When non-compliance is normalised and people pay the price

From air pollution to restaurant fire to kitchen market volatility – instances of regulatory malfunctioning are everywhere. Failures of the institutions responsible to enforce building and fire safety codes, environmental compliance and fair prices cause loss of lives, damage to property and public health and deprives consumers of their rights. 

Bangladesh Agriculture Marketing Department fixed prices for 29 kitchen items to give consumers, hard-pressed by soaring cost of living during Ramadan some respite. But most of the items still sell much higher as the designated agencies, like the consumer rights protection directorate, could not enforce the government's price chart in full in the market. Sporadic drives by various agencies bring the prices within the range for a while, and the price of onion declined only after the government announced import from India.

Highway extortion raises transportation costs, which add to commodity prices.

Ahead of Ramadan a year ago, traders had complained to the then commerce minister Tipu Munshi that 'police extortion' on roads and highways raises prices of goods further.

Extortion has not stopped and the transport workers' association has cited extortion as a reason for possible hike in bus fare during this Eid.

"Each bus needs to pay about Tk2,900 per trip to Mymensingh. But it increases to Tk4,000 during Eid. How can we manage these additional costs?" questioned Osman Ali, general secretary of the association, during a meeting on 19 March, organised by the Highway Police on the Eid-ul Fitr road traffic situation.

There, passenger rights campaigner Mozammel Hoque Chowdhury pointed out how BRTA cites shortage of executive magistrates as a reason why the government agency cannot enforce the government fare chart on the road.

Apart from depriving consumers of right products and services at right prices, authorities' laxity and failure also put investment in businesses and employment at risk.

This was what happened to restaurants in Dhaka. A good number of restaurants were shuttered in drives of city authorities following the Bailey Road fire tragedy that took 46 lives in February. It was only then they found that the building was not authorised to house restaurants which had not minimum fire safety and emergency exits. They raided markets, closed restaurants, fined owners and sent hundreds, mostly restaurant staff, to jail.

The result is: restaurant employees and workers are imprisoned for the faults they did not commit. The High Court asked why arrests of 872 hotel and restaurant workers during raids after the Bailey Road fire tragedy should not be deemed illegal.

"They are simply employees who used to receive a salary of Tk10,000 to Tk15,000 per month. They are innocent and were unlawfully detained," said Barrister Masud Reza Sobhan, who moved a writ petition challenging the legality of those arrests. The main regulatory authority, Rajuk, has not faced any action, the lawyer said.

Restaurant owners said the drives seemed to target the restaurant industry unfairly and called for a more integrated approach to address safety violations. Around 200 restaurants in Dhaka have been closed, Imran Hasan, general secretary of the Restaurant Owners Association, said, questioning the logic behind blanket closures, putting their business at risk.

Restaurateurs said to start a business, they need to approach as many as 13 agencies to submit documents and get approvals. These include Rajuk, city corporation, fire service, environment division, deputy commissioner office, food safety authority, labour ministry, civil surgeon office, factories and establishments inspection department, and revenue board.

Even having all proper paperwork, licences and approvals are not guaranteed without extra payment.

"It took me almost two years to obtain the required licences after paying from Tk30,000 to Tk2 lakh as bribes in various steps," said a businessman, who wished not to be named.

To M Mahmudur Rashid, vice president of the Electronics Safety and Security Association of Bangladesh, Bailey Road fire was not an accident. "It is the result of our actions. Everyone, from the building owner to the authority, is equally responsible."

There is nothing wrong with having many restaurants in a multi-storied building. But when it is done without adequate measures, planning, and approval, it is not only wrong, but then this unplanned construction amounts to a planned killing, he said.

Who is accountable to whom?

When agencies fail and ministries responses do not work, parliamentary watchdogs are supposed to intervene. In a parliamentary democracy, they have the authority to ask ministers and top officials to explain why they failed to perform their responsibilities.

After the 7 January elections, new standing committees have been formed in all ministries.

M Abdul Latif, an MP Chattogram, is a member of the parliamentary standing committee on the housing ministry that supervises Rajuk. Asked if the parliamentary body has something to do to make this agency accountable for failing to enforce building safety codes, he rather asked, "Why do people not file cases against these agencies? Are the above laws?"  

Air pollution has made breathing in the city unhealthy.  Dhaka frequently ranks among the most polluted cities in the air quality index. Physicians link the recent surge in respiratory problems among the city people to the toxic air, which add to health expenditure. Bangladesh's economic losses from air pollution are estimated between 3.9% and 4.4% of the country's GDP in 2019, said an earlier World Bank report.

Air pollution was the second largest risk factor leading to deaths and disability in Bangladesh, causing about 78,145 to 88,229 deaths in 2019. The number must have gone bigger, as air quality continues to worsen.

But what the agencies concerned, such as the environment department and Bangladesh Road Transport Authority, are doing against vehicles emitting black smoke and construction sites releasing dust in the air?

Asked, Aroma Dutta, a human rights activist-turned-MP from women seat who is now a member of the standing committee on environment ministry, said they would sit for the committee's first meeting on Sunday, where they would discuss what can be done to address pollution.

A Triangular Collusion

The common underlying problem in all these is a dismal governance failure that has been nourishing the pervasive impunity of collusive non-compliances across nearly every aspect of life and society, says Dr Iftekharuzzaman, Executive Director of Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB).

He points out how a section of regulatory officials may also have a hand in the game.

"There is no way for instance that those who operate businesses without proper authority, or systematically violate fundamentals of business principles and ethics, or construct buildings trampling down relevant codes and regulations can do so unilaterally or without the knowledge and involvement of a section of the relevant officials of the regulatory or oversight bodies," he says.

Dr Iftekharuzzaman sees non-compliance as much a source of profit of illegal business entities as a source of illicit income of some of those who are supposed to ensure compliance and rule of law.

"It's a win-win game through a triangular collusion between unscrupulous elements in business, politics and officials."

"As a result," he explains, "non-compliance has been normalised all around and the actors in collusion have been granted unrestricted licences to benefit ruthlessly at the expense of common people who not only bear the financial and other burdens of lack of rule of law but also often pay by life."

All these go on unabated until temporarily interrupted by tragedies like Rana Plaza, Tazreen Garments, FR Tower, Nimtoli, Bailey Road and more, when the regulators and oversight bodies become hyperactive in the face of media and public outcry to create a facade of action mostly by knee-jerk ad-hocism while theatrics of committees and investigations are activated only to gradually dissipate until everything is back to business as usual, Dr Iftekharuzzaman says.

"So goes the vicious cycle," laments the top executive of TIB.

In the abiding context with hardly any space for checks and balances and given the dysfunctional institutions, nothing but some form of benevolent and responsive exercise of the absolute and monopolised political and governance power may be the only entry point for occasional and selective redress, he feels.