The future of civilian rule

WHEN talking of return to democratic rule, many people feel excited at the thought of the upcoming elections which might provide an opportunity for some political normality to return to Pakistan. Should the forthcoming elections and the resultant change be considered a real shift towards democracy is the real question.

Common sense says that elections alone would not strengthen democracy in the country. Broadly speaking, there are two kinds of scenarios which are expected to emerge in the next three or four months. First, elections will be used as a tool to bring to power a coalition of forces which ensure that President Musharraf remains in power and the military’s political power is intact. This is what is being referred to as the deal between the Pakistan People’s Party and General Musharraf. Second, there is no deal with the PPP and another coalition is made which comprises many of the existing political players.

Depending on what option is selected by the government, those left outside the power equation might start a political movement which could result in a third scenario leading to greater tension between the military’s top brass and the political forces.

Whichever of the two above-mentioned options is selected, the next few months will see a transition to democracy. The transitory period is very critical for the future of democracy because any mishandling of the process can stall it forever.

If the politicians are not careful in handling the military and the affairs of the state, they could encourage ambitious generals to reclaim control of the state on the pretext of saving the country from disaster. This is the lesson we can learn from the ouster of all previous prime ministers.

It could be argued that the next political government should be careful not to annoy the military. Keeping the generals fairly satisfied will ensure that they do not return to power. But then, how does one keep the generals happy? The military leadership gets extremely nervous every time the political governments falter on boosting the economy or there is mismanagement in governance.

However, it is difficult to expect the next political dispensation to perform any better than the previous ones, not because the politicians are inherently incapable but because of the peculiar circumstances in which a new civilian government will be born.

The next government, unless it is a replica of the current one, will not find itself in favourable circumstances. Nearly eight years of military rule has resulted in incapacitating civilian and democratic institutions and kept them from performing. All major government departments today are dominated by serving or retired military officers.

Surely, a change in government will mean that the number of military personnel in the government will have to be reduced, especially if it is not to be the continuation of the same type of politics as we see today. The new dispensation would demand that it places officials to carry out policies congruent with its ideology or political beliefs. A change of civilian bureaucrats would not immediately result in stability because they would suffer from nervousness born from the memories of previous years.

Furthermore, a political change will not necessarily reduce pressure from the GHQ which would try to control things from the back seat. No party has outlined an agenda of critically examining and then curtailing the actions of the intelligence agencies, one of the major causes of constant instability. The parties do not even have an agenda to shift the emphasis from military security to social and economic security and development.

In any case, the next government would struggle hard to run the state and keep the generals happy. Given the limited playing field the top political leadership will opt for the easiest option which is keeping its expectant constituents happy through financial or other rewards. This will mean more of what we saw during the 1990s. Even if the PPP comes to power, the arrangement will be short-lived.

So, it is natural to ask: why bother with change? General Musharraf himself believes that his continuation in power will result in making Pakistan into a Singapore. But what he does not understand is that each country has its own historical experience.Military authoritarianism has never helped to sustain the economic progress which military regimes claim to bring about. Pakistan is not a city state like Singapore and its political dynamics are quite different. Hence, a transformation from military authoritarianism to civilian rule is necessary because centralised control has traditionally put massive pressure on the health of the Pakistani federation.

The Pakistani military is ethnically homogenous and does not truly represent the federation. Moreover, it pursues policies which treat the society of the entire federation as a monolith. This perspective is untenable for hundreds and thousands of people from the smaller provinces generally under-represented in the state’s policymaking. The interests of these people can only be negotiated through a political process.

However, fulfilling the democracy dream in Pakistan equally puts the onus on the political leadership to reconsider its own attitude towards democracy. A parallel process of negotiation has to start amongst the civilian political actors to achieve, what the famous political scientist Charles Tilly calls, the insulation of public politics from categorical inequalities. There are differences amongst the larger population based on their ethnic, racial, gender or other considerations.

According to Tilly, people form trust networks based on what they believe in or what race, colour, gender or ethnicity they belong to. Government policies or politics at large should create environments which do not reflect a bias for one group or the other.

