Awami League in cynical pact with Islamic 'militants' with links to terrorism

In the last two weeks, the Awami League has entered into an electoral alliance with people they have previously described as 'extremists' and parties with open sympaties with the Taliban.

For years we have been made aware of the existence of Al-Qaeda-type terrorism in Bangladesh. Bombs have gone off throughout the country and leading figures have been assassinated. The culprits, the small and insignificant JMB, have been caught. Yet, the Awami League has happily pushed the mantra that we are witnessing the 'talibanisation of Bangladesh'.

We have been subject to an emerging international discourse telling us that the problem is endemic. Mediocre analysts and gullible international activists have happily consumed Awami League propaganda dictating that: Bangladesh is an avowedly secular state, parties that draw from the country's rich religious (and syncretic) history are unpatriotic. Religiously inspired parties have explicit links to terrorism and are responsible for the country becoming another Afghanistan.

The Awami League has formulated this template as an appropriate weapon to defeat its opponent. Thus the ruling Bangladesh National Party has been accused of entertaining extremists in the form of the Jamaat-e-Islami, a moderate constitutional party believing in multi-party democracy. The AL has then proceeded to pin every act of violence and every cliché of Islamism that exists in our post 9/11 world on the Jamaat-e-Islami. As this blog has outlined earlier, lazy and unscrupulous journalists and academics have willingly taken up this narrative with gusto.

The trouble is, that narrative is unravelling before our very eyes. The Awami League is in meltdown as the leadership cynically enters into an electoral pact with people and parties they previously described as militant Islamist. On 27 December, the AL-supporting Daily Star reported that the Awami League has nominated 'militant leaders' to be part of their electoral alliance. Two are noteworthy of mention, Habibur Rahman of Syhlet (locally known as Bulbuli Huzur) and Mufti Shahidul Islam, a veteran of the Afghan war. Habibur Rahman is linked to Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami (Huji), an organization banned by the government in 2005 for being a self-proclaimed terrorist organisation. In 1989 he was a guest of the Harkat-ul Jihad Pakistan (a USA banned organisation) where he surveyed the frontline in Afghanistan. Shahidul Islam was once accused by the Awami League leader herself, in the Bangladesh Parliament, for harbouring militant connections.

As if things couldn't get ironic and surreal enough, the League has now entered into an electoral pact with the Khelafat Majlis and has agreed to a five-point memorandum of understanding, which includes a pledge not to enact laws in contravention to Qur’anic values, sunnah and shariah. The guardians of these values will be a small-band of narrow-minded ‘hakkani-alems’: no reference is made to the plurality of jurisprudence and thought in Islam. To some, the League's choice of partners make the Jamaat-e-islami (whom they oppose) cuddly centrists.

'Secularists' are in free-fall. Many cannot fathom the party's about turn. Mahfuz Anam, editor of the AL-supporting Daily Star has penned his state of puzzlement in a strong editorial. Lord Avebury, rent-a-gob for the Awami League is now questioning his godfathers. All demand to know: what happened to that secular Bangladesh we were sold? The answer is, it never existed. But nor did there exist a Pakistan-type society that others are cautioning against. This, of course, requires deliberation – one that examines Bangladesh’s past, and not the Stalinist re-writing of history in the past 40 years.

As we reported earlier, Martin Bright, political editor of the New Statesman, claimed at a Policy Exchange event that people of his profession are pig-ignorant about Bangladeshi politics. We have demonstrated his persistence in keeping the status quo as he sups with the Awami League. In a subsequent blog, Bright pleaded:

“In this sense, every Bangladeshi election is a fight for the country's soul. On the one side stand those who believe in an essentially secular Bengali identity; on the other are those who want the country defined as a Muslim state, much as Pakistan is.”

Mr Bright is completely uninformed about Bangladesh’s secular and religious identity. As his party of choice (the Awami League) proceeds to debunk his maxim, he is right about one thing, the forthcoming election will be a fight for Bangladesh’s soul. But the contest will be between the people of Bangladesh on the one hand, and a corrupt political-criminal mafia like elite who will use any means (subterfuge, lies and violence) to get into power.