Lofty goals, but fragile base of local government

Both the ruling Awami League and the BNP are set to emerge victorious in the five upcoming city corporation elections in their own ways. Sounds perplexing, doesn't it?

Here's an explanation. A boycott by the BNP has already made the polls a one-sided game. It is a win for their politics, for now at least. On the other hand, any mayoral candidate nominated by the party in power is going on a cakewalk.

Only voters of the city corporations will be deprived of participatory elections. But who cares about voters?  

None of the top leaders of the BNP are interested in becoming mayor of any city corporation, an urban local government institution. So, it was an easy decision for them to boycott the upcoming five city corporation elections scheduled for May and June.

There was no news reported by the media that the views of grassroots leaders were sought to take the all-important decision though election to any local government institution is always meant for them.  

The BNP's high command is however aware of the feelings of their grassroots. Many of them in Gazipur, Rajshahi, Khulna, Barisal and Sylhet are willing to contest the city polls, particularly for the councillor's posts as many of them were elected in the last elections.

Sensing their discontent, the party's top leaders, notable among them, its secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, has repeatedly issued warnings of punitive actions against grassroots leaders if any of them joins the race to become public representative by defying the party's decision.

Why are the BNP's top leaders so impassioned against the city corporation polls?

They are focused on something of much greater importance —the upcoming national election in which the party's top leaders will contest. Only a win in that election can take the party to state power through formation of a government for five years.

But the type of the election time government has remained the grounds of war since scrapping the polls time nonpartisan caretaker government in 2011. Like previous occasions, the top BNP leaders have now made their political stance clear. They say they will not contest the next parliamentary election with the Awami League in office during the polls as they argue the national election held under a partisan government would neither be free nor fair.

Therefore, they argue a non-partisan caretaker government during the national election is a must for holding a free and fair election, but the ruling AL in no way accepts the opposition's demand as it refused earlier before in the two elections of 2014 and 2018.

To mount pressure on the ruling party and the government as well, the BNP is leaving no stones unturned and boycotting the city corporations' elections is part of the party's political strategy. But that deprives the grassroots leaders of being elected as public representatives to consolidate their power bases in their areas.

The boycott has minimised the options for voters living in the five city corporation's areas to scrutinise the competence and integrity of the candidates and their electoral pledges before casting ballots. So, business seems as usual for voters.

The BNP has however been claiming that it is working to restore democracy in the country though intra-party democratic practice remains absent as evidenced by the latest action in taking the decision to boycott the city polls.

The actions of the ruling camp are not beyond questions either.

The party in power since 2009 has not done much to improve the quality of the elections that could have supported the claim that a partisan government can ensure level playing field for all in any election be it parliamentary or local government.

The election system has largely been tarnished due to violence and widespread irregularities, including capturing of polling stations and stuffing of ballot boxes by mainly ruling party grassroots level leaders and activists.

Low voter turnout in by-elections in more than a dozen parliamentary constituencies held in recent years indicates people's lack of interest and confidence in the election system.

The Election Commission could not deliver on its constitutional mandates that led to erosion of public confidence in it.   

However, the upcoming polls to the five city corporations – Gazipur, Rajshahi, Khulna, Barisal and Sylhet – again appear to be crucial even after the boycott by the BNP because the elections are being held just 6/7 months before the next parliamentary election.

The outcomes and quality of the previous two elections to these five city corporations are noteworthy to understand the present sorry state of election administration under the leadership of the EC.

In 2013 polls to these five city corporations held around six months before the January 2014 parliamentary election were fiercely contested and largely free and fair. The BNP-backed mayoral candidates clinched victory in all the mayoral posts for five city corporations. Accepting those defeats, the ruling party took credit that free and fair elections were possible under a partisan government.   

But the dispute over the mode of election-time government remained unresolved. The BNP boycotted and tried to resist the parliamentary polls held in early January 2014 amid intense localised violence and widespread electoral irregularities. That election also set an unprecedented record of having as many as 153 out of 300 MPs elected unopposed.

On the eve of the first anniversary of the January parliamentary polls, the BNP-led opposition in 2015 enforced countrywide indefinite blockade which was marred by widespread violence such as arson attacks on public transports killing dozens of people over a period of months.

Elections to these five city corporations were scheduled again in the middle of 2018, six months ahead of another parliamentary election. This time no more repetition of 2013 polls. Except Sylhet, the ruling AL candidates won all remaining four city corporations mayoral posts in the elections marred by widespread electoral irregularities.

Six months later, the 2018 parliamentary election, though not boycotted by the BNP-led opposition parties, drew outrage.

Another parliamentary election is now around the corner and as usual, the five city corporations are scheduled for election in May and June.

This time, BNP gave a walkover to the AL leaving all the mayoral posts wide open. Now, the fate of the national election, whether it will be participatory or not, remains to be seen.

The quality of elections held since 2009 to other local government institutions such as upazila parishads and municipalities has also been questioned.  This means holding free and fair elections to local government still remains a major challenge, let alone strengthening them with more legal and financial powers to turn the cities into economic growth centres as promised by the party in power in its elections' manifesto 15 years ago.   

