Open Letter to Prime Minister Jamali

Canada beware of Romair...he is already using phrases like ``our side`` , ``our victory party`` etc....HAHAHAHA......dude you don`t even have a vote yet.

sardarjis come out to be better lot from your posts...they were present in all three parties...they were divided in 3 ways....did ever occur to you that that is normal? that is the way it should be?

Dear Canadians...welcome to the communal politics of desiland.:)

more gems of wisdom from Romair:

``As an example, most of the time, I would vote for a Sardarji who can speak Punjabi, over a non-desi who could not. For the simple reason, that former could probably understand my issues better than others. People would vote for their own brother and sister, regardless of party affiliations. ``

wah..an educated businessman who can speak and write fluent English needs a Punjabi speaking representative to listen to his problem in CANADA but illiterate Punjabis living in Pakistan need an Urdu educated leader to listen to their problems and represent and guard their interests...wah ji wah...ehnu kehnday ne..laa`h lai ay loyee te ki karooga koi.

soon (at that point, I think all Canadian Punjabis in these ridings, should start a freedom struggle and fight for an independent country, like Quebec, called Can-Punjabistan. It would become the only country in the world with Punjabi as the official language).

---

hahahahaha wah bai wah....ajjay te Canada pairr vi nai lagge te Romair ne apnay rang wikhaane shuru kar dittay....I say Romair will be moving to Norway very soon.:)

Re: ferozk, roziba
Did you have a presidential / de-facto presidential system in
Pakistan or a dictatorial system? There is a big difference

Regards,

Faruk

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Ferozk,

See how you have opened the pandora`s box? Amazing.


Romair

You didn`t quite get my point about the stature... Jinnah`s reasons for being the Governor General was not stature or higher protocol... but that the post of Governor General got a higher stature in the eyes of Pakistanis because Jinnah chose to be the constitutional governor general instead of the Prime Minister.


I suggest you read Ayesha Jalal or Alan Mcgrath`s views on this. They are first rate scholars and don`t ascribe to this view. Jinnah exercised his prescribed authority as per the Government of India Act 1935. He didn`t even use it as much as Mountbatten who played an active role in the troop movements in Kashmir ( Read Alastair Campbell`s `Incomplete Partition`)... The argument is not whether he violated the constitution... it never was. The issue was whether he should have chosen the office of the Prime Minister or the Governor General ... Whichever one he would have chosen would have naturally been the the office of choice for the future generations... In Jinnah`s case he chose Governor General... In India Nehru chose Prime Minister... so that post was venerated.


I have gone through the Jinnah Papers, and believe me there is no such indication of a dictatorship. Jinnah, the so called dictator, wasn`t even able to prevail over Mamdot or Daultana... how could he be a dictator ? Ghaffar Khan and Khan Sahab came to Karachi and organized an opposition under his nose. Jinnah couldn`t even stop Qayyum Khan from acting against the Khudai Khidmatgars ...


Jinnah only exercised those powers that were given to the Governor General under the Government of India Act 1935... that legislation was obviously suited for British India and was not westminster style Parliamentary system. Under this act ... the Governor General was the executive authority who was to act on the advice of the Prime Minister in matters relating to 1) Foreign Affairs 2) Defence 3) Signing of the parliament bills 4) Rehabilitation of refugees. The Cabinet and the Ministers held their posts at the King`s pleasure, and Governor General was his nominee. If one reads the Jinnah papers, it is clear that the Prime Minister of Pakistan i.e. Liaqat Ali Khan is fully in charge of the Cabinet as per the constitution though as a person he is over shadowed by Jinnah.


I prescribe 5 books... that are held to be the authority on the matter.


1) Destruction of Pakistan`s Democracy by Alan Mcgrath

2) The State of Martial Rule by Ayesha Jalal

3) Incomplete Partition by Alastair Campbell

4) Pakistan The Formative Phase by Khalid Bin Sayeed

5) Liaqat Ali Khan by M. Reza Kazimi


Also it is good to read Jinnah Papers... and see it first hand.



