Democracy and the Jamaat-e-Islami dilemma

If half-baked plans were a form of culinary art, surely the current government would be chefs of the highest order with its half-baked posturing that it is going to ban Jamaat-e-Islami through a parliamentary bill. While we all understand the outright hostility Jamaat has garnered within most circles, this sort of move is a rather dangerous and short-sighted one, even from the fine people who brought us the 'Padma Bridge scandal' but not the Padma Bridge, yet. To put it in terms we all can feel uncomfortable about, you cannot ban a party in a democracy.

Banning any major political party regardless of their respective history is a bad idea. Germany, Italy, France, Spain, Argentina, Vietnam, Cambodia are just some of the countries that tried to put unwanted parties in body bags but ended up with millions of citizens in body bags. Now, one can argue that these countries are nothing like Bangladesh, but legal disfranchisement creates the same sort of results, be it in the killing fields of Cambodia or in the Egyptian jails where Muslim Brotherhood became the force that it is now.

Despite rampaging youths and a steady stream of propaganda we have not reached that point of complete disintegration, but if we are to proceed with the banning of Jaamat through parliamentary process where the majority party is the only party wearing a party hat and playing ball, then, we are opening a can of worms that we as a nation cannot afford to swallow.

Whether we like it or not, Jamaat is the party of choice in various parts of the country. In the last few elections, Jamaat acquired a number of parliamentary seats and cannot but be considered a part of the political landscape. That being said, there are myriad reasons people do and do not vote for Jamaat. Despite my numerous qualms with Jaamat, starting with their less than stellar record during the '71 Liberation War, and the hardened hooliganism they are engaged in as they try to stop the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT), they have the right to exist (within legal means) in a democratic society.

Furthermore, to ban a party through the means of the parliament, a parliament which is already dominated by only one party would only strengthen the resolve of Jamaat. After all, these people are not Bangla Bhai's group of ragtag Islamists. They own banks, hospitals, shipping companies, "leaders" of the nation, and more than likely are related through marriage to both major political parties and the army hierarchy. They have money and they have influence. Once the initial shock subsides, Jamaat activists would rebrand themselves but this time around they will have the moral high ground of being a disfranchised class on their side to further progress their agenda. In a game of thrones you don't give away the moral high ground despite your opponent trying brutally hard to induce such a reaction.

Let us not forget that, if hooliganism is the only criterion we need to ban a party, then we would have to ban all political parties in this country. Who among us have not seen the murder of Biswajit or the disappearance of countless activists who did not agree with the prevailing powers? So despite that queasy feeling in our stomachs, we cannot hold Jamaat to a higher standard than the other parties.

Remember, democracy is not only a function but also an idea, and one of the basic tenets of democracy is inclusiveness despite disagreement. As a society, we must first adhere to that value as opposed to trying to negate a force that is and will remain part of Bangladeshi politics.

If we ban Jamaat-e-Islami without any real prescription on how to handle their "orphans," we run the risk (which inevitably leads to action) of disfranchising people who have rights that are guaranteed within our constitution, even the right to deny the gains of '71. Germany was going through a process of banning the Nazi party but that reeked of political score settling and in politics perception remains reality. Journalist Lucien Kim commented in the International Herald Tribune that any such move was to create an illusion of action (from the politicians) and the Nazi party would have just evolved into a beast of the same kind under some other banner. Jamaat is not special enough to be different from this equation.

The problem is not a party like Jamaat exists; the problem is that they exist with the explicit approval of certain parts of our population who are citizens of this country. The real problem is that the social conditions of the country that allow intolerance to thrive with impunity. That sort of intolerance is not accidental but a product of sustained and well thought out rejection of progress for the sake of faux-piety. The barely educated, machete-wielding street warrior who kills in the name of God is no less of a product of an outdated ideology than he is a product of living in an impoverished country that is fighting a covert war between secular ideals and religious zealotry. The degenerates who allegedly killed and dismembered blogger Ahmed Rajib Haider because of his lack of religious beliefs should be treated as the criminals they are. They should not be given the blessing of an ideology and/or myths of "doing Allah's work" that has permeated the poorly educated, easily brainwashed population and a group of elites who have taken advantage of this situation through the means of twisting or taking literally the words of their respective holy books.

So the problem is deeper than Jamaat-e-Islami. Jamaat simply takes advantage of the prevailing conditions, just like the BNP or the Awami League (their attachment to the past is offensive but does not make them a special party). I have seen the carnage of all the political parties and the claim of victimhood from all the perpetrators. If we as a society decide to settle the score at the expense of democratic tenets and ideals, we do not run the risk of jeopardizing it, we just run the inevitability of burying it with blogger Ahmed Rajib Haider and the countless other political activists who have died because they had a differing opinion from the hoards of halfwits that carry on violence as a badge of honour to claim higher moral ground because someone misinterpreted a holy book for them or someone insulted some historical figure.

If we do not improve the conditions of this society on how it treats minorities, women and its citizens, we will preside over the deaths of many. And we will become immune like the previous generations who have let this go on for this long not because they were lazy or self-involved, but because it is easy to flinch at the face of brutality. The reaction to brutality and stupidity should not be to amplify and replicate them, even if inflamed sentiments suggest we should.

Simply banning Jamaat-e-Islami would be far from a rational move. Instead, changing the circumstances where a party like Jamaat has to adhere to the rules of the state and has to evolve to survive in an open and transparent society, where dissent and satire of even holy words are not treated with a machete, should be the goal. Anything else is illusion masquerading as action. Evolve or expire. The choice is ours.

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Jyoti Omi Chowdhury is a war theorist and a visiting researcher at the Center for Sustainable Development, Harvard University.