Why MMA supported the 17th amendment

Before holding elections to national and provincial assemblies on October 10, 2002, General Pervez Musharraf introduced 29 amendments in the Constitution of Pakistan on August 21 and October 29, 2002. He was of the view that the declaration of emergency on October 14, 1999, vide Provisional Constitutional Order No.1 (1999) and the Supreme Court decision of May 12, 2002, authorized him to make these amendments. Elections to the assemblies were held after these amendments (Oct. 10, 2002). Later, members of these assemblies elected the Senate.

The LFO (Legal Framework Order) of August 21, 2002, through which far-reaching changes were made in the constitution, has long been a bone of contention between the government and the opposition. Both the MMA and the ARD are of the view that the LFO did not form part of the Constitution, that the Chief Executive was not authorized to introduce these amendments, and that the only valid basic law was the Constitution that existed before October 12, 1999, when the military took over for the fourth time.

The same was the stand taken by the bar associations of the Supreme Court and the High Courts and the lawyers community. The majority of the country's religious and political parties supported this view. While taking their oath in the assemblies and the Senate, the opposition members quite clearly stated that they did not accept the LFO as part of the Constitution and that they were taking an oath under the Constitution as it existed before October 12, 1999.

Gen Musharraf, on the other hand, insisted that the LFO had become part of the Constitution. Elections, he said, had been held under the LFO and there was no question of taking these amendments back. Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali and the federal ministers continuously supported Musharraf's stand. They said that if the opposition wanted any change then it must do so by a two-thirds majority in parliament, as provided for under articles 238 and 239.

Evidently that strength is available neither to the opposition nor to the government. Above all, the Speaker in his ruling declared the LFO to be part of the Constitution. The Senate Chairman also said that if ever he were asked about it he would give the same ruling.

The joint opposition in parliament (MMA and ARD) did not accept this position. At present the opposition constitutes 40 per cent of both houses and cannot be ignored. Both in the National Assembly and in the Senate, seasoned opposition members are there. No business can take place without their cooperation. That is what had kept the parliament paralyzed for about one year.

All through the year 2003 after recitation from the Holy Quran, members of the opposition would stand up and protest "No LFO" and "No Pervez Musharraf". This would continue for an hour or so every day. The opposition would then walk out. That is why, in spite of its rigid stand, the government could not brush aside the protests in parliament and had to initiate a dialogue with the MMA.

After lengthy negotiations between the government and the MMA an agreement was signed on Dec 24, 2003, by Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and S.M. Zafar of the ruling party and Maulana Fazlur Rahman, Mr Liaquat Baloch and Hafiz Hussain Ahmed of the MMA. In the light of this agreement the National Assembly, followed by the Senate, approved the 17th amendment bill with a two-thirds majority.

While the MMA supported the amendment, the ARD strongly criticized the agreement, and alleged that the MMA had deceived the nation. Some ARD leaders called it a "mullah-military" alliance that had paved the way for dictatorial rule. Senior members of the lawyers' community also expressed their reservations about it.

In principle, the ARD was not wrong. The fact, however, is that because of the deadlock, the parliament was paralyzed. This was being criticized, with some political leaders saying that the LFO was not the problem of the masses, and people wished something was done to end unemployment, check inflation and corruption and improve the worsening law and order situation.

The opposition in Pakistan has always shown flexibility to pull the country out of crises. In December 1971, after the fall of Dhaka, General Yahya Khan handed over power to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto without any mandate. Bhutto ruled the country as a civilian Martial Law Administrator for about four months. During that same period he ordered the nationalization of the banks and educational institutions. The opposition was of the view that after the country broke up, the assembly that came into being after the 1970 elections existed no more, and, therefore, fresh elections were needed.

Still the opposition took the longer route of a dialogue to save the country from the crisis. It abandoned its stand for fresh elections, so much so that it agreed to the provisional constitution (1972). That helped the country come out of a serious situation, and we got the 1973 Constitution, which the nation accepts even today.

Similarly the Pakistan National Alliance had rejected the rigged elections of 1977 and demanded fresh election. Bhutto initially rejected the demand, but started parleys because of the nationwide protests. The parleys were fruitful, but the delay in signing the agreement gave way to martial law. The past experience led to the agreement of December 2003.

I would first present before you the details of those critical amendments which the government agreed to insert in the LFO, and secondly, I would talk about those articles which the MMA accepted out of parliament.