Jinnah actually as the Governor General did not meddle with the affairs of the Prime Minister. Quite the contrary, the Prime Minister throughout gained more and more authority. When I say the issue was of stature... it is like Feroz said ... Jinnah overshadowed Liaqat by the force of personality. In this way he embodied the nation.
So I must respectfuly ask you to point out the instances of where Jinnah went beyond the constitutional powers of the Governor General... may I remind you that in the GOIA 1935 the executive power was with GG.



A better way to word this would have been `` The Government of India Act did not envisage a parliamentary form of Government``


or ``Jinnah`s choice of the office of Governor General made the evolution of a British style Parliamentary form of Government hard``


Ofcourse I don`t agree with the second one... but atleast the second one would be an interpretation and not a white washing of facts.

-YLH

Well, no more T-shirts with the Pakistani flag on them for our Canadian immigrant. Sigh.....

Airports on alert for Pakistanis with `rope burns`

By Jerry Seper and Audrey Hudson
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Inspectors at six of the nation`s busiest airports, including Washington Dulles International, are on alert for travelers of Pakistani descent — including U.S. citizens — with ``rope burns, unusual bruises or scars`` that could have been received at terrorist camps run by Islamic extremists.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection inspectors, according to an internal Department of Homeland Security bulletin, have been warned that potential terrorists who trained at camps in Pakistan may seek to return to the United States between now and the November presidential elections to carry out new attacks.

Law enforcement authorities confirmed yesterday that the bulletin directs ``increased scrutiny`` of passengers at Dulles, John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, Newark`s Liberty International Airport, Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County International Airport, O`Hare International Airport in Chicago and Los Angeles International Airport.

A Homeland Security official yesterday downplayed the alert, saying it was a ``regular`` memo to inspectors at six airports and the 22nd such memo this year.

``It basically told them to be on the lookout for passengers that may have had certain activities or lack thereof when travelling to and from Pakistan. This is a regular occurrence and there is no specific threat associated with it. At the same time, we asked inspectors to look at certain activities of travellers coming into the U.S.,`` the official said.

CBP officials declined comment.

The June 17 bulletin, according to authorities, directs federal inspectors to focus on foreign travelers, naturalized U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents of Pakistani descent ``who exhibit evidence of suspicious travel, including short trips to Pakistan not related to family or business.``

The suspicious travelers are to be directed by primary inspectors at the six airports to secondary inspections, where more detailed checks are made.

The bulletin noted, authorities said, that persons who trained at terrorist camps may exhibit certain features the inspectors might be able to readily identify, including rope burns on the arms and legs from rappelling training, unusual bruises from obstacle courses, and wounds or scars that may have occurred during firearm or explosives training.

U.S. intelligence officials are concerned, according to the bulletin, that persons trained in the Pakistani camps could be intent on ``committing illegal activities in the United States.``

Additionally, the Department of Homeland Security announced this week a dozen commercial airline pilots and crew members from foreign countries were banned from flying into the United States after background checks showed suspected ties to terrorists or other criminal activity.

Homeland Security officials scrutinized 450,000 crew members who have flown into the U.S. since March and found nine pilots with suspected terrorist ties, two crew members carrying fake passports and a third with an arrest record for assaulting a police officer.

The officials said the countries of origin of the flight crew members could not be released because of legal concerns. Government officials also inspected 2.7 million truckers licensed to carry hazardous materials and flagged 29 drivers with suspected links to terrorist operations.

``This reflects a new capability of the Department of Homeland Security,`` said Asa Hutchinson, undersecretary for border and transportation security.

With the Fourth of July weekend approaching, federal and airline officials are stepping up security but will not raise the national security alert level, which remains at Code Yellow, or elevated.

Also, pilots trained to carry guns to protect their aircraft against terrorists can now travel with their weapons when they commute from one airport to another as passengers, instead of checking them with luggage carried in the plane`s belly.

The change in policy was a result of hundreds of reported incidents that weapons packed in lockboxes had been mishandled, lost or sent to baggage claim. At least one gun has never been recovered.

