BANGLADESH the coup: its roots and consequences by JAVAD HUSSEIN The overthrow and execution of Sheikh Mujibur Rehman marks the end of one phase of Bengali politics and the beginning of another. Mujibur Rehman was the only bourgeois leoder capable of holding his own party together and of simultaneously playing a Bonapartist role in Bengali society as a whole. His removal from the scene by young army officers eliminates the most solid pillar of bourgeois stability and will open a period of instability in the country. The bourgeoisie in Banglodesh and South Asia as a whole, not to mention the United States, will not find it easy to replace Rehman; some of the jubilation with which bourgeois circles greeted his death may soon give way to complete and ufter despair. Only three years ago, Mujib received a hero's welcome when he returned to Docca from Pakistan. Three million people lined the streets and by popular acclaim Mujib was awarded the title of "Bangabandhu" (friend of Bengal). But three weeks ago, when Mujib and his entire family were wiped out, there was little public response. Not even a demonstration or a strike. It is not difficult to grasp the reasons for this sharp and rapid decline in his popularity.
2,0 20₴ Crisis and corruption The task that confronted Mujib and his Awami League after Bangladesh won independence was not an easy one. In a country of 80 million people (with the highest population density in the world, and an underdeveloped one to boot (90 percent of the population lives in the coun tryside), they set about attempting to construct a capitalist state. But in spite of help from the Indian government and aid from the Soviet Union, the Awami League failed to deal with the social crisis. This was not surprising, for the solution to the problems facing the Bengali masses required a socialist revolution. Instead, the Awami League began to lay the bases for a bourgeois state. Many of its leaders became rich overnight. The lust for money resulted in scenes reminiscent of the American wild West, with gun battles breaking out between rival gangs of Awami Leaguers trying to appropriate foreign aid being unloaded on the docks. For a certain time, Mujibur Rehman was able to pose as the "Father of the Nation" and to appear as though he
BANGLADESH stood above the contending gangs in his own party. But the reek of corruption soon spread to envelop his own family, and his personal position was increasingly challenged. Earlier this year, he tried to strike back by banning all political parties except the Awami League, instituting a one-party state supported by Moscow and the pro-Moscow political forces in Bangladesh itself. These Forces dissolved their own organizations, liquidating themselves into Mujib's party. The other parties went underground. But unrest continued in spite of the one-party state. The immediate cause of Mujib's overthrow and execution was his favoritism on behalf of his own family. Let us examine some examples of this favoritism: 1. Sheikh Nasir, Mujib's younger brother, became "godfather" of North Bengal, accumulating vast amounts of wealth through currency smuggling. During an army investigation of smuggling, a Major Salahudin got too close to Nasir. Some days later, a group of gangsters entered the major's office in the town of Jessore and shot him dead. They were never apprehended. Sheikh Nasir was killed in the coup. 2. Sheikh Moni, a nephew of Mujib, used to be a staff reporter on a weekly newspaper; he drew a monthly wage of 300 taka (about US$22), Under his uncle's administration he became the owner of two daily newspapers worth more than 10 million takas. Moni was unofficial boss of many ministries and directories and became secretary of the Awami League, the country's only legal political party• 3. Another Mujib nephew, Sheikh Shahidul Islam, was boss of the studentwing of the Awami League. Islam used to regularly terrorize the women's hostels in Dacca; he was well known os a rapist. He kidnapped and forcibly married the 13-year-old daughter of a senior official of the State Bank. He later became boss of