Attempting to politically annihilate AL will backfire: Mahfuj Alam

Former adviser to the interim government Mahfuj Alam has warned that continuing the culture of politically annihilating opponents - as was done to Jamaat in the past - and attempting to eliminate the Awami League in a similar manner would ultimately backfire, pushing the state towards deeper authoritarianism.

He made the remarks yesterday (29 January) while reviewing the interim government's activities and experiences over the past 15 months at a conference titled "Cracks in the old settlement, reform and the reimagining of democracy" held at the BRAC Centre Inn in the capital.

Mahfuj said that following the July Uprising, there had been hopes of initiating a truth and reconciliation process. However, he cautioned against repeating a political culture rooted in elimination rather than reconciliation.

"We do not want to create another monster," he said, noting that suppressing a major political force would require increasingly repressive laws, making the state more coercive and authoritarian. He warned that such an approach would eventually boomerang, producing outcomes similar to those seen in the past.

While discussing the broader failures of the interim period, Mahfuj said the idea of a desired "new political arrangement" after the uprising could not be clearly articulated to the public, particularly to students. He added that the government had also "failed badly" to dismantle the entrenched "triad of power" involving the civil and military bureaucracy.

"This bureaucracy still exists and will continue to exist in the future. This is where everything has stalled," he said.

On the economy, Mahfuj said the government had largely focused on keeping the system afloat rather than implementing structural reforms. Although there had been some improvement in transparency and efficiency, fundamental issues such as land reform and wealth redistribution had remained untouched for decades, he said, warning that the economy could "collapse any day."

He also acknowledged that despite intentions to end the culture of killings and enforced disappearances, such incidents had continued over the past one to one-and-a-half years.

Mahfuj further criticised sections of civil society and the media, saying a large portion of civil society had become "crippled" over the past 15 years by legitimising the Awami League, and stressed that political parties and civil society must operate in clearly separate spheres.

Expressing confidence in the younger generation, he said the pain and trauma they had experienced had sharpened their sense of the need for reform. "Governments may fail, but the aspirations of a generation have not failed," he said, adding that there remained ample time to learn from past mistakes and correct course.