Seducing The Devil

Whatever one may think about the military and its curse on democracy in Pakistan, the performance of the major political parties, PPP, PML-N and ARD, was not really democratic when they boycotted the proceedings of the seventeenth amendment. When these parties and their leaders boycotted, they were suggesting that to them personal politics was more important than national politics. When they walked out, what sort of impression did they created?

The people saw the boycott and the walkout as merely another attempt at grandstanding and the refusal of the politicians to deal with the real issues. If they had believed in democracy, they should have opposed the passage of the seventeenth amendment, but they did not; they left the field to their opponents. They marginalized their own role in Pakistani politics and their discredited their own politics. They showed no political maturity, which one might have expected from two mainstream political parties and all they did, was create a sense of a deeper alienation in the public perception vis-à-vis political parties and politicians in Pakistan.

Personally, I honestly believe that there is no substitute to democracy but I have also learned, by living in Pakistan, which democracy is not a magic wand to be waved by elected officials. Elections and parliaments do not make and constitute the crux of democracy, but political sanity and foresight does make democracy a bit more accessible. The so called secular parties did themselves irreparable damage to their cause, when they boycotted proceedings and walked out of the parliament. Politics like nature abhors a vacuum and if these parties are intent on creating a political vacuum by their infantile politics of petulance, then there should be no surprise if MMA fills that political vacuum and becomes politically stronger.

Pakistan is an administrative state, in its heart, and the government of the day be it a military or a civilian or a hybrid, will make political adjustments that enable the functioning of the state’s political apparatus. The state has to function regardless and if that means legislation through ordinances, then the die is cast and the deed has to be done. Pakistan was being ruled by ordinances while this entire LFO-MMA tussle was going on and if the ARD and PPP still boycott the parliament on some principle or another, the government will not miss their absence, because it will still operate the nation via ordinances. The key to political maturity and utility is to make yourself indispensable. PPP and ARD, when they seek politics of confrontation and absenteeism, are in fact making themselves dispensable to the overall calculus of politics in Pakistan.

PPP and ARD and PML-N have no one, but themselves to blame for their political marginalization in Pakistani politics.

As to MMA, it has lost all sense of legitimacy and will soon face a backlash of its votaries. MMA, when it came to power, in October 2002, did so claiming that it did not consider LFO as a part of the constitution of 1973. Now, it has reached a Faustian bargain with the government through which it has agreed to amend the LFO, but in doing so it has simply accepted a revised version of the LFO as the part of the constitution. MMA is now a part of the government and it has in toto, agreed to all the extra-constitutional changes made since October 12, 1999.

The winner in all this has been the government and Pervez Musharraf. In this sense, all the western news media’s cries of Cassandra have been misplaced. By seeking an alliance with MMA, Musharraf has not been weakened but he has, rather ironically, strengthened his position. MMA is now a part and parcel of the government and if it wishes to guarantee its political comfort zone, it has to continually compromise with the Musharraf government. When one is in the inner sanctum of the temple, one has to obey the rituals and the ceremonies or you are soon excommunicated. By cooperating MMA with his rule, Musharraf has simply denied the MMA the pretext; the loci standi of its political argument that Musharraf’s tenure was unconstitutional and now MMA has no political argument against the government. The bad side of the deal is that Musharraf has to, now, seek a modus vivendi with MMA and agree to some of their policies and this brings the political pot in Pakistan to a full boil.

2004 will be a very interesting year, as far as Pakistani politics are concerned. 2004 will be dominated by Musharraf and MMA seeking to extract a better power leverage over each other and in the process, creating more obstacles than solutions to democracy in Pakistan. The year will be influenced by the political power plays and for better or worse, Pakistan’s fate in either secular liberal terms or an Islamic term, will be decided. 2004 will see the power struggles in Pakistan, between Musharraf and MMA spill over into the area of foreign policy and will have ripple effects internationally.

Why, did this happen?

It happened because the mainstream parties themselves created a vacuum and the reason that a political deal could not be agreed with the Musharraf government was due to the politics of exiled leadership of PML-N and PPP. Musharraf could have made the deal and Ameen Fahim could have been the PM of Pakistan had Benazir Bhutto given up her dreams of a third plutocratic rule in Pakistan. If that was not worse, MQM’s Altaf Hussain has been saying that Jinnah’s version of Pakistan was true and MQM will adhere to the words of Jinnah’s (in)famous speech to the constituent assembly. This suggests that MQM has smelled the weakness of PML-N and PPP and is adroitly maneuvering itself to occupy the political space left by these two parties and as a possible leverage to MMA. If MMA becomes too principled, the Musharraf government will be keen to see MQM as a possible counter-weight to MMA’s influence. Again, MQM is assuming a mainstream political role, because the two traditional mainstream political parties of Pakistan have proven themselves to be utterly incapable of wise political judgments.

The devil may be in the details and the details suggest that a sort of unholy system of checks and balances is emerging in Pakistan. MMA will check Musharraf’s liberalization and pro-western policies. In turn, Musharraf will check MMA’s rabid calls of Islamization of Pakistan and MQM will play the political leverage, which will balance the government’s influence and prevent it from relying on MMA for political support. PPP and PML-N will check each other’s intents and thus pose no threat to the Musharraf’s governments. What emerges out of this emerging political landscape is that political power in Pakistan is diffused and that there are multipolar power centers in Pakistan. No one, in Pakistan, is strong enough to politically dominate the others and all have to exist, as a dysfunctional coalition, and politically compromise, with each other.

In the process and in early assessment, Musharraf has won. PPP has lost. PML-N has lost and democracy has lost. Who is to blame for all of this? Musharraf, by all means he can be blamed. MMA; off course because it sought political expediency over constitutionalism. PPP and PML-N - yes, they are also to blamed, because by their actions and inactions they share an equal responsibility in derailing democracy in Pakistan. Every single actor in this sordid drama had their own interests and those interests were paramount over the interests of democracy in Pakistan. As long as political gamesmanship in Pakistan involves making democracy secondary to all the other interests, democracy will not flourish in Pakistan regardless how many elected parliaments to create!