SINCE I wrote the column Dawn published in its issue of November 5, some further commentary has appeared in America about the political situation in Pakistan. Some of this is worth noting. Of special interest are two book reviews on two recent books on Pakistan — “Pakistan: Eye of the Storm” by Owen Bennett Jones, and “Pakistan: In the Shadow of Jihad and Afghanistan” by Mary Anne Weaver.

Jones once covered Pakistan as a BBC correspondent. Weaver has written extensively for The New Yorker on Pakistan. Her latest contribution was a profile of General Pervez Musharraf that appeared a couple of months ago.

The book reviews from which I will quote in a moment are by two individuals who know Pakistan well but hold entirely different views about the country. One is Sumit Ganguly, a naturalized American of Indian descent who is Professor of Asian Studies and Government at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of a book titled “Conflict Unending: India and Pakistan.” His review appeared in Foreign Affairs, a magazine published by the prestigious New York-based Council on Foreign Relations. Professor Ganguly has earned himself the reputation of being a stern critic of Pakistan and the regime headed by General Pervez Musharraf. He often functions as a political pundit on radio and TV talk shows when South Asia is a topic of discussion.

The other review appeared in The New York Times Book Review on November 3 and was written by Robert D. Kaplan, a correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly and the author of a number of books on the Muslim world, including “Soldiers of God: With Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan.” Both authors, in covering the books they were reviewing, focused on the role played by the military in general and General Pervez Musharraf in particular in recent political developments in Pakistan.

For Ganguly, General Musharraf is the latest in a long line of political generals in Pakistan’s history to derail the country’s political development. “Late this summer General Pervez Musharraf announced 29 new amendments to the Constitution that vastly strengthened the powers of the military and the executive. Among the prerogatives, these amendments gave the president (who will be Musharraf for at least the next five years, thanks to the fraud-ridden ‘referendum’ held in April) the power to dismiss Pakistan’s legislature effectively making all of Parliament’s action subject to his approval. Another innovation, the National Security Council, formally institutionalized the already pervasive role of the military in the country’s politics,” says Ganguly at the start of his review.

In developing his argument that it is the military more than any other group that has thwarted Pakistan’s move towards a functioning democracy, Ganguly covers the ground popular with the Indian academics writing on Pakistan. According to this line of thinking and analysis, the military in Pakistan has developed a strong economic vested interest in keeping politics firmly in its control. The Indian commentators and analysts don’t accept that the unending conflict with India has anything to do with Indian actions. It is the consequence of the economic ambitions of Pakistan’s military to keep public resources flowing into its coffers.

“Pakistani military rulers have not only usurped political power but have distorted the country’s priorities and sustained unremitting hostility towards India. These dictators have also managed to siphon off substantial economic resources even while accusing Pakistan’s civilian politicians of being the ones who have raided the treasury. Look at the country’s annual budgets, more than a third of which goes to the military, and it should become clear who has done the bulk of the raiding,” writes Ganguly. Maybe Pakistan spends so much on its military since India is not prepared to leave its neighbour live in peace or resolve the Kashmir dispute according to international law. That thought, if it occurs to Professor Ganguly at all, he is quite content to keep it to himself and not share it with his readers.

The only departure Professor Ganguly makes from what is now conventional wisdom in the Indian writing about Pakistan is to recognize that Pakistani politicians have not helped with the development of the country’s political institutions that could have sustained democracy. “The root causes of Pakistan’s economic and political woes lie in its feudal society and the winner-take-all approach to governing that has been practised by successive civilian and military leaders,” he says in the review.

At least from my perspective of Pakistan’s political development, it is the book review by Robert Kaplan that comes much closer to the real truth of what has occurred in Pakistan. Readers will recall that a couple of years ago, Kaplan had contributed an article to the Atlantic Monthly in which he had predicted that Pakistan, like Yugoslavia, will break up into a number of mini-states, each catering to a different ethnic identity. He did not think that there was enough binding force in Islam or something called the Pakistani identity that would keep together the various groups in the country as the citizens of one state. However, Pakistan was not the only country that was subject to such fissiparous tendencies. There were numerous other countries in the world, particularly in East and Southern Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia and South-east Asia where it would be difficult to build nation states out of multiple ethnic, linguistic and cultural communities. Kaplan predicted in that article that the world in the middle of the 21st century may have 500 rather than today’s 200 states. It will be a world full of small states.

