Practice of Democracy in Political Parties: Selected Cases of Bangladesh

Abstract

Bangladesh is on, 3 of those new democracies where democratic culture and practice of democracy in institution level is yet to strike deep roots into the social soil. Institutional framework has been created, but these institutions have not been vibrant with life forces. Scores of political parties exist in the country, but all of these are allegedly organized on feudal lines and typed in the authoritarian way rather than democratically. Democracy was important ideological basis of independence struggle of Bangladesh. It is a fundamental principle of state policy in the Constitution of Bangladesh also. The country has passed about thirty-six years since independence, but its achievements in the spheres of democracy and development are not noteworthy. Bangladesh society with an under-developed political culture is lacking in truly democratic political organizations, institutions and practices. The country has some good signs for democracy such as parliamentary system of government, parliamentary committee system, multiparty polity, a fairly democratic Constitution and so on. Nevertheless, democracy in Bangladesh exists mainly in hope rather than in reality. Frustration creep up in public mind as politicians have, largely, failed to reap the fruits of democracy for the greater interest of the nation building, while they indulge in, highly confrontational nature of domestic politics. Political parties in Bangladesh are very much non-democratic in nature because they have no consensus on national issues, no tolerance at all, and have not been accountable to their followers. Political parties in Bangladesh have miserably failed to establish democratic system within their respective parties and the party leadership continued sort of dictatorship in running the party affairs. Chairman or President of the party holds absolute authority and everything is determined as per his/her desire. The wishes of the chief of the party are given the highest importance. Each major political party is headed by a person who is omnipotent in the management of the party, including the formation of central and executive committees. The party structure and committees are filled by nomination not by election. In a democracy parliament should be the main centre to solve all problems. But in Bangladesh, parliament, the main forum of people's representatives, has not been able to function properly even after the restoration of parliamentary democracy. The role of the speaker, the leader and opposition leader of the house have been none-too-active viewed from the standpoint of parliamentary functioning. None of them can possibly claim that he/she plays a definite role in favour of strengthening parliamentary democracy. The way that they react to their rivals' assertions in the house is not healthy for the democratic process. The General objective of the study is to critically evaluate the practice of democracy as performed by political parties in Bangladesh. The specific objectives of the study are: To examine how far democracy works inside individual political parties of Bangladesh, to explore the causes of non-democratic practices (if any) in Bangladesh's political parties, to have a comparative view of the practice of democracy among major political parties in Bangladesh, to evaluate the role of political parties in strengthening democracy in the country, to examine the practice of democracy in the Parliament performed by the political parties as party in power and as opposition. The present study may be categorized as an evaluative one. The analysis of the research is primarily qualitative in nature, although to realize the objectives of the study, quantitative interpretations, where possible, were attempted. The researcher used the historical method to examine written documents which involved content analysis also. In addition to this procedure, the researcher undertook a survey on purposively selected political parties and the leaders and followers of those parties from various committee/unit levels. The researcher also used observation and descriptive methods in conducting this study. Two major political parties have been selected purposively for the proposed study. They are Bangladesh Awami League (AL) and Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). The respondents were taken from the different levels of the selected two political parties' hierarchy and the total numbers of respondents were 170. The dissertation comprises of eight chapters. The first chapter titled 'Introduction' deals with the milieu of practicing democracy in political parties in Bangladesh, statement of problem, definitions of key terms used in the study, review of literature, objectives, justification, feasibility, scope and limitations of the study, methods of the study, area selection, sources of data, sampling procedures, sample size, data collection method, data analysis and interpretation, etc. The second chapter is on theoretical background of democracy and the origins of democracy in Greece, UK, USA, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Concept and meaning of democracy, forms and types of democracy and preconditions for the success of democracy are also the subject matter of this chapter. The third chapter deals with the theoretical background of political party i.e. the origin of political parties, evolution of political parties in British India, Indian National Congress, and Pakistan Muslim League. In the second part of the chapter the origin and development and ups and down of the two major political parties (Bangladesh Awami League and Bangladesh Nationalist Party) have been highlighted. Chapter four examines the party constitutions of AL and BNP. In this chapter organisational structure, membership criteria, leadership selection process, candidate selection process, financial management of the party, the powers and functions of the party chairman of both parties of Bangladesh have been evaluated critically in the line