An enlightened nation on the way to darkness!

Amimul Ahsan Tanim

As a human rights worker who resides in the UK, a country with a good reputation for free speech and human rights, I that it was high time for an article of this name.  This article could hurt someone still: we only have to cast an eye over the free speech and human rights violations in Bangladesh… When I saw courageous writers brutally killed in the street, as happened recently – as if we were still in the medieval period – my pen oblige me to write.

Voting is a very basic human right for every citizen in any democratic country – though it can seem that people in Bangladesh don’t have this right, as can be seen in the City Corporation Election of Bangladesh. In many places throughout the country people are tormented when they go out to cast their votes, and many of them found their vote had already been cast when they arrived at the polling station.  This is a clear violation of human rights. While every electronic and paper media organ is saying that the voting process was unfair and full of misconduct, the Government is busy trying to cover up their own role in this attack on voters by saying that the whole electoral system is fair. As Bangladesh is a developing country, bad practice could happen in some places – and a good Government should acknowledge this and do their level best to prevent it.

I want to share my personal experience to make it easier to understand what I am trying to say. When I was working as a human rights activist for Amnesty International, I wrote letters to an influential Members of the UK Parliament (who were candidates in the General Election) in relation to the establishment of the Human Rights Act and stopping torture across the world.  Just four or five days before the parliamentary election was held, these candidates wrote to me.   They all agreed with me and want to stand with me on the questioning of establishing a Human Rights Act and stopping torture across the globe.

In particular, Rushanara Ali, former Shadow Minister, wrote (just before she was re-elected as an MP): “I am proud that a previous Labour Government introduced the Human Rights Act, which incorporates into UK law the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). My Labour colleagues and I also believe that the UK must remain at the heart of global efforts to uphold the international global ban on torture.  My Labour colleagues and I are committed to uphold human rights domestically and promote them abroad. We will put human rights, individual freedom and democracy at the heart of our foreign policy and we will promote gender equality, the eradication of poverty and inclusive economic growth.”

Just because a politician writes a letter, it does not mean that she can do whatever it is she says she wants to see. Here, the fact that she has written shows that she is a politician who has the courage to say the truth, the courage to say no to oppression. However, when I look back to my home country, than this courage and honesty to stand up against falsehood and oppression is missing from our politicians. Our politicians don’t have that courage or the slightest moral values which make them speak the truth – such as recognising murder as murder, kidnap as kidnap, and fraud as fraud.

Surprisingly, it turns out that not only our politicians but also a majority of our intellectuals and so-called human rights activists are biased, in that they are not speaking out against gross violations of human rights. They talk about minor human rights issues, but they can’t see the gross violation of human rights. For example, the international media has said that there are many Bangladeshis floating in a never-ending sea, in the ame boat as Ruhinga Muslims – and their suffering had reached an unbearable level. However, our human rights activists and Government have nothing to say on that issue!  A BBC journalist questioned our Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina about the Ruhingua refugee issue, particularly as far as it concerned Bangladeshi nationals.  She replied that this not our problem, this is a problem for Myanmar. How can a Prime Minister say this while the people of her own country are victimised? Isn’t this a gross violation of human rights? Where are our human rights?

On the other hand if we look at UK, it is just as bad. In a European Union crisis meeting, the Italian Prime Minister asked Britain to help Syrian refugees. The UK Home Secretary Theresa May put her hands over her ears and went “la-la-la-la-la-la-la”.  This creates enormous debates in society and in human rights organisations and raises questions in regards to the democratic and peaceful policy of UK. Moreover, it creates a storm of criticism from among human rights activists.

This led to Richard Godwin writing in the Evening Standard: “It shames us to turn our backs on Syria’s refugees”. My heart start bleedings when I see that in my country human rights are violated in every day but there is no such person as Richard Godwin who can stand out from the crowd and speak against injustice and oppression because they have no fears about doing so. If someone took a step like Richard Godwin has done, he or she may be locked up in a prison cells – as happened to Mr Mahmudur Rahman, Editor of the daily Amar Desh, and to many others who stand out against oppression.

In the UK, the Home Secretary Theresa May can’t stop the freedom of speech of Richard Godwin or others who are against her policy. In the UK, the people crossed the line of slavery and oppression a long way back, and human rights were addressed in 1215 AD by the Magna Carta and the 1689 Bill of Rights Act.   In contrast, Bangladesh still is waiting for a Magana Carta to happen. How far do we have to go, how long do we have to wait for our Magna Carta?

The highest level of punishment in my country is the death penalty – a questionable punishment in the civilised world, not least when it becomes a means of abuse and degrades people through unfair justice. When I see this happening, I am embarrassed to say that I am a civilian from a civil country. The present Government is staging a drama by putting the burden of killing 3 million people on the heads of three or four individuals – and it wants to string them up.  I don’t want to comment on whether they are guilty of a war crime or not, but I am anxious that my nation does not set an example to the next generation that the right way to act is to have an unfair trial and a questionable judicial system which allows a court to fail to prove that the defendant was guilty “beyond reasonable doubt”. This is the basis of criminal liability for any criminal offence.

I want to finish by referring to the words of Amnesty International in the hope that it may open the eyes of people who have a mind capable of understanding.   Amnesty International writes, in regard to the clarity and fairness of the International War Crime Tribunal of Bangladesh, “trial [by the] International War Crime Tribunal in Bangladesh means a trial against humanity which is done by present Tribunal”.

•Amimul Ahsan Tanim is a journalist, columnist, human rights activist and TV presenter.