Could Pakistan be spared such a future? Could Pakistan keep its many ethnic groups working together in the context of a single state? “Islam in Pakistan has had no more success in quelling ethnic and tribal animosities than communism had in Yugoslavia. There is so little sense of authentic nationhood that when the Baloch inhabitants of the country’s south-western desert venture elsewhere in Pakistan, they say they are going to Hindustan, which for most people means India,” writes Kaplan. What has brought Pakistan to this situation?

Kaplan’s answer is closer to my interpretation of what has happened in Pakistan than I have seen in most other analyses. “The reality is that Pakistan’s experience with democracy has so far been unfortunate, beginning in essence with Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, a slick demagogue who in 1965 played a leading role in instigating Pakistan’s disastrous war with India. Bhutto’s daughter, Benazir, ruled twice in the late 1980s and 1990s, after Zia’s death returned the country to democracy. When Bhutto returned to power in 1993 (after being dismissed in 1990 on charges of corruption) and the country began to fall apart, she had only herself to blame. She and Asif Ali Zardari, her husband as well as the investment minister, ran Pakistan as though it were a commercial enterprise.”

Kaplan is equally uncomplimentary about the other two-time prime minister of Pakistan in the 1990s, Mian Nawaz Sharif. According to him, Sharif, “a Punjabi religious conservative was bribing parliamentarians and journalists to erect a theocratic dictatorship under the guise of democracy.” General Musharraf stepped in in time to save Pakistan from what would have been a disastrous move.

What about the military leaders in Pakistan’s turbulent political history. Kaplan is considerably more accommodating of them than is the fashion today both inside and outside Pakistan. According to his reading, Musharraf emerges in the two books reviewed by him as the philosophical opposite of another Pakistani general, Mohammad Ziaul Haq. According to Bennett Jones, the author of one of the reviewed books, “Zia is perhaps the only one of Pakistan’s four military dictators to deserve the epithet ‘dictator.’ Zia aligned himself with Muslim extremists, institutionalizing radical Islam in almost every branch of the state.” Zia’s democratic successors, Bennett Jones notes, did little to dismantle his legacy.

Zia, of course, had worked hard to destroy the legacy of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto which combined total disregard of democratic practices while professing love for democracy to the world outside; bringing back Fabian socialism into the country when it had been thoroughly discredited everywhere else; using the nationalized financial sector to corrupt the political system and distort economic priorities; and, perhaps most disturbing of all, to use the education system to create a political base for his new party. With that legacy Pakistan could not have made any progress either in politics or in economics.

But in destroying one legacy, Zia created another, equally unhealthy one, which left Pakistan isolated, confused and in the grip of obscurantist forces. It is this second legacy that General Pervez Musharraf has had to contend with. What has been his record?

According to Kaplan, “undoing Zia’s Islamization programme has proved a thankless task for Musharraf, who despite his failure this far has at least tried: challenging the clerics by denouncing religious practices like honour killings and blasphemy laws, and speaking out in support of human rights in a way that previous Pakistani leaders rarely did.” Kaplan agrees with the author Bennett Jones, who asserts that Musharraf, unlike his predecessors, “does at least have an agenda. He wants a modern, liberal Pakistan in which there is religious tolerance and respect for the law. It is impossible to avoid the conclusion that the military stands a better chance of delivering radical change in Pakistan than the civilians.”

Kaplan and at least one of the authors he reviewed in his essay come to the conclusion that I have been offering in these pages for some time. I have argued that numerous civilian politicians must take the responsibility for much that has gone wrong with Pakistan. I have also suggested that General Pervez Musharraf appears to be making a serious effort at building political institutions without which democracy cannot be sustained. And, finally, I have also taken the position that the military needs an institution such as the National Security Council to ensure that this time round, Pakistan’s politicians will not fail the country once again.

But if we grant General Musharraf the benefit of the doubt — as we should — then we must ask another question. Is the general succeeding in his effort or — as has been claimed by the commentators I quoted in my article last week — he has by his actions only managed to place the political system in the hands of the forces representing the Islamic right? In answering this question we have to look at the political situation emerging in Pakistan in a wider global context. That I will do in this column next week.

