"CIVIC WORLD" IN BANGLADESH 

The civic society creates the values
 

By Gonce Jakovleska The non-governmental organizations in Bangladesh are an important actor in the development of the country. They function in conditions which are completely different from the ones in Macedonia, however, there are some common issues. We talked to Aloysius Milon Khan, coordinator of the communication group in the Rangpur Dinajpur Rural Service - RDRS from Bangladesh about the NGOs functioning in Bangladesh.

Setting up NGOs

If you ask someone from the employed in RDRS how old the organization is, almost with no exception, they will proudly answer: "just as the independence of our country”. RDRS is a non-governmental organization founded in 1971 with help from the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) aiming to help the refugees from the war for independence of Bangladesh from Pakistan who looked for a shelter in India. Thousands of people who fled from the northern parts of Bangladesh into the border, southern parts of India, were provided with food, medicaments, clothes etc. After nine months, when the war finished and the refugees returned to the places which used to be their homes, RDRS continued helping them.

"LWF asked for a permission from the Bangladesh's Prime Minister to continue its activities in the country in the post-war period", recalls our interlocutor who has been with RDRS for 27 years. "In that time the organization worked under the name Rangpur-Dinajpur Rehabilitation Service".

The post-war period is actually the time when the non-governmental organizations began setting up. "The need for help was really enormous", says Milon, "each organization formed in that time, began its activities in an almost identical way".

In Bangladesh there are 1800 NGOs. A small number of them are big, only six, and most often they cover the territory of the whole country. RDRS is in the group of the medium-sized organizations and the smallest ones work on a local level. Regardless the level, all NGOs work on the same kind of activities, according to the country's needs.

Target groups and activities

Generally viewed, the RDRS target group are all the people in need from the target region of Rangpur-Dinajpur. Activities change in due course, from rehabilitation to development ones.

Four years after the war the organization functioned as a rehabilitation service, it distributed food, clothes and medicaments for the people in the region of Rangpur and Dinajpur. "Then we started building roads, schools, bridges, ambulances etc.", says Milon. "Our next step was to develop the strategy for the development activities. The activities were divided in several sectors: health, education, agriculture etc. One of the sectors we have developed is the preparation for catastrophes. Bangladesh is a country of natural catastrophes: cyclones, fires, earthquakes, floods. In the region covered by RDRS most often there are floods, caused by the river Brahmaputra. Then we help people dealing with the consequences and previously we preventively teach them to prepare for that elementary disaster, as well as to protect at least the basic things. Catastrophes are usual here, they’re part of our life.”

“One of our activities in the sector of ‘education’ is the children’ s education”, says Milon. “In the region covered by RDRS (5498 square meters – 6,2 million people) over 100 000 children at the age between 6 and 10 don’t go to school. That is the reason why RDRS is involved in promoting the children’s education. RDRS builds schools and provides education in the regions without any state schools. 83 children’s educative centers have been formed with more than 4,000 schoolchildren.”

One of the activities carried out by most of the NGOs in Bangladesh is the “federation”. It is a kind of an organization for self-help. Its motto is – “from people to people.”

“The first level of the ‘federation’ are the primary groups”, says Milon. “They comprise one member of each family”. In 2000 there were more than 8,000 groups like these with over 150,000 members. Within five years with these people and their families there are some parallel activities in almost all sectors: health, education, generating funds etc. For that time, the group, most often involving from 18 to 25 people should learn how to become sustainable and to help itself without any external help. If it “graduates”, then it moves to a higher level. One member of the group becomes a representative in the “Federation”, that is in the secondary groups of the “federation”. In 2000 there were more than 7,000 secondary groups with about 110,000 members.

“We have been trying to promote the democratic culture through the “federation”, says Aloysius Milon., “and we have been impelling people’s participation in decision-making. Always, at least 33% of the members of the ‘federation’s’ bodies have been women.” RDRS supports the “federation” so that within several years it could function on its own, as a separate organization. In due course, they are going to provide contacts between the “federation” and the DONORS so that they could communicate directly.

Financing and sustainability

“In the beginning, biggest part of the assets which helped us implementing our activities were from the Lutheran World Federation (LWF)”, recalls Milon. “In due course and our bigger engagement in the development activities, the assets from LWF started decreasing. In general, LWF supports only the urgent and humanitarian operations. We find the new funds for development projects from other DONORS, such as the Danish Church Help, Finn Church Help, Norwegian Church Help, Swedish Church Help, the Inter-church Development and Cooperation Organization – ICCO from the Netherlands, the EU Humanitarian Office – ECHO, USAID etc.”

