The kind of intense propaganda against the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) that took place in the 1990s is, perhaps, unprecedented. When Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto spoke of the elections getting rigged at that time, most people did not listen to her. Yet, many historical facts were revealed through the Asghar Khan case. Hardly any politician in Pakistan has been able to avoid this propaganda.
When a particular type of negative propaganda lasts for not just years, but decades, a generation evolves that is unaware of the facts and considers the narrative based on lies to be the truth. When facts are presented to this generation, it is very difficult for them to understand and acknowledge. Human nature makes changing one’s mind one of the most difficult tasks in the world, even if you know both the reasons and the evidence against what you have been led to believe. Even today, we see both politicians and our democracy being subjected to criticism in the media. It is often argued that any politician who became popular at the national level could not reach that position without support from the powerful circles. All of the struggles of politicians are rejected on these grounds.
Perhaps, those in power knew that if the education system were fully developed, they may no longer have been able to rule a submissive people, so education was limited to the elite only
Of course, it is a fact that most politicians in Pakistan climbed the popularity ladder in an era when there was no democracy in the country. Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto cannot be included in these examples. However, her party was still founded in the era of dictatorship and the founder’s relationship with a dictator was no secret. The most important thing to understand here is the options available for a politician to do politics in the era of dictatorship. In these periods, they had only three options: to struggle in opposition to the dictator, to get along with them and be given their blessings, or to completely separate themselves from politics. Today’s generation may not fully understand that standing up to the dictators of the past was equivalent to ending one’s political life. The rulers were complete dictators. There was no internet at that time and no freedom of the press. In such a situation, many politicians preferred to reconcile with the then-dictators to shape their political structure. If we analyse history today, we can see that their decisions were not correct. Politicians, today and in the future, should learn a real lesson from these decisions from the past.
Time passed and these same politicians came out against the dictators of their time. The fate of these politicians was also in front of everyone. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was at the forefront of this struggle. After that, Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif also emerged during the Zia Regime. What then happened with his government is now a part of history. History also shows us that no elected prime minister of Pakistan has completed their term. The most tragic incident of these was the assassination of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto when Pakistan lost a great political leader. Perhaps no one will be able to fill her shoes for a long time.
Pakistan has continued to go through long periods of dictatorship, and somehow, our people survived. The children of those regimes have become old now and the old ones from those eras are no longer with us. A new generation was born, which is also old now. The only difference is that no matter what happened to Pakistan’s democracy, the country’s natural resources continued to be subject to looting. Pakistan used to have abundant water, which made our land fertile and highly productive, but the powerful people controlling our resources continued to overuse them. The population was small and the resources were plentiful.
As time passed, the things integral to the long-term and sustainable development of any country were not monitored. The greatest example of this happened during the Musharraf Regime. Generating power was completely neglected and so our new generation went through a long period of darkness. During this time, the power shortages caused irreparable damage to the national economy and the education system. The damage to the education system may not have happened elsewhere. Perhaps, those in power knew that if the education system were fully developed, they may no longer have been able to rule a submissive people, so education was limited to the elite only.
In between came some democratic periods where democratic leaders did make some progress. The eighteenth amendment is a shining example of this. It strengthened Pakistan’s roots by giving rights to the provinces. Of course, we need to immediately transfer those powers and resources given to the provinces to the lower levels of government, under Article 140 of the Constitution. The party taking credit for the eighteenth amendment should take the initiative in this task. The problem is that, at present, most of the tax from the economy is generated in the city of Karachi and the PPP has very little influence there. This is probably the reason why they do not want to hand power over to lower levels of government. If the resources obtained from Karachi were limited to Karachi, the Government of Sindh could face financial difficulties in the rest of the province. On the other hand, by gaining power through local body elections in Punjab, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government could risk facing humiliation in the political arena due to their substandard performance.
If political parties want to see democracy flourish within Pakistan, they must transfer power and resources down to the lower levels of government. Otherwise, the roots of Pakistan’s democracy will never strengthen. The simplest way to understand this phenomenon is that whenever a dictator took control in the past, it was very easy for them to control a few hundred people in the assemblies to form a government of their choice. Perhaps this is why undemocratic powers prefer the federal system – because it is easier to take over. However, if the powers are handed over to the lower levels, it might be impossible for future dictators to control the thousands of councillors functioning at the local levels.
The writer is a freelancer