IN August 2002, the Chief Executive, General Parvez Musharraf promulgated the Legal Framework Order, 2002 (the LFO) which made amendments in various articles of the 1973 Constitution. At the present moment it is unclear whether or not the government will seek to have the amendments in the Constitution made by the LFO ratified by parliament.

However, it is quite clear that notwithstanding the millions squandered by the National Reconstruction Bureau, the LFO as a piece of legal draftsmanship is quite simply shoddy.

It would be a shame if the Constitution, which is the bedrock of our legal system, is allowed to be defaced by the kind of elementary mistakes which are found in the LFO. The present discussion is however limited in its scope to the errors in relation to the disqualification of members of the assembly only and does not seek to address the other errors contained therein.

The LFO states that in Art. 63(1) of the Constitution: for paragraphs (h), (i) and (j) the following shall be substituted, namely:

(h) he has been convicted by a court of competent jurisdiction on a charge of corrupt practice, moral turpitude or misuse of power or authority under any law for the time being in force; or

(i) he has been dismissed from the service of Pakistan or service of a corporation or office set up or controlled by the Federal Government, Provincial Government or a Local Government on the grounds of misconduct or moral turpitude; or

(j) he has been removed or compulsorily retired from the service of Pakistan or service of a corporation or office set up or controlled by the Federal Government, Provincial Government or a Local Government on the grounds of misconduct or moral turpitude; or”;

For paragraph (p) the following shall be substituted, namely:

(p) he has been convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for having absconded by a competent court under any law for the time being in force; or

(q) he has obtained a loan for an amount of two million rupees or more, from any bank, financial institution, cooperative society or cooperative body in his own name or in the name of his spouse or any of his dependents, which remains unpaid for more than one year from the due date, or has got such loan written off...

If we examine clause (h) above, this disqualifies a person who has been convicted of “corrupt practice, moral turpitude or misuse of power or authority”. The first point to be noted is that “moral turpitude” is not an offence under the laws of Pakistan. As held by the Lahore High Court (in PLD 1963, Lah 601) the expression “moral turpitude” has not been defined in any statute and is generally understood to mean anything which is done contrary to the principles of morality. It is therefore impossible to convict anyone on a charge of moral turpitude. Thus, the LFO lays down a disqualification which is in fact meaningless and makes a mockery of a constitutional provision.

At this point it should be pointed out that the original text of Art. 63(h) states: (h) “he has been, on conviction for any offence which in the opinion of the Chief Election Commissioner involves moral turpitude, sentenced to imprisonment for a term of not less than two years, unless a period of five years has elapsed since his release.”

As can be seen, the draftsman of the original provision was cognizant of the fact that moral turpitude is not an offence and hence the reference to the opinion of the Chief Election Commission as to whether any particular offence involved moral turpitude. It is clear that this drafting is far superior to that in the LFO.

The second error in clause (h) is that in Pakistan “misuse of power” is also not an offence. (The closest offence is “misuse of authority” which, although also an imprecise term, has at least been used in the NAB ordinance, which itself is hardly a model of good drafting.) Thus it is impossible for anyone to be convicted of misuse of power and hence be disqualified under this clause. Sadly, it appears that the draftsman of the LFO is not very well versed in the field of criminal jurisprudence.

The third point to note is that this clause only disqualifies those who have been convicted of corrupt practices or misuse of authority. Therefore, under this clause it is impossible to disqualify someone who is convicted of, say, murder. In the original version of this clause, such a person would be disqualified as the Chief Election Commissioner would have surely concluded that such a crime involves moral turpitude. This leads to the bizarre result that following the amendments a murderer would now no longer be disqualified but a clerk who has accepted a bribe of Rs 100 would. If this is a “reform”, it is surely rather startling.

We now turn to examine clauses (i) and (j). The point to note here is that the same penalty (disqualification) has been prescribed for dismissal as well as for removal and compulsory retirement. While a government servant can only be dismissed if he has done something seriously wrong, he can be compulsorily retired on the ground that he has completed 25 years of service. Therefore, this clause disqualifies for life a former government servant who has been compulsorily retired without having committed any serious offence — merely on the ground that he has served for 25 years. Surely this cannot be right.