the perfume monopoly of the country, presumably in an effort to mask the stench of his other activities. He was also killed in the coup. 4. Sheikh Kamal, Mujib's son, was involved in smuggling and looting. In 1973 he was shot at by police during one of his looting operations. (The police were unaware of his identity.) The policemen in charge of the operation subsequently lost their jobs. Sheikh Kamal used to count his bribe money by weighing it on special scales. He too is reported to have been killed in the coup. 5. Kamal's younger brother Jamal was recently trained af Sandhurst, the British military academy, but he was better known for his involvement in a smuggling racket with a group of Hong Kong businessmen. He was also killed in the coup. The new officers The young majors who killed Mujib are now themselves facing a severe crisis. They have no clear perspective except an anti-Indian attitude; their appointment of a 18 well known pro-U.S. politician, Mushtaq Ahmed (formerly a minister in, Mujib's government), as president is hardly likely to solve anything. In fact, it is extremely doubtful whether Mushtaq will last out the next few months. Since the Bangladesh officers have no social program whatsoever, they will even find it difficult to halt corruption, even temporarily. The experience of martial law in Pakistan during the Ayub regime (195868), which was also aimed of wiping out corruption, failed abysmally in this tosk. And the reason is simple: Corruption cannot be weeded out by moralistic appeals or the indiscriminate use of bayonets. It is deeply rooted in the social crisis and can be assaulted frontally only by tackling this crisis. There are absolutely no signs that the Bengali army is capable of doing this. On the contrary, the distinguishing feature of Bangladesh has been the extreme weakness of the state and the state apparatus. This weakness was not unrelated to the way the state came into being, which made the figure of Mujibur Rehman extremely important for the cohesion of the state and its apparatus. Even Mujib found it difficult to contain the growing crisis and had to resort to a one-party state. The personal corruption surrounding him merely exacerbated the anger of large sections of the population, since it contrasted so vividly with the growing poverty in the country. Thus, although many might be relieved that Mujib has been eliminated, this relief will buy the army and its supporters a few months at most. In any case, the Bangladesh army is itself a relatively new entity. Its only traditions are those of the armed struggle against the Pakistani army. There were never any "martial traditions" in Bengal. The British very carefully avoided recruiting Bengalis to the army, for British imperialism regarded Bengalis as politically unreliable, and the Pakistani and Indian ruling classes followed the same tradition. Thus, Army Commander in Chief Shafiullah, who had recently been posted to the Foreign Office, is only 38 years old. He was one of the two generals in the army, which is a force of only 50, 000. The other general, Ziaur Rehman, also young and a veteran of the war of independence, has replaced him. The rest of the army is run by young colonels and majors, all of whom received their rank in the 1971 war. Among the colonels are Moinul Husain Chaudhry, Motiur Rehman, Nasim, M.H. Khan, and S.A. Bhuia, who were all leaders of sectors during the 1971 war. Together with Majors Azizur Rehman Chaudhry, ljaz, Ibrahim, and Murshed, they developed an opposition to the Awami League. The sentiment expressed in the statement "We fought to free our people, not to see these Awami League bastards get rich" was widespread in the army and even within the much-hated Rakhi Bahini (Security Force), which was used to repress all opposition. However, the new leaders, civilian and military, will be confronted with the same problems that finally resulted in the overthrow of Mujibur Rehman: social and economic choos compounded by famine conditions in large areas of the countryside. We can therefore expect continued instability for some time.
