Years ago the popular Indian cartoonist Laxman drew an image of a politician striding his way towards a constituent. His comment was 'how time flies, it must be time for elections again'. Cartoonists such as Laxman and our own Rafiqunnabi, etched in the annals of history for the brilliant Tokai cartoons that, alas no longer continue have through parody and satire depicted a reality that resonates firmly with the general public. As next year's elections approach, it is doubtful whether the voters will ask for accountability of the MPs who promised them so much.
If media reports are anything to go by, it would appear that even the ruling party is listing the public representatives who, far from delivering on their promises have been alienated from the constituents.
A similarity can be drawn with the City Corporation Mayors and Ward Commissioners. In a fairly short period of time both the Dhaka City Mayors have effectively thrown in the gauntlet as far as delivering on their pre-election promises go. Waste collection and management has gone south after the initial focus and matters are bad enough for the High Court to direct that garbage collection and transportation be carried out in the wee hours of midnight to six in the morning. There's nothing new about the timelines. City dwellers were requested to leave their garbage at collection points after sunset with the collection to follow. Of course, we don't abide by such advice. The sooner we can push out of our homes the smelly waste, the better. Even better is the growing tendency of domestic help in the concrete slums, to chuck the garbage in the adjacent alleys or house yards, thereby saving them an oh so arduous trip from upper storeys to the collection points.
The issue is, garbage collection between the collection point and the newly built garbage dumps. Because the collection chain is awry (courtesy the Ward Commissions), we have a horrid and unhygienic situation where the old, open-dumps hold the garbage and in many cases the waste is left lying around them. The local area waste collection operation is carried out through uncovered cycle vans leaving putrid air in their trail. And now it has to be the courts that issue directives for remedy. Given the number of such directives issued by the courts, ranging from dismantling and handing in to the police hydraulic horns, dismantling steel bumpers from cars and the like through not over-packing school children's backpacks beyond a certain weight limit to stopping mobile phone operators' package offers between midnight to 6.00 am, it would appear that the agencies involved are total failures.
This on one hand and on the other, any major initiative in any field has to be as per the directive of the Prime Minister gives a rather dim view of the ministries, departments and directorates. Amid all the despondency, the two Mayors had instilled new confidence. But now that Sayeed Khokon has followed Annisul Huq's path by saying old Dhaka is worse than our villages, he has touched on a sensitive chord. Firstly Mr. Mayor, our villages are far cleaner than the city and secondly if anything is wrong it's the infrastructure. Villagers don't dump their wastage everywhere and anywhere, they bury it or burn it. The air is cleaner and fresher. Admittedly, the ponds need cleaning but in many ways that's due to nature's intervention in stagnant water.
The more posh areas of the city, where residents fed up with the inefficiency, have set up their societies to address the situation. To an extent, it works. Elsewhere, it's an unholy mess that is neither catered to by the City Corporation, nor by the local communities. The copycat efforts of sweeping roads, initiated by the Mayors in line with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, remain as photo-sessions. It was never followed up as in India's case with the legendary Amitabh Bachchan leading a host of celebrities tied up with the media that keep the Swach India vision alive. The vision set by our City fathers echoed William Shakespeare 'A man's reach should exceed his grasp, else what are the heavens for'. Maybe they would have been served better by the older adage. 'Don't bite off more than you can chew'. Ambition is good, over-ambition comes with its own pitfalls. Now, as never before accountability for action or the lack of it is coming up for introspection.