Feroz:

Thanks for the post. I agree with what`s happened in Pakistan the past 57 years. That is not in dispute. You`d mentioned in an earlier post on this thread that:

``If Pakistan is truly headed for a presidental form of system, I am really optimistic because Pakistan had no future under a parliamentary form of government.``

And this is why I asked why a Presidential system would be a better alternative. Presenting a factual historical analysis indicating that there has been a `de facto` presidential system already does not really allow one to conclude that indeed a `truly` Presidential system would be better than a `de facto` one.

Anyhow, a `presidential system` doesn`t make me optimistic as the President we are to have is no Lee Kuan Yew or a Deng Xiaoping. More importantly, not that anythings improved (it`s only gotten worse), I no longer find hearing `yahaan ka system hee hai kharaab` entertaining as it used to be when a teenager.

We can discuss this further at our next Chowkie gathering with the theme `Celebration of Liberalism` (`and fundocide` as a fellow chowkie wants to include).

Hello everyone. Gone Jinnah, good-bye. Is now all you people la Pakistani, some vouchers some bad one but global contract for repair Pakistan. Please not to try the times waste. Please the work improves the class class average. Repair to repair not only the speeches speech.

The speech is inexpensive.

Ferozk,

The events of this afternoon must have abundantly shown you how true your remark about Jinnah`s centrality is in the imagination of an average Pakistani.

-YLH

Ferozek # good points.

I think one should really go into the details of how Jinnah centralized the power into his own hands. It is quite interesting. People tend to skip over that, due to Jinnah`s stature, itself. But it wasn`t merely due to his being the Gov. General, for higher protocol. It was based on his efforts of being the Gov. General, thereby getting the protocol, while still wanting to excercise the powers that did not belong to a Gov. General, in a parliamentary system.

Jinnah was infact, Pakistan`s first civilian dictator. Not due to stature alone, but due to centralization of Constitutional power.

Having said that, I think he did it for all the right reasons (having said that, this is what all individuals, including Musharraf say, when they centralize power), and I would have supported him in such centralization of power, had I been alive. Pakistan needed a Lee Kuan Yu, at the time. It needed a civilian elected individual, who then could make unhindered decisions. That could only happen if power was centralized in an unbalanced manner.

I sitll think a civilan elected dictator, who centralizes power for the right reasons, and then delivers economically, is the best (and maybe only) way for Pakistan to progress. Unfortunately, every leader, after Jinnah - civilian or otherwise, as you have explained, has been a dictator, but for the wrong reasons.

I am still waiting to see how the Musharraf-Aziz combo will turn out, once Musharraf takes off his uniform. The moment he takes it off, as per Army tradition, he will lose all power over the Army, as an institution. Which will, from that point onwards, follow the new Chief. Power will thus be decentralized back to the trioka, you have mentioned (bureacracy, feudal, military). I think maulvis need to be added to this now, and it should be turned into a quadoka (?). It will still not be in the control of the people, but it will no longer be with one person.

Amongst this quadoka, the Army and the bureacracy cannot be disbanded. Every country has and needs these two institutions (though not in politics). However, they will continue to influence power, as long as the people are fed up with the elected officials. Hence they will not move outside the quadroka, voluntarily, just because the elitist chattering classes yell at them. They will only do so, when their elected political opposition has the support of the people.

This leaves the maulvis and the feudals. They cannot all be deported to Mecca and Dubai. So their powerbase has to be removed. Maulvis don`t own land, or industries. Nor do Generals and beaurecrats marry their daughters into maulvi families. So in case of the maulvis, there powerbase is an appeal to God. And one cannot get rid of God. One can only hope that people don`t buy the ideas of the maulvis.

The feudals are mostly secularly inclined, and hence do not appeal to God. They physically control the livelihood of their voter by owning his land, who is thus forced to vote for them, because he has a gun to his head. So they only way for the system to be re-organized, in my opinion, is:,

1. As a first step, the feudal lands be taken away from feudals (like it was done in many other countries). This will kick them out of the quadroka, automatically. The maulvis will try to fill this vacuum. But I don`t think Pakistan is a maulvi country, hence they will not succeed. Unlike Iran, Pakistan does have a non-maulvi middle class and upper middle class progressive urban political leadership. It cannot come up to the top, because it`s space in the quadroka is taken by the feudals. This class will then move in a fill the feudal vacuum.

