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PAKISTAN: A Political Deadlock
B. Raman
A little more than two weeks before his scheduled departure for the USA for
high-profile talks with President Bush at Camp David, Pakistan's President Gen.
Pervez Musharraf finds himself confronted with an embarrassing political
deadlock, which does not bode well for his self-projected image as the designer
of democracy in Pakistani colours.
2. The coalition of six religious fundamentalist parties called the Muttahida
Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), with the support of the Pakistan Muslim League (N) of Nawaz
Sharif,the Pakistan People's Party Parliamentarians (PPPP) of Mrs. Benazir
Bhutto and other smaller anti-military political parties, has been waging a
relentless battle against Musharraf's continuing to function as "the olive green
President", wearing the two hats of the President of the Republic and the Chief
of the Army Staff (COAS). Another objective of its battle is to force Musharraf
seek re-election as the President under the provisions laid down in the
Constitution, according to which the President is to be elected by a joint
electoral college consisting of the elected members of the federal Parliament
and the provincial Legislative Assemblies. Musharraf got himself elected last
year through a referendum, which was alleged to have been blatantly rigged with
the complicity of the Election Commission, which has already ordered the
destruction of all the records pertaining to it.
3. The opposition led by the MMA has also been challenging the various
constitutional amendments grouped together under a Legal Framework Order (LFO),
which Musharraf had got promulgated before the elections of October 10 last.
The LFO restores or vastly increases the powers of the President in matters such
as appointments of the chiefs of the
armed forces, judges of the federal and provincial high courts, the head and
members of the Election Commission, governors of the provinces etc, dismissal of
an elected government and the elected Assemblies and the constitution of a
National Security Council chaired by the President and not the Prime Minister.
Through the LFO, Musharraf has sough to give Pakistan a revised Constitution
more akin to that of France than those of other parliamentary democracies, which
follow the British model.
4. The Government headed by Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali, which is
a coalition dominated by the Musharraf-engineered PML (Qaide Azam), finds itself
legislatively paralysed due to the battle waged by the MMA and its supporters in
the Federal Parliament. Even though it is more than six months since the
elections to the National Assembly were held, no formal legislative business
could be transacted so far due to the deadlock. The two Houses of Parliament
have been functioning without even the formal inauguration of the session by a
presidential address outlining the policy goals of the Government. This is
attributed to the fears of Musharraf that he might be heckled if he appeared
before a joint session for this purpose.
5. While the federal Government thus finds itself stymied in its efforts to
project a democratic image of Pakistan, the deadlock has not come in the way of
the administration of the country. The economy continues to show sustained
improvement under the stewardship of Shaukat Aziz, the Finance Minister, who
enjoys the confidence of Musharraf and the international financial
institutions. The Government's response---positive, but not totally-- to
India's overtures for re-opening the bilateral dialogue process has not been
inhibited by the murky political situation.
6.Till now, Musharraf has had the Army, the judiciary and the general public
behind him in his confrontation with the opposition parties led by the MMA.
Despite his vastly enhanced powers, his positive international image and good
vibrations with the US administration, Musharraf has resisted any tendency to
ride roughshod over any dissenting views in the Army. His authoritarianism is
tempered by his habit of seeking consensus in the army and the civilian
bureaucracy in favour of his views. His views ultimately prevail, but are not
seen as imposed on the military-civilian bureaucracy from above.
7. Even before he assumed power in October 1999, he was known as an officer, who
was responsive to the views of his colleagues and subordinates in the military
and sought their prior approval for his decisions. He has maintained this
practice. Moreover, all the present Corps Commanders got their promotion
as Lt.Generals under his stewardship and hence are assumed to owe a personal
loyalty to him. For these reasons, he should normally have no reasons to fear
dissent in the armed forces over the way he has been handling the political
crisis.
8. The present judiciary was largely picked and chosen by him after he assumed
office and has been systematically softened by him through various lollipops
such as extended tenure through increase in their retirement age etc. Many of
them thus owe their career and comforts to him and have found ways of standing
by him whenever his decisions have been
challenged before the courts.
9. While some sections of the elite (it is difficult to quantify them) have
backed the opposition's political struggle against him, the general public of
the country has by and large remained indifferent till now to the campaign
against him. The bitter memories of the past style of governance of
Sharif and Benazir remain strong. The fact that both these leaders have chosen
for themselves the safety and comforts of political exile instead of facing the
wrath of the regime by returning to the country has not done any good to their
image. The visible signs of improvement in the economy marked by an increase in
tax collection and foreign exchange reserves, rise in exports, a remarkably
buoyant stock market, flood of external cash flow etc and the improved
international image of Pakistan under Musharraf have had their impact on the
attitude of the general public towards him.
10. The MMA is still able to draw large crowds into the streets to demonstrate
against his co-operation with the USA against the Taliban and Osama bin Laden's
Al Qaeda and International Islamic Front (IIF), the US invasion of Iraq etc, but
its ability to draw similar
crowds to protest against his arbitrary political style and against his
continuing as the COAS is still to be proved though the MMA has been threatening
to take recourse to public agitation if its efforts to reach a compromise
through talks with the Government fail.
11. The MMA owed its remarkable success in the October elections to Musharraf's
munificence. He ordered the withdrawal of the cases against many of their
candidates from the anti-terrorism courts so that they were not disqualified by
the Election Commission. He made the Election Commission pass an order giving
the certificates in Islamic studies issued by the madrasas the equivalence of an
university degree so that the newly-introduced electoral provision that only
graduates can contest elections did not come in the way of the mullas and their
proteges contesting the polls. He broke the PML (N) and the PPPP, thereby
weakening their ability to counter the religious fundamentalist parties.
