IN DAYS TO COME

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2018/08/07/in-days-to-come/

• Why is so much intra-institutional interference possible in Pakistan?

It turns out to be Nawaz Sharif’s greatest achievement, that instead of achieving the greatness of his choice he has achieved the great status of a warning to those would fall afoul of the establishment.

After all, an institution that can dictate foreign policy, and even the newspapers we read and the channels we view, is not to be trifled with.

So, with the elections over, and even though much detritus remains…what now?

The most rational move would be to accept election results and extend support for the new government. There is much constructive work waiting to be done, much catching up with the rest of the world, and no government can achieve anything without cooperation from the nation, and I do not suspect IK of being unwilling to achieve change. Rational acceptance is indeed best for the country. Yet it is hard to be reasonable and accept the situation when a government is brought into power the way this one has, and democracy lies in shambles at one’s feet.

It brings one back to the question: why is so much intra-institutional interference possible in Pakistan?

No institution knows its place in Pakistan, not even the judiciary which above all others should know better. Is it after all the role of the Supreme Court of the country to raise funds for dams, and what’s more, to order fines to be paid into a dubious dam fund? Is it, for God’s sake, justice to barter on court judgements in return for payments into that damn fund? Is the CJPs response acceptable when he says that he is compelled to interfere in the executive’s business because of the poor state of affairs? Should a CJ be so little aware of the law?

This is a country in crying need of education. And there are two kinds of education, basic literacy and academic education. This segues into the education of political rights and duties. We have neither. We are not so far from our Mughal legacy to have lost the wish for dominance and the willingness to be dominated. For an institution so trained in gaining the upper hand and a people so ignorant and poor, these are some major reasons why interference is so eminently possible in this country, and the CJP’s response is very much acceptable to most people, who make use of the same argument as his own. Things are not likely to improve either when, along with the major party, radical ‘religious’ parties such as the TLP and MML too were so neatly allowed in, parties that at least did not possess an official stage prior to this.

Without a majority in the lower house, the new government will need to be a coalition. And coalition partners are likely to be accepted undiscerningly as it was with party members

Because of the same argument about dominance, and an exceedingly myopic reading of religious texts, radical ‘religious’ groups are against education, specifically the education of women. Many schools have been blown up, several very recently, for which acts ‘religious’ groups have claimed ‘credit’. So that education Pakistan needs is likely to be a long time coming, given the violent following these groups possess.

Many people hope that Imran Khan’s invective prior to the elections, his avowals of support for certain laws and questionable practices — he has expressed a resistance to re-examine the blasphemy law, a support for jirgas and has been bouncing his head off shrines — and his unpleasant language were just a means of garnering popular support, nothing more. That now that he is where he has always wanted to be, the country will be run more along the lines of Shaukat Khanum hospital than a hell-house for women. It is to be seen if this is a correct view. One hopes it is, although it is a pity that this should be the route to public support.

Without a majority in the lower house, the new government will need to be a coalition. And coalition partners are likely to be accepted undiscerningly as it was with party members – Aamir Liaqat comes to mind, and now perhaps the MQM-P, even though earlier that party had rejected the election results.

IK’s first speech after the elections was creditable. Yet with the MQM or its splinter group in tow, a group of people who have been responsible for so much disruption and terrorism in its hometown, will all the new PM says he wants to achieve be possible in days to come? Will IK have a free hand at all? Will he for example be as hamstrung as the PML-N with regards to the country’s foreign policy? If somewhere along the line his ideas diverge from the establishment, will he dare to bring them into play, given what happened to his predecessor?

God Bless Pakistan indeed, and the people of Pakistan. But if I belonged to one of the minority segments of society right now, or had a few strong dissenting views, I would be running for cover.