Daily Times

As a child in the 1980s, I thought Muhammad Ali, the greatest boxer of all time who passed away on Friday, was a Pakistani. It was only later when he visited Pakistan that I realised that he was not. I had been fooled into thinking he was a Pakistani, because in Pakistan we saw him as our own. This was the depth of the feeling we in Pakistan had for Muhammad Ali.

At college in the US I discovered that Ali was much more than just a great boxer, partly through Malcolm X’s autobiography and partly through the 2001 film Ali, starring Will Smith. It was around 1998 when I first landed in the US that I had come across the Nation of Islam through their newsletter The Final Call. This Nation of Islam, had it existed in post-Bhutto and post-Zia Pakistan, would have been declared a non-Muslim sect. Still I was not prejudiced. Through their writings, I discovered the depth of racial feeling that Americans of African descent had had to face in America. The Nation of Islam was not as much a religious movement as it was a movement for black rights and black identity in a majoritarian and racist society. It was nothing less than a rebellion against a social order that sought to keep African Americans backward and marginalised simply because of the colour of their skin.

Ali had joined the Nation of Islam in 1964. That was after years of disenchantment with the treatment of African Americans in a segregated America. In 1960, a white-only restaurant had refused to serve Ali, despite the fact that Ali had won the gold medal for the US at the Rome Olympics. At the time America practised segregation that was worse than even South Africa’s apartheid. Ali is known for some great fights in the ring, but his greatest fight came against the US government, when the heavyweight champion of the world refused to be drafted for the war in Vietnam as conscientious objector. The government revoked his boxing licence, and he was convicted in a trial in 1967. It was not until 1971 that the US Supreme Court returned an 8-0 verdict in the Clay v United States, 403 US 698 overturning Ali’s conviction. This was a great victory for the civil rights movement as well as the anti-war movement.

Many Pakistanis and indeed Muslims around the world admire Ali for being a great Muslim athlete. Yet Ali is perhaps much more relevant to us in Pakistan today. Muhammad Ali remains relevant because he fought and won against prejudice and against government oppression. In Pakistan the treatment of religious minorities is not very different, I am sorry to say, than the US’s treatment of African Americans in the 1950s. Echoes of the same bigotry are found at every level in our society. Need I remind the reader of what happened at the Hafeez Centre, Lahore, earlier this year? Every other shop in that wretched shopping plaza in one of Pakistan’s most populous and supposedly educated cities has a sign that says that they would not serve the Ahmadi community. Some signs even refer to Ahmadis as dogs etc. Even the state is complicit. We all forcibly sign off on a statement abusing this forced minority community when getting our passports. Where are our conscientious objectors? I am ashamed and embarrassed to say that come my next passport-renewal, I too will meekly sign the statement that goes against everything I believe in and what I believe this country should stand for. I hope you, the reader, are a better person than me. I hope that you have the courage to pull off a Muhammad Ali.

It is not just the Ahmadis who face prejudice and discrimination. Hindus in Sindh live in perpetual fear as their women are forcibly abducted and converted to Islam. Not a week passes by when a Christian is not accused of blasphemy, and when a mob does not resort to ‘vigilante’ (in)justice against them. Civil rights are a distant dream in Pakistan even today, despite Pakistan’s constitution promising fundamental rights to each citizen. Where is our Muhammad Ali? Where is our Malcolm X? Where is our Dr King?

The history of civil rights movement in the US is instructive for us. 50 years on, no one remembers those who stood in the way of civil rights. Meanwhile those who dissented, those who refused to accept the status quo and even paid the highest price are the heroes of today. Will there be a corresponding civil rights movement in Pakistan? As a Pakistani, I hope and pray for the sake of my country that such a movement comes sooner rather than later. Societies that stifle their minorities can never be successful. In a recent speech at a convocation US First Lady Michelle Obama said that a government, a state and a society that stifles the potential of their citizens is less hopeful and less free. One would have imagined she was talking about Pakistan in 2016.

This is not what we were meant to be. The Pakistan we had set out to make was to be a different place. It was going to be a land where every citizen, notwithstanding his religion, caste, race, or gender, was an equal citizen of Pakistan. It was not supposed to be the dystopic hellhole we have made it. Our pusillanimous attitude and refusal to stand up for what is right has landed us where we are now. Let us find in ourselves the courage to stand up and to be conscientious objectors for the sake of our future generations.

The writer is a lawyer based in Lahore and the author of the book Mr Jinnah: Myth and Reality. He can be contacted via twitter @therealylh and through his email address yasser.hamdani@gmail.com