Bangladesh Diary: Monthly Meeting and Decision Making

A rather large fly buzzed lazily round, and having buzzed for a while, decided to flop down in front of me. Suddenly fascinated, I looked into its oily little eyes and at its gauzy wings. Swirls of paraffin blue and iridescent green, catching the light.

"But the rules and regulations" said a voice, coming to me through soft clouds of cotton wool, "must be followed. And followed, I tell you, to the letter".

The world hummed outside the window, my hand doodled on the notes in front of me.

"In respect of procurement procedures I am requesting you to do the needful", added another, from far away.

"Noted. But moving on", echoed a third, on a distant planet, "to the next item, I would like to give the floor to the materials development consultant".

The fly hesitated, hovered, then flew off to another table. "What a completely useless life", I thought. About the fly, you understand, not me.

"Ahem, Mister Andrew?" said the third voice, more insistent this time. "Could you shed any light on the issue?"

"Um, what?" (Oh bugger, he's talking to me). "Er yes, of course, sorry. Well, let me bring our respected Chairman Sir up to date on what we've achieved..."

***

What joy, it's another monthly meeting and we're on the 8th floor of an anonymous grey ministry building, downtown Dhaka. Naturally, there's been a power cut: loads have been shed. (Loadshedding being a local euphemism for an electricity failure on a par, in its deliberate obfuscation, with 'extraordinary rendition' or 'collateral damage'). The microphones don't work - no-one can hear each other, but perhaps it doesn't matter, as we're all talking at the same time anyway. Key decisions are being made at this meeting. Or rather not being made - the answer to most requests being either: a) "It will take time", b) "We will look into it in due course", or c) "We will place this before the higher authorities, for their kind information and necessary action". I've never actually met a high authority. Presumably they are simply too high. Perhaps one day, if I am really lucky, I will catch a glimpse of an ankle floating past me.

A wise man once said to me "Be careful what you try to push through here. In this place, no-one ever got sacked for not making a decision, but plenty lost their jobs for making the wrong one". And so we wait. And wait. At today's meeting I have learned, amongst other lowlights, that the process for finding website developers for our humble project, on which I have been working for weeks with a colleague, has to begin again because we failed miserably to observe Page 4658, Paragraph 3, Subsection 4.5, Footnote 813 of the Rules and Regulations. The rule book must be a huge tome. I imagine it's kept in a dusty basement, where only tenuous shafts of wan daylight penetrate. Its pages are the size of football pitches. Forgotten buff-coloured men spend their entire lives crossing each page, armed with magnifying glasses. Occasionally they drop to their knees to read the infinitesimal print, and call out in thin papery voices to scribbling clerks, who dutifully pass the messages up into the relevant ministry.

We are also informed that computers have been ordered, but there is no budget for generators. Glumly, I see loads being shed. I see computers being shed. And as for the materials which I am paid to train people to develop? Very important, yes, exceedingly important. But apparently it says here there is no budget either for extra training. Ergo, no training.

Just another day at the ministry, then. Where did that fly go to?

But suddenly, there's a different distraction. Only of a more sinister tone. Outside the window there are shouts from the street below. Chorused, in unison. Another demonstration is passing by. There are sirens. Years ago I used to be less respectful of demos here - there seemed to be one on every corner - led by copiously-bellied old men in the eternal Punch-and Judy, or perhaps Paunch-and-Judy show, that is two-party politicking under the aegis of the two Grandes Dames of Bangladesh.

The recent Nobel euphoria apart (on one ecstatic blog the inestimable Dr.Yunus was referred to - somewhat fruitily - as the Noble Peach Prize Winner), things have turned sour in recent months.

Item: Village farmers protesting about lack of power in rural areas. Item: A whole suburb of Dhaka involved in pitch battles with police over the hours-long electricity shortages in the heart of the city. Item: garment workers enraged about their ridiculously low wages, while the mega-rich bosses close ranks and threaten immediately to shut down the factories in retaliation. Item: a village up in arms about a rapacious attempt by an energy company based, of all places, in Regent St, to turf them all out in the pursuit of coal and naked profits.

The people are slowly stirring here, and they are on the march. These street protests are no longer mere bombastic processions, driven by hot air. These are serious, and the air is burning. They involve weapons, and bricks rain from a sky blackened by blazing tyres. The force of their arguments is then met by the overwhelming force of police brutality. People die. Stuff happens, as Rumsfeld might say.

Meanwhile, up on the 8th floor, it's time for the next item on the agenda. Any other business. Who knows, maybe our dithering and this popular awakening are more connected than we think. The government fiddles (in more ways than one) while the city is set alight. The future, seen from this angle, is not bright. It's really quite bleak.