Daily Times

National Assembly rejected the private member’s bill seeking amendment in Election Act, 2017 to bar disqualified person from heading a party or giving party office to disqualified member of the Parliament. The House was unusually packed and the treasury benches were seen jubilant over the victory. The opposition members were left pontificating about what they termed an ‘undemocratic’ and ‘person-specific’ law that the ruling party had been able to pass.

PTI’s Shah Mehmood Qureshi reminded the treasury benches of the ‘irony’ that a democratic government would support a person specific legislation. PML-N’s Khawaja Saad Rafique reminded PPP of the ‘minus-one politics’ of which the party had itself been the victim, alongside MQM and other parties. PPP’s Shazia Marri reminded PML-N of the time when it was working hand in glove with those trying to topple a democratically elected government. Leader of Opposition Khursheed Shah pointed out that not too long ago, Law Minister Zahid Hamid was defending a military dictator while serving as minister in his government. In their own reality, all political leaders appeared to be viewing themselves on the side of democracy. The convenient one, that is.

The amendment bill was moved by PPP’s Naveed Qamar and sought to retain a controversial clause resurrected by retired Gen Pervez Musharraf through the Political Parties Order 2002, paving the way for Nawaz Sharif, otherwise ineligible to be part of any legislative house, to head his own faction of the Pakistan Muslim League. The story of this clause is an interesting one.

In 1958, when military dictator Field Marshal Ayub Khan came to power, he abolished all political parties in his quest to destroy the existing political order. His slogan was that of change and accountability. In August 1959, Ayub Khan brought the controversial Elected Bodies Disqualification Order (EBDO) and disqualified around 75 ‘problem making’ politicians under Section 5 of EBDO, who were mainly from the East Pakistani political parties particularly Awami League. Muslim League remained untouched. Another 78 politicians were disqualified under Section 7 and 8 of the EBDO.

The most clichéd argument is that if Nawaz Sharif is allowed to head a political party, all convicts of robbery, murder, arson and terrorism should also be allowed the same luxury. No one seems to be bothered on the baffling parallel that is being drawn between a white-collar crime (that is not proven yet) and terrorism

The Section 5 disqualified: a) public servants who had been removed from service on any charge other than inefficiency; (b) persons who had ever been served with an order under the Security of Pakistan Act or a similar law relating to an act prejudicial to the defence, external affairs, or the security of Pakistan; (c) persons found guilty by the Federal Court or High Court or a tribunal under PRODA; and (d) persons convicted of any offence, and sentenced to more than two years imprisonment stood debarred from being candidates or members of an elective body, until 31 December 1966 (Separation of East Pakistan by Hassan Zaheer).

The second stage was Ayub’s promulgation of an Ordinance, which while redefining the political parties debarred the ‘EBDOed’ politicians from associating themselves with a political party. The Ordinance, called the Political Parties (Amendment) Ordinance, 1963, carried four amendments to the Political Parties Act, 1962, in addition to making a change in the definition of a political party.

Ayub followed a shameless course of eliminating any political opposition to his dictatorship. Bhutto, who had taken the centre stage in politics as Ayub’s minister, betrayed the establishment when he founded his own party and became the bane of his former benefactor by leading a popular campaign against Ayub Khan. As soon as he came to power, sadly after the dismemberment of the country, amendment to EBDO’s provisions was among his foremost priorities.

Not that he was less formidable to his political opponents, but Bhutto still was opposed to the undemocratic nature of the disqualification clauses. His government repealed the clause from Political Parties Ordinance, in 1975 with a majority vote. The clause remained practically superfluous during General Ziaul Haq’s dictatorial regime because he had never allowed any elections under his watch on party basis. But again, yet another military dictator could not resist the temptation of using the clause against the politicians having spine to oppose him. The then-military dictator General Pervez Musharraf brought it back in his Legal Framework Order in 2000 and later in the Political Parties Order 2002.

Throughout the five years of PPP-led coalition government from 2008-12, the clause remained in the cold storage because the minus-one formula was being tried through other means considered more effective those days. The PPP, despite its newfound love for ‘democratic principle’ of saying no to person-specific policies, passed resolutions in all assemblies against the court decision barring the President of the country from holding a party office.

It was somewhere during the 2015-16 (before the Panama hullabaloo) that during the proceedings of Parliamentary Committee on Electoral reforms (PCER), the issue came up again when a PPP MNA (as per the law minister’s account) requested to revise the clause and strike down the provision, for it represented the dictatorial regimes that were up against the unlikeable politicians. The sub-committee approved it, as did the PCER. It was also passed by Senate and the National Assembly. But the day it was presented in Senate, the opposition leader said it was linked somehow to the recent disqualification of Nawaz Sharif.

Ironically, the PTI has made itself synonymous with anti-democratic rhetoric, while the PPP has made itself conspicuous by regurgitating the accountability-mantra, despite knowing how it has been used against all democratic governments by selective application of the principles of justice. The PML-N, which in not-very-distant past had enjoyed the lucrative benefits of obliging the deep state by acting against the democratic dispensations, has suddenly been left as the sole voice for ‘democracy’. JUI-F and PKMAP are interestingly not very convinced of the repeal of draconian colonial FCR law from FATA, but are big fans of democracy where it suits them.

These double standards of the political parties aside, the self-righteous talking heads on television screens, are making interesting but very strange points against what they think is a ‘person-specific’ law. The most clichéd one among them is the argument that if Nawaz Sharif is allowed to head a political party, all convicts of robbery, murder, arson and terrorism should also be allowed the same luxury. No one seems to be bothered on the baffling parallel that is being drawn between the white-collar crime (that is not proven yet, trial underway) and terrorism/criminal cases.

This is specifically outlandish to hear in a country that allows proclaimed offenders and heads of terrorist outfits like Maulana Fazlur Rehman Khalil, Ahmad Ludhianvi, Aurangzeb Faruqi to carry out political activities and where another disqualified person, former military dictator Pervez Musharraf is not only allowed to head his own party but is also hailed as leading a 23-party election alliance. It appears that some under God’s blue sky are more equal.

The writer is a staff member who tweets at @marvisirmed and can be contacted at marvisirmed@gmail.com

Published in Daily Times, November 23^rd 2017.