12.One would have, therefore, expected that the mullas would have been grateful
to him and refrained from raising issues inconvenient to him. Instead, they
have been relentlessly challenging his self-assumed political supremacy and
seeking to reduce his powers. Before October last, all religious fundamentalist
parties---and particularly the Jamaat-e-Islami (JEI)
of Qazi Hussain Ahmed--- were viewed as the stooges of the army, amenable to its
pressure. The Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and the COAS never had
difficulty in the past in calling the mullas to order, except on rare occasions.
When Qazi Hussain Ahmed strongly opposed Musharraf's visit to India for the Agra
summit in 2001, one courtesy call on him by Lt. Gen.Ehsanul Haq, the present
Director-General of the ISI who was then the Corps Commander at Peshawar, was
sufficient to make the Qazi relent in his opposition.
13. Ehsanul Haq, who is an old personal and family friend of the Qazi, and his
senior officers in the ISI have repeatedly failed since October last in their
efforts to make the Qazi and other leaders of the MMA see reason. The ISI and
the Intelligence Bureau (IB) have not so far been able to engineer a split in
the opposition ranks. The MMA gives the impression of being prepared to face the
risk of a dissolution of the National Assembly and the provincial Assemblies of
the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Balochistan and fresh elections in
which, without the bounties of Musharraf, it may not do as well as it did in
October.
14.The questions which inevitably arise in one's mind are: What explains the
unity and seeming confidence of the religious opposition? Are there elements not
only in the military-intelligence establishment, but also in the scientific
circles associated with Pakistan's nuclear and missile capability, which, while
openly supporting Musharraf, have been covertly instigating the MMA not to
relent? If so, who are these elements? Is it possible to quantify their
strength? Data presently available do not permit convincing answers to these
questions.
15. However, one has to note reports of Musharraf's pro-US policies causing
unhappiness not only in the general public, but also in some sections of the
armed forces and the scientific community. There are reportedly elements, which
are yet to reconcile themselves to some of his actions such as assisting the US
in its efforts to destroy the Taliban, giving
the US intelligence agencies a free run of the country, subjecting renowned
scientists, doctors and other professionals to the humiliation of detention and
interrogation just because of the suspicion of the US intelligence of their
having possible links with Al Qaeda, rendering Dr.A.Q.Khan, the so-called father
of Pakistan's atomic bomb, a virtual non-person by removing him, reportedly
under US pressure, from all positions of executive power in the scientific field
and starting a campaign to play down his role in the development of Pakistan's
military nuclear capability etc. There are continuing reports of unease in the
army and the Foreign Office over his covert intelligence co-operation with the
US against Iran. However, there are at present no indicators to suggest that
such pockets of unhappiness of undetermined strength could create serious
dissensions in the establishment against him.
16. The NWFP, which is now ruled by the MMA, and Balochistan, which is ruled by
the MMA and PML(QA) in coalition, have been adding to the headaches and
embarrassment of Musharraf. The MMA Government in the NWFP has not only
brazenly given sanctuary and protection to the survivors of Al Qaeda and
Taliban, but has also been trying to talibanise the province by setting up a
department of virtue and vice and by having a law enacted for the enforcement of
the Islamic shariat laws in the province.
17. In Balochistan, there has been a deterioration in the law and order
situation since October, with at least three reported explosions disrupting oil
and gas supplies through pipelines to the industries and other consumers of
Punjab and Sindh. A public agitation against the Chinese-assisted Gwadar port
development project has been gathering momentum. The Balochi nationalists have
been critical of the induction of a large number of Punjabis and Pashtuns into
the province to work in this project.
18. Musharraf's personal and political gains hitherto by positioning himself as
the frontline ally of the US in the war against terrorism would stand in danger
of being reduced, if not wiped out, if he is not able to bring the MMA and the
administration controlled by it in the NWFP to order. The spectre of the
resurgence of the Taliban and Al Qaeda from the fertile soil of the NWFP and
Balochistan would increasingly haunt the US and the rest of the international
community if the alarming developments in the NWFP are not arrested and
reversed.
19. There are some indications that Musharraf might already be contemplating
some action. He has reportedly initiated some action against terrorist
organisations, which are close to the constituents of the MMA. Examples are the
reported action against the Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) of Kashmir, which is an
appendage of the JEI, and the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM) and the Jaish-e-Mohammad
(JEM), which are close to the Jamiat-ul-Ulema Islam (JUI) of Maulana Fazlur
Rahman. At the same time, he has avoided action against the Lashkar-e-Toiba
(LET), which has no association with any of the constituents of the MMA, so that
he does not lose the services of this organisation, the largest of the Pakistani
terrorist organisations, in his proxy war against India.
20. The heads of the local administrative councils of the NWFP called Nazims
have collectively resigned reportedly at his instigation on the ground that the
provincial government has been interfering in their functioning, which could be
projected by him as a
legitimate ground for proclaiming the break-down of the constitution in the
province. It has been reported that the Federal Government has unilaterally,
without the concurrence of the provincial government, ordered the transfer of
the Chief Secretary and the Inspector-General of Police of the province.
21. The matters seem to be moving towards an intensification of the
confrontation and the ultimate denouement may come before his visit to the US.
He would like to go there with his seeming strength and following in the eyes
of the US unimpaired and as a leader totally in command of the military and of
the situation in the country whose value as a stalwart ally remains
undiminished.
22. Will he wield the big stick against the religious fundamentalist parties
and, if he did, what will be the impact in the country? The indications till now
are that if he did so, he might be able to get away with it just as he got away
with his volte face in Afghanistan in October, 2001, when warnings of a public
upsurge against him proved to be wrong.
(The writer is
Additional Secretary (Retired), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, and,
presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Convenor,
Advisory Committee, Observer Research Foundation (ORF), Chennai Chapter. E-Mail:
corde@vsnl.com
) |