2. This middle class leadership will eventually defeat the maulvi and occupy his space also, since Pakistan is not, by its nature, a theocratic populace. The maulvis only win, because the feudals are even worse.

At this point, the civilian political space will be occupied fully by the new leadership, which will have real backing of the population. Not a backing, based on a fear of God or ownership of land.

4. I don`t think there is any way the military or the bureacracy could then take on such a political force. They would be unable to do so, because unlike with feudal leaderships, the common would support this leadership.

For all this to be initiated, the catalyst has to be a removal of the power of the feudal. This is exactly why Pakistan is one of the only countries in the world, whose civilian politics is dominated by feudals, and not by lawyers, businessmen and labor leaders (like most established democracies). Why are feudals so interested in politics? Shouldn`t they be more interested in agriculture? It is the only profession in Pakistan, where everyone is a politician. Very few big doctor, comp. sci, industrialist, labor leader, lawyer, cricket player, expat, maulvi etc. in Pakistan are into politics. Yet every big feudal is?

Why?

Specifically because they know that it is only the current screwed-up, ``democratic`` system that can protect their powerbase. That is why they lead every movement for, ``democracy.`` Are Bhutto, Fahim, Leghari, Jatoi, etc. and each and every one of their relatives in politics for public service? Obviously not. Are they in it for money. No (if they just developed their lands and sold them for housing, they could make much more money than they do through shady deals with Swiss companies).

They are in there to keep their powerbase. So that Abida Hussain and her husband both become ministers. If not them, then their nephew, Faisal Saleh. And their daughter fights elections only against her own cousins and becomes a minister in the Punjab assembly.

This is why they want election after elections, so that they can control this system from the inside. Why in the world would they want elections after elections, if they felt it would strengthen democracy, thereby removing their own power? This is a clear indication, that elections within the current system, only strengthens the feudal. Thus the whole system needs to be changed.

Who will make this change? Who will bell the cat? Who can tame the feudal? One would think a military dictatorship, if it were well-intentioned. However, for some strange reason, military dictatorships have never touched the feudal. In two cases, Ayub and Zia, their off-spring have joined the status quo feudals. The beauracracy cannot tame the feudal, because it has a direct symbiotic relationship with him. And it doesn`t have guns, nor people power, even if it wanted to remove the feudal.

This leaves the dreaded mullah, as the only member of the quadroka who can take on the feudal. Primarily because he appeals to a higher power than landownership, i.e. God, i.e. the only entity which scares the poor peasant feudal voter more than his feudal master. This is also why feudals and tribals try to remain in the secular sphere, becasue they don`t want to be crushed from both sides. This is also why feudals give into mulllahs, on religious issues, because they are afraid of the dedicated comman-person street power the mullah comamnds (which the feudals do not have).

But mullahs have their own issues. No country in the world, ruled by feudals has advanced. However, no country in the world ruled by mullahs has advanced either. Some countries ruled by short term effective army and beurecracy govts. have advanced, and some haven`t. And all countries ruled by genuine middle class elected leaderships have advanced.

The only solution I see out of this is economic porgess. If the society can get to a stage, where the feudal voters` family has a brother with a good job in the city (or abroad), so that he can afford to take a stand against the feudal; thereby bringing him down. This will set into sequence, a set of events (as explained above), which will eventually disband the quadroka, in Pakistan.

The other solution is to keep yelling and screaming, for it to disband, volutarily. Or to live in a fairyland, which assumes that elections after elections, all of which are supported by the feudals, specifically because they see them as the best way of staying in power, will change the system.......It won`t.....

dost-mittar #166:``So, when is Mississauga going to be divided between Hindustan, Pakistan and Khalistan? Or are you saying that it has already happened? (I am feeling sick!)``

I am not sure when it will happen. But I don`t think this will happen, though. However, one has to accept the fact that people do vote this way. And certainly in our riding, the workers and voters were clearly divided along these lines. Obviously, I didn`t see the actual votes, but the supporters and campaign team were clearly visible - Indian Hindus on one side (Conservative; most of whom were actually and normally probably Liberal), Pakistanis on the other side, and Sardajis divided in two or three groups. There were sardarjis at our victory party, but I did not notice a single non-sardarji Indian.

