As
popularity of rightwing party Hefazat-e-Islam grows, millions of female garment
workers increasingly fear for their jobs
Six
mornings a week, Tania Akhter leaves her home in the Banasri Ullah Para neighbourhood
in the north of Dhaka , the Bangladeshi
capital, for the garments factory where she stitches jackets and trousers to be
sold on western high streets. The journey takes the 23-year-old through a
simmering city.
Protests
and clashes in Dhaka and elsewhere in the
country have diminished in recent weeks but with about 100 dead and thousands
injured, tensions remain high. A series of "shutdowns" have been
enforced by political groups, more are threatened and many fear violence will
flare again.
The
battle pits religious conservatives against more moderate, progressive voices
in a fight to determine the future direction of the country – the world's
eighth most populous – 40 years after it won independence from Pakistan in a
brutal war.
The
most recent development is the emergence of a radical conservative Muslim
party, Hefazat-e- Islam, as the standard bearer of the religious right. Earlier
this month, at a huge rally in Dhaka attended
by more than 100,000 according to police, the party issued 13 demands. They
included the introduction of measures to stop "alien culture" making
inroads in Bangladesh, the reinstatement of the line "absolute trust and
faith in the Almighty Allah" in the nation's constitution, which is
largely secular, and a ban on new statues in public places.
But
it was Hefazat-e-Islam's demand that men and women do not mix in public – seen
by many as a bid to stop women working outside the home – that most worried
Akhter, one of tens of millions of female labourers in Bangladesh's booming
garment industry.
"If
we are not allowed to work, how will we survive?" asked Akhter, who
supports her elderly parents on her monthly wage of 6,500 takas (£55).
"Many of our coworkers were abandoned by their husbands. Some families
only have daughters, whose parents are old. What will a single mother do? We
will not have any means for a living."
Hefazat-e-Islam's
demand is opposed by employers too. "There are women in media, defence,
and development. There cannot be development [by] keeping half of a population
ineffective," Mushrefa Mishu, president of the Garment Workers' Unity
Forum, told the Guardian.
But
beyond the issue of women working are much larger questions. "Although Bangladesh
is a Muslim-majority country, it is a people's republic, not a Muslim
country," said Mishu.
The
unrest was initially provoked by the first verdicts passed by the international
war crimes tribunal, set up by Sheikh Hasina, the prime minister and daughter
of the wartime leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, to investigate atrocities
committed during the 1971 conflict.
When
a group of young moderates in Dhaka
demonstrated in the central Shahbag
Square , their protest quickly grew into a mass
movement demanding accountability and harsh sentences for alleged crimes during
the war.
The
conflict left up to 3 million people dead. At least 200,000 women were raped
while millions fled to neighbouring India .
Religious
conservatives, many loyal to JI, took to the streets to counter the Shahbag
demonstrators, accusing their leaders of being atheists and blasphemers.
Some
of the violence has been explicitly sectarian, with attacks on places of
worship of the small Hindu minority. Several activists have been shot dead by
the police who routinely use live ammunition to quell protest.
The
leader of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist party (BNP), Khaleda Zia, the
widow of the independence war's best-known military commander, has accused
Hasina of using the tribunal to hound political enemies.
In
turn, Zia has been charged with encouraging and exploiting the rightwing anger.
Hefazat-e-Islam are close to JI, which is a key ally of the BNP.
The
conservatives say they are victims of a smear campaign and that their aims have
been misunderstood. "The idea that Hefazat-e-Islam is taking the country
back to the medieval age through its demands is propaganda," said
Moinuddin Ruhi, joint secretary of the party. "We are not opposing women's
development … Hefazat demands women refrain from free mixing in society to
avoid sexual harassment and incidents such as rape. This does not … mean we
want them to refrain from going to work or study. They should go to work and
study following the principles of Islam."
Akhter
countered that she and her female colleagues were "responsible enough to
protect our own prestige and self-respect".
Hefazat-e-Islam
officials say they will "besiege" Dhaka
next month if the government does not agree to their demands.
There
are fears that the pressure from the conservatives is having an effect. Shortly
after officials said their demands would be considered last week, police
detained four bloggers who are seen as sympathetic to the Shahbag movement and
critical of Islamists on charges of "hurting religious sentiment".
In
Bangladesh ,
defaming a religion on the internet can carry a 10-year jail sentence. One of
Hefazat-e-Islam's principal demands is that the death penalty be imposed in
such circumstances.
Pinaki
Bhattacharya, a blogger and online activist, describes the arrests as
unacceptable. "I believe we should not unnecessarily hurt someone's
beliefs. I believe everybody should be sensible. Everybody should have their
own sense of responsibility and they should not indulge into things which might
create unrest and trouble in society," said Pinaki.
Police
in Bangladesh
have also arrested the acting editor of Amar Desh, a pro-opposition newspaper,
on several charges, including sedition. Mahmudur Rahman of the Bengali-language
publication was detained in a raid on his office in Dhaka ,
said a city police official Masudur Rahman.
The
arrest has concerned local journalists. Nurul Kabir, editor-in-chief of Bangladesh 's
popular English daily New Age, said: "I have serious disagreement with the
editorial policy of Mahmudur Rahman and the most of the contents that his paper
Amar Desh disseminates, but I have no doubt that the government has arrested
him primarily because of his active support for the opposition political camps.
In a democratic dispensation, this is unacceptable."
Elections
are due in Bangladesh
later this year or early in 2014.
Yet, in this dreadful tragic drama of internecine conflict neither of the contending protagonists will be the winner. There will be no spoils of victory for them. The losers will be the country, its people. Women’s empowerment and dignity will suffer. Above all, there is no glory in presiding over the liquidation of one’s own country.
ReplyDeleteThe winners will be the forces of evil darkness and decadence over good light and progress. The winners will be falsehood, prejudice and bigotry over truth, freedom, creativity, art and culture, poetry, music and beauty, everything for which life is worth living.