CHT Peace Accord implementation faces fresh complications

The Rangamati Hill District Council building remained under padlock for five days last month. Several Bengali organisations enforced the programme, demanding the cancellation of quotas for hill communities in public employment along with four other demands. Before that, the Council’s chairman, Kajal Talukder, was assaulted.

The Rangamati Hill District Council was formed in 1989. In the three decades since, no one has seen the Council, or any other hill district council, under lock and key.

The public humiliation of the Council’s chairman is also unprecedented in the region, says Gautam Dewan, the first elected chairman of the Rangamati Hill District Council.

Speaking to Prothom Alo, he said that obstructing teacher recruitment in this manner is, in effect, an attempt to undermine the Peace Accord. During the past 18 months of the interim government, there has been no genuine attempt to implement the Accord; rather, efforts are underway to effectively “padlock” the Accord itself.

The Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) have even witnessed several ‘untoward’ incidents over the past year and a half. These include the deaths of five people in law enforcement shootings, paralysis of district councils, the suspension of Land Commission meetings, and fresh armed clashes.

As a result, implementation of the Accord has become even more tangled. It is against this backdrop that the 28th anniversary of the CHT Peace Accord is being observed today, 2 December.

After two decades of armed struggle, the Peace Accord was signed on 2 December 1997 between the government and the Parbatya Chattogram Jana Samhati Samiti (JSS), which had been agitating for autonomy. Following the Accord, the Regional Council and the district councils of Rangamati, Bandarban, and Khagrachhari were formed.

The 1989 law governing the district councils was amended accordingly. While several provisions have been implemented since, several central issues, such as resolving land disputes and holding elections to the district councils, remain unsettled.

The JSS, the signatory to the Accord, has repeatedly accused successive governments, especially the most recent Awami League government, of obstructing implementation.

Of the Accord’s 72 clauses, 35 are directly linked to the district councils. Experts therefore regard the Accord as a charter for local self-governance. Yet, elections to the three hill district councils have never been held. All the governments have run the councils through their nominees.

After assuming office, the interim government dissolved all three councils. Following about a month of leadership vacuum, the councils were reconstituted in November last year, again with government-nominated individuals.

Bengali organisations raised objections to the Rangamati Hill District Council’s recruitment notice for assistant teachers in primary schools across 10 upazilas. They demanded the introduction of the national formula, 93 per cent merit-based, and 7 per cent quota, within the hills as well. As a result, examinations could not be held despite two dates being announced. Ultimately, the council building was padlocked.

Under the Peace Accord, priority in recruitment must be given to indigenous permanent residents of the hills. The District Council Act also vests the power of third and fourth-class recruitment in the council.

Jahangir Kamal, coordinator of the Parbatya Chattogram Samo-Odhikar Andolon, told Prothom Alo, “The most deprived community in the hills today is the Bengalis. Communities including the Khumi, Mro, and Rakhine are also lagging behind. We want recruitment purely on merit.”

When asked whether maintaining the national quota structure would push the numerically smaller indigenous peoples even further behind, he said, “Yes, that too can be discussed.”

Under the law and regulations of the three hill district councils, both indigenous and non-indigenous (Bengali) communities receive recruitment proportionate to the number of council members representing their groups. This system has been followed for decades.

Human rights activist Nirupa Dewan told Prothom Alo, “Bengalis have always been employed according to the law. No one questioned this before. Now fresh questions are being raised by those who do not believe in the spirit of the Accord or want it abolished.”

The structure of the hill district councils is significantly different from other district councils.

Local government expert Salauddin M Aminuzzaman believes the councils are a genuine model of local governance. The disputes surrounding the councils today, he says, undermine the spirit of local government.

According to him, in such a strategically vital region, disrupting local empowerment in this manner “will not lead to anything good”.

Two bouts of deadly conflict in the hill districts over the past year resulted in eight deaths.

On 18 September last year, a Bengali youth, Md Mamun, was beaten to death in Khagrachhari Sadar over allegations of motorcycle theft. The next day in Dighinala, a man named Dhananjay Chakma was killed in mob violence.

That night, gunfire erupted in the district town following the incident, killing two hill youths. This year, on 28 September, three hill youths were shot dead in Guimara, Khagrachhari.

After the 1997 Accord, violence in the hills decreased significantly. Although clashes between hill people and Bengalis did occur in the interim, gun violence and deaths had become rare. Under the interim government, however, old fears have resurfaced.

Speaking about this, security analyst Major (retd.) Emdadul Islam told Prothom Alo, “Two rounds of violence within a year are rare in the post-Accord period. The face-off between the security forces and local residents in Guimara is unprecedented. This is the result of the interim administration’s overall failure.”

Land disputes remain the most intractable issue in the CHT. Under the Accord, such disputes are to be resolved by the constitutionally mandated Land Dispute Resolution Commission. But its most recent meeting, scheduled for October, was not held due to obstruction by local Bengalis.

Similar disruptions occurred under the previous political government, yet the Commission managed to conduct several meetings nonetheless.

When the 12th meeting of the Task Force on the Rehabilitation of India-Returned Jumma Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons was called on 22 October, it too was cancelled following threats from local Bengalis.

As the Chakma Circle chief, Raja Devasish Roy is involved with both the Land Commission and the Task Force. He told Prothom Alo, “I received invitations for two meetings but both were cancelled. Under political governments, such problems did arise. But what is preventing this government from keeping these institutions, created under the Accord, functioning? The interim government’s approach to the Accord has been purely ceremonial.”

Foreign affairs adviser Md Touhid Hossain has been appointed convenor of the CHT Accord Implementation and Monitoring Committee, and Appellate Division’s retired justice Muhammad Abdul Hafiz has been appointed chair of the Land Commission.

A meeting of the Implementation and Monitoring Committee has been held in Rangamati with the participation of the JSS. But the JSS said in a statement marking the Accord’s anniversary that there has been “no progress” in implementing the decisions taken at that meeting five months ago.

Repeated attempts to reach CHT affairs adviser Supradip Chakma for the government’s position on Accord implementation went unanswered.