Daily Times

Once again, Pakistan faces great uncertainty. Talk of a technocrat set-up coming in or a direct military coup being staged hangs thick in the air. Constant warnings from the Prime Minister as well as some federal ministers against the former are quite unprecedented. And they underscore the gravity of the situation.

Unconstitutional misadventure by the military appears unlikely, given the international pressure that we are currently facing. Nevertheless, what has become apparent over the last few months is that the security establishment still holds the real power in today’s democratic Pakistan. And just in case anyone anywhere had any doubts — Mustafa Kamal’s recent outburst ought to have put paid to that.

The greatest threat to Pakistan’s nascent democracy, paradoxically, comes from the political parties themselves. Meaning that the latter have been unable to persuade their constituents of the importance of this paradigm. They have failed to push home the point that, far from being a dirty word, direct politics is a process of interaction and negotiation to bring about necessary changes to both their own lives as well as the broader society.

It is this lack of connectivity that makes people wary of democracy as a concept. And thus far more open to the idea of either direct or indirect military rule.Because for the ordinary citizen there is not much difference between the two.Flouting of the law, cronyism, large-scale corruption and a complete lack of indifference to the plight of the common folk — these problems plague the country regardless of who is at the helm; the uniformed or the non-uniformed.

Had Nawaz Sharif put just a quarter of the effort that he is presently exerting to save his own skin into strengthening his party structure and building a people-owned narrative — things would have been different for him and for Pakistan. The strength of a politician lies in the people; never elsewhere

Yet the worst part is the way that the political leadership itself has failed to demonstrate that it values the process of democratic consolidation. This has led to our politicians wasting precious time in point-scoring, which only serves to deliver untold advantages to the security apparatus. After all, it was not so long ago — in the run-up to and in the aftermath of the 2013 general elections — that the latter had been at odds with the PPP government; and the PMLN and PTI were willing to do absolutely anything to sink that political ship. Fast-forward to today and we now see the PPP and PTI doing their utmost to exploit the establishment’s war with the Sharif family for political gain, however short-lived.

Naturally, the real beneficiary of all this remains the military.The opportunity cost being the prolonged weakening of the democratic system and the strengthening of those forces that stand in its way. In addition, all the parties have completely given up on any sort of narrative building. From foreign policy to everything else — these rest firmly in the establishment’s hands and no civilian has the courage to say anything about it.

Had Nawaz Sharif put just a quarter of the effort that he is presently exerting to save his own skin into strengthening his party structure and building a people-owned narrative — things would have been different for him and for Pakistan, too. The strength of a politician lies in the people; never elsewhere. And no national party here, not just the PMLN, entertains any notions of in-house democracy. What we see instead is a culture of spineless sycophancy and appeasement, which has stifled all constructive debate with those at the top. The result being that our politicians, thereby safeguarded from all sorts of learning curves, are left free to repeat mistake after mistake after mistake.

Sadly, it is considered nothing short of heresy for party workers to question their leaders. This has to stop. For if democracy is to take root in society with a view to delivering the peoples’ wishes — the first step must be a critique of internal discourse. It is the only way.

Meaning that PMLN members must be able to raise with the party leadership uncomfortable but important issues such as: how is it that after holding the Punjab for close to a decade and enjoying power at the Centre for more than four years — peoples’ living conditions have yet to improve? Or, why is it that those from South Punjab have begun to doubt the PMLN’s ethnic bias when it comes to development spending patterns? Or, how has the PMLN, along with other parties, failed to introduce a better system of local governance as well as across the board accountability?

Similarly, PPP party workers must ask their leaders this: how has it come to pass that a party founded on a pro-poor mandate has failed to uplift the most under-privileged areas of interior Sindh. The neo-feudals that rule the party today have embraced strongly archaic power-play traditions.

Theirs has become the politics of sloganeering and the ordinary people of Sindh are not fooled. How many more years in power does the party need to fulfil the promises made by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto? How did it happen that Farhatullah Babar became one of the few remaining voices committed to the idealism for which the party was once known?

Without a doubt, the politics of patronage brings with it not only power — it also opens the door to personal financial gain. Which explains why successive governments have shown little interest in tackling our problem of widespread corruption.The establishment only remembers accountability when the time comes for it to play the political victimisation card. It has shown itself the least bit bothered when it comes to instituting a system of checks-and-balances across the board.

The biggest culprit, however, when it comes to failing to understand the significance of intra-party dialogue is none other than Imran Khan’s PTI. Despite its tall claims about how it is committed to cleaning up the system — the party leadership has become part of the long arm of the security apparatus. Moreover, all of its honourable principles fell by the wayside the minute it welcomed politicians with less than clean records on corruption into the fold.

Political parties must learn that they will have to do more than simply rage against the excesses of the establishment; for this will do neither them nor the country any good. They will need to act; and promptly if they are to strengthen an already fledging and fragile democracy.

For in Pakistan, today as well as yesteryear, the military apparatus is able to maintain its dominance over the country given how it has from the start invested heavily in structural and institutional strengthening. Thus unless and until our political parties do the same but keeping democracy at the forefront — they will continue to suffer this utter humiliation at the hands of those in whose hands power rests. And then Pakistan will have lost.

The writer is a freelance researcher and tweets@aatifnazar

Published in Daily Times, November 18^th 2017.