Change in Islamabad
Restoration of the twice-deposed chief justice of Pakistan on March 16 is a significant change. How real is it? The long struggle began when Pervez Musharraf sacked him in 2007. This is the first time in Pakistan's history that a popular agitation has attained its objectives. But will it last?
The change looks like a new star in the firmament. Who has won? It was the lawyers' movement, supported by the media and the civil society that started it. Later came the support from major political parties. It became a strong movement that forced the PPP government into conceding its main demand.
But who are the losers? They are the recognised stakeholders -- the army, bureaucracy, feudals, mullahs, industrialists, bankers and successful professionals. It is this powerful elite that had to concede the popular demand. This is a clear defeat of the establishment, including its foreign supporters -- the western powers. The support of these foreign forces has long manipulated Pakistan's decision-making.
Will it help create a free democratic dispensation if the winners press on with the democratisation of governance? The answer is neither simple nor automatic. Unless the common people get the message that they matter and that their wishes, if expressed properly, can change things in the country they will not be the new force for change.
There has to be insightful and democratic leadership, which should be able to win popular support and preserve it. These conditions are not easily met. While the adversary remains strong in image, up to a point, the power of the people has succeeded for the first time.
Is it a revolutionary change? The answer is not automatically yes or no; it is maybe. It is what the people and political leadership of the country make of it. This is the first ever victory of the people against the establishment. Its nerves gave way in the wee hours of Monday. But can this kind of pressure be brought against the establishment another time? Who knows? This can become a lasting change if the people remain vigilant.
What it will require is a competent intelligentsia and a political leadership that remains highly vigilant and articulate. Regular articulation is the name of this game. There is the danger of confusion: this is a government that lays claims to be democratic, though its actions are not. It will be in power for four more years.
This government has been amassing all manner of powers in the hands of its co-chairman. His latest foray was to deny the PML (N), the party controlling the province of Punjab. The two top leaders of the PML (N), Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif, were declared ineligible to stand for any elective office by a plaint court. President Zardari clamped the Governor's Raj, the governor being his friend.
After the election last year, the two parties became coalition partners in both the Punjab government and the central government under an arrangement mediated by the US and UK. But one of these, PML (N), was more inflexible in its demand for a free judiciary represented by the sacked CJP.
But the president has deprived the PML (N) of its right to rule Punjab. That probably was punishment for the inflexibility of Nawaz Sharif. The PML (N) threw its full weight behind the lawyers' campaign. Much of the glory for the victory will naturally go to the PML (N) and the Sharif brothers.
Zardari actions were quite unnecessary. The government had mobilised all its resources to thwart a second march to the capital by physically preventing marchers coming from the Balochistan and Sindh provinces when Punjab shut its borders with them. The president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, Ali Ahmed Kurd, was prevented from traveling to Islamabad or Lahore three times in a row.
The solidarity of the people and the developments leading to March 16 should lead to a new election. It is almost certain that only a few parties will prefer a new election and the government will continue. But few will forget the way it grabbed power in NWFP and Balochistan. Its information minister resigned because of Zardari's order to suppress a TV channel and probably to put some restrictions on the freedom of other media also.
There are serious crises in political and economic life. Widespread unemployment, increasing poverty and high inflation are making the lives of common people miserable. Virtually nothing is being done to ameliorate the situation. Ethnic nationalisms remain after 60 years.
There is also the rise of Islamic extremism. It has not been tackled well. The government has been forced to act the way the Americans wanted. The disparity of incomes between the rich and poor grows by the day. The new democracy has to solve these problems.
But this government has done little to tackle any major problem, or move out of the harsh limits set by WTO. It has to act as a guarantor for the democratisation process that delivers something to ordinary citizens. Can such conditions be fulfilled? The task seems daunting.
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