuna that seriously impeded the system was the vacuum of ethics, morality and values, because the overwhelming majority people had allegiance to another set of value system. The vacuum still in the same form, and hence the ineffectiveness and inefficiency of the system that no ruler of the independent country has as yet had attempted to change and improve, much less made compatible with the belief and value system of the overwhelming majority people in this country. It is thus useless to blame the system we inherited from the colonialists that has been failing to be efficient in our context of situation. Unless we have firm political will and hard work by experts and specialists to materialize the will, there is little hope for the ACC Chairman’s wish to be fulfilled.

Building character
The other important issue to me is the crucial need for building up of national character of our younger generation through value based education system followed by socio-economic set up that would take pride in moral values commensurate with our own ethical aspirations. In other words, a moral regeneration from current erosion of moral values clearly manifested unfortunately at each level of human endeavor or exercise is needed that would be based on viable and transcendental human high values as Islam certainly prescribed. It is useless to argue anything against for other religious people, because, Islam encompasses all other beliefs in the matter of high moral values.

Free market syndrome
The free market economy based on human greed and material gains and having been underpinned by the principle of the laissez faire and licentious indulgence in consumption spree behavior constitute cause and effect of moral erosion. Fortunately, Islam and Islamic life style that asks for simple living and egalitarianism may well reinforce moral standard of our upcoming citizens, provided we train them in the way with spiritual motivation and incentives. Unless Bangladesh goes for these changed issues, programs, attitudes and outlook, and instead continue with the status quo of the colonialists as in this case in the current judicial system, there is no hope for anything better, much less in the ACC action programs, I am afraid.

Author: Dr. M.T. Hussain