Tailoring democracy

IT IS not always clear whether a man is being duplicitous or simply thoughtless when his speech is vague, weird, or incoherent. It is not uncommon to hear such speech in casual, non-serious drawing room chit-chat. But one does expect a degree of consistency and connectedness of thought when listening to those who hold, or aspire to, high public office.

General Musharraf’s pronouncements are often troublesome. Let me cite a case in point. Addressing a BBC audience (covered in this paper on September 6), he claimed that the process of institutionalization was moving forward under his government’s auspices. Strangely enough, he sought to substantiate this claim by stating the fact that he had restored the president’s authority to disband the country’s foremost political institutions, namely, the National Assembly and the provincial legislatures.

Then he went on to assert that the authority to dismiss the assemblies would be exercised by the National Security Council (NSC), and not by the president, forgetting that he had assured his people repeatedly, and the constitutional amendment he had promulgated in this regard says, that the NSC would be a consultative body or “forum,” and that it would make no binding decisions

Speaking of his own pro-democracy credentials, he sought to reassure his audience with the rather unconvincing assertion that he had been a democrat throughout his career in the army: “I have taken my people along with me.” That a commander may consult his staff officers on certain issues, and that the latter may speak freely, are known. But that decisions in such assemblages are made by a majority vote, that the “chain of command,” and reports to the effect that “theirs is not to reason why,” are all fiction that must have come as news to his audience.

He went on to explain that while democracy was important, the nation was even more important, and that he must therefore do that which was good and right for the nation. The country needed “sustainable” democracy and, in the absence of a single universally accepted model, he was “trying to tailor democracy to suit the needs of Pakistan.”

This is a familiar train of reasoning. Iskandar Mirza and Ayub Khan wanted to give us a type of democracy (“controlled” or “guided”) that would suit our “genius.” The latter did actually impose one of his own choosing on us, but our people found it to be insulting to their genius and revolted against his rule.

There is surely nothing wrong with “tailoring” democracy to suit our needs, but what are these needs? The general is not thinking about our need for safe drinking water. He has some other kind in mind: political needs that can be met by a system that our “genius” (meaning our political culture) will sustain. What are these needs? Before naming them, we should bear in mind that, when they are strong and persistent enough, wants, desires, and aspirations may convert into needs.

Protection of life and property is indubitably the primary need for the satisfaction of which individuals, acting together, formed, valued, or endured governments. Political or governmental stability is another need, for in its absence one does not know what the next day will bring by way of laws and policies, and consequently no one can plan his life. Such uncertainty is particularly troublesome in the economic sphere. For essentially the same reason we need the rule of law and freedom from the arbitrariness of rulers. We also need probity, efficiency, and economy in government operations in order not to be burdened with oppressive taxation.

The fulfilment of needs such as these has no necessary connection with democracy. A good king, given reasonable longevity, can meet them. He can also provide for the other constituent elements of the package that we call “good governance.” Nor can it be said — as we know so well from our own past experience — that democracy will, ipso facto, produce “good governance.”

It has been argued that since “good” kings are an extremely rare commodity, democracy is the least hazardous of the available options. But regardless of its relative merits, the idea has increasingly taken hold of the minds of men during the last two to three centuries that the right to be governed by their consent has been bestowed upon them by the “laws of nature and nature’s God.” As a result, they have been wanting democracy which is the only type of government that elicits their consent on a regular basis.

The people of Pakistan have been going through an interesting learning experience. They become restive when they have democracy and it fails to provide good governance. They start asking for a “deliverer.” After two or three years of seeing that the deliverer has not brought the good things they had expected, they begin to clamour for democracy’s return. The vagaries of their politics during the last fifty-five years may now have brought them to the verge of concluding that democracy is what they want. What are their needs in connection with democracy?

They need the right to vote, free and fair elections held at regular intervals; legislatures with adequate regulatory jurisdiction, including the authority to raise revenues and allocate public funds; government’s accountability to the people directly and/or through their representatives; assurance of certain basic civil and political rights that governments may not abridge.