of democratic values. Chapter five deals with the major findings of the survey conducted by the researcher. Democratic and non-democratic practices performed by the two major political parties of Bangladesh have been identified and critically analysed in this chapter. The respondents were interviewed regarding their election process, formation of committees on due time or not, elected by secret ballot or not, council meetings, role of general members in leadership selection, decision making process, role of leaders in policy issues, holding regular meetings of the committees, freedom of speech in committee, income and expenditure of the party, financial transparency and accountability of the party, candidate selection process or nomination procedure, role of money in candidate selection system, effectiveness of parliament, absence from parliamentary business, knowledge of party constitution, adherence and following party constitution, absolute power of party chairman-- all these issues are discussed in this chapter. Chapter six illustrates the practice of democracy exercised by AL and BNP as party in power and as opposition in parliament of Bangladesh. In this chapter the key issues of parliamentary democracy like practice of democracy in legislation, parliamentary surveillance. Nature of the MPs' activism, oversight techniques, parliamentary committee system, walkout and boycott, attendance in parliament etc. have been analysed critically. Chapter seven traces the causes of non-democratic practices in major political parties of Bangladesh. It was found from the survey and other secondary sources that the main causes which hinders the practicing democracy within parties are: hereditary nature of leadership, lack of democratic mentality and values, personality cult, corruption and criminalization of politics, internal conflict and grouping, lack of adherence to respective party constitution, lack of honest dedicated and patriotic leaders, leaders are unwilling to change leadership, historical cause, patron-client relationship, constitutional flaw, lack of law enforcement, lack of trust and tolerance, etc. In chapter eight, an overall summary of the chapters and concluding remarks have been furnished. It is dealing with the findings in brief as well as some recommendations in accordance with the suggestions of the respondents. Most of the respondents (92%) admits that they or their committees were elected. 90 leaders (52.94%) admits that their committees were formed either through the announcement of nomination or recommendation of the party high ups or were directly selected / appointed by the party's central committee. More than two-thirds (67 .06%) of the respondents assert that their committees were not elected by secret ballot while one-thirds (32.94%) of the respondents were elected by secret ballot. Large majority of leaders (85%) assert that their committees were not formed in due time. 14.1 % of AL leaders and 12.9% of BNP leaders admit that central leaders influence the lower committees' decisions. Three-fifths of the respondents (60%) think that their party chief plays the role in making policies or programmes or manifestoes of their party. Large majority of the respondents (90%) agree that obviously general members and workers should be involved in policy formulation and decision making process of their parties. More than three-fourths of the respondents (76%) recognize that their parties do not involve their grass root level workers and committees in policy issues. Among the respondents 67% of AL leaders, 84% of BNP leaders think that the policy making procedure in their respective parties are not democratic. An overwhelming majority of the respondents (71.2%) inform that their committees / units in which they belong to, do not hold regular meetings. More than half of the respondents (53.52%) admit that general or primary members have no freedom of speech in their respective committees. Overwhelming majority of the respondents (78%) does not know their party's income source. Only 22% of respondents say that they have knowledge about income source of their parties. Comparatively 71.8% of AL leaders and 83.5% of BNP leaders don't have any clear idea regarding income of their respective parties. Large majority of the respondents (88.2%) state that their political units have no account in any bank. Nearly cent per cent of the respondents (97.6%) admit that their unit or committees and as a whole the party do not audit their financial activities each year by professional audit organization. A large majority of the respondents (87.6%) state that the general members and workers of their respective parties cannot know about total income and expenditure of the party. More than two-thirds of respondents (68%) admit that their party has no transparency and accountability in case of financial matters (i.e. income and expenditure) of their parties. Less than half of the respondents (46%) feel that their candidate selection system is democratic. But it is also significant that 39% of leaders of the mc.1jor political parties admit that their party does not follow democratic system in selecting candidates. Nearly three-fourths of the respondents (72%) state that when their party was in power they neglected the opposition in parliamentary activities. Almost all the respondents (99.5%) agree to the proposition that continuous absence from the parliament for any political party is another undemocratic practice which hinders the growth of parliamentary democracy. 89.4% of respondents express that when their party were in opposition, they were absent continuously from working days of the parliamentary business avoiding duties. 89.4% of the respondents agree that the article 70 of the constitution of Bangladesh is another obstacle to practice of democracy within political party as well as in parliament. 