Currently in Pakistan political activity and political speculations are on the rise. The establishment is engaging with the PPP leadership; on the ground PPP workers continued to be arrested; the PPP and PML (N) are uniting but with reservations; within the PML (N) there are those who believe there should be no engagement with the army or with the army-supported PML (Q) while some believe otherwise; the establishment seeks a "political roll-back" of the MMA it had helped to create and supported in the 2002 elections; within the PML (Q) there are signs of an emerging power struggle with all eyes on the 2007 prime ministerial slot; the president himself has joined the political fray calling for a defeat of extremist political forces and hoping for a victory of the moderate forces; in Sind the PML(Q's) internal battle continues; the establishment-favored MQM and the MMA appear headed for a political show down in the coming local bodies election.
Much of this activity is restricted to only new steps being taken by the establishment and the political parties. While the establishment-PPP dialogue continues, no basis for any continued establishment-PPP cooperation has yet been worked out. Still sections within the establishment's main party, the PML (Q), are already insecure about the establishment-PPP engagement. After all PML (Q), as yet is merely a paper party put together by the establishment and survives because of the establishment's support.
What does all activity then mean for democracy in Pakistan? Especially if democracy has to be based on principle and processes within the parameters outlined in the country's sacrosanct document called the Constitution. While dialogue with the main opposition party too has begun, all this activity, which not only involves the political parties, the establishment but also peripheral references to ideology, as yet guarantees no promotion of genuine democracy.
The indispensability of genuine democracy as opposed to establishment-engineered democracy, for Pakistan has repeatedly been established. The outcome on the political front of generals' democracy introduced after every military intervention; Ayub Khan, Zia ul-Haq or Musharraf coup d'etat included, has been discredited political systems and political extremism, political alienation and strengthening of nationalist forces.
After five years of the Musharraf rule his government's foreign policy and economic policy can be counted as achievements. Other initiatives for which the Musharraf government can be credited include the devolution plan, license to new television channels, promotion of free debate in society, fighting sectarianism, increase in number of women seats, revival of joint electorate. Yet in the absence of a credible democratic order where principles and processes dictate matters of exercise of state power and politics, the society cannot truly benefit from these positive initiatives.
In a power context where principles, standards and values rest on shifting sands, the relationship between state, politics and society will always be drained of trust. Crisis of legitimacy is unending. In a system of engineered-democracy when all else often becomes subservient to power considerations, the society is robbed of its power to distinguish between right and wrong. Then even blundering leaders like Benazir and Nawaz Sharif will forever remain their ideals. Only political processes alone do the needed clean-up jobs.
Within the context of engineered-democracy, the state too loses its credibility. Without a credible functioning state no society, with any amount of economic growth can hope for sustained domestic peace, progress and prosperity. A credible functioning state alone can dispense justice, a fundamental requirement for harmony and order in society. In Pakistan justice and credibility in the exercise of power and in the current engineering of democracy are in short supply.
Pakistan's historical experience unmistakably links the absence of a credible state to the absence of genuine electoral democracy. The repeated experiments with Khaki democracy, following on the heels of military interventions, have led to manipulation of state organs including the judiciary. An uncontestable conclusion from Pakistan's political history is that genuine democracy is indispensable to the existence and survival of a credibly functioning and an independent judiciary.
This conclusion therefore cannot be ignored. Democracy simply means that there would be a level playing field available to all political parties wanting to contest for power. The absence of such a "level playing field" and the absence of the rule of law have been the twin pillars of a discredited power edifice that have dominated Pakistan's power scene, discredited the state and worked against society, for the greater part of Pakistan's history. Hence unless these two pillars are removed neither can there be genuine democracy nor a credible state, so necessary for national progress and harmony. It is in such a context that extremism would decrease, both through democratic, legal and political means. Declarations against MMA by those in power are unnecessary and unwise.
Musharraf has been an establishment man but with a difference. He has proven this in his support of the Parliamentary Committee's work on Balochistan crisis, in encouraging open debate, the Pakistan-India relations, the Kashmir issue and engagement with various political forces. However the most crucial step required for genuine democracy, the holding of fair and free election, has yet to be taken. The 2005 local bodies elections and 2007 national elections have to be fairly conducted elections.
Key steps required for the run up to these elections would be the establishment reconciliation with all political parties, the appointment of a Chief Election Commissioner on the basis of a consensus between the military-backed PML (Q) and the main opposition parties like the PPP and MMA, the holding of local bodies elections under the supervision of the provincial administrative structure over seen by a politically nonpartisan governor, allowing all political parties to carry out their political activities within the parameters of law. These steps alone will guarantee the return of genuine democracy and the beginnings of a credible state in Pakistan. All other "plans" will undoubtedly end up in imposing another version of unworkable khaki-engineered democracy on Pakistan.
