National unity
Zeenat Z. Syed UPS eDeployment
When countries are attacked by outside forces or by forces within they often unite in their grief to work together. We saw this after 9/11 and 7/7. The government and opposition parties put aside bipartisan arguments and make decisions as one to help the citizens cope with the fear that will probably change their lives forever. Bangladesh went through such an event. It is unimaginable that 459 bombs went off without notice in public near crowded areas. If the culprits wished to do more damage they might have succeeded. This would be a wake up call for our Home Office to investigate how such a planned event went unnoticed. It is not the first time we have had bombings in Bangladesh. In most cases there have been greater number of deaths and many have been injured. But, even then the Home Office did not take these threats seriously and more often than not people have seen it as a new arena for political control and conflict. But, this event was different because it clearly showed a rising feeling of a group of people who do not believe in country or people and who would go out of their way to instil fear. They worked against Bangladesh, against Bangladeshis, including our politicians and their families. One had at least hoped that we would see unity in such an atmosphere where the politicians would put aside their animosity and work towards a joint effort to enhance security. Unfortunately, it is too much to expect. Instead of unity we have seen members of our opposition party pointing fingers at the other party and calling hartal. It is not enough that movement and day to day living may have been stunted due to these bombs, they had to go ahead and completely stop businesses. This event instead of being a lesson for improving our infrastructure will be used in a blame game without any benefit. We have a problem in our country and its time we actually worked on it. The security within our country is a myth, the infrastructure available to our investigative agencies are probably sub par because after all they have not detected this bombing or the ones before that. At least they were able to detain many members who may be linked to the bombings and the group who have accepted responsibility. We hope our court systems will successfully and appropriately convict the culprits who have been caught. One could only hope that a proper example is set so that such an event does not take place or people would think twice about attacking our country and its people. We hope the media gets the proper opportunity to do their duty for the nation to investigate and report. There is nothing worse than living in fear and not getting all the detailed information in the news. It is time for unity, not time for hartal and not time to take part in the blame game.
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