As we have emphasized on this blog since it was launched in 2017, the persecution of Professor Yunus and the mistreatment of the people of Bangladesh by their government are interrelated stories. In fact, the attacks against Yunus have come to symbolize the overall misrule of the country by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
In July 2024, the discontent boiled over when the nation’s HIgh Court reinstated quotas for coveted civil service jobs for the children and grandchildren of those who fought for Bangladeshi’s independence war in 1971. By way of background, there have been previous protests about these quotas, which led Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to abolish them in 2018. But once again, Hasina has had the supposedly independent judiciary do her dirty work by reinstating them on June 5, 2024, presumably to mollify her hard core supporters. When that backfired by leading to massive student protests in July and then the deaths of scores of young people and their sympathizers at the hands of the police, paramilitaries, and thugs associated with the ruling party, the court reversed itself and nearly eliminated the quotas entirely. It is amazing how jurisprudence can shift in a matter of weeks when the survival of a hated Prime Minister is hanging in the balance!
But by the time the quotas were nearly abolished again, the country was enflamed by the needless deaths (at least 200 and perhaps as many as 1,000), many more injuries, the imprisonment of around 10,000 students and opposition politicians, curfews and the on-again, off-again Internet and social media blackout imposed by the government. The business community decried the impact on commerce, especially those that required access to the Internet and transit of finished goods to the country’s ports. The protests evolved to be against not just the quotas, but against the entire regime which was increasingly being referred to as “fascist.”
Once the government opened up communications, many tragic stories – including shocking videos of unarmed protesters being assaulted and shot – emerged, further enraging the populace. Lame efforts to excuse the behavior of the government and its allies were mocked and derided. For example, a video emerged of young man named Abu Sayed in Rangpur (a northern district) playfully taunting police from a distance (in a manner that in no way threatened them) and then being shot dead in cold blood by the very police that should have been protecting him and his right to protest peacefully. Then, in an effort to evade responsibility, the authorities initially pinned the blame for his death on a 16-year-old whom they laughably accused of causing Sayed’s death by throwing stones at him. (This is despite the Daily Star reporting that it was “clear as daylight” from video evidence that the police had shot him.) The boy spent 13 days in prison before being released on bail.
The Daily Star among others reported on Sayed’s death, writing, “In two video clips, verified by Amnesty International, at least two police officers fired 12-gauge shotguns directly at him from across the street. Sayed clutched his chest on impact, and the officers fired at least two more times. Amnesty International used satellite images to geolocate the positions of Sayed and the police officers and found that they were at a distance of about 15 meters during the shooting. Also, Sayed posed no apparent physical threat to the police, Amnesty International said in a statement on July 18, adding that the police’s attack on Sayed was reckless and unprovoked. Sayed’s death certificate said he was ‘brought dead’ to the hospital.”
In the meantime, UNICEF has released a statement condemning the deaths of at least 32 children, which the Home Minister responded to by saying that there was not a single child killed. Who do you trust, a United Nations agency committed to protecting children, or someone installed by Sheikh Hasina to defend her misrule?
Students bravely resumed their protests at the end of July, which culminated in massive gatherings on August 2 and 3. They did so despite intensifying government efforts to intimidate and silence them. For instance, three student leaders who were being treated in hospitals for wounds suffered during the mid-July protests were “taken into custody for their own protection” by the police. After days of mockery and outrage by the public and the media, the leaders were finally released. In a growing number of cases, students, their parents, and other sympathizers have been boldly confronting police and successfully demanding that fellow protesters who are being taken into custody be released. Increasingly, the police have been forced to give in to their demands. It seems that many in law enforcement are increasingly doubting the orders that they are being asked to follow.
The most common refrain of people in Bangladesh these days is, “The Prime Minister went too far this time and can’t possibly survive this.” For their part, the students shifted from nine demands including an apology from the PM and the resignation of several ministers to a one-point demand: the resignation of the PM and her entire government. The media, which had been guilty of self-censorship for several years, found its voice and began reporting aggressively on the protests, the resulting state-sponsored violence, and the growing disgust amongst the populace about the government’s tragic role.
In a classic too little, too late response, one minister apologized – but only for the Internet being down for a few days. The PM finally stopped her tone-deaf mourning of the damage to government property (while saying nothing about the loss of life), and instead invited students to meet with her in her offices, which the students rejected. But by the time these half-measures were announced, the government had lost all credibility and hardly anyone was paying any attention to what it said. Students called for a national noncooperation movement starting today (Sunday, August 4) to be continued until the government resigns. The inevitability of the fall of this much-hated regime is becoming increasingly obvious to nearly everyone in the country.
There has been some excellent international reporting on the crisis. The latest wave of protests was covered in the New York Times and by Reuters and the Times of India. The Bangladeshi diaspora has weighed in, issuing statements and convincing U.S. Senator Markey and 21 colleagues to send a strong letter to the U.S. Secretary of State demanding action, which received significant coverage in Bangladesh. This compelling segment aired on Al Jazeera featured a courageous student leader in Bangladesh and three young Bangladeshis studying abroad.
Professor Yunus’ statement about the bloodshed, followed by his influential interview with The Hindu (a leading Indian newspaper) where he called for new elections, has given him great moral standing among the protesters and the populace in general. The PM and her hapless ministers could only respond by saying that the protesters were being duped by people like Yunus and the leaders of the opposition parties. In fact, the government took the step of outlawing one of the opposition parties, which sparked additional protests. Actually, students – who have been at the center of progressive political movements in Bangladesh for decades – were in the lead from the beginning, but their courage in challenging oppression has spurred others to step up and offer supportive words and actions.
So where does this go from here? One can imagine it could play out in a manner similar to the fall of the BNP government in March 1996, when a month-long noncooperation movement that had broad popular support shut down the country for several weeks and forced the party in power at the time to resign. A neutral caretaker government ran the country for 3 months until a remarkably free and fair and (this must be said) joyous election was held and a new regime took power, ushering in several of Bangladesh’s best post-independence years.
Professor Yunus is currently in Europe, honoring a longstanding commitment to advance the causes of social business and the positive impact sports can play on society. He is also offering support and encouragement to those advancing positive change in his native land. By the time he returns to Bangladesh, he may be welcomed back by a country that has been transformed through student activism that stirred the conscience of an entire nation to throw off the yoke of authoritarian misrule, corruption, and oppression. Hopefully, the death toll will not grow, as too many young lives have already been lost. (Sadly, though, at least 52 more deaths have been reported on August 4, according to the Daily Star.)
People in Bangladesh and the Bangladeshi diaspora seem intent on pushing for regime change, whatever it takes. The key question is whether or not the Prime Minister and the people around her will insist on going down with a bloody battle, and how the country’s military will respond to any additional orders to attack protesters and to “shoot on sight.” Let’s hope for as peaceful a transition as possible.