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The International Republican Institute (IRI) began working in Bangladesh in November 2003 with initial goals focused on strengthening domestic election monitoring and expanding the participation, leadership development, and influence of women and youth in politics and civil society.
In 2004, IRI expanded its program to include the Five Estates of Democracy Initiative, a long-term, integrated approach aimed at overcoming political malaise in Bangladesh. In a democratic society, the five estates—private industry, labor, nongovernmental organizations, media, and political parties—play a critical role in the political process. By empowering the five estates, IRI hopes to create a more representative and responsive democracy.
Election Monitoring
In advance of ultimately postponed January 2007 parliamentary elections, IRI developed a program aimed at strengthening domestic election monitoring to reinforce the legitimacy of the electoral process.
In 2004, IRI initiated a partnership with the National Election Observer Council (JANIPOP), a domestic election monitoring organization. IRI has worked with JANIPOP to train observers to shadow candidates through every stage of the election process, detecting electoral abuses long before Election Day, acting as a deterrent against abuses, and preventing the media from being used to spread false allegations by candidates.
In 2005, IRI and JANIPOP conducted a long-term election observation of the Chittagong City Corporation mayoral election. The IRI-JANIPOP team was essential in documenting false voting and vote-buying, which were largely overlooked by the media.
In the lead-up to the ultimately postponed January 2007 elections, IRI supported a nationwide effort to train domestic election observers to conduct domestic long-term election observation missions. In addition, IRI conducted an international pre-election technical assessment to explore key aspects of the election process, such as election laws and regulations, the voter list, access to media, violence and pressure on voters, and the state of preparation by political parties. With the postponement of the elections, IRI’s international and domestic long-term observation missions were cut short and a planned international short-term election observation delegation mission was cancelled.
In 2007 and 2008, IRI plans to support domestic observation efforts of the voter registration process and local elections.
A complementary component to IRI’s election monitoring program is a journalist education project, designed to provide journalists with training in both election observation and investigative journalism. The goal of this project is to increase objectivity and accuracy in press coverage of elections in Bangladesh. IRI plans to continue this project through March 2008, with an increased focus on journalists based outside of Dhaka.
Youth Leadership Development
Empowering Bangladeshi youth and increasing their participation in civic and political activism provides the best hope for a democratic future for Bangladesh. From September 2004 through March 2006, IRI provided young people concrete skills and opportunities to become more involved in politics and civil society through a series of multi-faceted Discovering Democracy youth fairs.
IRI hosted five Discovering Democracy fairs: Cox's Bazaar in September 2004, Khulna in March 2005, Barisal in August 2005, Sylhet in February 2006, and Rajshahi in March 2006. Each of the fairs attracted thousands of students between the ages of 15 and 25, many of whom had never had an opportunity to learn about politics, governance or civil society.
The fairs provided youth the opportunity to experience first hand the nuts and bolts of the political process through interactive games, mock parliamentary campaigns and elections, and letter writing campaigns to local government officials. The fairs also introduced youth to the wide range of domestic and international civil society organizations operating in the country.
In 2006, IRI built on the success of the youth fairs by supporting a network of nationwide youth citizen forums. In 2007, IRI continues to support the establishment and strengthening of forums around the country with a goal of creating a National Youth Agenda (a statement of the political and social aspirations of Bangladeshi young people). In early 2008, forum leaders will unveil the agenda at a nationwide youth conference in Dhaka.
Civil Society Initiatives
IRI support for civil society focuses on advocacy organizations' efforts to develop voices, strategies, and messages that pressure political parties to respond to constituent needs.
In September 2004 and May 2005, IRI partnered with the Solidarity Center, a U.S.-based nonprofit organization that empowers workers around the world, to co-sponsor two labor issues forums, which were administered and moderated through the Bangladesh Independent Garment Workers' Union Federation. Hundreds of mostly female garment workers attended each conference to hear how political parties would protect their jobs and make Bangladesh more competitive in the world market.
Since 2004, IRI has also supported the International Business Forum of Bangladesh (IBFB), a nonpartisan business advocacy association that advocates for better business policies. IBFB received official registration from the Bangladesh Ministry of Commerce on September 14, 2005, and was officially launched in September 2006. Currently, IRI is supporting IBFB’s advocacy efforts with political parties, the government and domestic and international business stakeholders.
Women's Initiatives
At the city corporation level, a number of commission seats are reserved for female candidates. Each reserved-seat commissioner is responsible for three wards, while each general seat commissioner is responsible for one ward. Unlike at national levels, female candidates compete against each other for reserved city commission seats. Women may contest general commission seats, but rarely win over male candidates. Reserved-seat commissioners are entitled by law to the same resources allocated to their male counterparts. However, this is rarely the case in practice. In addition to denying reserved-seat commissioners legally mandated resources, mayors and male commissioners have refused to allow them to participate equally in development activities. These factors hinder the ability of reserved-seat commissioner to serve their constituents.
IRI began working with reserved-seat commissioners from Barisal, Chittagong, Khulna, Sylhet and Rajshahi in 2005. IRI provided training and counsel to facilitate development of local strategic plans, to enable analysis of their challenges, and to provide skills needed to articulate their demands professionally. Thanks to IRI training, reserved-seat commissioners in some city corporations have worked with their mayors and, in some cases, male commissioners, to make strides toward their goals. In 2007, national advocacy efforts paid off in Chittagong and Khulna, where reserved-seat commissioners now receive development funds.
Through sustained advocacy, reserved-seat commissioners around the country are increasingly able to serve their constituents, and IRI continues to support their advocacy efforts at the local and national levels.
In February 2006, IRI hosted a three-day national workshop for reserved-seat commissioners. The workshop provided a forum for an exchange of experiences about advocacy successes and failures from each city corporation, provided an opportunity to update existing strategic plans for each city, and enabled reserved-seat commissioners from across the country to work together to create a national strategy for 2006.
In May 2007, IRI conducted a second national training focused extensively on campaigning in advance of local elections (expected to be held in 2008). Following the conference, IRI conducted follow-up training sessions in each city corporation to reinforce the skills learned in the national training and to encourage reserved-seat commissioners to contest in general commissioner seat races.
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