Any “tailoring” that General Musharraf might have wanted to do in relation to these needs has already been done. He has expanded the franchise, changed the criteria of eligibility for elective public office, modified the composition and enlarged the membership of legislatures, made rules to reform the internal organization and working of political parties, and reinstated a previously discarded procedure for getting rid of a delinquent executive.

These structural improvements have been enacted ostensibly to make democracy work better in the presumably inhospitable environment of our political culture. In our society the art of organization, concept of the public interest, and commitment (beyond ritualistic profession) to moral values and principles relevant to good governance — honesty, dedication to duty, adequate levels of competence, sense of obligation to fulfil one’s covenants, willingness to work with others for the common good, and tolerance of the dissident, among others — are still in the very early stages of development.

What is the evidence that we as a people are in this state of ethical under-development? One way to find out may be to ask how many people we know who will reject the request of a young and handsome police officer, belonging to a right kind of family, for the hand of their daughter in marriage on the ground that he takes bribes, offers false testimony in court even while being under oath to tell nothing but the truth, or otherwise neglects his duty. The answer, most probably, will be: few, if any.

A friend keeps asking me how, given our levels of corruption, can democracy work in Pakistan. He thinks real democracy does not exist even in America inasmuch as its political system does not exclude injustice from public policy, economic relations, and social interaction. He confuses democracy with good governance but, as I have said above, even if the prospects of good governance are better in a democracy than they are under a non-democratic regime, the two do not go together at the same pace.

Governance under democracy, operated by a corrupt society, will inevitably be corrupt to some degree in spite of the checks and balances that the founders or reformers may have put in place. A democracy is not the same as an aristocracy of the righteous. It will practise, as much as it can, society’s noble values but it will also yield to some of its pernicious prejudices.

When Thomas Jefferson, the great American apostle of democracy, and author of the American Declaration of Independence, asserted the “self-evident truth” that all men are created equal, his “men” did not include the blacks. When Woodrow Wilson in his Fourteen Points, and Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt in the Atlantic Charter, proclaimed the right of all peoples to self-determination, they were not thinking of colonial subjects in the British empire.

The southern states in America, all of them democracies, passed and enforced laws that imposed all kinds of deprivation and degradation on the black people. In Pakistan it was a parliament, consisting of the people’s representatives, that placed the Ahmadis outside the pale of Islam and passed discriminatory legislation against other minorities.

Fortunately, corruption of morals does not afflict all members of society equally. Differences of degree do exist. Even when the majority are profligate, those treading the path of righteousness are also present. They strive to reform the larger society and at times they do succeed in some measure. In many ways the world is a more pleasant place to live in than it was in the so-called good old days. There is no reason to believe that in Pakistan reform and improvement will remain beyond our reach.

We want both democracy and good governance. There may be a mutually reinforcing relationship between them, but it is not a cause-and-effect relationship. In any case, we want democracy because we believe we have a right to it. We will not be supplicants at the court of a dictator any more; we must have the ultimate authority to decide how our affairs are to be managed. Our experience in the next few years may show that the “tailoring” General Musharraf has done suits our needs. But he can be sure that if it doesn’t, we will call in a tailor from other quarters to remake the jacket he has gifted us.

A dull election ahead

THE key question in the upcoming elections, it appears, would be not for whom the people vote but whether they will vote at all. Eighteen days to the polls the people’s enthusiasm is at low supply.

It is a curious phenomenon of Pakistan’s public life that as the political parties and politicians multiply the number of voters is diminishing. In the elections of 1988, 1990 and 1993 the votes polled ranged from 40 to 46 per cent. Ironically, in the 1997 election of Nawaz Sharif’s heavy mandate, and his ultimate undoing, the turnout fell to 35 per cent. Going by the prevailing apathy, even that looks too high a target for October 10.

In the view of the common people politics has progressively become a profession of self-aggrandizement rather than public service. Contrary to the general expectation, even the current non-political regime has not been able to halt this downward spiral of mistrust between the rulers and the ruled.

The confidence of the citizens in the intention and ability of their representatives to help them in their needs seems to be touching a new low watermark. Or, maybe, the people’s year-long encounter with democracy at the grassroots has dulled their appetite for more of it.

