Faizabad, Trump tweet, Kasur, Balochistan...one after the other, like the stations you pass by in a speeding train. All received our default response: a lot of sound and fury. Then they fadeaway, fast as they came, to be overtaken by new ones. Is it some kind of a divine comedy that the visitations come upon us with such unerring regularity? Or is it symptomatic of the myriad fault lines that we have collectively nurtured over the years and learnt to live with?
Alibis abound. Faizabad was an administration nut-cracked between judicial pronouncements and machinations of the hidden hand. The tweet was a betrayal of an ungrateful 'ally' shorn of diplomatic niceties. Kasur was an indictment of a patriarchal society. Balochistan was where threat and money combined to obtain the 'desired results'. Let's tease through the alibis to establish culpability. Yes, the courts were wrong in asking police to clear Faizabad without weapons. Firing on protestors is never the first resort but if the lawbreakers know you have been deprived of the last resort they always push the envelope. Yes, a public message to 'both sides' to restrain emboldened one and weakened the other, and unsurprisingly the ultimate enforcer of government's writ became the mediator.
Possibly, the outcome would have been ugly but for these interventions. Police, badly trained and demoralized, messes things up more often than it fixes them. Once we freed it of magisterial control (separation of judiciary from the executive, for which we were not ready), but not political control, we ended up with a mongrel that is bossed by all but owned by none.
Political interest prevailed over public interest?
Trump's unprofessional tweet deserved dismissal not reaction. Threat of cessation of military and economic aid deserved a thank you note. That we are being made a 'scapegoat' is irrelevant; what is relevant is a good working relationship with the US. What also matters is if the world shares the US perspective.
What is of real import, though, is if our policies are serving our best interests. There is little evidence to suggest they are, even if they are anchored in defence considerations and not any lofty ambitions. If the world engages with us, it is not out of love but our nuisance value. If the idea was to checkmate India, we have clearly been left holding the bag as India's image burnishes (despite its horrific record of human rights, particularly in Kashmir) while ours keeps getting tarnished. Our objective of having a voice that matters in Afghanistan has blown back in our face as we hunt with the hounds and run with the hare.
Parliament says it should shape the policy. Can it?
Turf interest prevailed over national interest?
Kasur is not the first metaphor of national shame. It is fresher and more heart wrenching but we have been there - several times. We cried and wrote and heard 'orders to arrest within hours', and moved on. Despite the staggering number of child molestations - 515 last year in Punjab alone - we did nothing to get to the root causes, cultural and legal. We live with the possibility of this happening again and again on a daily basis - every time we stop at a traffic light and approached by an alms-seeking minor girl, for instance.
What does it tell us when the Council of Islamic Ideology is disinclined to accept evidentiary value of DNA testing in rape cases? What do we make of instances of girls being made to dance naked (as punishment) and no dharna taking place in protest? How come our heavily funded intelligence agencies know everything about 'disappearances' but nothing about serial rapists? The courts may give as many 'hours' to the police to arrest the culprits as they like, but the last we heard no police official has ever been proceeded against for failing to trace criminals in his jurisdiction.
Women may not exactly be 'fair game' in the Islamic Republic but their issues are not 'vote getters' either. We have deeply ingrained cultural biases against them.
Cultural interests prevailed over interests of justice?
Balochistan, a first in many unsavoury respects, now has the unique distinction of having a Chief Minister whose party consists of only five members but who got elected because the majority party (PML-N) members voted for him! [The new CM already enjoyed the distinction of only 544 constituents voting him into the provincial assembly]
The timing of it gives rise to several questions. Why did it take the PML-N and its allies two years to decide they could suffer Sanaullah Zehri no more? During this time did the disgruntled members ever share their unhappiness with the PML-N leadership? Apparently not - if they had a genuine grouse the leadership could have made an 'in-house' change. And if the cause was removed, through the CM's resignation, why didn't the majority party and its allies choose one of their own to replace him?
Is Balochistan a pawn in the great game of national politics? The soft political underbelly that is so easy to exploit - to engineer postponement of elections, or deny PML-N a majority in the Senate? It appears election of a new CM has vitiated the domino effect that the dissolution of Balochistan assembly could have triggered. But PML-N's en masse vote of confidence in Bizenjo stabs the chances of PML-N capturing the Senate. Game, set, and match?
Control interests prevailed over democratic interests?
Politics everywhere is a clash of interests. But accommodation, the give and take of it, is the essence of politics. You compete and you collaborate, within the respective red lines. That is what makes democracy tick. You don't need a 'charter of democracy' - until you feel threatened by a non-political force.
There are two obvious challenges to a charter of democracy. One, there is no guarantor and there are no penalties for infraction. Second, it becomes meaningless if it doesn't embrace all.
Is the Pakistani drama nearing its denouement? We don't think so. This is not political engagement, where the powerless millions have to be won over. It is a battle of the elite, political and non-political. It will take time for the elite to demolish one another, but ultimately the powerless will be the victors.
The worrying question is if the ticket to this match of elite elephants is prohibitive.
shabirahmed@yahoo.com