US-Pakistan partnership

REAFFIRMING their firm commitment to a US-Pakistan strategic partnership, President George Bush and President Musharraf discussed on Friday issues relating to bilateral investment and trade arrangements — so far unresolved because of the differing approaches of the two sides. In pursuit of common objectives, the interests and concerns of both sides are to be addressed. The task is not made any easier by the fact that negotiations are taking place between a big power and a developing country. Apparently, President Musharraf wants American support in resolving critical economic problems facing Pakistan. With the external sector under pressure from a massive trade deficit, his first priority is to have more access to the world’s most prosperous market for Pakistani merchandise. He is seeking more American investment and trade, not aid. Unfortunately, a bilateral free trade agreement has been linked by the US government to the conclusion of a Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT) which has been delayed. The contentious issues in BIT have yet to be resolved. The fifth round of BIT negotiations are scheduled to be held next month. This will be preceded by informal discussions which the US has facilitated by providing a “non-paper” to thrash out differences over the treaty.

The US is insisting on more than one international forum to settle investors’ disputes while Pakistan wants American investors to seek remedy first from the local courts before approaching the International Centre for Settlement of Disputes. In BIT’s absence, the negative travel advisories issued by America from time to time and the banning of direct PIA flights to the US for security reasons, any hope of major investment from the US does not seem promising at the moment. The opportunities for foreign investors offered by Pakistan’s fast growing economy and the widening gap between domestic demand and supply are considerable. Addressing the Business Council for International Understanding in New York, President Pervez Musharraf pointed out that this big gap has raised the prospects for fast-track industrial development. Pakistan is also shaping up as a trade and energy corridor in the region. In his talks with President Bush, President Musharraf also raised the issue of acquiring nuclear energy from the United States. The outcome of the Bush-Musharraf talks is not known yet, but it may unfold in developments that are to follow. A 48-member delegation of US investors will visit Pakistan next month to look at the energy sector. Noting a significant opportunity for investment especially in power generation, ports, airports and other infrastructure projects, the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation has decided to provide funding for the American investors through Citigroup and guarantee risks for US investments.

A law for setting up Reconstruction Opportunity Zones (RoZs) in areas close to the Afghanistan border is to be passed soon by the US Congress on the basis of an assessment report by a US consulting firm. The goods produced in RoZs are to be exported to the US at zero tariff. Pakistan also wants these zones to be set up in backward areas in Balochistan, the NWFP, Azad Kashmir and some districts of Punjab. The RoZs could also be a joint venture between investors from Pakistan and Afghanistan which could promote bilateral trade. But things are not moving as fast as Pakistan expects. One hopes that the Bush-Musharraf talks lead to the early conclusion of BIT and FTA. This may turn out to be a major step towards a strategic economic partnership between the two countries which now lacks substance.

Abbas’s fruitless journey

PALESTINIAN President Mahmoud Abbas got nothing but vague promises of America’s commitment to peace during his visit to the US, where he had gone in the hope of reviving the peace process. But neither President George Bush, who called him “a man of peace”, nor Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said anything about a timeframe for the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the occupied territories or the likely date for the emergence of a Palestinian state. While Mr Abbas praised Mr Bush for speaking of a two-state solution during his speech to the General Assembly, the American president made no mention of it in his meeting with Mr Abbas and merely expressed his wish for a society where Palestinians “can raise their children in peace and hope”. As for Ms Rice, she merely promised to “create conditions that will allow us to accelerate on the roadmap”. As with Yasser Arafat, so with Mr Abbas now, the Bush administration is focusing once again on the Palestinian Authority’s internal scene, the aim being less a solution of the Arab-Israeli conflict and more Hamas’s isolation. That a two-state solution is not America’s priority was apparent from Ms Rice’s remarks that what she wanted was the PA’s commitment to a renunciation of terrorism. All this will gladden Israel.

So long as Israel remains in illegal possession of Palestinian lands, peace will elude the Middle East. Whether it is Hamas in Palestine or Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Arab people will continue their struggle for the rights of the Palestinian people. What happened in July-August was basically an extension of the Palestinian conflict. Hezbollah is alive and nothing can stop it and all those who love freedom to continue to struggle for ending the Israeli occupation and giving the Palestinians a state of their own. This means, sooner or later, one can expect another conflict in Lebanon. This vicious cycle of violence, followed by a truce and then war again, will continue unless America makes a determined effort to move the peace process forward to ensure the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the West Bank and Gaza and the emergence of a sovereign Palestinian state.