The apprehensions of a low turnout and a lacklustre and unproductive process are many and well founded. The general scepticism and outright incredulity of the intelligentsia can be dispelled somewhat even in the remaining two weeks by reversing some official actions and taking some more reassuring steps. It is important so to do, for the people’s disenchantment with the electoral process can be the first step towards the acceptance of absolutism as a creed which has dogged Pakistan’s political and social life all along.

The assertion of the government that it has no favourites among the contenders lacks credence. The factions or individuals who have disowned the top leaders of the previous two ruling parties — the PPP and the PML — have for that reason alone become the supporters, or informal allies, of the present regime.

That was a development which President Musharraf could not have helped even if he wanted to, for it was inherent in the circumstances in which he assumed power. The rebels of the leaders he sent directly or indirectly into exile had no option but to be his loyalists. In this situation it is not humanly possible for General Musharraf to remain unconcerned about the people who have hitched their political career to his presidency.

Yet to remain the president of the country, and not just of a political faction, he has to make the people believe that his administration and the Election Commission both uphold the principle and tradition of neutrality in conducting the election. His presidency too will be durable, safer, and respected if it were to be universally acknowledged that he took no sides in the polling, especially after he had excluded all those from the contest whom he held to be undesirable or ineligible.

The president has learnt this lesson to his cost. He won the referendum and yet lost it. Even a solemn declaration by the CEC, a retired Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, that it was a large turnout and a larger affirmative vote could not save It. In the BBC question hour the president admitted that the bungled referendum would remain his lasting regret. The consequences of a rigged election would be much deeper and longer lasting.

The elections are being held during an administrative transition in which the writ of the government, even when it vows for neutrality in elections, has to be enforced by the district governments (which are led by political nazims) or by the police. Neither is mentally inclined or trained to perform that role. It is General Musharraf’s own expressed feeling, or information, that it was not the policy direction from above but the absence of an impartial and stern supervision which reduced the referendum to a farce. The same danger faces the elections in a larger measure, for the stakes are higher, and the administration was never in greater disarray.

The rule universally applicable to democratic elections is that the decision to hold the elections rests with the government, or the party in power, but its time table and details of execution are left to be determined by an independent election commission. Here, most decisions for the commission are made by government or, at best, both act in unison.

An illustration of it may be found in the decision of the government to hold the next election on the basis of joint electoral rolls. That done, its implementation should have been left to the Election Commission. And that is how it first proceeded. At a later date (on June 17) the executive authority, on some political persuasion perhaps, decided to take the Ahmdis out of the joint rolls and put them on a “supplementary list.” The Election Commission instantly implemented the order of the government causing confusion and harassment.

The procedure laid was so hasty and defective that the Ahmadi voters did not know whether they were on the joint list or consigned to the supplementary. Most of them, thus, may stand disenfranchised.

The Election Commission, even if it felt compelled to follow the executive notification, should have pointed out that the religious belief of a voter was no longer a relevant factor in the new law and scheme of elections. The supplementary list stands on no legal footing and violates the fundamental rule of equality of all citizens. Equally irrelevant and, perhaps illegal, would be to compel every candidate to sign a declaration on oath about his religion when the election is open to all irrespective of their sect or denomination.

This paper in an editorial on September 12, the Human Rights Commission in a national consultation and many other independent observers and organizations have questioned the propriety of this arbitrary action and expressed concern about its negative impact on national integration and the country’s image which already has become a metaphor for intolerance and oppression. The concern expressed about the manner in which the reserved seats for the women and minorities are to be filled is similar.

The instructions of the Election Commission to the governments banning transfers of officials have either been ignored or circumvented by holding that the transferred officials were not connected with the elections. The commission has acquiesced in that. Taking just one instance, it would be naive to hold that the transfer of an irrigation secretary (it took place in Sindh) will have no bearing on the elections while the officials of his department sit on the lifeline of every farmer. The commission’s latest instructions to the nazimeen and the police not to interfere in the electoral process give no assurance either as the commission has no means to enforce them even if it has the will.