I don`t think it was a question of voting against Pakistanis or Hindus or Sikhs. It is just a question of supporting your own community, regardless of who is the opposition. Pakistanis did not support the Pakistani guy, because he was standing against the Indian candidate. They would have supported him regardless. Similarly, Indians did not support the Indian lady because the other guy was Pakistani. They supported her because they wanted another Indian in the parliament, etc.

South Asians are still not a large enough community, to move away from their background and vote simply along party lines. They want someone from their own community in the parliament, because they feel they are not 100% in the mainstream yet (which is true).

Pakistanis, in this election, voted Liberal, as they always do. So one does not know what they would have done, had the Pakistani candidate been non-Liberal (probably voted non-Liberal). Another Pakistani had an NDP seat, from a neighborhood, and I don`t think she got too many votes. Similarly, the Sardarjis who won big, were Liberal. As well as the Hindu Indians (mostly).

I am not sick, regarding this. It just goes to show that the baradari system is alive and well, everywhere, including Canada. This is how minorities always behave. Jews will vote for a Jewish candidate over a non-Jewish one, regardless of party. Iranis, Arabs and Chinese will vote for their own candidates. I heard that the NDP got a lot of the Chinese vote, because the wife of its head (Layton) is Chinese.

As an example, most of the time, I would vote for a Sardarji who can speak Punjabi, over a non-desi who could not. For the simple reason, that former could probably understand my issues better than others. People would vote for their own brother and sister, regardless of party affiliations.

I would only start worrying, if Pakistanis, Hindu Indians, and Sardarjis started deliberately voting against each other, even if there was one desi Liberal candidate. That is not going to happen. In fact, quite the contrary. As I stated, a desi Liberal, with a non-desi opposition, is undefeatable in this area, because he gets all the combined desi vote.

P.S. if one really thinks about, voting jointly along desi lines (Hindus + Pakistanis + Sardarjis), for a desi candidate, is also not correct. But that is what minorities do, until they get large. They start from their inner circle, and grow outwards - family, originating country, language, culture, religion, party etc.

re: Mantolives # 167

You have made a very salient point.

However, the issue is not only of stature, but it is also one of perception and how we wish to see the distinction; meaning the role played by Jinnah in the early years of Pakistan as a politican in comparsion to the other politicans in Pakistan. In the end, the legacy left behind by Jinnah has been a source of inspiration for all the politicans and military leaders, who followed him into politics. We can disagree on the legacy of Jinnah, but we cannot disagree as to the centrality of his place in Pakistani politics, which according to his biographer Stanley Wolpert and I am paraphrasing Wolpert here, towered over all of his comtempories.

Ciao

Ferozk,

The issue was simply of stature... Jinnah, for reasons well explained by Alan Mcgrath, Ayesha Jalal, and Khalid Bin Sayeed... chose the position of Governor General instead of the Prime Minister. Whether that leads us to believe in a presidential system is a different issue... but there is nothing inherently wrong or unconstitutional about this. Jinnah didn`t use his power anymore than mountbatten... but ofcourse Mountbatten didn`t have the stature in India, that Jinnah had in Pakistan.

Romair:
``This split the desi vote. All the Pakistanis and Muslims, regardless of party affiliations, voted for the Liberals. All the Hindu Indians, regarless of party affiliations, voted for the Conservative candidate. The Sikh vote got split into three parts. The NDP candidate got it because he was Sikh(?).``

So, when is Mississauga going to be divided between Hindustan, Pakistan and Khalistan? Or are you saying that it has already happened? (I am feeling sick!)

re: Rozaiba

In your last post, which was a reply to mine, you mentioned that I made no arguments to convince you about the nature or the value of a presidential system in Pakistan. My dear friend, I have no wish to convince you. I can only convince a person, who is willing to be convinced. I have no arguments to offer you, because I have no theory, which can act as a solution to Pakistan`s problems. I can only share with you my own experiences, which suggests that in order to understand Pakistan, one needs to step off the boat of theory and onto the shore of reality.