The opposition What of the left? The pro-Moscow groups were solidly behind Mujib - some of their leaders even claimed af public meetings that "he is the Lenin of the East. " When Mujib's police opened fire on pro-Moscow students demonstrating against U.S. imperialism in 1972 (killing two of them, the pro-Moscow groups remained silent. There can be little doubt that the overthrow of Mujib, the anti-Indian stance of the new regime (however carefully disguised it may be at the moment), the recognition of the new regime by Peking, and the gradual release of the Maoist prisoners, represent grave blows to the entire strategic line of the pro-Moscow groups. Having backed Mujib fully, they will now pay the price for supporting a one-party state, remaining silent on key political issues, and acquiescing and even actively encouraging repression against the Mooists. Previously, the largest opposition force in the country was the JSD (Jatiya Samaitantrik Dal - National Socialist party), a split from the Awami League, led by Major Ahmed Jali and Abdur Rab. For a time, this formation represented a real threat to the Awami League, but it was brutally repressed. It is not impossible, however, that the JSD could come forward and play a major role after the death of Mujib. The National Awami party (NAP), led by the old peosant leader Bhashani, has been pushed to the sidelines, and Bahshani himself is hopelessly confused and compromised. There are three major groups in the Maoist underground: 1. The People's Revolutionary party of East Bengal has the largest trade-union and peasant base of all the far-left groups. During the war of independence it established its own training camps and its armed units fought against the Pakistani army. 2. The Proletarion party of East Bengal was the most important armed-struggle group after the war of independence. It held a completely ultraleftist position and decided to continue the war against the Awami League. 3. The Communist party of East Bengal, led by the veteran Maoist leader Toha, also held an armed-struggle position. But after suffering a major setback in the Rajshahi district in 1974, the group withdrew from the armed struggle. These groups differ from the ir counterparts in India in that some of them have genuine experience in mass armed struggle. During the war they fought in close collaboration with the young majors and colonels of the Banglodesh army. To varying degrees, they all remain within the framework of Maoist orthodoxy, but with Peking's recognition of the new regime, they may well find their political and material aid cut off and may even be denounced as "Lin Piaoist revisionists." Some of these groups will undoubtedly return to opportunism and will not oppose the new dictatorship - on the grounds that it has overthrown a "puppet of social imperialism. "They may well refuse to demand the release of all political prisoners. Revolutionary Marxists will have to fight against any manifestation of this sort of opportunism even more vigorously than in the past, for what is on the agenda in Bangladesh today is the permanent revolution: The only solution to the crisis in the country lies in the overthrow of the capitalist state and its replacement by a proletarian state. There is no possibility of any intermediary stage of "new democracy" (of an unspecified class character) or of bourgeois democracy. Any political organizations that refuse to understand this will Find themselves in a blind alley. For the moment, the situation in Dacca remains confused, and it would be premature to discuss the orientation of the new regime in any detail. Reports that the new government had inaugurated the Islamic Republic of Bangladesh" have been vigorously denied by Dacca, much to the embarrassment of the Pakistani Foreign Office, which had awarded instant recognition to the new regime. But a drift away from the Soviet Union and India remains likely, and should a civil war erupt, revolutionary Markists will have to demand that all regimes stay out of Bangladesh and will have to fight to oppose any new Indian intervention. But the most striking feature of the events in Bangladesh is that they demonstrate the instability that continues to prevail on the South Asian subcontinent, an instability that has characterized the region ever since the 1971 explosions. The extent of the social crisis in the area is such that this instability will drag on, although unevenly. Indira Gandhi should learn some lessons from Bangladesh before she decides to institutionalize the state of emergency in India. September 3, 1975
ANGOLA
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Congo Cabinda Zaire OLUANDA •Malanje Atlantic Ocean Lobito • Luso
Nova Lisboa Gaco • Coutinho Zambia Porto Alexandre Namibia Rhodesia (SWAfrica) Botswana Since the conference held af Nakuru, Kenya, during which the leaderships of the MPLA, the FNLA, and UNITA made an agreement to "disarm civilians" as a sort of amendment to the Alvor accords, there has been a sudden acceleration in the development of the political situation in Angola." It was only the leadership of the MPLA that had any illusions in the Nakuru conference, which was a sort of ritual battle aimed at saving the coalition government. Neither Holden Roberto of the FNLA nor Jonas Savimbi of UNITA considered the coalition government to be the stable form of political regime after independence, which is scheduled to take effect on November 11, 1975. (See INPRECOR, No.31, July 31, 1975) The strength of the mass movement in the urban areas rendered illusory any attempt to establish a government within which a nationalist organization under pressure from its rank and file and two organizations acting as the fifth column of imperialism could coexist. It was in the framework of this illusion that the leadership of the MPLA had been "making use of" the mass movement, seeking to utilize it tactically in an attempt *The "Alvor accords" were signed on January 15, 1975, in Alvor, Portugal. The signatories were the Portuguese government, the MPLA (Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola - Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola), the FNLA (Frente Nacional de Libertação de Angola - National Front for the Liberation of Angola), and UNITA (União Nacional para Independência Total de Angola - National Union for the Tatal Independence of Angola). The accords set up a coalition government composed of representatives of the three