THE interim government on May 10 banned all activities of the Awami League keeping to the Anti-Terrorism Act 2009 until the completion of the trial of the party leaders in the International Crimes Tribunal. The ban meant ‘to protect national security and sovereignty, ensure the safety of July movement activists and safeguard plaintiffs and witnesses engaged in the trial’ effectively means the suspension of the party activities until the accused party leaders are tried for the mass killing that the party presided over in July–August 2024. The council of advisers has also promulgated the International Crimes (Tribunals) (Amendment) Ordinance, provisioning for the prosecution of political parties and their fronts as organisations for institutional complicity in crimes against humanity. But all this should have happened at the very first meeting of the council of advisers after the installation of the interim government on August 8, 2024. If it had happened then, the issue might have been resolved keeping to legal proceedings and the need might not have occasioned for the use of executive authority.
The approval for the amendments to the International Crimes (Tribunals) Act is assuring in that it would create the scope for the trial of political parties and their fronts institutionally responsible for such mass killing, based on credible evidence of institutional complicity. The incorporation of the provision for the trial of political parties as organisations would help to try the Awami League and its fronts, which carried out the mass killing in July-August 2024 to cling to power. The universal provision for the trial of parties and their fronts would help to try any political quarters that would carry out such killing in the future. Besides, it would also pave the legal way for trying the parties involved in mass killing in the past. The government should, meanwhile, proceed with the legal proceedings against the leaders of the Awami League — already behind bars and at large or in hiding, after their arrest — with proper investigation carried out following the due process of the law to keep the trial of both the party and its leaders above any controversy. Justice should not be delayed as it denies justice; and it should not be hurried as it buries justice.
The suspension of the Awami League’s activities until the trial is way better than the imposition of a blanket ban. The democratically oriented sections of society need to remember that political parties, the embodiment of certain ideologies and thoughts, cannot be vanquished with bans. Because, undemocratic politics needs to be fought with democratic political ideologies and thoughts.