All factors so far point towards a low turnout at the polls on October 10. The administration and the Election Commission are making it worse by their thoughtless or biased actions. President Musharraf thus might be left to discover once again that he won the ballot but lost the election — like winning a battle but losing the war.

As grave peril persists

AN AFP correspondent, who recently interviewed President Musharraf, questioned: “What have you done to dismantle militant training camps?” The President replied: “We don’t want to discuss those. We have spoken, there is nothing happening on the Line of Control.” “No I don’t want to discuss those. Whatever happens in Pakistan is our business. Clearly the world was concerned about cross-border terrorism, We call it freedom struggle, and there is nothing happening and I’ve given an assurance to the world that nothing is happening on the Line of Control.”

What happens in the global village today is the world’s business. The world — the western world to be precise — has raised barricades when it comes to narcotics, terrorism and human rights. It has made these matters its concern. If you wish to question the propriety of this approach, then you opt for a hiatus in soft loans, curtailment of textile quotas, a fall in foreign investments and less access to new technology. Should we say the “descent syndrome” which marked our status before 9/11.

The implication of president Musharraf’s reply (“No I don’t want to discuss those”) is that these camps might exist in Azad Kashmir or in Pakistan; the mujahideen will not be allowed for the time being to cross the LoC.

The president proceeded to conclude in reply to the same question: “Now we are expecting a response from India. This is a step-by-step movement forward towards discussing and solving the Kashmir problem. Now I’m not going to take 10 steps when India doesn’t take one even. Nothing gained. We stop at that. “

The concluding part of the reply appears to buttress the above conclusions. The training camps are in a standstill state. If India does not respond aggressively, the possibility of letting loose the freedom fighters is not foreclosed. It remains an option.

President Musharraf’s answers would find wide acceptance in the armed forces especially in the spook outfits, and in right-wing quarters, particularly in Punjab, but the international consequences of retaining camps for the mujahideen (or terrorists in Indian parlance) are and will be grist for Indian mills. Here perceptions matter, not facts. As long as the camps exist anywhere in Pakistan or in Azad Kashmir the perception worldwide will be adverse to Pakistan. Any genuine indigenous terrorist activity in Kashmir will be held against it. World opinion today is intolerant of terrorism. It is also intolerant of any perception of protection for narcotics business and of human right violations.

Today any freedom cause buttressed by terrorism is virtually a lost cause. The difference between the Afghan war and the Kashmir uprising is that the former was fought almost entirely by the Afghans. Naked invasion of a sovereign state by an outside power as in the case of Poland in 1939 or Kuwait by Iraq in 1990 is not in the same league as a national liberation struggle in a disputed territory in the eyes of international law.

Granted that the line is thinly drawn, but most people will agree that Pakistan helping the Afghan mujahideen in the Soviet-Afghan war was to roll back foreign invasion. And all is fair in war. But Kashmir is not a war in that sense. Yet. If the Kashmiris in the Valley desire world attention similar to Muslim Kosovo or Christian East Timor, the condition precedent is the perception of an indigenous struggle against formidable odds.

There is a pernicious angle to the on-going subcontinental confrontation today. The moderate Vajpayee has virtually abdicated control of the Indian government to the hardliner — Advani. The de facto boss of the BJP was a one-time militant leader of the RSS, an extremist Hindu group that took responsibility for the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi in 1948 on grounds that he was ‘pro-Pakistan’ and a traitor to India. The right-wing of the BJP has a single item agenda: to Hinduize India and undo Pakistan. The BJP-RSS combine that today controls the government of India holds that the ‘solution’ to the Kashmir problem lies in dismembering Pakistan.

Kuldip Nayyar, writing in these columns last Saturday had this to say of the BJP: “It has been relentlessly playing the Hindutva card. In the process the party has adopted the hated two-nation theory, the basis of partition, to polarize the country. And it has met with a success of sorts.... ‘Vajpayee rules but does not govern’. How soon Vajpayee steps down to make way for Advani is whispered about in the BJP corridors! “

This is not the time to be chauvinistic. It is an hour of peril. We are already eyeball-to-eyeball with an adversary whose avowed purpose is to break up Pakistan. They have done it before — in 1971. War today is not a matter of valour alone. It is size and technology and funds that matter more. India has a defence budget many times larger than Pakistan’s; they outgun us in conventional arms on land, sea and air. A longitudinal geography and long border with India with vulnerable ‘necks’ in between, does not make Pakistan’s defence easy.