Trigger-happy police

TWO incidents within the space of a few days show that Karachi’s trigger-happy police have no qualms about killing innocent civilians. In one incident, a man was shot dead by the law enforcers when he ignored their signal to stop and sped away on his motorbike. In the other, the police escort of a religious figure shot and killed a young mechanic travelling in a car. Unfortunately, such occurrences are becoming quite common in other cities as well, as evidenced in Lahore some time ago when the police personnel shot dead a teenager near a check post, apparently because he and his friends were slow to respond to instructions to stop their vehicle. These incidents and others make a mockery of the police order 2002 that seeks to bridge the differences between the law enforcers and the citizenry and to set up public safety commissions to facilitate the filing of complaints against errant policemen.

The trust deficit between the law enforcers and the public is of longstanding, and effective measures are required to overcome this. For instance, it is not surprising that motorcyclists do not always stop when signalled to do so by the police for fear of harassment at the hands of the law enforcers. This is not to say that the public is not to blame for defying the rules. Many motorists and motorcyclists do not carry the requisite vehicle papers and, fearing the imposition of a fine, often ignore police signals to stop. Even then, targeting the vehicle occupant should be totally prohibited, except if circumstances demand that the police retaliate in self-defence. Meanwhile, the process of accountability should not be allowed to elude the police as this is the only way to make them realise that they are not above the law.

Thrown into the wilderness of politics

WHEN the military regime introduced its draft of the women’s bill in parliament, many progressive forces that had been pushing for the repeal of the infamous Hudood Ordinances imposed by Ziaul Haq saw an opportunity to effect change for women in Pakistan.

The regime had a manipulated majority in parliament but one where its allies were supportive of such a change. No sane elements thought it would be right to stand in the way, and hence support for the bill was initially available.

This is because the Women’s Protection Bill had initially made some tentative attempts to alter the balance in a society which is heavily biased against women. The injustices done to poor, resource-starved women through the man-made Zina and Qazf Ordinances had at least stood some chance of being removed from the system. Today the bill stands once again bogged down in political expediency because the regime that had proposed it was not actually backed by a political party but a group of individuals who had come together as political surrogates for the army chief, and were, therefore, without any party manifesto or consistent policy on national issues.

Initially, the bill had sought to amend two of the four Hudood Ordinances, the Zina Ordinance and the Qazf Ordinance, through 30 amendments in the Protection of Women (Criminal and Family Laws Amendment) Act. The main thrust of the original bill was to remove zina (consenting sex) from the tazeer (general law and Pakistan Penal Code). If this was ever done, it would not have made Pakistan a “free-sex zone” as reactionary elements suggested, but would have taken it halfway back to the position before 1979.

Why is that important? Because the Hudood Ordinances were used to award punishments under the Pakistan Penal Code or Tazeerat-i-Pakistan, not under the strict conditions required for Islamic hadd, but on flimsy evidence trumped up by the assailant. What this did in effect was to convict a rape victim who had complained of a crime against her and acquit the rapist, or the accuser of any woman whom they sought to criminalise as an adulteress.

By allowing the lower courts and gender biased judges at that level to confuse zina with punishments for rape (zina bil jabr), these ordinances were responsible for placing thousands of underprivileged women in the lock-up. No convictions would ever be awarded under hadd when the case went in appeal to the superior courts or the Federal Shariat Court, but the victim’s life would be over when she was acquitted or released, as her family would rarely take her back after her name had been “dishonoured”.

Under the original draft of the Women’s Protection Bill, many crimes against women were no longer cognisable. Charges like zina could no longer be registered at the police level, but would have been taken to a sessions court. The presiding officer of that court would have at once examined the complainant and at least four adult eye witnesses, upon oath, of the act of zina, necessary to the offence. This would have been difficult to prove, as indeed intended by Islam, and would have protected women. The fact that the amendment also made the offence bailable provided a great deal of relief to the ordinary woman.

However, the extra-parliamentary changes proposed by the regime’s ulema consultants, not the Islamic Ideology Council, would have done two things: one, zina would be awarded under tazeer again, which had been initially changed. This would make a woman liable to zina punishments for five years, whereas the fig-leaf of two male witnesses to the charge could easily be circumvented by the rapist who could pay for the witnesses. Not only would a woman with a medical certificate for rape be sent to jail for “lewdness” but the rapist could go scot-free by implicating another innocent or missing man in the absence of DNA testing. Neither would this change have been Islamic, as Islam requires four witnesses not two, and nor would it be just by any universal standards.

