Political Quandary in Pakistan

We are starting with the fundamental principle that we are all citizens and equal citizens of one State…Now I think we should keep that in front of us as our ideal and you will find that in course of time Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious

sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense as citizens of the State.
(Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s address to the Constituent Assembly)


In West Pakistan, politics was a preserve of landlords who had secure constituencies. They were mostly ill-educated and had no interest in the welfare of the people. They were not loyal to any one party. Their only aim was ceaseless tussle for power among different groups led by Daultana, Noon, Mamdot, Dasti, Qizalbash and Gurmani in Punjab; by Khuhro, Talpur, Fazlullah, and Rashid in Sindh; and by Qayyum Khan, Pir Manki Sharif, Sardar Rashid, and Bahadur Khan in the NWFP. These feudals and Khans struck blow after blow at democracy and provided an unmistakable proof that feudalism and democracy could not coexist. (Safdar Mahmood, Pakistan: Political Roots & Development, p. 359)

Jinnah’s dream as described in his address to the Constituent Assembly remains unfulfilled. Alluding to this mishap, Roedad Khan gave a title to his book “Pakistan: A Dream Gone Sour.” This indeed highlights the tragic plight of Pakistan – a country which came into being with high hopes of becoming an exemplary State in the Muslim world. In its entire history of sixty years, it has waded through one political crisis after another without any silver lining on its horizon. The recent Emergency declared by President Musharraf is yet another nail in its coffin. Many have already declared it a failed State.

Whenever there is a military coup in Pakistan, the political analysts begin scrutinizing the causes which have prevented and continue to prevent democracy to take roots in our political system. On every such occasion, the question is raised whether democratic form of governance is somehow genetically unsuitable for Pakistan and the temper of its people. The answer is given invariably that democracy is okay but the political leaders are too selfish, too self-centered, and relentlessly power-seekers. But the fundamental question that remains unresolved is what can be done under such circumstances to protect and promulgate democracy in a continuous and unbroken manner. We are facing the same dilemma now after the enforcement of emergency rule in Pakistan by President Pervez Musharraf. There is a clamor for democracy again without any certainty that it will succeed this time around. The saddest thing is that not only the army generals like Ayub, Yahya, Zia and Musharraf did not want to relinquish power, it is that the politicians as well like Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (ZAB), Benazir Bhutto (BB), Nawaz Sharif, and their predecessors in the 1950s and 60s were also power hungry and wanted to remain in power at all costs. ZAB had the signal honor of being the only civilian Chief Martial Law Administrator after the ouster of Yahya Khan. The elections were more often rigged than not in favor of the government which was in power at the time of election.

Once a political leader gained power in Pakistan, he or she would resort to all kinds of unconstitutional activities to stay in power. Under such circumstances, who could or would depose them? If a democratic government fails to reform itself, it can be as bad as an autocratic dictatorship. It is not always half-educated or illiterate feudal landlords who are the cause of the failure of democracy in Pakistan because almost all the leaders that Safdar Mahmood enumerated in the quotation in the frontispiece like Daultana, Mamdot, Talpur and Qayyum Khan were highly educated yet they failed to abide by the norms of democracy.

Safdar Mahmood wrote in his book, “Democracy is always a slow process and people can not bring democracy into being by a sudden change of attitude. Democracy attains its fuller development after many experiments, some of which may be abortive, but it should not cause disappointment.” Unless some positive change and reform is introduced in these experiments, it is not very certain that a democratic experiment (of the kind practiced in Pakistan) can succeed.

For example, both Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif had their chances in the closing decades of the last century and they had failed to deliver. They are still dominating the political scene. Is there any hope that they will deliver now? Why can’t they be disqualified for their past misdeeds? If there is a degree of punishment for messing up with the democratic institutions, the new leaders might refrain from misusing them for personal advantage and greed. Otherwise, it will remain the same old musical chairs and democracy will be flouted again and again.

Describing the downfall of BB in her second tenure as Prime Minister, Roedad Khan narrated in his book (Pakistan: A Dream Gone Sour) how President Farooq Ahmed Khan Leghari (BB’s former supporter) was disappointed in BB’s government. Roedad wrote, “When I told him (Leghari) that never before had public faith in the country’s future and its rulers sunk so low and the people felt terribly angry and alienated, the President responded by saying how he had tried on several occasions to impress upon the Prime Minister (BB) the urgency of stemming the rot by taking effective actions against the rampant corruption in her administration, and had repeatedly warned her that if mismanagement of the economy continued and she did not arrest the downward slide, a grave financial crisis would soon engulf the country.” Regarding BB’s dismissal, he wrote, “Around midnight on 5 November, President Farooq Ahmed Khan Leghari, long-time ally, party loyal, and staunch supporter of Benazir, in exercise of his power under article 58(2) (b) of the Constitution, dissolved the National Assembly, sacked the government, sending Benazir out in the cold, and appointed 3 February 1997 as the date for general elections to the National assembly.”

A caretaker government headed by Prime Minister Malik Meraj Khalid was appointed one of whose tasks was to investigate the extent of corruption committed by Benazir, Nawaz Sharif and many other politicians so that they could be barred from participating in the forthcoming elections. Curiously, the caretaker government could not find sufficient evidence against them. According to Roedad, “The new (caretaker) government has publicly stated that it has not been able to gather enough evidence to act against top politicians, including Ms. Bhutto, her husband Asif Zardari, and the former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif…Many people who had welcomed the Bhutto government’s dismissal now feel cheated and are saying that if there was not enough evidence to act against her, why was her government dismissed…” In the next election, Nawaz Sharif became the prime minister and was later deposed by the army coup staged by General Musharaff..

Now after a decade, the same duo, Benazir and Nawaz Sharif, is hovering on the horizon of Pakistan to contest yet another election.

It might appear that I am putting down democracy in this essay and, by doing so, am supporting the military dictatorship. Nothing can be farther from the truth. Military dictatorship is illegal and immoral and it shouldn’t have any justification to usurp political; power. The upshot of my essay is to highlight the inevitable political quandary in which Pakistan is trapped. You can install a political government by popular vote but there are no effective checks and balances by which a political government can be kept to the straight, narrow and workable path.

Who will break this quandary or how can Pakistan escape from this quandary is not clear yet.