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| Bangladesh |
| Nothing learned, nothing forgotten |
| 2013-03-27 |
| [Bangla Daily Star] After the French Revolution a large number of Bourbon loyalists migrated to other countries to escape the concessionary policies of Louis XVI and the violence of the republicans. When the Bourbons were restored in 1814, these émigrés returned to their country with exactly the same mentality they had left with 25 years earlier. The great statesman and diplomat of that era, Talleyrand, had said of them: "They learned nothing and forgot nothing." This statement was rephrased by an Italian professor recently as "Nothing learned, nothing forgotten" (N-L-N-F). The professor further elaborated N-L-N-F as a class of people who judge today's events with exactly the same criteria as those years ago. Only six years ago the country was on the brink of a civil upheaval because of intransigence shown by the main political parties at that time in agreeing to a peaceful transition of power overseen by an interim neutral government. The party in power at that time had a grand view that the country had given it authority to rule it for infinity, and all it required was to secure the means to ensure it. So it went about putting in place the mechanisms and retrofitting the institutions that would facilitate a perpetual hold on power. We are all aware of what happened then. We had intervention by the armed forces to foist on the country a long-enduring caretaker government, the ire of which was borne by the leaders of both the sides that are currently engaged in the political crisis. Six years down the road we are back to where we started. It seems that two years of army-backed rule, months of detention behind bars of many of the current leaders who are at loggerheads with each other now, and public accusations of venality against many of them have disappeared from the memory of our politicians like water flowing under a bridge. As they were six years ago, the political parties and their leaders are impervious to the damage to economy and the sufferings of the people that their actions are causing. They are unmoved and unaffected by the mayhem that their acolytes are launching on the streets; they are not concerned if their actions lead the country down the drain. In fact, they are threatening that more of such bedlam and anarchy will happen if their demands are not met. We have the classic group of N-L-N-F people all over again. They have not learned how a crisis created by intransigence of political opponents can bring the entire country to a halt. They never learned how such crisis is a stigma on our reputation in the international community. They also did not learn from the public humiliation a good number of them went through when they fell out favour and out of power. They also did not forget the taste of power as they did not forget what the purse and the privy power brought them. The looming crisis in the country carries worse forebodings now than six years back as the major opposition party has gone on a warpath supporting issues that defy the spirit of the Liberation War of 1971. And the most ominous part of the looming crisis is the call by the leader of the party to turn the country into a wasteland if the demands of the party are not met. One wonders if it is really the voice of a person who was twice at the helm of the country. One wonders if this is really the voice which can be won over by reason. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #1 "Nothing learned, nothing forgotten" Kinda reminds me of the 75 years of New Deal politics by the Dems. |
| Posted by: Bill Clinton 2013-03-27 10:21 |