The aforementioned formula means that a successful transition will not happen until and unless the national leadership is willing to see beyond its personal need to capture more power for itself. In fact, greater political power will accrue to an individual who is able to insulate policies from categorical inequalities.

To put it simply, politicians of all kinds will have to make space for each other in order to create greater room for themselves. As long as the leadership continues to pursue politics which denies space to the other, as had happened in the past, the country will never be able to transit to greater political maturity and sanity.

Under the circumstances, the best option for the future government is to spell out the problems to its constituents and the nation at large. Also, there is a need to make the government transparent. The best bet for the next political dispensation is to introduce ‘glasnost’ and ‘perestroika’ in its policymaking and conduct of the business of the state.

Such transparency will convince the people of the government’s sincerity of purpose and save the political leadership from pressures from the GHQ. It will indeed be a shame to see the generals touting the political leadership as insincere once again.

The writer is an independent analyst and author of the book, “Military Inc, Inside Pakistan’s Military Economy.”

E-mail: ayesha.ibd@gmail.com

India’s growing insensitivity

A FOUR-and-a-half-year-old child dies in Simla on the Mall because the ambulance carrying him does not reach the hospital in time. The road is blocked by a throng of protestors from the ruling Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party. A panchayat in Haryana forcibly separates a newborn boy from his parents belonging to the same clan (Gotra).

Upper caste members kill a Dalit who is acquitted by the court in a Jat murder case. A policeman chains to his motorcycle a poor boy who has stolen a gold ornament and kills him in public. A truck runs over four people of a minority community which retaliates by fomenting communal trouble.

On the face of it, there is nothing common in these incidents, except that they illustrate strong emotions. Yet what strings them together is society’s insensitivity, the authorities’ nonchalant attitude and the people’s blind faith in tradition which was wrong even when adopted. It also shows the other side of society. The social order is breaking up. The value system is weakening further. The common man is losing faith in decency because of a hard and insecure life.The boy’s death due to the road blockade was described by politicians as “very unfortunate”. There was no word of apology and no action by the authorities. In the second case, two Haryana ministers, in defence of “tradition”, took the couple to task for having violated the sanctity of the Gotra clan. The state chief minister said he had received no complaint. Media focus forced the police to restore the child to the parents. They have left the state because they do not feel safe.

Haryana is the same state where a Dalit was murdered after acquittal. Thousands of Dalits took to the streets in protest in the state and even in Punjab. But the hold of the Jats is so firm that the police are normally afraid to take notice of what they do. Both states are headed by Jat chief ministers.

Police highhandedness displayed in the death of a poor child is nothing new. There is hardly any such happening which does not underline police brutality. What shocks me is the lack of accountability in the force. The other day, the SSP of Moradabad was caught on TV beating innocent bystanders. He was not even in uniform. The state government promised to consider the case after receiving the details. The matter rests there.

Police in Bhagalpur have decided to go on strike after the dismissal of two policemen. The punishment was, in fact, overdue. The case had been going on for 16 long years. The police were a party to the killing of persons belonging to a minority community. Still, many have gone scot-free.

Communal rioting appears odd in a society which takes pride in pluralism. By this time, people should have imbibed the basic tenets of tolerance and a sense of accommodation. A truck accident should have been treated as an accident, not an opportunity to settle old scores. Leaders of the minority community should have intervened before the riots broke out. In fact, the riots spread to Allahabad. Here the majority community was at fault.

Such incidents have taken place earlier. But their occurrence was rare. A study shows that in the rioting people attack one another to kill and not only to injure. This indicates many things but one thing is certain: there is no normal outlet for grievances. Nor are there any serious attempts to bridge the gulf between two antagonistic sides.

Of what use is the annual growth rate of nine to ten per cent when people have no concern, no sympathy for one another? Granted the government cannot do much in a capitalist economy to stop the rich from getting richer and the poor from getting poorer. But the state can at least ensure the rule of law.

The West, with all its faults, does so. The rich have a civic sense. The top echelons of society in India, the upper castes, the Jats or small-time politicians get away with the violation of basic laws. Devoid of values, they are like animals on the prowl. But for the attention they receive from the media, even a few examples of excesses would not have come to light.

