A better collection of human beings most adroit in taking advantage of a position of political authority to rub the nose of the political opponent in, one is unlikely to come across. That is why one comes across, not infrequently in Bangladesh, the phrase "playing politics."

A case of "playing politics" that turned out to be not only dirty, even by our own standards of political propriety, but also extremely harmful to our national security, is the way the issue of the Bangladesh navy frigate "BNS Bangabandhu" had been exploited by the then BNP-Jamaat alliance government.

Considering the fact that the frigate is to be "re-commissioned" soon, after having been in a state of "decommission" for five years, there is very little doubt that the policy of the erstwhile alliance government was, at best, an abject attempt, motivated by very base considerations, to spite the face of its opponents. It may well turn out to be case of spiting one's own face too. As a fallout of this, the country has lost out on vital military assets, apart from suffering in lost time and money, which is difficult to calculate.

A brief background is perhaps in order. The caretaker government has decided to put back into operation the frigate "BNS Bangabandhu." It was the first South Korean frigate to enter service with the Bangladesh navy, at the very fag end of the AL government, in June 2001 (although not the first naval craft to be supplied by that country; "BNS Madhumati" a large patrol craft was the first naval vessel supplied by South Korea during the first BNP regime).

It was decommissioned in Feb 2002, very soon after the BNP-Jamaat alliance took over the reins of the country, and remained so on paper for the last five years. It cost $100 million, of which the hull cost $55 million, and $45 million was for equipment to be supplied by several western countries, for which separate deals were made.

And what were the reasons given for decommissioning the ship. None whatsoever has ever been made public.

But there were allegations that the deal lacked transparency, and that corruption was involved in the acquisition of the ship. While there was talk about the performance of some of its equipment, the pre-induction test and trials that were carried out appear to negate those arguments.

These automatically generate some very pertinent questions in our mind.

First, what compelled the decommissioning of a ship that was the only state-of-the-art warship that Bangladesh acquired, only eight months after it was put into operation? It needs pointing out that a piece of kit of the size of a man-of-war is decommissioned only when refit and complete overhaul, that require more than two years to complete, become necessary.

Secondly, if the ship was decommissioned, why did it put out to sea from time to time without any apparent change of its engine or any of its major systems, which a post de-commission action entails?

Thirdly, if the frigate was a bad piece of kit, why was money spent to fix it with new missiles and torpedoes; and the missiles that were fitted while it was in a state of decommission were not purchased from the country that was originally meant to supply them. And the very process of fitting it with missiles from altogether a new source has caused problems that are yet to be fully addressed.

There are two aspects of the issue, and each must be addressed separately. One, whether the frigate meets our requirements and whether we got the things we bargained for in the deal. Two, were palms greased in the process of acquisition of the ship, causing loss to the exchequer.

As for the first, there was, indeed, an urgent need of a state-of-the art frigate. The frigate is a modified version of the ones in service with the South Korean navy. It was the best that could be acquired with the money that we were able to pay.

It sailed from the country of origin after having completed various maneuvers and evolutions, some of which were carried out in the presence of the parliamentary committee on defence, which included members of the opposition also.

The possibility of malfunctioning of a new equipment, or any of its components, is not beyond the realm of possibility, and if that occurs within the guarantee period the supplier is bound to replace it. One is not sure that was the case, either.

As for the corruption issue, it is very difficult to put it past the capability of our politicians not to be influenced by the lure of the greenback, as has been so starkly revealed recently by many of the political heavyweights who have spilled the beans under interrogation by the investigating agencies.

In fact, there is a corruption case in this regard, in which a top brass of the then AL government is amongst the accused. There should be no compromise on this matter, which must be seen to the end. In the meanwhile, several senior officers of the navy have lost their jobs, while the case against the politicians awaits trial in the court of law. The government must also go into the rationale of not purchasing the missiles from the original vendor.

Many feel that nothing justified the decommissioning of the ship in the first place. It is difficult to compute the loss that this has caused. Leaving the training of the crew, and the financial loss incurred by not utilising such a costly ship aside, we left a vast stretch of our EEZ vulnerable to outside encroachment.

The cost of decommissioning is perhaps as much as the money that might have accrued illegally to the unscrupulous, if not more. The difference is, the corrupt can be caught and brought to justice and the money recouped, while in the other case the losses may not be even be quantified, let alone recovered.

Now that the caretaker government has decided to re-commission the ship without any apparent major refit, it must not fail to determine why the ship was made non-operational. When there is a call for not only transparency in military expenditure, but also that hard earned foreign exchange be spent judiciously, it is all the more essential to determine that partisan politics has not prevailed over our decision making

From what has transpired about the matter so far, there is ground to believe that it was not technical nor strategic, but political, consideration that motivated the BNP policy on "BNS Bangabandhu." If that is the case, should the nation put up with the kind of politics that harms our national interest?

The author is Editor, Defence & Strategic Affairs, The Daily Star.