Daily Times

The disintegrated minorities in the country once again broaching the subject of electoral reforms when Christopher Sajjid of The National Minority Rights Network, (NMRN) and Advocate Riaz Anjum, Chairman, Pakistan Christian Movement triggered the new blood in the movement for minorities’ electoral reforms. The idea of struggle is not new, already against J. Salik’s petition in 2015, the Supreme Court of Pakistan has issued a verdict in favour of minorities for their right to elect their own representatives through a secret ballot but the recommendations of the Apex Court have not been entertained by the government.

Very recently, the Prime Minister of Pakistan has announced electoral reforms with no mention of minorities, which shows, the political system of the country as yet not ready to undertake any new legislation about minorities elections. Minority leaders, especially, the Christian Minority scuffled much to claim their political desideratum as rightful citizens of the beloved state, paradoxically, achieved nothing, but an unimplemented court verdict. Knowing the blooming vision of Christopher Sajjid, Riaz Anjum, and many others like them, this is imperative for minorities’ leadership to understand those entrenched social certitudes hindering minorities to get their democratic rights mentioned in the constitution of Pakistan.

Before 1999 minorities had the right to elect their representative through direct balloting but General Musharraf in 2002 introduced new reforms through which minorities were given the right to vote for general seat candidates from the majority community members in their respective constituencies whereas, for their parliamentary representation, the indirect system of election was introduced. The political parties from the majority community were given the right to send nominations to the election commission of Pakistan where proportionate minorities membership was commissioned to be allocated to the mainstream political parties. Since the time, minorities find these reforms ‘undemocratic’ for this system does not meet the norms of democracy.

Why this is becoming difficult for minorities to get the right to elect their representatives is a pertinent question? General Musharraf did everything to keep the control over the so-called parliament, he introduced such legislations that strengthened his position as the Chief Executive of the country and all tools were used to achieve personal objectives. Minorities’ selection system of election was to keep a dozen of people totally dependent who could be used as and when required by the government. So, handpicked personnel, based on personal relationship or acquaintanceship, were nominated as members of parliaments, among minorities, no one could oppose the military ruler instead some individuals blissfully accepted that as a rare opportunity, thus, two-way objectives of appeasing minorities and keeping personal control over parliamentarians were achieved. At the cost of the minority population, some individuals started their lucrative political career ignoring their respective communities for they were not elected through the ballot but blessings of the majority political parties and the State Head.

After Musharraf’s departure, the ruling political parties almost rejected dictator’s policies but ironically, continued his legacy of picking favourite individuals to fill parliamentary reserved seats allocated for minorities. This system of indirect election of minorities suited much to the Dictator’s regime but the system evolved by the Military General was also befitting to the democratic governments. Ten minority members being chosen by the major political parties never go against the vested interests of their master parties rather act as spokespersons in and out of the country defending government policies when there is a question about maltreatment of minorities in Pakistan.

Moreover, specially chosen individuals continuously do all things possible to bolster their membership and we see some members are in the parliaments of the country for more than a decade. To them this is the best policy to be loyal to the respective party head than to the community they represent in their respective legislative Assemblies. The perfervid relationship between minority members and their party leaders is politically so aerobicized that even in critical situations the majority leadership thinks it out of question to trust a stranger, for instance, after the brutal assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti, the PPP regime did not trust anyone out of the family of Shahbaz Bhatti, when in the presence of the senior leaders from his own political party, APMA (All Pakistan Minorities Alliance) his brother was invited to continue substitution in a quick fill strategy of indirect election.

The mainstream political parties never allow minority members to go beyond the circle of obedience and party policy, Shahbaz Bhatti, being a hot-blooded Christian leader jumped out of the circle, trapped and killed. Serious issues of minorities’ persecution at the hand of warmongers are always edgy but scarcely these selected minority members speak against such atrocities. The Christian community is always wishful to hear something from Christian members about ‘blasphemy laws, forced conversions of young girls to Islam, forced marriages, kidnapping and torching of minorities, so on and so forth. Same is true of Hindu members of the legislative assemblies, forced conversions and marriages are one of the biggest issues Hindu Minority face in Pakistan, no concrete steps are taken towards the solution of problems.

Satirically, minority members claim the list of bills for minority rights, they present in the legislative assemblies but they are not ready to adopt the real mechanism to get success. However, their efforts add much to their personal political profiles. In 2002, addition to the indirect election, minorities were given the right to vote for electing members of the country’s legislative assemblies in their respective constituencies that too sabotaged their political will, as an example, Youhannabad, Lahore is one of the major Christian vote banks, Shahbaz Sharif, the CM Punjab contested an election winning the overwhelming majority of minorities voters from that constituency. In spite of his election promises during the campaign to develop the community, the area seems to be the most ignored. People are confused, whether they should complain to the Chief Minister of the Punjab or the selected provincial members. Many complain, that when they go the Chief Minister Secretariat, they are advised to contact minority members and definitely, minority members are not bound to listen to them for they never were elected with their vote.

Interestingly, in one of the programmes, organized by the National Minorities Rights Network, the Provincial Minister for Human Rights, shared his concerns about increasing of seats in the assemblies but not about the electoral reforms, likewise, one of the Christian MNA’s submitted seat increasing bill but not electoral reform including direct election for minorities. In the same way, Hindu Members of Parliament never speak about the direct election and the Sikh members, with their few thousands population in the country will not take the risk to go for direct election. The tough trajectory of election not selection, the young Christian leadership is pursuing, is not a bed of roses, all indicators are against their will, convincing the government is the first thing, bringing selected minority members, religious leadership, NGO’s, and political leaders from the social spectrum to one page, is itself a challenge. Still, I betcha, the unyielding faith and relentless efforts shall bear the fruit and remember, every cloud has a silver lining.

The writer is a freelance columnist, can be contacted at kaleem.dean@mail.com