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THE more you look at the current turmoil the more you question whether the main issue is that of freedom of expression and its alleged abuse by a TV channel or if the situation is symptomatic of a wider malaise, an issue that can no longer be left unaddressed.
Frankly, while even the lounge-bound urban elite and the middle class may have had enough of the daily diet of muck-raking on prime time television, surely those living below the poverty line would have no interest in it at all.
Whether you look at primary school enrolment across the country, the provision of healthcare and potable water as reflected in, for example, child mortality statistics or simply crime figures and terrorism tolls, it wouldn’t take long to figure out what the real issues facing the country are.
And you’d be close to pulling your hair out if on top of all these stark facts, you are forced to bear the sizzling summer heat across the country with power cuts and water shortages with no respite in sight.
So isn’t it time to push out of our lives the red herring that seems to have clouded over the main underlying issue: the civil-military relations? The optimism witnessed immediately after the last two general elections sadly didn’t take long to evaporate.
This was so because the power struggle within the various key pillars of the state ensued at such a pace and in such a manner that it left little time and energy at the disposal of those at the helm to focus on the poorest among the poor who constitute a majority of the population.
Shouldn’t we then focus in earnest on whether it is time to consider a new social contract? Does the 1973 Constitution, written and approved by parliament during a period when a major player in the country’s power politics, the army, was inactive due to the 1971 debacle, still provide all the answers and does it remain relevant?
Look at what happened by 1977. The elected prime minister, who presided over the rehabilitation of an army responsible for the loss of half of the country, was ousted by that very institution and executed two years on after a trial which a member of the bench that sent him to the gallows termed as sham.
Zia couldn’t even live with sharing power with the beneficiaries he handpicked for his non-party, controlled democracy experiment and jettisoned it well before its term could have ended. His successors backed what seemed like a party-based, inclusive democracy at first glance.
But it wasn’t. First electoral alliances were engineered and the polls rigged to stop the most popular leader and party from winning. However, when the PPP came into power despite all these obstacles no effort was spared to make it ineffective and block its decision-making.
The tolerance for this government, which was allowed to exercise powers of possibly no more than a metropolitan corporation, ran out within two years of it coming into office. Yes, some corruption allegations were not without substance but cases of criminal behaviour by the top leadership were fabricated, literally manufactured in conjunction with surrogates in the media.
The following decade was no more than a joke where the two major political parties played on a power merry-go-round with neither being allowed to complete a term. One would be a fool to say the conduct of the parties themselves was entirely democratic. It wasn’t.
But the manipulation and pressures from the military and its agencies on the one hand and the inexperience and near-paranoia of the parties about their survival on the other made for a disaster foretold. Yes, their own role in their downfall was significant too.
The Musharraf years are too recent and fresh in all minds to dwell on in much detail. After the good general’s ISI-engineered 2002 election could only ensure his longevity and do nothing else for the country, the 2008 polls despite the tragic assassination of Benazir Bhutto, raised optimism.
But within weeks of the induction of the government we were back to square one. The PPP, which was once known for its jiyalas and populist politics, was now tarred with the corruption brush again, demonised by the media, hamstrung by the judiciary and undermined by the military.
In reflection, the completion of its five-year term was no less than a miracle. And despite the PML-N’s big mandate in the most recent electoral exercise, somehow one gets a sense that it too would need a miracle to complete its full term.
All the while the major power players fight it out and interpret the Constitution and various laws in accordance with their own need and to their own advantage, the poor Pakistani awaits the spotlight to one day focus on his/her needs. Who knows if a pressure cooker-like mass sentiment is developing at being taken for granted?
It is time to do one of two things. Either the major power players gather round a table and thrash out a new contract after an exhaustive televised debate on each of their strengths and shortcomings, or make a pledge to work within the confines of the 1973 Constitution in letter and spirit.
If anyone of them were to ask me, I’d say work with the Constitution you have. The track record of each one of the so-called major players is so replete with failures and shortcomings they should fear a public reminder, an abject embarrassment that a televised debate would inevitably bring.
The writer is a former editor of Dawn.
Published in Dawn, May 24th, 2014
