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Old Friday, July 07, 2006
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Arrow US democracy agenda: dangerous farce

Shireen M Mazari

The democracy agenda of the US has certainly not made much of a mark in the Middle East especially in Palestine where the US is supporting Israel's massacre of the Palestinians and the leaders they had elected in a transparent and democratic manner. The fact that the so-called "free world", with its leader the US, is content to watch in silence as Israel moves closer to a potential genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza, shows the irrelevancy of democracy in the wider agendas of these states. Clearly, with the Palestinians rejecting the creation of a Bantuland in the Gaza Strip, Israel has decided to put a violent end to any dreams of a viable Palestinian state -– and the Bush Administration seems to have acquiesced in this murderous design. In these circumstances, it is unfortunate that a group of Pakistani Americans sought to visit Israel at the precise moment when Israel was conducting its onslaught against the hapless Palestinians.

More important, from a Pakistani perspective, is the sudden focus on democracy education by all and sundry for us Pakistanis. Notwithstanding the fact that the average Pakistani is probably more shrewd in terms of electoral norms and is as if not more politically aware than many in the West, especially in the US where the average citizen barely knows much about the world -- except when US soldiers go and get killed in far away places. Nevertheless, the donor agencies and the US have decided that they may find a more receptive audience in Pakistan, than elsewhere, to their version of democracy education. This is in keeping with the new trend amongst donors to focus more of their funds on advocacy than on service delivery. This gives a high profile to the donors with seminars in five-star hotels in the main urban centres and also allows them to push their agendas through in terms of our national policies. So what if the main population, especially in the rural areas is devoid of health and other services delivery. In any case, these services are primarily the responsibility of the state to begin with.

Coming back to the issue of democracy education, we now have the Women's Development and Youth Affairs Ministry undertaking a Norwegian-funded project entitled "Women's Political School", in coordination with the UNDP. This is intended to "mould" our women councilors into leaders. Equally important, why has it been assumed that only our women councilors need to be educated? Having seen the male variety, I think it is presumptuous to assume that the women are less politically aware than their male counterparts.

More disturbing is the issue of how different "moulding" really is from "indoctrinating"? Equally important, it would be interesting to know how much of the $4.5 million allocated for the fund will go to consultants and "teachers". Surely, all our elected (direct and indirect) women, in the Parliament and provincial assemblies should be obliged to undertake interaction with our women councilors in their constituencies, so both groups can become mutually aware of the issues and problems the other faces. This would be informative, educative and would not cost anything if one assumes the elected representatives do visit their constituencies on a regular basis. Why does one need massive foreign funding or a school for politics?

But these days, advocacy of all sorts is the name of the game in Islamabad. The result is that some organisations with highly contentious agendas have also moved in. For instance, it has been reported that a so-called "US expert" is coming all the way from the US to deliver a special lecture to women senators on democracy and the role of women lawmakers. If I were a woman senator I would be insulted at the assumption that I needed to be lectured on such basic issues by an American "expert". Apparently male senators will not be invited to this exclusive lecture. Who is this expert? Ah, therein lies the rub. It is a Ms Judy Van Rest who is the executive vice president of the International Republican Institute (IRI). "So what's the big deal?" the readers of this column may ask. After all, it would be logical to assume that this lecture and visit will not be at the expense of the Government of Pakistan and it is always good to listen to varied opinions even if it is a little demeaning to hear pontifications on democracy.

However, the issue is not so simple because the IRI's agenda is highly controversial. The Institute is loosely affiliated with the Republican Party -– now of Neocon infamy -- but it receives US government funding for so-called "international democratisation programmes". The IRI was founded in 1983 in the wake of a Reagan agenda item to promote a global "democracy" agenda which of course was not supposed to result in electoral victories for the likes of Hamas. Most of the staff of the IRI has strong links to right-wing think tanks and institutes as well to the neocons. Others represent the corporate interests of major oil, financial and defence sectors. IRI's President and CEO, George Folsom, was a member of the Bush-Cheney Transition Team and is also known to be a frequent guest at forums hosted by the extreme right wing Heritage Foundation and American Enterprise Institute.

Given this background, it is not surprising to find the IRI being linked to political upheavals and attempted coups in Latin America. For instance, after the April 2002 aborted coup against Venezuelan President Chavez, who has been highly critical of the US government, many accused the Bush Administration of having been involved in this attempted ouster. While the Bush Administration denied any role, one connection did become clear between the US government and the anti-Chavez movement: American government funding was channeled through groups like the IRI to the anti-Chavez groups. According to Mike Cesar of the International Relations Center (IRC), with funding from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the IRI sponsored anti-Chavez activities in Venezuela and even flew his opponents to Washington to meet US officials.

In Haiti, in the first year of the Bush Administration, the IRI received USAID funds to effectively work with Haitian leader Aristide's opponents and the IRI point man in Haiti was a Stanley Lucas who had earlier been closely linked to the Haitian military. With such a dubious record, do our Senators really need to be educated by Ms Van Rest of the IRI? Incidentally, she was also in Iraq. And this seems to be another link developing in Pakistan. We now have US organisations moving into Pakistan, who have been working with the US government in Iraq. One prominent organisation is the Lincoln Group which has been working in Iraq and is now in Pakistan, and is one of three companies that were awarded a lucrative contract from the Pentagon, for the conduct of psy ops to improve foreign public opinion about the US, especially the US military. Already the Group has begun certain operations in Pakistan. And this is just one of many such groups that are now making their presence felt in Pakistan. Surely we need an awareness campaign on such groups?

As for democracy and political awareness, practice and indigenous experience sharing is the only rational teacher.
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