There has been continual turmoil in the country since the 2013 general elections, including demands for reforms and an end to certain state repression that has caused bloodshed. Recent events have occurred to trigger movements and marches invoking the causes of freedom and revolution. Begun over charges and suspicion on the transparency of the 2013 polls, with demands for a reform agenda, the marches peacefully progressed to the capital except for an unpleasant event in Gujranwala. This situation is the consequence of the debacle of otiose attempts to settle the rough and tumble between the government and its defiant opposition, and due to a stage set by Imran Khan and cleric Tahirul Qadri outside parliament. Subsequently, after the political fiasco, the military jumped in to settle the dispute, conveying a clear message from their perspective: we do not belong in the barracks only.
Pakistanis were needlessly told to look at history and were bombarded by the expertise of different people. They were asked to recall the 1977 movement against rigging that became a drive for Nizam-e-Mustafa and Nizam-e-Zia. The question is whether the champions of democracy must always engage in strident sloganeering and rhetoric at the expense of the democratic discourse. We must not allow derailing of our fragile democratic setup while they themselves are manifestly undemocratic. Democracy, whose cause they espouse so passionately, appears to be one where repressive charges of blasphemy are placed curtailing freedom of expression, where minorities (Shias, Ahmedis and Hazaras) are subjected to ritual slaughter. This democracy has failed to address and solve inequalities, injustices, cheating by representatives and abolition of rights in Pakistan.
Plato, in his still provocative Republic, opined that there are five kinds of government: aristocracy (rule by the best, that is, by specialists specially trained in governance), timarchy (rule by those known for their bravery and sense of honour), political system (rule by a flush minority), democracy (rule by the individuals as a whole, a “mob” as the philosopher saw it) and tyranny (rule by an autocrat answerable to nobody but himself). Plato’s categorisation may have been a smart place to begin brooding about the character of government structures. Although we do not appear to fall under any one of these categories as a whole, however, each somehow appears akin in some characters exhibited by our wider social group, as an organism whose traits demonstrate latitude of manners across all sorts opined by the philosopher Plato.
Primarily, transparent polls are the foremost step to initiate a fair and true democratic process, with the people’s choice to elect a government to protect their rights following the process of good governance, a mammoth task. What several fail to grasp is that the change does not come as dramatically as the euphoria of elections fades into the future and people come back to normalcy. A truly democratic society needs to be engineered upon the true intentions of the people. It has to come from change within to modify a regime or government to operate. As a result, if the individual is not ever-changing it for betterment regardless of how huge an election victory, in such a scenario there emerge possibilities that it may reverse to wherever things started. Ergo, the change ought to be made in society first and then in our values and attitudes. Elections could create a greater problem, given it is very easy to tilt public opinion in many ways. For example, in the US, many people do not even know where Iraq is but vote for a president who wages war against it. The same is the case with Pakistani voters who lag far behind when compared to literate US voters. The rural voter is usually unaware of the manifestos of the political parties they have the option of voting into power.
The episode of brutality we saw Saturday night on protesters — still going on — has exposed the mindlessness of our current government with no scope for an imaginative solution to the crisis, a way out. The violent operation against protestors on the orders of Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar resulted in bloodshed, injuring hundreds and killing some amid cries for the premier to step down. This episode will enter its third week and the government’s frivolous response to resolve this political crisis has led to havoc. Since the issue has not been solved in a timely manner, it is compounding problems for the government, especially in the manner in which they have resorted to brutalise the protestors. Clearly the situation is spinning out of the government’s control, even as protests have spread across every nook and corner of the country.
Finally, it is the same democracy in which the Punjab police have attacked media teams from various local news channels, injuring reporters and a cameramen. Seven vans belonging to several television news channels have also been damaged by policemen. Media personnel were also affected by these violent attacks by the police that charged the cameramen and photographers with batons while damaging their cameras. Using brutal application of force, the police, during the night, targeted journalists who were present there just to cover the protest. Police torture has been condemned by the government as well as government leaders while media houses have termed it a serious attack on press freedom.
The violence not only jeopardises the prospects of the country’s fledgling democracy that for the first time saw a peaceful transition from one government to another, it conjointly threatens to destabilise Pakistan before the international community and crucial regional issue of future withdrawal of troops scheduled to depart from Afghanistan. The democratic design has ostensibly and distinctly become larger than the prime minister’s caprice. Since his starting in office this time around, he has been facing tough times both from the opposition and military over a crackdown against the militants and electoral fraud. He has been under severe political pressure but it is too late to ameliorate now.
The writer is an award-winning columnist. He tweets @JanjuaHaroon and can be contacted at [email protected]