The Seventeenth Amendment Bill was passed on Dec 30, 2003, with the support of the MMA. Through the Act, the following amendments were approved in the LFO:

i) Gen Musharraf as president and Chief of Army Staff.

Article 43(i) of the 1973 Constitution does not permit the President to hold any other office of profit. The LFO (August 21, 2002) brought an amendment in Article 41 that rendered article 43(i) ineffective and permitted Gen Musharraf to hold constitutionally the two posts for five years. The general insisted he would not give a date for giving up the post of army chief, because that was not in the interest of the country. The agreement between the government and the MMA, however, added a sub-clause to article 41.

Accordingly, article 63 will come into force on Dec 31, 2004, when the president will no more be able to hold the post of army chief. Thus, Gen Musharraf gave a certain date for shedding the uniform. While the opposition's protest, within and outside parliament failed to work, this agreement made this possible.

ii) The President's power to dissolve the assembly: Article 58 of the Constitution authorizes the prime minister to propose to the president to dissolve the assembly. Having received this advice, the president would order a dissolution, or else the assembly will stand dissolved after 48 hours. The late President Ziaul Haq added sub-clause (2)(b) to article 58, authorizing the president to dissolve the assembly in his discretion. Using this power, Gen Ziaul Haq ousted Prime Minister Muhammad Khan Junejo and his cabinet in May 1987 and declared the assembly dissolved.

Then between 1988 and 1999, the governments of Benazir Bhutto and Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif and the assemblies were dismissed thrice by Presidents Ghulam Ishaq Khan and Farooq Ahmed Khan Leghari. The political circles felt that the presidential power of dissolving the assemblies was a factor in political instability, so it should be done away with.

The government-MMA agreement adds sub-clause 3 to article 58, which says: if the president dissolves the assembly then it will be binding on him to take the matter to the Supreme Court within 15 days. This addition limits the president's discretionary powers, and makes it binding on him to refer the matter to the court, whose decision is to be given within 45 days of the dissolution.

This is an appropriate solution of the controversial 58(2)(B). Similarly, if the governors follow article 112 and dissolve provincial assemblies, the same procedure of reference to the Supreme Court is to be adopted.

iii) National Security Council: Originally, the clause providing for the National Security Council was introduced in the Constitution by Gen Ziaul Haq, but then deleted. Gen Musharraf made it again part of the Constitution by adding sub-clause(A) in article 152. The agreement between the government and the MMA has, however, removed article 152(A) that deals with the composition and working of the NSC. It is no more part of the Constitution. That is a commendable success for the MMA.

iv) Retirement age for judges: Gen Musharraf made an amendment in the Legal Framework Order on October 9, 2002. Accordingly, the retirement age of the judges of high courts was raised. This amendment order amended Article 179, sub-clause (i) of the Constitution, raising the retirement age from 65 to 68 for judges of the Supreme Court. Similarly, Article 185, sub-clause (i), was amended to enhance the age-limit for the High Court judges from 62 to 65.

To be concluded

The Sufi saint and Basant

Few would know that Basant Panchami, the ancient spring festival that is celebrated with such gusto in Lahore, is also celebrated by the Muslims of the sub-continent at the dargah of Nizamuddin Aulia at Delhi, every year. This 700-year-old colourful tradition is attributed to the Sufis, especially the Chishti saint and his disciple, Hazrat Amir Khusrau, who were probably the first Muslims to have rejoiced at the celebration of Basant.

Legend has it that the Chishti saint experienced Basant in Lahore during a visit to the shrine of Hazrat Data Ganj Bakhsh, and willed that his disciples celebrate life and spring with the same gusto as was done in the latter city. However, the celebration was confined to the dargah of the saint, and to this day it is celebrated with kite flying, feasting, recitals of classical music, especially 'raag basant', and with light raags. Later, however, the dargah added 'qawalis' to the fare. One imagines that the spirit of the day was being dampened by the conservatives that took over the establishment of the dargah.

Two interesting changes have taken place in Lahore and Delhi over the last five years. In Lahore, the conservative religious extreme, which seems to have established a 'monopoly' on the morality of the population, (much as it is detested) has sought to kill off the very festival itself. In Delhi, which had over the centuries almost killed the festival because of the sway of the conservatives, have managed to turn this Lahori festival into a major money-spinning event.