To understand the Byzantine nature of Pakistani politics, you have to appreciate the nuances, which influence the politics. There is no dicotomy of good and evil; secularism or theocracy; democracy or lack of it in Pakistani politics, because it all about hypocrisy. The hypocricy, whose paradigms circumvent Pakistani politics is based on the propostition that Pakistani politics are all about the manipulation of the reality to deny the truth from being spoken.

I mentioned that Pakistan is headed towards a presidential system, because that is what our past has bequeated to us and Pakistani politics never displayed a parliamentary color but were always dominated by the questions of the distribution of power. Starting from Jinnah in 1947, Pakistan never experienced a parliamentary form of governance, as Jinnah arrogated more powers to his office at the expense of making the prime minister into a non-entity. From 1948 to 1958, the burning question in Pakistani politics was, which office would be more powerful; the governor-general`s or the prime minister`s. It was the lack of an answer to this question, which saw governments being formed and dismissed in Pakistan and re-created not by elections, but through ordinances. From 1947 to 1958, Pakistan saw multiple governements take office, but they were all non-elected.

The nature of politics from 1948 to 1958 imposed a reality that Pakistan was to be ruled as an administrative state and not as a democracy. In this sense, the bureaucracy was always partial to a rule in the mode of the British Raj and thus, it ruled Pakistan not as a sovereign state, but as a fief of the administration. The bureaucracy in Pakistan has always favored military rules over civilian rules, because it harks to its tradition of being an instrument of enforcing the Raj. In this equation, once you add the sum of the evolving nature of politics in Pakistan, you will realize that it was timocratic. Timocracy is a Greek word, which means that political power is commeasurate with the amount of personal wealth and the land owned. The tradition of Pakistani politics, or accurately the tradition of regional politics of what became the western wing of Pakistan, was always feudal based. The feudals were favored by the British not to proffer political rights to the natives, but to ensure the continunity of the British rule. When these feudals came to power, as parliamentarians, they found a natural nexus, with the bureaucracy and in a symbiotic relationship continued to rule Pakistan as an administrative responsibilty.

This was the nature of politics, which Ayub Khan gained upon taking power in 1958. Ayub Khan totally cranked this system out of synchronization, when he embarked on this devolution of power idea and the creation of an electorate college made up of about 80,000 basic democrats. In this sense, there developed a better understanding between the bureaucracy and the military, but there was a falling from grace between the feudals and the bureaucracy. It was at this time, that face of the traditional troika in Pakistani politics, which would influence it later was finalized. The troika of power in Pakistan has remained as a combination of the bureaucracy, the military and the feudals. It is usually the confluence of two out of three, which governs Pakistan and the combinations keep changing, but the basic nature of power has remained the same. To this reality, Musharraf is adding the fourth leg known as the industrialists, but in reality the industrialists are the same as the feudals, who have sold lands for new factories. Hence, even if the feudals are replaced by the industrialists, the reality of the troika will not be altered.

The point being made is, that Pakistani politics never had any plurality of opinion to challenge this troika and when it did, it was brutally crushed. The crisis in East Pakistan, to a degree originated against this troika, dominated by West Pakistani bureaucracy, military and feudal politicans and this troika was a reason, among many which saw the disememberment of Pakistan in 1971. This troika ruled Pakistan not as a democracy, but more as a timocracy. In other words, Pakistan was the property and it was ruled as the feudals ruled their personal lands, with absolute power. In this scheme of things, parliament was a fig leave to lie that Pakistan was in reality a personal holding of the trokia, whose members were related by marriages and family connections. Again, we are seeing the contours of a political system, which was more geared towards an oligarchic form of government than a democracy. This system was dominated by one person and that person was Ayub Khan and from this experience, Pakistan was being pushed towards a presidential form of government, much in vouge of Jinnah`s legacy of vice-regalism.

