PESHAWAR, July 23: Speakers at a seminar on future of democracy have underlined the need for ending military adventurism, which has promoted political expediency and stalled the growth of democratic culture in the country.

The seminar on ‘charter of democracy’ was organised by MPA Abdul Akbar Khan of the People’s Party Parliamentarians at a hotel here on Saturday to highlight the importance of the document jointly authored by the PPP and Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) on May 14 in London.

PPP deputy general secretary Senator Mian Raza Rabbani, Awami National Party central vice-president Haji Mohammad Adeel, NWFP senior minister and Jamaat-i-Islami provincial amir Sirajul Haq, Begum Nasim Wali Khan, PML-N provincial chief Pir Sabir Shah, PPP provincial president Rahimdad Khan, JI naib amir Senator Prof Mohammad Ibrahim, PML-N parliamentary leader in the NWFP Assembly Anwar Kamal Khan Marwat, Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam Abdul Jalil Jan and Barrister Masood Kausar spoke on role of military adventurism and its effects on the body politics of the country.

Senator Rabbani said if the charter had been authored in 1947, Pakistan would have had an ideal political environment. He said neither Justice Munir would write an unjust verdict nor the civil-cum-military bureaucracy would have indulged in palace intrigues.

He said after realising the gravity of things both the former prime ministers — Benazir Bhutto and Mian Nawaz Sharif — had identified the prime causes of failure of democracy.

He said that an independent judiciary, an independent election commission and an independent institution of accountability were essential to do away with the military coups, rampant corruption, tax-evasion and other socio-economic ills.

He said in the charter of democracy, its authors had proposed a transparent mechanism for the selection and appointment of judges of superior courts, chief election commissioner and officials of the accountability institution.

The present military rulers, he said, had made a mockery of justice and accountability by installing corrupt people in the federal cabinet. He said the National Accountability Bureau, which had become a Benazir-specific agency, was silent over many a scandals, including privatisation of the Steel Mills, hoarding of sugar, bungling in purchase of railway engines, wagons and black cabs, crash of stock exchange, lease of state land to Mercedes Benz and cement scandals.

He said the NAB should take action against the prime minister, minister for privatisation, leader of the sugar cartel in the cabinet and others involved in unprecedented malpractices.

He said the military was being used against patriotic people of Balochistan and Waziristan in order to prolong the military dictatorship in the country. He said: “Military action is not a permanent solution to the Balochistan issue. It is a political issue and must be solved politically. Baloch people have done nothing wrong, they are asking for their economic rights.”

The PPP leader said the suggestions on provincial autonomy offered by the ANP would be discussed and incorporated into the charter. He said the charter was not a divine scripture or a final word from the two major political parties. More suggestions would be welcomed in the future, he added.

Pir Sabir Shah said Gen Ayub Khan, Gen Yahya Khan, Gen Zia and Gen Musharraf were responsible for the failure of democracy in Pakistan. He said Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, an architect of the country’s nuclear programme, and Mian Nawaz Sharif, who ordered nuclear tests, were punished for bringing back 90,000 prisoners of war and saving the country from India’s adventurism, respectively.