The Shanti Bahini has split into two factions. The other faction - the United People's Democratic Front - rejects the peace treaty and both sides are involved in killing and kidnapping each other's members. Things are so bad that the Chakma people I spoke to are terrified of going into new territory in their own hills! According to the Daily Star ( December 1, 2011 ), hundreds of families of murdered UPDF members congregated in Shanirbar to protest the murders. They claimed that the PCJSS have killed at least 228 UPDF men since the signing of the peace treaty in 1997. The placards read: ''try my husband's killers', 'I want justice for my son's killing', 'stop fratricide in CHT,' 'we want peace'".
The hill people are also aware that neither the UPDF nor the JSS care for the fate of those they claim to represent. Both sides are involved in money-making activity: extortion, kidnapping for ransom....
For instance, the road from Khagrachari to Panchari is 24 kilometers long. Five years ago, the first 15 kilometers were smooth -- then the potholes and ruts began. Why? Well, when the road-building project was undertaken by the contractor, it was agreed with the UPDF and JSS that they would each get 600,000 takas (around $10,000) from him as protection money. Work began. Then the two sides came round demanding double the original figure. Work stopped.
Income per head is declining at Khagrachari, one of the three hill districts and still the most volatile. Extortion is discouraging big businessmen from investing in the region, so there's less money to go around.
The UPDF and the JSS are now nothing but criminal organisations. The JSS is part of the government, so receives money from local and foreign sources. My sources claim that the JSS commands very little loyalty - what following it has, has been bought with cash. On the other hand, the UPDF - this may sound bizarre - receives assistance from the national army! Openly, it claims to be against the government and against the peace treaty. It is, however, very popular, and receives plenty of cash from local hill people. (Their leader, however, prefers to live in the relative safety of the national capital!)
That the UPDF is in cahoots is obvious from the fact that their graffiti are to be found all over Khagrachari - while there are no graffiti of the JSS. But it's the location of the graffiti that's a dead giveaway. These words are painted in red on the wall of the stadium: GIVE US BACK OUR LANDS/STOP VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN CHT. Inflammatory slogans, but for the fact that the stadium is right next to the cantonment entrance which is heavily guarded 24 hours a day!
The donors seem blissfully oblivious of the fact that they have helped trigger a near-civil-war in the region. It was they who pushed for the treaty, and the Awami League gained kudos for signing it.
What the three groups of actors appear to have had in mind was a peace-that-is-no-peace, to use George Orwell's expression. They calculated that the average hill man and hill woman would go along with whatever arrangements were made. What they didn't reckon on was the emergence of the UPDF and the civil-war-like situation.
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