Destabilising democracy
By guestwriter at 17 September, 2009, 1:34 pm
Article By Nasim Zehra.There are revelations galore, mainly by former spooks and former army chiefs, which may have generated grist for the propaganda mill and produced endless media stories and programmes.
Yet, beyond reviving sagas associated primarily with Pakistan’s blundering establishment, and some with faulty politicians, the revelations have really not dented the democratic setup. If there are issues of the current government’s stability, they have more to do with the government’s own mistakes, lapses and blunders.
Today the democratic government is functioning in a relatively secure environment. Six illustrations of the politically supportive environment in which the government is functioning are noteworthy. One, the government is not facing a tough political opposition. Contrary to the democratic era of the nineties, the opposition is not one that is conspiring with the establishment. Even what may appear to be big-ticket items which can destabilise the NRO and the Musharraf trial, are not issues that the opposition will press ahead with.
Two, if the two big-ticket items of Pakistan’s politics, the trial of General Parvez Musharraf and the NRO, are unlikely to snowball into a national crisis, the Supreme Court too sees its role as one of overseeing credible functioning of democratic institutions, not destabilising the country.
Three, the government has managed to keep the ruling coalition intact and the PPP is a partner in all the provincial ruling coalitions. Four, the PPP holds all the important posts in the federation: the president, the prime minister, the speaker of the National Assembly and the chairperson of the Senate.
Five, the army poses no threat. The army fully understands that no direct or indirect adventure against the democratic system will be acceptable, even by the leadership of Pakistan’s main political opposition, the PML-N.
Six, on security matters within the country the political leadership and the security establishment are generally “reading from the same page.” Differences on issues ranging from anti-terrorism policy to the US and India policy are generally debated through among the top political and military leaderships. The only grey area, of course, remains the reported expanding presence of private US security agencies.
To the government’s credit, it has used this political power positively in certain areas. For example, on dealing with the Swat crisis, opening the inter-provincial debate on the NFC, addressing the country’s most serious political and constitutional issue of Balochistan.
There is no force in the country whose political agenda is destabilisation thereby providing the government an opportunity to focus on good governance and on ensuring the credible functioning of state institutions; of the bureaucracy and of the state-run public corporations. Yet, it is in these areas that serious allegations against people in high positions that have surfaced. These range from the Rental Power Plants (RPPs) to the hoarding of sugar by political influentials, soaring sugar prices, the controversy around the Steel Mills, the expanding activities of the land mafia, including its attempted takeover of KPT land. For example, in the RPPs the president’s cronies, including Iqbal Z Ahmad and Malik Riaz, have allegedly been the beneficiaries. the government has given the clearance on some of the RPPs despite widespread criticism that the expense incurred in them is not financially viable.
Clearly, the most serious questions are raised around the hiring and firing of top guns in public-sector institutions. Against this backdrop several businessmen have left the country because of harassment by government functionaries. There have been accusations by them personally to this scribe of the direct involvement of the president and his cronies in an attempt to acquire their business assets. These include Hashwani and the Deewan group.
Similarly the sugar scandal has also brought into focus the involvement of the government’s top men. Politicians from Punjab to Sindh own the majority of sugar mills. Names that are reportedly doing the rounds include the Sharifs, the Speaker and the Sindh home minister and the president himself
Similarly, at the local level endless stories of corruption against the PPP leadership have surfaced. For example, Karachi’s PPP workers who have through generations supported the PPP are now being asked for six-digit bribes to either get people reinstated in jobs or for getting new jobs. These PPP jiyalas who have been victimised by the Zia regime and subsequently by the MQM governments are now expected to pay bribes, to their party leaders, to get jobs. They accuse Jehangir Badar, the secretary general of the PPP, as soliciting money to get them jobs. In a recent meeting a PPP MPA fairly senior in the PPP provincial hierarchy conceded that the situation within the PPP in Karachi is “disastrous.”
Of the three-dimensional challenge that Pakistan must deal with–one, ensuring the survival of a functioning parliamentary democracy; two, ensuring good governance; and, three, the accountable and credible functioning of state institutions–the country is now doing well on the establishment of parliamentary democracy.
Nevertheless, the challenge is to deliver on all three dimensions simultaneously. Unless this can be done the government in power cannot deliver on people’s constitutional rights, which include the right to life, to economic security and all other freedoms the Constitution guarantees.