My guess is that over the next few years, Basant Panchami will become one of India's main tourist attractions. It is almost like our sporting industry in Sialkot has been hijacked by a fake Sialkot in India. In the case of Basant, I firmly believe that this is an occasion that is impossible to hijack.

The beauty of Basant lies in the fact that it is truly a festival of the people, be they blue, black or white, be they of any religious hue. Spring has this ability to bring out the optimists in us. It is an unprompted response. One cannot help it. Unlike the warrior extremists who see life in black and white terms only, it were the great Sufi saints of the sub-continent who vividly saw the people, especially the poor, in colourful shades and tones. From Data Ganj Bakhsh to Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia to Bulleh Shah, all of them saw the beauty of the inner spirit in the changing shades of spring, the bursting into life of the yellow flowers in our mustard fields.

The basic fact remains, irrespective of whom or what one worships, that our fortunes are firmly rooted in our land. The starting point is the fact spring means that the sun will soon dry our wheat and we will be assured food for another year. Let alone the ancient religions of the Jains or the Hindus or the Buddhists, all of whom flourished in Lahore in their day, the Muslim saints gave it new meaning. The Sikhs celebrate it as 'Baisakhi' on the fifth day of 'Basaikh' in the lunar calendar. The mainstay of our celebrations will be in Lahore and Kasur. But this year Delhi's chief minister Ms.

Sheila Dixit, some say of Lahori origins, has gone out of her way to expand last years "Basant Utsav". This year, there will be many more kites in the skies of Delhi than ever before. This year we are informed that Amritsar will also be celebrating Basant in a big way. It has become a major tourist attraction. I repeat, my guess is that in a few years time Basant will be India's biggest tourist attraction.

The ban on kites over most of the year has badly damaged this ancient festival. The reason is solely the use of 'metal wires', which is surely an unsporting tactic in a sport that is all about being happy. One cannot be happy and unfair at the same time. That is why if one were to concentrate on nabbing 'wire users' only, and to punish them in a nice sort of way, by making them ride donkeys with blackened faces, maybe then the 'law' would be enforced.

It would make greater sense if the population were asked to participate in nabbing 'wire flyers' and handing them over to the police. On this the authorities need everyone's support. On banning, they do not deserve any support. It is silly to ban kite flying just because a few cheat at it. If that logic is followed, then every sport, including the most enjoyable one, would be banned.

In our youth, before night kite flying started, we loved making paper lantern balloons. At night the entire old walled city of Lahore would have paper lanterns floating in the sky. It was an exquisite experience. Lahore on Basant will be as beautiful, or as ugly, as we make it. I wish the Indians the best of luck in their effort to cash in on Basant. There is need for us, Lahoris, to use the occasion not to ban visits, or dull any celebration, but to take it to new heights. I for one will be enjoying myself.

How soon the cheaper cars?

Is this decision to bring in reconditioned cars going to be implemented soon? Is there still a room for cynicism as far as the decision of the federal cabinet is concerned? A decision that has been received with optimism, but a cautious optimism. There is a feeling that the powerful car assemblers may create some obstacles as that is what they have been managing for so long now, being totally unmindful of the fact that a huge blackmarketing of cars has been going on, for long now; and longer than that has been the period wherein a steady increase in the price of new cars has been unchecked.

Of course, people are delighted at this news that has also made the auto shares fall in the stock market. And it reminds me of so many people who have been waiting and wanting to buy a new car; a small new car that would give a family not just comfort and convenience, but also get them rid of the harassment that comes when a citizen has to rely on our public transport.

One is in particular inclined to focus on a working woman who has been wanting to buy a car for at least 10 years, but failed because the price of the 800cc car has steadily risen in the last decade. This family has had one car throughout, but in this age of changing family profiles, and urban compulsions, the need for a second car was born.

It was understandable as her work needs, and professional compulsions made her want a small car of her own, and which would in turn have given her children too the mobility that they sought. So it makes one wonder now whether she will be able to afford the small car, with this reported decision to reduce import duty on 800cc cars.

Of course, there are scores and scores of families like this, where secret, quiet dreams of a new car have been in the pipeline for years and years, if not a lifetime. One would like to underline the typical family where even the first car has not been affordable, despite the best of lifelong efforts. The tears and frustrations, the desires and dreams of individuals and families, for new cars, or even a decent second hand car is something that could become subject of a good drama. Of how all the saving and effort that people have made has been in vain. Now comes this hope.

