Political crisis...

. PHOTO: AFP

We urge the political leaders to show statesmanship to deal with the political crisis. Statement and counter statement will not help. Kindly try to realise the situation in the interest of the nation and democracy, and avoid political spinning. Now the politics is in the "no spin zone" Failure to reach a logical agreement will firmly establish the failure of politicians to handle any crisis.

We cannot predict what we are going to hear or see next week. So far the future of democracy appears unsafe.

Some ministers and BNP loyalists claim that justice Hasan has the constitutional responsibility and a right to be the next the chief advisor of the CG because of the 14th amendment to the constitution. How tenable is this argument?

When Justice Hasan retired on 27 January 2004 he had no idea that an amendment to the constitution would be made. Or did he? After all, he appears to be a bird of the same flock as the rest of the government. This amendment was made after he retired and only because he was a BNP loyalist. If he were a former member of the AL or any other party or even a neutral person, we can be absolutely sure that there would have been no such amendment.

The 14th amendment of the constitution was passed on 16 May 2004 in the absence of the AL and ratified by the president on 17 May 2004 and therefore the AL should also bear some responsibility for allowing this to go uncontested. It is however doubtful that the presence of the AL would make any difference to the proceedings.

The reason given by the BNP for raising the age limit of the appellate division judges was to retain experienced judges. This reason is not tenable because nothing happened to or in the Supreme Court at that time to suggest that the situation had taken a sudden turn for the worse to warrant such an amendment to the constitution. The amendment, even if necessary, should have waited for a couple of years until opinions on this issue were heard from all sides, especially because of its implications for the caretaker government. The caretaker government was made a part of the constitution by the 13th amendment after prolonged consultation among all the major parties and the same procedure should have been followed for amendments to it.

In my opinion, the 14th amendment is an act of supreme wickedness on the part of the BNP.

Those who foam up their mouth reciting the sacredness of the constitution should know that clever people in power are capable of a great deal of mischief while remaining within the limits of the law. When they have the power to make laws or amend constitution the citizens are put in a very precarious situation.

We may remember that apartheid was legally and constitutionally sanctioned in South Africa, so were Hitler's wars and genocide. Pakistani atrocities in Bangladesh were said to have been committed in the interest of national integration.

The provision of importation of duty free vehicles by MPs is legal but highly inappropriate. Ask anyone who is not an MP and he will tell you that it is inappropriate for the government to allow MPs not to pay tax while rest have to pay through their noses.

People while in power may make laws as they wish to serve their own purpose and may impose them on the rest of us. Provision of duty free cars was made by Ershad and should have gone with him if our politicians and MPs had any spine.

People in power should be given a message that such laws cannot be the last word. Laws should be perceived as appropriate, fair and in public interest.

The 14th amendment has none of these virtues. It is, if anything, a proof of what pseudo democrats with the help of servile MPs can do to us, the people, if we are not vigilant all the time.

The 14th amendment is full of silly provisions and should be scraped in time. Such acts only serve to increase people's apathy for laws, lawmakers and authority in general. If there is no time for amending it now, at least let us, by mutual agreement postpone the operation of a law that should not have been enacted in the first place.

Mansur Ahmed, Uttara, Dhaka

Career knows no laws, but Mr. Oli Ahmed has proved that it is not always true. In these days we hardly find people still fighting corruption. I became very upset when I heard from his mouth that he joined another party only for this corruption. Like everybody I also think about three major issues. But nobody has any headache about corruption, which should be a major issue in the next elections.

Sayeed, Dhaka

It was clear that the long awaited dialogue between BNP Secretary General Mannan Bhuiyan and AL General Secretary Abdul Jalil would fail and the people of the country were going to suffer a lot for the irresponsible politicians. I am sure if Mannan Bhuiyan and Abdul Jalil were free men and were not controlled by the selfish hardliners of both the parties the dialogue would have brought something good for the nation.

Ironically, Chief Justice KM Hasan and Justice MA Aziz are also working irresponsibly and leading the nation to a war-like situation. Time and again it has been proved that Justice Hasan is not neutral and Justice Aziz will not be able to conduct the election smoothly. If Justice Hasan declares that he is no longer interested to be the chief of the caretaker government and Justice Aziz resigns from the post of Chief Election Commissioner there is every possibility that things will calm down. If there is bloodshed due to the failure of the dialogue Justice Aziz and Justice Hasan will largely remain responsible for this.

Dr. Mahboob Hossain, Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacy, The University of Asia Pacific, Dhaka