The Pakistani Autumn

By Dr Tariq Rahman

The Arab Spring is said to be coming to an end, not with a bang but with a whimper, and some would like to think after the recriminations of October 28 that the Pakistani Autumn is about to begin. But both perceptions could be wrong. First, the Arab uprising has brought about changes in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya but is still continuing in Syria, Yemen and Bahrain. Nobody can predict how it will end there — at the moment the movement in Bahrain has been suppressed but that in Yemen and Syria refuses to be suppressed even by force. But why is the end a ‘whimper’? Well, because the change appears to be democratic but has too many uncertainties to be celebrated yet. In Tunisia, the Islamists could come to power and in Egypt the military is well-entrenched so far and there too the Muslim Brotherhood could gain power. In Libya, it is too premature to say who will rule and what kind of rule it will be but the hold of western powers will be there to reckon with. So, to talk of celebratory bangs would be premature. All we can do is to keep our fingers crossed.

But what about the Pakistani Autumn? There are several criteria to judge it by. First, every political analyst knows that the Sharif brothers are not really talking of a real change in the way the country is governed. They are really talking about taking power in the centre in place of the PPP. That is what all opposition parties do and democracy gives them this right. What democracy does not allow is a call for a violent revolution. For no matter how romantics have painted revolutions, the fact is that all of them entail unacceptable levels of violence and there is no guarantee that the rulers thrown up by these traumatic events will be compassionate and democratic. Let us remember that the French Revolution (1789-1799) was followed by a Reign of Terror (1793-1794) in which the guillotine sent between 16,000 to 40,000 to a bloody end without adequate or fair trial; the counter-revolution (War in the Vendee) was termed ‘the first genocide’; and eventually, instead of kings, France was saddled with an emperor (Napoleon 1804-1815) who led a ‘grand army’ of Frenchmen (400,000) to death and destruction in the wintry wastes of Russia (40,000 returned in 1812) and finally lost to the allies (1815). The Russian Revolution (1917) brought the Bolsheviks to power in Russia and they destroyed their rivals, the Mensheviks, and then went on to establish a dictatorship (Stalin, 1878-1953) which executed 700,000 and sent 14 million to concentration camps. The governance did improve but still 1.5 million people died in the famine of 1947. In China, the communists established a one-party rule which made dissent punishable and which curbed political opinion. In Iran, the Islamic revolution curtailed personal liberties, made dissent dangerous and established a non-democratic form of rule in which parties not approved of by the religious establishment simply could not contest the elections. In short, revolutions generally end up by replacing one set of dictatorial rulers by rulers even more dictatorial than before. It is much better to let politics follow an evolutionary course as it did in Britain, the ‘mother of democracies’.

In any case, rhetoric aside, Pakistan is not exactly eighteenth century France or Czarist Russia or even the Shah’s Iran. No ruler of this country, including the generals, have behaved as ruthlessly as Hosni Mubarak, Saddam Hussain, Qaddafi or Basharul Assad. Even during martial rule, Pakistan’s press, at least the English press, has been more free and anti-establishment than even some democratic countries. The present government was elected through due political process and was accepted as such by its political rivals. It is, of course, entirely true that the government has not given good governance so far. To be fair to it, foreign and military policies are not in the hands of the civilians in Pakistan. So, to blame the government for allowing drone attacks or not being able to prevent the Taliban from attacking parts of the country is unfair. But to blame the government for loadshedding of power and gas; or the increasing gap between the rich and the poor; or not being able to prevent the turf war between armed supporters of political parties, including the PPP, in Karachi; or the ruin of the railways and the disruption of PIA flights; or the failure to appoint the chairman of the NAB; or letting off the big fish in corruption cases — for these things it is fair to blame the PPP government. The perception that at least some of these distortions, especially those related to corruption cases and the appointment of the NAB chairman, are related to the vulnerabilities of Mr Asif Ali Zardari seems to be correct. If he did not have cases against him, some of these things need not have occurred. However, Mr Zardari is not the PPP as a whole nor is the PPP the system as a whole. So, if one calls for a revolution, one is in danger of overthrowing the system and what will replace it is anybody’s guess. Moreover, if it is a question of good governance, provincial governments do not deliver good governance either. In Punjab, first doctors and then students of various secondary boards of education resorted to considerable violence before they were given relief. Even in the case of dengue fever, it was not prevented initially and hospitals remained without sufficient platelets and other necessities, though it is only fair to say that Mr Shahbaz Sharif did put in an enormous amount of effort to redress the situation eventually.

But otherwise it has become a national characteristic that cities, including hospitals with dengue patients, remain dark till people resort to violence; that pensioners have to die before pensions are paid; that medicines are rushed from India but only after avoidable deaths. This kind of knee-jerk governance is part of all the provinces of Pakistan and it does not have only to do with the PPP it seems. Our dysfunctional justice system remains the same despite both military and civilian governments and we cannot protect policemen and judges who arrest or kill terrorists.

While I do not think there will be a revolution in Pakistan because ours is still a society in which people are free to express their anger both on the street and with each other, there is much irresponsible talk about it. This talk dilutes peoples’ faith in the democratic process and paves the path to fascist philosophies. In our case, the army was always the beneficiary of the end of civilian rule. Now it may be the religious right wing also. But if one has any illusions of how that kind of rule will be, then Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan are possible examples. Democracy, after all, is the best revenge, even if one has to wait for five years or more to take that revenge.

Source: Pakistani Autumn