Now let us divert our attention from this aspect to the nature of politics, as they evolved after the breakup of Pakistan in 1971 and their influence on the form of parliamentary government. Z. A. Bhutto took power as the president of Pakistan and later became the prime minister of Pakistan on the basis of results of the 1970 elections. This was, one of many slaps in the face of democracy in Pakistan, because Bhutto had had lost that election to Mujib-ur-Rehman and was in fact, an illegitimate prime minister. The 1970 election was for the entire nation; east and west, and it was the results of this very elections, whose lack of acceptance by the troika in West Pakistan led Mujib-ur-Rehman to break free from West Pakistan and declare the independence of Bangladesh. When Pakistan broke up in 1971, those election results were nullified and were no longer applicable. The democratic and logical thing would have been for Bhutto to call another elections and to win a majority from those elections to form a government after the break up of Pakistan in 1971.

Hence, when Bhutto became the prime minister, on the basis of the election of 1970, he had already destroyed the institutional freedom of the parliament by foisting an illegal government upon it. Bhutto was made president of Pakistan and thence, a prime minister not by an election result but by a military ordinance, which bestowed upon him the authority of a martial law administrator, after Yahya Khan had resigned as a martial law administator. People claim that Bhutto was elected as a result of the most free elections in Pakistan, but those elections were for Pakistan that existed from 1947 to 1971 and were not for the Pakistan, which existed from 1972 onwards. The irony is that Bhutto was elected as the president and later, as a prime minister of Pakistan without an election. This created the precedent, that a prime minister need not be elected to power and this tradition has, sadly, continued to the present.

Once in power, Bhutto was more interested in the political powers of the president and it is no suprise, that when he became the prime minister, he kept majority of the powers with him. This made sure that the parliament was a rubber stamp to Bhutto`s dictums and as a prime minister, Bhutto was always increasing his power at the expense of the parliament. Bhutto was an absolutist politican and he marginalized the parliament and it was one reasons, why there was an opposition against his absolutism in Pakistan. Bhutto was responsible, to varying degree, for creating the political conditions that allowed the military to intervene and impose another martial law in Pakistan in 1977. The outcry against Bhutto stemmed from the fact that in the elections of 1976, Bhutto wanted a parliamentary majority, which would have allowed him to impose a presidential form of government in Pakistan. To ensure this eventuality, he rigged the elections, but his satraps in their zeal did such a good job, that he won an overwhelming majority and this raised the hackles of the opposition. (lol)

Had Bhutto favored a true parliamentary form of government, he would have not rigged the election to win a majority to create a presidential form of government and Pakistan would not had to suffer the eleven years of Zia-ul-Haq! Hence, the steps towards a presidential system were already underway, when Zia took over and he simply went on solidfy the obvious.

This brings the development of the process, for a presidential system, to tenures of Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif. Both of these personalities wanted to rule Pakistan with an absolute power. Benazir wanted to rule, much as her father did and that meant, she was not willing to tolerate an independent parliament, which could act as check on her ambition. Nawaz Sharif wanted a solid majority to rule Pakistan as the last of the forgotten Mughal emperors, with no opposition and his rhetoric for winning a heavy mandate was not feather in the democratic cap, but a blow for his own agrandizment of power. In all of their political differences, both Benazir and Nawaz agreed on a basic idea and that was to make sure that parliament was never in a position to challege them and they were systematically denuding parliament of its powers.

The reason, why their governments were aborted by the presidents, in concordance with the military, was that had they succeeded, they would have radically changed the balance of power within the troika, away from the military-bureaucratic nexus that governed Pakistan. In this changed nature of governance, the power would have not ended up with the parliament, but to the person who was the prime minister, to weild it as a personal extention of his/her right to rule Pakistan.

Hence, when I say that Pakistan is headed towards a presidential system, I say this with the knowledge of the past that suggests that parliaments have been institutionally ruined in Pakistan and as a result, there is no parliamentary government in Pakistan. We should accept the fact that Pakistan, has been and always will remain, as an administrative state in the guise of a presidential system, which derives its inspiration from the politics of Jinnah`s vice-regalism.

Ciao

P.S.: I am really sorry for this long post. Again, these are not agruments in favor of a presidential form of government, but an acceptance of what past history of Pakistani political experience has taught me. Please feel free to disagree with me and you can easily deny this post, as being factually incorrect, but you cannot deny the past 57 years of Pakistani existence. :) (lol)