Furthermore, there is a clear-cut difference between dismissal and removal from service. Dismissal is a harsher penalty than removal and hence is only prescribed when the government servant has committed a very grave offence. We have already seen the limits of the knowledge of draftsman of the LFO in relation to criminal law. It now appears that he does not seem to know much about the laws which regulate the conduct and employment of government servants either.

The next clause which has been amended is clause (p) which disqualifies any person who has been convicted for having absconded. While it is arguable that any such person should indeed remain disqualified until such time as he has either served his sentence or his conviction has been set aside, it is certainly not justifiable that he should be disqualified for life as no time limit for the disqualification has been laid down.

It is possible that in a criminal case the police are unable to arrest the accused because they do not have his correct address. Such a person may be convicted for having absconded. Thereafter the person may appear before the court and satisfy it that he did not have any knowledge of the case filed against him. Alternatively, the person may be subsequently acquitted on the merits in relation to the crime with which he has been charged. Nevertheless, the wording of clause (p) is such that he can never ever be eligible to be a member of parliament. This again is a case of poor drafting.

Unfortunately, clause (q) is also rather problematic. This clause penalizes those who have defaulted in the payment of large bank loans. Unfortunately, it disqualifies all those who have had loans written-off irrespective of the reason. It often happens that a bank writes off a loan for bona fide commercial reasons. In fact, the government itself frequently allows certain types of loans to be written off. For instance, if an area is devastated by floods, the government sometimes allows agricultural loans to be written off because it realizes that after the destruction of the crops standing in the field it is impossible for farmers to repay their loans.

Obviously, the clause should have been restricted to the write-off of loans by misuse of authority or improper means. A further problem with the drafting of this clause is that it does not lay down any cut-off date. Thus, theoretically, if a loan is outstanding or was written off at any time since 1947, the person is disqualified. A more sensible approach would be to include only those loans which were taken after, say, 1985, which is what the NAB law does.

Although this discussion is confined to Art. 62, in fact the entire LFO is riddled with such errors. All one can hope is that parliament in its wisdom will make drastic changes to the LFO.

The writer is a practising lawyer.

THE focus in local think tanks was on Pakistan-Bangladesh relations in the last week of October as a group of academics from Bangladesh visited Pakistan. Along with an analysis of the regional scenario, which has been affected by the post 9/11 global trends, the discussions naturally took up the prospects for relations between Pakistan and Bangladesh.

This has been a significant year for this relationship in many ways. Perhaps the most important single development was the regret expressed by President Pervez Musharraf during his July visit to Bangladesh for the excesses by the Pakistan armed forces during their crackdown in 1971.

This was a spontaneous and sincere initiative to remove the lingering resentments that had continued to cast a shadow on bilateral relations. The president had also won appreciation for his announcement that Pakistan would allow tariff-free imports of major Bangladeshi staples of tea and jute, a gesture that took cognizance of the imbalance in bilateral trade.

The 9/11 attacks on the US have resulted in a campaign directed against the Islamic world with forces of Zionism and conservative Christianity in the US fuelling a sustained drive to browbeat and subjugate the Muslim world. The identification of the “axis of evil” by Bush and the resolve to attack Iraq, with Iran as a likely target to follow, disguise the twin objectives of establishing US-Zionist hegemony in the Islamic heartland on the basis of sheer military power and of bringing the oil resources of the region under Washington’s control.

As India has forged links with Israel and proceeded to practise the same type of excesses against the Muslims in India as Sharon been perpetrating against the hapless Palestinians, both Bangladeshi intellectuals and popular sentiment have taken note of the implications.

Islamic awareness runs deep among the Bengali Muslims. There is genuine support there for the Kashmir cause, and the outrages being committed against Indian Muslims in Gujarat and other states are strongly resented. The Bangladeshis also sense that India has no real enthusiasm about the SAARC concept, which they take seriously as a vehicle for regional cooperation. The desirability of closer links among the smaller countries of South Asia, both for economic reasons and to counter Indian hegemonic ambitions, is also recognized.

These factors figured in the discussions on various aspects of bilateral relations, as well as of the role they could play in the multilateral sphere. Given the fallout of the war against terrorism, the US has launched, which is impacting Asia in particular, security came in for consideration in several contexts. There is the traditional aspect, with the US military presence in the Indian Ocean region, and the decision by India to join the US in patrolling the sea lanes from the Gulf to the Malacca Straits.

