Still the surge of a so-called humanitarian corridor to Rakhine and the whispered intentions of handing over Chattogram's vital terminals to foreign companies are lurking ominously in the skies above Bangladesh's utmost volatile political fields. These decisions -draped in the pretence of diplomacy and developmental necessity -are rising like fog before a storm. Though elite intellectuals and basic rights groups have raised due voices against these moves, the tide hasn't halted: Rather, it has simply changed its disguise.
As the long and exhausting rat-race of politics spins toward a national compromise stitched for mutual survival, what emerges is not a new dawn but a fraught twilight. All political parties -previously scattered and hunted like fugitives in a forest of fear - are now regrouping: Yet not through idealism, but desperation; and not from leadership, but necessity.
Bangladesh now finds itself again at a historical juncture, not carved by revolution or written in the dust of tanks, but shaped by silence. It is a silence heavy with negotiations behind closed doors, with unread documents, and with whispered names of foreign firms. Two key issues now hang in that quiet: the corridor to Rakhine, and the leasing of strategic port terminals that guard the nation's economic heart.
Each might seem manageable, explainable, defensible even, if one sees them in isolation. But reality does not unfold in compartments. Together, they form the early outlines of something more grave -a creeping dilution of sovereignty dressed in suits and cement.
The proposed corridor into Rakhine is presented to the people in the language of mercy: Humanitarian responsibility, neighbourly obligation and regional stability. But corridors, once opened, do not always follow the script. They widen with time. They deepen with foreign interests. Often, they end up becoming roads not for aid -but for influence, control and the quiet shifting of power.
From Kabul to Khartoum, from Aleppo to Bagram, we have watched this choreography. The gate is opened in the name of humanity. Soon comes logistics. Then oversight. Then foreign personnel, intelligence-sharing, permanent depots. Before long, what was meant to save becomes what must be watched, regulated, and eventually controlled. Bangladesh -already hosting a burden that no other nation has shouldered, the 10-million lives exiled from Myanmar, must be vigilant not to open another door it cannot close. Even a corridor paved with good intentions can lead to the erosion of national command.
The leasing of Chattogram and Payra port terminals to foreign entities under terms that remain hidden from public view. We are told this is efficiency, investment, and progress. In Sri Lanka, the Hambantota Agreement was signed in a mood of urgency. What followed was debt, then surrender: A 99-year lease. Generations traded for repayment schedules. In Djibouti, in Pakistan, in parts of Africa, the pattern repeats.
Bangladesh, with its strategic coastline and irreplaceable sea lanes, cannot afford such sleep-walking. Port control is not a commercial matter only. It is about defence readiness, economic independence, and political leverage.
Yet, those currently guiding the state do not hold an elected mandate. An interim government, by design and by duty and fitness, is a caretaker: Not an architect of permanent shifts. It must restrain its hand, not extend it into treaties with generational implications.
Now, to decide the fate of national assets or geopolitical alignments without the voice of the people is not leadership. It is the dire-over-reach. No amount of bureaucratic efficiency can replace democratic legitimacy. No matter how benevolent their motives -no unelected regime has the right to sign away a nation's future. This is our fundamental constitutional order for the republic. "These are very sensitive national issues-not should be done alone," echoed NurulKabir, Editor of The New Age.
But perhaps most troubling is the silence that surrounds it all. In Dhaka, the editorial desks remain curiously mute. The studio lights of debate shows are -barely--dimmed. The headlines are either missing or misdirected -or ill-edited. Now, where is the national conversation? Where are the front-page urgencies? When sovereignty is under quiet negotiation, the press must thunder, not whisper. A press that chooses silence during such a time is not neutral! This is complicit.
This moment demands vigilance -utmost strongly! It demands that Bangladesh return to the principle that sovereignty cannot be outsourced -and nor sold. No foreign corridor should be carved through our borderlands without scrutiny. This is our common demand: The demand of all and of end people.
No terminal should be leased without full public transparency.No agreement signed behind the curtain should hold weight in daylight. The path is one: consensus not concealment.
To that end, the nation must immediately call for the formation of a national consensus committee comprising all political parties, civil society leaders, and independent experts, tasking with reviewing all pending deals, evaluating their impact, and proposing a course -reflecting the very will of people, not the comfort of the elite. No foreign hand should enter this land without first facing the judgment of its people. It should be confirmed before further attempting.
Bangladesh has endured too much to gamble away its independence for short-term convenience. This is a country that has risen from partition -bled through war, and crawled through decades of coups and political cannibalism. Yet it has endured. Because people never let go of the belief that this land is theirs. That belief must not be broken now -and not in the name of corridors or terminals.
So far we know, the World Bank's port funding is a major concern for us. At the same time the UN's approach for the Corridor to Rakhine is it-self a grave concern. And UN SG's Dhaka tour was a flash of all-way-empathy!
This is not merely about policy. It is about principle. If the nation is to take bold steps into the future, let them be steps taken together, not in secret, but in sunlight. If the decisions are just, they will survive scrutiny. If they are wise, they will be ratified by the people. If they are necessary, they will be celebrated, not hidden.
Let this moment awaken the public voice once again. Let the interim government understand its bounds. Let the press remember its purpose. Let those who would bargain with sovereignty hear a nation rise and say:
We are not for lease. We are not for sale.
The writer is a journalist with The Daily Observer