In the summer of 1971 during the civil war in East Pakistan there was a lot of breast-beating. One of the popular myths of the time was that one Pakistani soldier was equal to four of India. The myth had been broken in 1965; it was broken again in December 1971. The war gamers of the US think tank Rand Corporation in 1971 gave Pakistan a near zero chance of holding the enemy for even two weeks. They were right. We were dead wrong. Publicly we were over-confident, boastful and privately hanging on to American coattails. President Nixon was decidedly pro-Pakistan. But world opinion was against it for it kept on saying ‘that what happens in Pakistan is our business’.

Any sober person can calculate that a nuclear exchange will surely damage India, but will destroy Pakistan. The nuclear calculus is horribly calculable in ways that a conventional war is not.

In this scenario it is tempting to ask if the Kashmir Valley is worth risking Pakistan for? To give up on Kashmir or accept the LoC is unthinkable but Pakistan’s approach, strategy and tactics must change. There should be no room for training camps in Pakistan or in Azad Kashmir. We cannot ever hope to convince India of our good faith and vice versa. We have to convince the West that we have washed our hands of mujahideen terrorism. The Kashmiris only have a chance if the West recognizes a Kashmiri freedom struggle, which is purely indigenous. The Kashmiri uprising since 1989 has been largely so. Terrorism is not the only weapon in the armoury of the freedom fighters. There are other weapons too. The APHC is the best weapon they have.

Pakistan has a penchant for getting into war situations when the timing is inopportune. It chose not to read Shastri’s warning in 1965; the warnings of friends and foes alike in 1971 and even at Kargil in 1999 it acted as if the world would stand aloof and take no notice. Common sense suggests when the adversary is stronger, it is best to bide your time.

In 1920 after the Soviets acquired power, Germany imposed draconian terms for peace. Lenin forced the party to accept humiliation as “revolutionary realism” in the surrender known as Brest Litovsk. “Be as gentle as a dove, but as wise as a serpent”, he advised in a situation of weakness. The seeds of ultimate victory are embedded in realism. He was right.

The writer is a former member of the National Assembly of Pakistan.

Shine light on secret court

A SPECIAL federal appeals court met in secret last week to hear the Justice Department argue that it needs still more latitude to spy on suspected terrorists. The three-member court heard only from lawyers for Attorney General John Ashcroft on why the expanded powers Congress gave him in the USA Patriot Act to tap phones, scrub computers and search homes are not enough. No one was allowed to be present to argue against Ashcroft, not even members of the Senate Judiciary and Intelligence committees who asked to attend.

The next day, Judiciary Committee members — obviously troubled by the potential for civil liberties abuses in these secret, one-sided proceedings — began discussing the outlines of a possible legislative response. Their concern is more than warranted.

Congress created the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court to keep government from snooping on its political opponents, as Richard Nixon had done. The seven judges rule on requests for national security-related wiretaps or searches. Congress let the court operate behind closed doors to keep foreign spies in the dark.

But it directed that, though the information gathered in these searches could be used to try a suspected spy for espionage, it could not be passed to local police to bring criminal charges for, say, grand theft or drug possession.

That’s because FISA courts can approve search warrants on a lower threshold of suspicion than the “probable cause” standard enshrined in the Fourth Amendment that governs criminal cases. Under the Patriot Act, investigators can get a warrant even if there’s no evidence of wrongdoing.

Nonetheless, in an unprecedented opinion, the FISA court last May rebuked Ashcroft for having gone too far in letting criminal investigators press for secret searches. The court’s concern mirrors the worries of many that the war on foreign terrorists is leading to civil liberties abuses at home. Ashcroft last week appealed to the three judges who review FISA court decisions, a trio that had never before been convened. The panel’s ruling is pending.—Los Angeles Times