Clearly substantive progress has been made on establishing parliamentary democracy. Cumulative blunders and their disastrous consequences have produced the widely acknowledged and widely owned wisdom that there is no system better than parliamentary democracy for Pakistan.
How effectively is a democratic government able to deliver on people’s rights and on its other constitutional responsibilities is a statement on its quality of governance. Clearly, at present the biggest curse for the people of Pakistan is bad governance. Decode the term bad governance and it translates into elements including corruption, nepotism, non-transparent government deals, the political class reportedly promoting its business interests and blatant violation of many established rules of business.
Ultimately, the three-dimensional challenge has to be addressed with as much seriousness as the issue of terrorism been in recent months. Indeed, many factors, including the destruction devastation caused by suicide bombers and the external factor, finally prompted effective state action against terrorist forces. The fact is that the cumulative impact of bad governance and non-credibly and ineffective functioning of state institutions is creeping towards a dangerous and destructive direction.
Multiple factors are contributing towards the making of an explosive political situation triggered by none of the usual players from within Pakistan’s power construct. All those players are seeking stability. The list of these factors is endless–it includes denial of people’s basic rights, their rising anger, their exposure to the corruption and nepotism of the ruling classes, rising inflation, the saga of influential sugar and flour hoarders the proliferation of small arms.
This season of people’s rising discontent will yield instability. Especially when juxtaposed with reports of senior ministers acquiring expensive properties abroad. A recent report claimed that the minister of water and power bought a multimillion-pound flat in London. Similarly, another high-profile minister is reportedly acquiring a four-star hotel on Edgware Road in London.
Pushed to the wall people will now increasingly opt for anarchic ways to protest against democratically elected leaders who maybe, at this stage be faulted both for not solving people’s basic problems and for filling their own coffers. Frustrated and angered people’s power makes for extremely combustible factor in popular politics. In times of scarcity and of rapid circulation of information the wages of discontent multiply rapidly. It is this source of destabilisation on which the federal and the provincial governments must urgently focus.
The writer is an Islamabad-based security analyst. Email: nasimzehra@hotmail.com
After decades of dictatorial rule in the country since independence, a majority of Pakistanis now feels that it’s important to live in a democratically ruled country.
According to a study entitled ‘World Public Opinion on Political Tolerance’, about 62 per cent of Pakistanis feel it’s ‘very important’ to live in a democratic country.
Some 26 per cent say it’s ‘somewhat important’ while seven per cent feel this is ‘not very important’. Two per cent remain rather indifferent.
Sponsored by the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the study was released on Tuesday to mark the International Democracy Day.
The ‘WorldPublicOpinion.Org’ conducted the poll in 24 countries that account for 64 per cent of the world’s population.
The countries are China, India, the United States, Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Russia, South Africa, Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Germany, Great Britain, France, Israel, Poland, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Kenya, Egypt, Turkey, Iraq, Korea and the Palestinian territories (Palestine).
The surveys were conducted between April 4 and June 30. The poll reveals a widespread perception of a serious lack of political tolerance.
Large majorities perceive that people in their nations are not completely free to express unpopular views, that opposition parties do not get a fair chance to express their views and try to influence government decision, and that legislators have limited freedom to express views that differ from their political party.
The poll found strong support for democracy in general. Asked ‘how important is it for you to live in a country that is governed democratically?’, majorities in all 24 nations said it was very or somewhat important. In no country did those calling it unimportant exceeded about one in four.
On average across all nations polled, 90 per cent said it was important to live in a democratically governed country and 67 per cent said it was very important.
In Pakistan, about 56 per cent said ‘very important’ when asked how important did they think it was for people to be free to express unpopular political views, without fear of being harassed or punished.
Thirty-five per cent considered unpopular political views as ‘somewhat important’.
As far as the status of free expression was concerned, 33 per cent of Pakistanis gave their opinion that there was an opportunity of free expression while 35 per cent spoke of ‘somewhat free’.
Asked how often did opposition parties get a fair chance to express their views and try to influence government policies, approximately 50 per cent said: ‘Most of the time.’
Thirty-three per cent said ‘only some times’ while 39 per cent stated that most of the time members of the legislative body felt free to express views that differ from official views of their own political party.
More than 80 per cent of the people polled said women were fairly represented in the legislative body.
DIS PRESENT SETUP IS NT DEMOCRACY…ITS LAUTACRACY N DEAL-CRACY