An additional element is the expanding Indian missile capability that, taken with its nuclear programme, gives it a reach that is expanding beyond South Asia to Europe and the Pacific. Indian goals extend beyond hegemony in South Asia to a world role, and its nexus with Israel specifically threatens the Muslim world.

So far as the immediate interests of Bangladesh and Pakistan are concerned, both are affected by the deteriorating security environment in South Asia with extremists on the rampage within India, and India playing the terrorist card to suppress Muslims internally and in Kashmir. Taking security in the larger context, there is need for economic security in a region containing the largest concentration of poverty in the world.

Whereas the South Asian countries should be focusing on sustained development, they are held back by continuing conflict. India has chosen to employ its military muscle, notably in Kashmir, but Bangladesh has been pleading for a resumption of dialogue. The persistence of political tensions between India and most of its neighbours has obstructed the realization of the full potential of SAARC for inter-state cooperation for collective progress.

On security and political issues, both Bangladesh and Pakistan agree that the role India is carving out for itself is helpful for stability nor does it contribute to an environment conducive to economic development, which is the real need of the region. Indian naval capability has been expanded, and it has set up a Far Eastern Command, participating in naval exercises with Vietnam in the South China Sea.

Pakistan has been pressing for the resumption of a dialogue over Kashmir, but India finds it more advantageous to keep the pot boiling through its own repressive policies while blaming Pakistan for continued support to “cross-border terrorism”.

Both Pakistan and Bangladesh agree on the need for more substantive measures to revive SAARC, whose next summit is due to be hosted by Pakistan next January. Dhaka and Islamabad would like to jointly counter Indian moves to minimize SAARC’s role by exploiting the issue of terrorism, to suppress the popular movement in Kashmir and to malign Pakistan. Bangladesh has also been bracketed as a fundamentalist Muslim country, whereas, in the words of a senior retired Bangladeshi defence official, it is India which has turned “non-secular”.

There was appreciation of cooperation between Pakistan and Bangladesh in the area of security, with their armed forces sharing military training facilities and equipment transfers. If India continued to build up its offensive capability and use its military strength for political pressure, their cooperation can be further expanded. Bangladesh shares the view that informal discussion of political differences should be included in the scope of SAARC activities. Other, more successful regional organizations such as the European Union and ASEAN have created a security environment which facilitates economic integration.

With their strategic vision converging, Pakistan and Bangladesh are looking for practical ways to take concrete measures that would strengthen their political and economic ties. The obvious needs are increased economic cooperation and trade that contribute to their development and help overcome poverty and backwardness. Though there are some problems left over from their shared past such as those of stranded Pakistanis who want to be given the right to return, and both have claims and counter-claims regarding assets, these are not major irritants. There is a mutual desire to concentrate on the positive factors, and to step up efforts that would build on the fund of goodwill and friendship existing between the two countries.

There is realization on both sides that the full potential of economic cooperation has not been achieved. For instance, the total trade between them has averaged 100 to 150 million dollars annually in recent years. Not only is this level relatively low but is also characterized by an adverse balance, Bangladeshi exports being about 25 per cent of the imports from Pakistan. Last year, Pakistan’s exports totalled $133 million, while imports from Bangladesh were $35 million. Though the measures announced during the visit of the Pakistan president would help correct this imbalance, difference, concerted efforts are needed to increase economic interaction. The joint ministerial commission is due to have its eighth meeting in Dhaka and should carry this process forward.

Though India made much of the concessions it made to Bangladesh in settling the Farraka dispute, Bangladesh continues to face Indian pressures over water-sharing, territorial issues and transit rights. Quite a few territorial disputes that should have been settled remain pending, as the Indian parliament is reluctant to ratify accords worked out at the expert level decades ago. India’s desire to play the role of the regional policeman remains unwelcome to both countries, which also resent India’s generally negative stance over the activation of SAARC.

An association like SAARC provides a framework for cooperation over a wide range of areas, including social development and countering drugs, smuggling and terrorism. Pakistan would like to support the efforts of Bangladesh to turn it into a catalyst of regional harmony and cooperation.

The two sides are concerned about the challenges that would confront the poorer countries after the coming into force of the World Trade Organization charters in two years. They agree that they, together with other developing countries, have to work together to safeguard their interests and need to improve bilateral and multilateral cooperation between them.