Civic forums stay ‘squeezed’ in Bangladesh

As in the previous years, the overall situation of civil society organisations in Bangladesh particularly those have a focus on democracy, good governance, and human rights remained in the grip of the authorities concerned, according to CSO Sustainability Index.

The organisations faced obstacles and bureaucratic harassment in legal processes, including complicated registration, renewal issues, and delayed approval for foreign support, according to the global index published by USAID on Wednesday.

The 2021 CSO Sustainability Index for Bangladesh shows that the overall sustainability index for last year remained static at 4.0, the same as that of 2020. The figure was 3.5 in 2015, a year after Bangladesh was included in the annual estimate.

A pool of experts suggests the scores for each country based on publicly available information and data. A US-based editorial panel finalises the score before producing the report.

The CSO sector includes self-governing formal and informal organisations, usually of non-profit nature, such as non-government organisations, community-based organisations, faith-based organisations, social movements, trade unions, women’s groups, research institutes, and think tanks.

The report says that NGO Affairs Bureau increasingly delayed approvals of foreign grants in 2021, imposing new conditionalities in the process.

This happened despite the fact that the CSO sector in Bangladesh has long depended heavily on foreign donors, including multilateral institutions like the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and UN, and bilateral donors like USAID, FCDO, and Sida, etc.

The financial viability of the CSO sector remained unchanged overall in 2021. Though the amount of foreign funds approved by NGOAB increased, CSOs received notably less of it in 2021 than they did in 2020.

“CSOs were hesitant to carry out advocacy campaigns that may challenge the government, especially in regards to policy making, and the public image of CSOs deteriorated slightly with an increase of negative media coverage,” the report said.

“The organisational capacity of CSOs also declined slightly in 2021 as funding cuts limited CSOs’ ability to retain full-time, qualified staff. Financial viability, service provision, and the infrastructure supporting the sector remained unchanged in 2021,” the index adds.

It says that the legal environment for CSOs, governed by several regulatory frameworks, declined moderately in 2021 while restrictions on civic space more broadly continued to impede CSOs’ ability to operate.

CSOs register under various government departments, making it difficult to determine the total number of CSOs in the country. There are more than 58,000 organisations registered under the Department of Social Services, the study finds.