Neglecting the local government in fact has always been a common strategy of all successive political governments since the independence of Bangladesh, while military rulers Gen Ziaur Rahman and Gen Ershad abused them to consolidate their power base in rural Bangladesh.  

Therefore, the lofty goals stipulated in article 11 of the Constitution which focuses on ensuring effective participation of people through their elected representatives in administration at all levels still remains unachieved for the last five decades.

Is there any alternative to strengthening the local government system and decentralisation of powers which many advanced and emerging economies have done long ago for better governance and economic growth?

Former finance minister AMA Muhith was a lone ranger as he, in some of his budget speeches, had kept focusing on the need for a strong local government for better economic growth.

In FY 2017 budget speech, he said the poor state of local governance remains a major impediment to governance in the country.

"It would be difficult to infuse dynamism in development initiatives to achieve 10 percent GDP growth unless an enabling environment is created by devolving power," he stated.

But his repeated call always fell flat. Neither the government nor MPs were interested in empowering the local government bodies with complete jurisdiction over development activities in their areas.  

The poor base of the local government system does not conform with Bangladesh's lofty goals to become an upper-middle-income country by 2031 and a high-income one by 2041.

The country is now on track for graduating from the least developed country status in 2026, five decades and a half into its independence. It needs to maintain a GDP growth rate of over 8% as stipulated in the 8th Five-year Plan and increase its per capita income to around $13,000 from $2,824 now in less than two decades to reach the milestones in less than two decades.  

For a big boost to GDP growth, the local governance system needs to be dynamic as seen in other developed and emerging economies across the world. Decentralisation of powers can lead to development of other cities and turn them into economic growth centres.

But unplanned and unequal development policy over the years turned Dhaka into a centre for everything – from politics to power, administration, business, education, health care. Other cities and towns remained out of favour and offered fewer opportunities for livelihoods.

Interestingly, Dhaka city corporation was split into two in 2011 considering the size and pressure on the capital. But the corporations were not given authorities over the city utility service providers.

Two decades ago, the demand for the introduction of a metropolitan government system led by mayors in Dhaka and Chattogram to bring all utility service providers under an umbrella saw some discussions. But nobody speaks about it today.

Three urban development specialists of the World Bank – John Roome, Annie Gapihan and Hyunji Lee – in 2019 in their article cited global experience showing that no country in the world has moved up within the middle-income status without developing its cities.

"Most countries that achieved middle-income status did so when the majority of their citizens were living in cities – high-income status is mostly accompanied with 70-80% of people living in cities," the article said.

Bangladesh is currently 38% urban, meaning that the country needs more people moving to urban centres and to make fast-growing cities liveable and productive to make sure that gains of urbanisation are shared by all.

Decentralisation of powers to strengthen the local government system as governance experts have been arguing for long are the keys to achieving the lofty goals.

For that major reforms are needed, but no reform will work if elections are not free, fair and participatory as when electoral democracy is not functioning in the best way possible, the quality of the governance falls drastically.

This should also be noted that sweeping electoral reforms carried out before the 2008 parliamentary election have now little impact on politics.

Ultimately, election is the basis of democratic legitimacy as Abraham Lincoln has defined democracy, "as the rule of the people, by the people and for the people".

Local government elections are political in most other countries too. The difference is, the election systems in those places function as designed. So, when the ruling party won in metropolitan government elections in South Korea last year and Japan in April this year, nobody rejected the results. Rather, both the ruling parties successfully used the mayoral polls in major cities including Seoul, Busan and Tokyo as a testbed for their popularity. They won the litmus test through the city polls and appeared firmer.

Instead of mud-slinging, the new mayors would now focus more on making their cities smarter, carrying forward the planned reforms to ensure better services to citizens who elected them.

Here, parties count their political mileage caring little about the electors' choice. They rarely have any commitment to voters. Even if they have some, they forget it soon after the elections. Sometimes, Political rivalry also makes their work difficult. In 2013, all the five major city mayor posts went to the main opposition BNP. Though the victory offered political confidence to the BNP, voters' got little as the mayors elected from the opposition camp had to struggle to get projects or budgets sanctioned from the ministries concerned. The Gazipur mayor completed almost his entire tenure shuttling from court to jail. The Sylhet mayor used his personal capacity to undertake and implement some programmes to the benefit of city dwellers.

For most city mayors, running city government affairs is just business as usual.

This is quite unlike that of the Seoul city mayor, Oh Se-hoon. Oh Se-hoon is pursuing to improve the Smart city project to give city people better traffic, smoother bus service to lower the number of cars further from the present 30%, a cleaner environment by expediting power generation from waste, make the city administration more job-oriented by equipping single-point call centres with modern tech to respond to public complaints instantly, among other responsibilities. 

Mayors in Bangladesh, be it from ruling or opposition, rarely have any visions of their own to serve their electorate. They mostly run common programmes taken up by the government or funded by development partners. While mayors from the opposition camp cite a hostile attitude of the government towards them, those elected from the ruling party bother little about answering to voters' grievances. In any of these cases, voters rarely have anything to expect in terms of quality of services they are entitled to, though political parties will not stop weighing their losses or gains from winning, losing or boycotting the game.

Shakhawat Liton is the Deputy Executive Editor of The Business Standard.