With the yawning divide between the haves and the have-nots, the quarrel over denial to the poor is going to intensify. The lower half is getting increasingly marginalised. How to enable it to earn its livelihood with dignity is the biggest problem the country faces. Many are getting desperate and 112 districts in 15 states have become a haven for armed radicals. However reprehensible the use of force, they see no other way out.

Yet I find the common man still imbued with values which he has inherited. Thus he does not ordinarily steal or appropriate another man’s gains. He or she prefers to suffer silently and does not take up arms. The question is not whether or not the suicide of farmers in the country is increasing. It is whether the present system is driving them to choose suicide (112,000 in a decade) over natural longevity.

Even palliatives in the shape of government grants have not been of much help. A study shows that the money does not reach the needy. There is too much red-tape and plain corruption.

UP chief minister Mayawati is too busy buying property in Delhi to initiate something concrete for those whose holdings are shrinking. Is it not possible for the government to establish facilities to provide common services like ploughing, tending and thrashing for the crop?

The corporate sector, if asked to step in, can do so. But its entry in the agricultural sector will not augur well for farmers. Economic steps to ameliorate the condition of the poor are too few and too slow. At least basic rights under the constitution should be available to them. Yet if faith in the fundamental values of a democratic society is to be preserved, every citizen, whatever his class, caste or creed, has to display a degree of sensitivity and support for the rule of law.

Without being aware of what is right and without speaking out when wrong is done, there may come a day when the realisation of what is wrong may go. There is a thin line dividing right and wrong, moral or immoral.

Once that line is erased, people do not know where they stand, whether on the right or the wrong side. It does not need a revolution to change this attitude. Mere concern for others will do.

The writer is a senior columnist based in New Delhi.

The dilemma of our youth

INTEREST in cricket has plummeted. Gone are the days when street after street was lit by neighbourhood boys playing cricket all night with taped balls. Whatever caused the interest in cricket to fall — Pakistan’s shocking exit from the World Cup’s preliminary round or Bob Woolmer’s death — another source of entertainment for the young is gone.

With every form of entertainment — film, drama, music and fashion shows — declared un-Islamic or frowned upon, cricket was the one channel in which the young ones directed their energy without being censured. Now only one form of entertainment is available to them — arson. Sociologists and psychologists must debate whether there is a relationship between violence and lack of entertainment. In other words, will our boys be normal if they had some extracurricular activity to enjoy.

Sport is not the only form of extracurricular activity; there are other avenues like volunteering their time to teach, take care of the old and the sick, clean the beaches, help people cross roads, etc. Unfortunately, our society does not put premium on social work; the emphasis has been on traditional family values — showing respect to elders and perhaps being kind to a neighbour.

But beyond that, traditional wisdom in South Asia gives little importance to “public morality” — like being kind and courteous to people on the streets, developing the queue habit, following traffic rules, or conducting celebrations or religious activities in a way that does not become a nuisance to others or contribute to noise pollution.

The result is that if a boy has the time and the inclination to be of service to the community, he turns to religious organisations. Once he starts working for them, he undergoes a gradual transformation in outlook. Suddenly, what once was legitimate entertainment appears sinful.

If hostility towards all art forms and entertainment were to be mute, things could perhaps have been less traumatic. Instead, as one can see from the attacks by the Lal Masjid brigade, and in Fata, on CD shops, hostility towards all entertainment is being expressed through violence.

Scholars and non-political religious divines now must debate whether the war on such innocuous entertainment forms as music and movies has been worth its while. If the idea behind this war was to check sexual waywardness, then there is nothing to suggest that things in Pakistan are better than, say, in Egypt or Indonesia or Malaysia where intellectuals have better things to do than wage war on entertainment.

For Pakistani boys, cricket was a healthy pastime. No one objected to it, not even the ulema, barring one, who thought the way the bowler rubbed the ball was “obscene”. It was thus wonderful to see a boy having a bat and ball in his hand instead of a Kalashnikov. Let us hope cricket is revived, Bob Woolmer is remembered as a wonderful coach, and cricket bounces back on our streets so that boys have a hobby other than burning buses.