The second change that the regime had proposed in a paper circulated outside the formal committee of parliament, but inside the parliament cafeteria, was even more dangerous. This change would have imposed a clause to make all judgments in accordance, supposedly, with the Quran and Sunnah in women’s cases, without ever having resolved the great Islamic discourse on which injunction of Islamic jurisprudence or Quranic verse or action of the Prophet (PBUH) would constitute the basis for common law. Its proponents say that it is part of the Constitution, but if that is the case, why does it not stay there, forming a general framework for social protection?

What is the motive for it to be specifically inserted in a women’s bill? In a utopian Islamic society, women would clearly have as much right as men to conduct their affairs freely and not be subjected to discrimination. Islam would never allow injustice to be done. But under the prevailing circumstances, in modern-day Pakistan, it would become an instrument for reversing all the positive judgments and case law that have accumulated over the years from the higher courts and the FSC, wiping out all progressive interpretations of the law as precedents that are so critical to any justice system.

Also, this clause could create a situation where the sessions judges would be loath to pass a verdict in women’s cases unless they were advised by a religious scholar as amicus curiae, or assistants to the court. In other words, the option of awarding tazeer offences to victimised women under the Zina Ordinance would have been unimaginably magnified. No one would know who is the right scholar, from which sect or school of religious jurisprudence, and the justice system would not only become subject to a mind-boggling set of anomalies, it would provide a whole host of new opportunities for gender biases to come into play in a courtroom.

The third clause proposed by this informal body of ulema would also have taken us back to the original situation prevailing under the Hudood Ordinances. The punishment for rape would be available under both the hadd laws, as well as tazeer under the Pakistan Penal Code. Criminal lawyers agree that on appeal, the retraction of the confession alone would stop the court from imposing hadd. Nobody knows where this case would go, and if it would entail a re-trial. In the worst case scenario, the rapist could find shelter outside tazeer in the hadd law, and tire out the complainant, who would then not be able to use the protection provided to her in the PPC as a rape victim.

What has got lost in the political hype is a fundamental point. Such crimes occur because the rapist knows he has impunity under these laws, and he is usually more empowered than the woman he is subjecting to his violence. For 27 years the campaign against the Hudood Ordinances in Pakistan may have been fought by the progressive PPP, because it resisted all reactionary laws imposed on the country by a dictator, but outside the political mainstream these laws were also contested hotly by women’s groups both in the tear-gassed streets of urban Pakistan as well as their offices.

For many commentaries to denigrate both this political and civil society struggle as a western or elitist formulation is unjust. The reality is that these laws have never hurt or criminalised women with resources or those with access to expensive defence attorneys. They only target the level of victimised women who get paraded naked in the streets of rural Pakistan, or women whose former husbands or assailants have a feudal mindset, leaving the assailant comfortable in the knowledge that his victim will probably be forsaken by her community for even naming her rapist, let alone mentioning the crime.

These laws victimise women in a social system where even saying the word rape implies a level of complicity in her own actions. The world witnesses this accusation of female complicity in even western societies. So what chance does a blind Safia Bibi have when a man attacks her, and the law in Pakistan accuses her automatically of zina just because she is pregnant after her ordeal?

It is the responsibility of all parliamentarians to study these laws and support any positive change that brings relief to women. To cynics who say that the PPP allowed the regime to split the opposition by supporting the regime’s proposed bill, the answer is then by that logic, when the ulema brought in heavy amendments, should the PPP have looked the other way and not opposed those laws? If that opposition had not been vocal and strong, the regime may well have buckled under neo-Islamist pressure and allowed those anti-women amendments to go through.

The message of this whole sorry saga is that the regime has caved in even with a parliamentary majority and allowed the national agenda to be dictated by forces that could take Pakistan back into the dark ages. The other message the regime gave by succumbing to its own internal dissent is that it cannot effect change on any real issues. This constitutes a serious lack of confidence in its abilities to govern. It also put the seal on the pointlessness of this parliament, or the value of standing up for one’s beliefs. If no change comes about in the near future, then no one should be charged with cynicism if they see the women’s bill as a ploy to divide the opposition, or a ticket for Musharraf’s warmer reception to the White House. In either case, the regime stands more divided than the opposition and also exposed, naked and shivering in front of the world for what it is: a military dictatorship that has played out all its cards.

The writer is a member of the National Assembly.