Daily Times

Is liberalism really winning out in Pakistan? Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) government seems to be pushing a ‘liberal’ agenda. Here I think it is important to make the point that all we might be seeing is a slight shift away from the obscurantist ideas that seemed to pervade in the past. Considering women’s rights especially, there seems to be some movement for better rights and some protections. Many Muslim scholars might suggest that treating women better is very much an Islamic obligation and has nothing to do with liberal thought. That might be true but my question is that why is the PMLN leadership bringing these issues up at this time. The PMLN is comfortably in power in Punjab as well at the centre and elections are still a couple of years away. After all, the PMLN was born from the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI) and, in its previous time running Pakistan, was almost able to pass an ‘Islamist’ amendment to the constitution (the Fifteenth Amendment). So have the Sharifs really become progressive politicians and have abandoned their Islamist roots? The answer to that question is complicated and I don’t think that it is just about a spiritual change of heart.

The most important political changes we saw in the last general election held in 2013 were the virtual decimation of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) in Punjab combined with the rise of Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). PTI is occupying a political space to the right of the PMLN and so far is competing for a similar vote bank. However with the disappearance of the PPP from Punjab, the previous liberal/centre-left vote bank is literally up for grabs. Existing progressive parties do not have any serious support in the country. The once formidable centre-left PPP has been reduced to a rural majority party in Sindh. In the previous elections Punjab provided considerable support to PPP enabling it to form a government at the centre between 2008 and 2013. This support is now gone, but where is it gone to is an interesting question. The PTI might have won some of the PPP supporters and others probably stayed at home or voted for the PMLN from a Punjabi bias.

Whatever might have happened three years ago, there does exist a centre left political support base in Punjab, in the cities and possibly in south Punjab. This was in the past a stronghold of the PPP. So in my opinion one of the reasons why the PMLN seems to be moving to a more liberal position might be to capture the support of the PPP supporters for good. The PTI has not been able to capitalise on its initial momentum and has now become established as a conservative party that is to the political and religious right of the PMLN. So at least from the perspective of present political realities it makes eminent sense for the PMLN to try to permanently capture a significant portion of the centre left vote bank that once belonged to the PPP, not only in Punjab but elsewhere also.

Recently it would seem that the PMLN government at the centre is pushing a relatively ‘people friendly’ agenda. Recent initiation of a scheme to provide subsidised health care for the poor through a government funded insurance system seems to be an interesting idea and its proper and widespread implementation might be something to watch for. The government seems to be stepping back from its privatisation plans out of necessity but also perhaps due to a realisation that such plans could undermine PMLN support among the salaried classes at the lower end of the economic spectrum. The recent kissan (farmer) packages might also suggest a populist ideation. So it is possible that the need to effectively govern a relatively poor country is pushing the PMLN in a leftward direction. The Punjab government is making populist noises but so far noises only.

Why PMLN is veering towards a more socially liberal persona might also have to do with international political realities. With Saudi Arabia receding in importance as a source of easy money, the need to maintain a rigid Islamist posture is becoming less important. The US and international aid agencies that are virtually controlled by the US have now assumed complete control of all foreign financial support and as such, some ‘visible’ social liberalisation is becoming politically necessary. This is needed to augment the anti-terror policy and activity of the Pakistan army and justify increased US arms aid. I at least do not remember the last time a US Secretary of State went to US Congress to support selling US military aircraft to Pakistan. So perhaps this new ‘liberalisation’ in Pakistan is also driven in part by the interests of the Pakistan armed forces. Here an interesting question arises. Are the Pakistan armed forces socially liberal? And does the Pakistan army have any political or social biases? These of course are questions for people a lot smarter and more knowledgeable than me to tackle.

And we must not exclude the possibility that the PMLN leaders, especially the brothers Sharif have over the years become more socially liberal than they were in the past. Being less beholden to Islamist extremes does not in any way diminish the capability of any person from being a believing and practicing Muslim. However, from a personal perspective I would much rather support the idea that it is political imperatives combined with a gentle nudge from the armed forces that are mostly behind the Sharif’s move to the political and social left. This move might be aided by a personal predilection toward more socially liberal points of view resulting from the influence of well educated and modern women around them. Social or cultural liberalism to be politically effective must also be combined with economic liberal ideas.

The author is a former editor
of the Journal of Association of Pakistani descent Physicians of North America (APPNA)