I watch television as this column proceeds and see business reports indicate that the blackmarketing of new cars has suffered a setback in Friday's transactions, and new car buyers are likely to stay away and hope that prices will come down substantially next week. There is a chance that it will disappear altogether. There are all kinds of speculations, but there are fears too. The possibility that nothing may really happen, says one person who wants to change from his Suzuki Highroof (on the verge of being rickety) to a small new car later this year, is there.

In fact I have spoken to a Karachiite who is not sure whether import of used or reconditioned cars will be a boon for the middle class. And he explains it with the argument that the business community or the trading class has generally exploited the consumer in one way or the other. There is always some argument, or rationale, or pretext that makes it possible for the typically scheming industrialist or businessman to fleece the common man. Vulnerability of the common man is now fait accompli, really.

We talked about the subject of prices and our new cars, and he said that in the days when the reconditioned cars were allowed into the country, their dealers too were not following the rules, and buyers had problems in getting decent fair deals. So there is a wait and see attitude for the moment, and the more perceptive are keeping their fingers crossed.

We talked on the point about all banks and leasing companies that have financed the buying of new cars, and how banks have in their competition (on for some time now) been luring people into the most 'attractive' of deals. Auto finance schemes have been afloat in the country for some time, and while the mark-up (8.5 per cent) has been lowered with time, there has also been emphasis in the advertising that there are 'no hidden costs' in the car loans. Who knows?

Of course we talked about the fact that our car assemblers have not increased production which they had promised, and how all efforts made by the federal government in the last year or so had produced no results at all, and how all the blackmarketing of cars, (Suzuki, Toyota and Honda, Kia and Cuore) had been criticized by all and sundry, but the car assemblers just did not care. No plausible explanation was given on why they could not increase production adequately to counter the unethical practices and manipulation of the middleman.

It makes one wonder as to what these 'mysterious' middlemen have been. And why they could not be controlled, and checked, says one citizen as he shows his anger, and reminds us that there are so many law-enforcement agencies in the country. There should be some sort of accountability here, too?

As a reaction to the prospects of more cars on the country's roads, there was a voice of serious concern. A short term concern, and a long term worry, as he said. He took into account the fact that most cities in the country, simply do not have the roads, to take on the additional load that will come with new cars. What will happen to Karachi's roads, keeping in mind that the even existing number of vehicles have the potential to paralyse movement with the slightest effort. Just about any change in mood in the city creates dead ends, and mobility freezes.

What will happen when the number of cars and buses rises in the years ahead? And then he referred to the point about the increase in the country's population, a factor that is upsetting and diminishing all the good work that is being done in different areas. How the growing population factor is straining the existing level of infrastructure that is available in fields like health, education, communication and so on.

The big question that arises here and now is: when will the proposals and decisions be actually implemented? It is hoped that there would be no dilly dallying on this, and every effort would be made to provide the consumer, a product that he can afford, and that the price offered would ensure quality also. For at the moment what we have seen is that despite the new cars that automobile assemblers have given to the people, the vehicles were not always trouble free. For reasons that are easy to perceive, (advertising?) consumer grievances and complaints have not been able to be heard as often as they should have.

The best of cars, and the most expensive, have not been trouble free to which some cynical citizens have remarked that "after all it was a Pakistani made Suzuki and not a Japanese made Suzuki". You could substitute, Toyota or Honda for that matter, another person complained!

The other question, that is being repeatedly asked as the impact of the Islamabad decision spreads across the car markets (hopefully), is what will be the real price. Will the price of the small car (800cc) come down by Rs150,000? In that range? Why not more than that, say people and point to the Indian car which is much much cheaper. And why are we limiting the benefits to 800cc alone?

Cars are status symbol. Indeed. But they are in today's world almost a necessity, especially in a society like ours where public transport networks are miserably poor, in terms of capacity and upkeep, both. Both the operators and owners of public transport in the city, and elsewhere, are in the nature of a mafia, almost, and impregnable, in their power. So the need for this decision, was long overdue.

That this cabinet decision has come at a time when the price of atta has gone up, and the ordinary 'Naan' for the common man has become costlier. It is ironical. Or for that matter, chicken has become cheaper. From a certain perspective, life is not going the way of the poor. Not as yet, anyway. Will it in the near future? Guess?