72% of the respondents believe that regionalism, nepotism and partiality are widespread in their parties. Comparatively saying, 65.9% of AL office bearers and side by side 77.6% of BNP leaders admit that there exist these negative elements in their parties which prove that they practice non-democratic cultures. More than three-fifths of the respondents (61 %) assert that the politicians receive extra-legal benefits during their tenure of public office. A large majority and more than three-fifths of respondents (76.5%) feel that democratic practices are missing or absent in the structure and functioning of the major political parties in Bangladesh at the moment. More than half of the respondents (53.3%) had no hesitation to admit that their own party lacked internal practice of democracy. Majority of the respondents (91.8%) agree that having absolute Power of the party chief is obviously non-democratic. To maintain fairness in leadership selection in political parties, democratic selection process should be taken at all level. In addition all kinds of internal election should be based on secret ballot. It is also needed that all committees of parties should be formed in regular basis and elected by the popular voting of concerned unit members/workers of the parties In making decision instead of some key leaders, lower units and grass-root level leaders must be involved especially on national and vital issues. Political parties should maintain regularity in holding meetings at every level or units as per their constitutional provision including national council meetings. There is urgent need for one comprehensive legislation that should provide for opening compulsory bank account for every committee of parties and all financial activities would be maintained by those bank accounts and compulsory auditing of the accounts of all political parties registered with the Election Commission should be done by an independent authority, and publishing of audited party accounts to be made available for public inspection and scrutiny. The legislation should include provisions for maintaining strict, detailed and transparent records of all receipts and expenses of political parties carried through established bank accounts at all levels. The candidate selection process of major political parties must be democratic in the way that local unit leaders or grass-root leaders should be involved in the process. More over, the nominations for MPs, city councils and municipal councillors, and upozilla (Sub-District) and union council members must come from grass-root levels through secret ballot of nomination committee members at the respective electoral districts, and not from the party headquarters. MPs should be rewarded for maximum presence and the list of members with best and worst record of attendance could be made public. Regular attendance of Prime Minister in the sessions can reduce the quorum crisis. The opposition leader should also be present regularly in parliamentary sessions. A rule may be introduced so that one out of every 7 or 15 days can be set aside for the opposition party members. All the issues raised by the opposition will be discussed on this day, and the opposition parties too will be encouraged to join and attend the sessions of the parliament. A new convention may be followed under which the Speaker and his deputy are elected from opposing camps and on their election to parliamentary leadership they resign from the parties they have been elected from. All MPs should be treated equally and there should be no discrimination in the allocation of resources to them from the treasury for service to their constituents. The MPs should inform people about their success and failure every year and should be introduced the "Right to Recall" on the basis of public opinion. MPs should be free to voice their feelings and vote as they want on most issues in parliament. The use of Article 70 of the Constitution should be limited only in two places: during the motion or question of no confidence of incumbent government and in the question of electing parliamentary party leader. All the committees should be formed during the very first session of each new assembly. All standing committees should hold meetings at least once in a month as per the RoP and they should make necessary reports on important issues or irregularities of concerned ministries. Parliamentary knowledge can be disseminated through the print media and modern information technology including regular journalistic coverage of proceedings of the House and its committees. To consolidate effective democratic practices in parties, major political parties of Bangladesh should have democratic constitution and those should be followed strictly. Absolute power of party chairman should be removed and the accountability of the leadership must be established at every level in the party constitution and in practice also. It is also needed to organize and orient adult population in democratic values and practices thorough publicity, seminars and meetings. Though the major political parties of Bangladesh have significant role in developing democratic order in this country at state level, their performance in respect of practising democracy within parties are not at satisfactory level. The democratic practices in line with democratic ideals such as periodic leadership selection by secret ballot at every level, fair candidate selection based on grass-root support, holding regular meetings including councils or conventions, democratic decision making process involving local level leaders, financial accountability, adherence to party rules etc. was absent or not vibrant in major political parties of Bangladesh particularly from 1972 to 2006. If the suggestions recommended in this study as well as from the other studies done so far on democracy and political party related issues are taken into considerations, the non-democratic practising situations are expected to reduce gradually to a certain extent though cent percent democratic political party is quite impossible in the context of Bangladesh. Otherwise, the very people's choice of governance, democracy will not take deeper root in political parties as well as in the soil of Bangladesh.