We are all trapped in a night without end

And now a court, on the advice of the ACC, has imposed restrictions on Matiur Rahman, the NBR official made infamous by his son and a goat, followed up by media reports of his own limitless indulgence in corruption. The official, removed from a number of positions he held at other institutions, cannot travel abroad. Neither can his family.
So the law is really working? So the state is taking actual action against such corrupt elements? Far from it, if reports that Matiur and his family too have fled the country are credible. No one has been able to trace the man or his family in these past few days. That can lead to a predictable conclusion: They are not in the country.
Which brings us to the ugly truth: It is all right for the powerful to commit gross crime and then be able to leave the country, in order to be beyond the reach of the law, to stay miles ahead of the law. But then we have the question: How do the Benazirs and Matiurs around us, having indulged in unprecedented malfeasance, find it easy to make good their escape from prosecution by making their way out of the country?
It is here that our worries register a rise to an uncomfortable degree. There are the new questions which emerge about the efficiency or lack of it of those institutions which should be going after the corrupt. That is not happening. Which has us asking the question: Who are the elements in the corridors of power stealthily ensuring that the corrupt can safely leave the country? It should be obvious to any citizen that none of these people caught in embezzling public property could have made it to safe havens abroad if they had not been assisted by their patrons in higher places, reports DT.
These people have been given safe passage out of the country. Who authorized their departure? Who put them on the aircraft or other means of transport that had them run from facing justice in the country? These are questions which, together with focusing on the corruption of the ones who cannot be located in the country, must now be directed at investigating those who cleared the escape route of these elements.
Those who facilitated the departure of these elements must be identified, investigated, and exposed in the interest of citizens. Do these elements who have fled the country have sordid tales to relate about those who patronised them, rewarded them, knew about their dark deeds and then thought it prudent to have them safely out of the way, the better for the patrons not to get ensnared in the dark tales that might have emerged if these escapees had been hauled before a court of law?
The instances of corruption in high places revealed before the country in recent weeks is but the opening of a window to what could be happening in the region of politics and administration at present. All of these activities, at every level, call for investigative reporting by the media, both print and electronic. The encouraging bit here emerging from all these sinister tales is that the journalist community has in one voice -- which is remarkable given the political polarisation that has marked the community for the past few decades -- condemned the recent statement by the police officers’ association on media reports of corruption in the police force.
Bangladesh is certainly not a police state, which is our way of informing the powers-that-be that it is now their constitutional responsibility to preserve the security and well-being of the state through cracking down hard and mercilessly on those who have been taking the nation for a ride. For the media, however, the moment is opportune for an unmasking of those who, wielding political and administrative authority, have not only been shielding the corrupt across the board but may also have had their hands deep in the till. The media ought not to be afraid as they embark on their investigations.
These men who have commandeered vast tracts of land, have built homes and resorts and parks, and have purchased a ubiquity of vehicles have served in influential positions under this government. Even as they purloined resources ethically and legally not their own, they have been rewarded through medals and promotions and in sundry other ways. Did no one notice what these men were up to? Or did political loyalty shield these elements from the law? Does no one notice what other such individuals may be up to even as we speak of those who have scampered off to safety overseas?
Why hasn’t the nation heard from the Home Ministry on the scandal caused by officers serving under it? Why has the National Board of Revenue lapsed into silence on the unbridled wrongdoing by one of its influential figures? If this is a democratic country, if zero tolerance of corruption means much more than pointless rhetoric, is much more than lip service, it should be for the Jatiya Sangsad to deliberate on these scandals in full view of citizens. The government should by now have appeared before the nation repeatedly to explain its position on these scandals. It should have informed citizens of the measures it means to take to bring back to the country these fugitives from justice from their hideouts abroad. The silence of the government is bewildering.
For journalists, it is that moment in time when they must raise questions about the wealth of politicians -- ministers, lawmakers and everyone in every elective and administrative body -- and elicit responses from those around whom the questions swirl. Let’s have no illusions. The state has been taken hostage by the unscrupulous in nearly every area of public responsibility. There has been precious little sign of the law being employed to right such wrongs. If the corrupt flee the country, with assistance from perhaps their equally or more corrupt patrons, what happens to the concept of the rule of law?
These are depressing times. When the powerful turn to brigandage, into highway robbers not ashamed to put the state to shame by their thievery, we as a people collapse in collective humiliation heaped on all of us. When justice loses its voice, when institutions become ineffectual, when the law hangs limp in the form of a withered entity before the audacious onslaught of corruption, we ask: is this what we went to war for more than a half century ago?
The arc of our destiny has been bending relentlessly downward -- and into -- circumstances of a nightmarish pallor. We are all trapped in a night without end, without stars, without the munificence of lunar light.
Syed Badrul Ahsan is Consultant Editor, Dhaka Tribune.