Letters to an unborn daughter

The girl in Kishwar Naheed refuses to grow up. Writing presumably as a have-seen-it-all kind of mother to her never-born daughter, our prima donna of women's lib bares her adolescent angst with a fire that is still in high flame. The epistles are a hearty debriefing in our current proliferation parlance.

Kishwar takes a sweeping glance at our contemporary society and finds it only worsening in its hypocrisy, social attitudes, its shallow facade of openness and the growing dysfunction of its institutional life. She takes a rough measure of the gloomy scene by focussing on what one may call the genito-glandular aspect of male oppression that persists against women and daily appears in cruder forms as stories from the interior of the land leak through the iron curtain of conventions into public view. Yet even these are treated as items of novelty by the establishment as after creating some sensation they sink into the dark pit of our national unconscious.

It is a relentless exposure without the customary inhibitions. No one is spared, neither father, nor brother, uncles all variety of them - chachas, mamas, khaloos and phuppas - all lecherous souls on the look out for a safe opportunity. The sanctity of relationships is a best kept secret, a tenuous screen that the abused victim's inability to speak up strengthens. From letter to letter and from paragraph to paragraph Kishwar's account of the world in which she lives is generously punctuated with hints of violations. It is just as well the daughter whose birth she yearns for is not delivered into the crass loveless world of her mother's experience.

What is amazing is the self-consciousness that runs through the sad tale. Past middle age one tends to tide over the clumsy awareness of one's adolescence, but Kishwar's hurts are still green. She recounts with pain the callous reception her own mother gave to her announcement of her arrival at puberty. Was that the end of innocence, she seems to ask. Was biological transition into womanhood an entrance into sin and shame. But this is sadly how it is. Maybe in earlier matriarchal societies the occasion might have been celebrated as a proud stage in a woman's life when she became able to be a mother.

With the advent of patriarchal societies not only the female child's hormonal change but her very birth became an occasion that brought dishonour to the family. In the Hindu lore that deified womanhood, the 'sati' tradition symbolized a strange paradox as men were supposed to carry their wedded shame with them to the pyre. Kishwar Naheed should do some thinking on this as all the foreign women writers she has listed for the benefit of her unborn daughter have failed to enlighten her on the sources of this morbidity in the gender ties.

This is important for the feminists to know. Why do men behave as they do? Perhaps an inner weakness in their constitution, some basic flaw in their structure, some intrinsic incapacity, their own ability to come up to their own expectations, a lurking fear they might be discovered, propels them to behave like crowing roosters, masters and governors. Whatever, the feminists must have the condition diagnosed and a suitable treatment given to the patient if this unhealthy tussle, this moaning and groaning is to end some day.

Kishwar has alluded to the touchy subject of male inadequacy which is a major factor indeed as the rocketing market of Viagra in North America and the Continent indicates. But psychologists hold this merely to be a symptom. The instinct of domination in men, which her unborn daughter was destined to face if born and not find herself able to understand despite the impressive catalogue of horrors her mother-to-be has prepared for her in the ribald epistles, is buried deep somewhere in the evolutionary stages. The ape woman must have done something silly.

A survey of male behaviour in most species, however, shows that domination is not peculiar to our species alone, except that female birds and fishes have accepted their lot in life. They make no complaints. But then Kishwar is likely to tell the unborn that women have a cerebral cortex under their braided hair that the birds and fishes do not have, and subject to the availability of a suitably hen-pecked husband they too can rule the roost, nay the rooster.

The epistolary technique has not been in use of novelists and autobiographers for many decades. Kishwar Naheed has revived it as a sequel to her earlier Katha. The letters allow the writer to knit a loose tale, and if it is a story that is to be told, permit piling up of events and observations with relative ease that the more structured format of a novel or short story does not allow. Yet even the epistolary method has progression.

Kishwar's Khatoot are more in the nature of casual essays that take up anything that pops up in the writer's mind, whether history, literary criticism, styles, lives and sayings of various writers, personal anecdotes, stories of crimes that the press reports, politics etc, etc; it is their directness and intimacy, their charming flippant chatter, that makes up for their lack of craft and literary quality. Among some sparkling witticisms and loaded remarks that you come across is this most intriguing gem at the end of the letter titled Lolita: "Had you been born you would see how many of the writers I have taken across to the last destinations."