“One the biggest questions today is the question of self-sustainability”, continues Milon. “One of the news we have implemented with the new middle-term plan 2001-2005 are the micro-financing activities, i.e. micro-crediting. We had to start these activities because nowadays all the NGOs in Bangladesh carry out activities of this kind. We started some pilot-activities from micro-financing in 1991, but with very small amounts. Part of these assets wasn’t paid back. However, I think that in that period we weren’t organized and prepared so well for this activity. Now it more looks like a business. I hope it is going to function well. The other organizations work with much bigger amounts. However, the first reason for starting this type of activities were the people, our target groups. We provide them with courses of the basic skills for breeding hens, cows, fishing etc. They weren’t able to implement what they have learned because they didn’t have money to start such an activity. That is why we have decided to give them assets in a form of loans. The micro-financing program is separate from the other programs and sectors in RDRS.

We view the micro-financing from an aspect of reaching self-sustainability or self-financing. The accumulation of the assets from the interests, long-term viewed, in five or ten years is going to provide self-financing of the micro-credits part.”

Human resources and organizational structure

In the Rangpur-Dinajpur Rural Service (RDRS) there are almost 1 600 employees. At the top of the organizational structure is the executive director. Then there are three directors responsible for different working spheres. In next level are the sector coordinators, partner projects coordinators etc. However, the number of people working on the spot is the biggest. The central office of the organization is in Rangpur and in the capital Daka there is only a relations office. RDRS has a board of trustees, but its role is only counseling. Decisions are brought by the management of the organization.

“For employing new people most often we use advertisements in the newspapers”, says Milon. “But sometimes we manage to find the locally engaged workers through the already employed ones. Bangladesh is a big country. For one part of the interested ones the new working place means a change in the place to live. It isn’t easy to bring this decision, especially if the candidate is a family man.”

Cooperation between the NGOs and the country

There is a competition between the NGOs, especially in the micro-financing sector. Most of the NGOs work on micro-financing and it happens that sometimes the regions, even the users overlap. Mainly the competition is in this sector. “However, there is a cooperation”, adds our interlocutor. “The NGOs have established several networks. Some of them are sector networks. For example WHSS helps the NGOs which work in the health sector. It represents their interests in front of the government. It is a special organization with its own organizational structure. Another organization like this is the Volunteers Association from Bangladesh.”

“The cooperation between the NGOs and the Government for the past 30 years has been good”, continues Milon. “The NGOs helped the Government a lot in the war and the post-war period. And they are still doing that. Actually, the NGOs developed almost the whole rural part of the country. There is a special regulative for the work of the NGOs. It is exactly prescribed what the NGOs can import money in the country for and the Government gives an approval for that. As soon as the project finishes, the NGOs are to submit a financial report to the donator and the Government.”

As far the benefits are considered, the NGOs are sometimes excluded from paying taxes, but not always.

In the end, this is what the civic society represents for our interlocutor Aloysius Milon: “The civic society is a part of the community. It has a great role in the development of the country and establishing a better life for the people. The civic society creates the values, simultaneously being a possibility for pressure on those who bring the decisions in the country. The civic society in Bangladesh is trying to influence the Government through the pressure groups. This opportunity should be used and the influence should be qualitatively improved. The civic society also has a great role in people’s private life making them aware of the issues such as AIDS, children’s marriages etc.

It also has a big role in keeping the history, tradition and culture. The civic society concept is of vital importance for a country in development such as Bangladesh. The actors in the civic organizing expect big support from everyone, especially from the local self-government and the media. Thus, everyone is going to develop the society more efficiently, making the life better.”

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Networking, fighting for trade and economic justice, against AIDS, poverty...

In the period between 20 and 26 January 2002, in Rangpur, Bangladesh, there was a meeting of the global network communicators. The host of this meeting was the Rangpur-Dinajpur Rural Service from Bangladesh. The communicators global network is a volunteering association of people who work with communications through the massive media and promote their work for more justice and sustainable order in the world, also wanting to share their experience and interests with a wide forum.

The network was set up in 1985 by representatives of the development and international help agencies which work with the Churches World Council, Lutheran World Organization and the World Association of Christian Communications. In 2001 the network involved 54 individual representatives of 40 organizations throughout the world.

This year there were 42 communicators from 29 different organizations at the communicators meeting. MCIC was the only representative from Eastern Europe.

At the meeting it was discussed about communication within urgent operations or crises, trade and economic justice, HIV/AIDS and networking. The present ones were introduced with the media trends in Bangladesh and the preparation for urgent operations and catastrophes in Bangladesh. In the workshops there were discussions on film/radio/TV production, how to communicate in urgent situations, how we work with AIDS/HIV and with the trade and economic justice. In relation to the communication in urgent operations the last cases such as Afghanistan, Kosovo etc. were presented.

Apart from that, at the meeting there were also discussions on the needs for training the communicators, as well as networking and planning. The participants of the meeting had a possibility to spend a day on two islands of the river Brahmaputra where the host, i.e. RDRS implements a program for preparations for catastrophes.