Wanted: A promise to women

Every year, International Women’s Day comes and goes. As is the custom on such commemorative occasions, the lives of important women are highlighted and their contributions underscored. But this year is special in Pakistan, for on July 15 a general election will be held. In elections past, Pakistanis have voted for women, even elected them prime ministers. They may do so again.

But things are different regarding women voters. Though they disagree on just about everything else, Pakistani political parties have been unified when it comes to preventing, or at least deterring, women from voting.

On May 17, 2013, about a week after the last general election, leading newspapers in the country revealed how all the political frontrunners signed written agreements that effectively banned women from voting in Upper and Lower Dir districts.

The consequences were evident in the results: In NA-32 election station in Punjab, which had some 130,000 female voters, only one woman’s vote had been cast. The result of those elections was cancelled by a judge, but when local elections were held in 2015 nothing much had improved.

The problem is not limited to Pakistan’s tribal areas, where religious conservatives dominate. According to statistics released by the Free and Fair Election Network, an NGO that monitors elections in Pakistan, a huge gender gap exists between men and women registered to vote.

According to the electoral rolls as they existed in September 2017, the gender gap between male and female voters tallied up to more than 12 million, up by several million since the last election. This situation is a tragedy for Pakistani women. On this International Women’s Day, then, it would be apt if instead of the usual empty promises, the government makes a commitment to Pakistani women to rectify the situation.

If the elections are to be considered truly fair and representative, they must not only be based on male votes. The government must take immediate and urgent steps to register Pakistani women for national identity cards so they can vote in July.

It is not that the government is not trying. In December 2017, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) acknowledged the gender gap, and even admitted that elections cannot be considered truly free and fair if not all sections of society have an equal opportunity to vote. To make this happen, the ECP has launched an effort to get female voters registered, but the effort seemed under-resourced and ineffective from the start.

Even in its initial stages, officials from the ECP blamed the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) for the fact that the target of eliminating or even significantly lessening the gender gap would be missed. One agency blaming another, one political party blaming the other — all of it presaged what was to come: No action and plenty of excuses.

Pakistani women have had the right to vote ever since the country was founded in 1947. Legislation passed since has reiterated their right. According to the Representation of People’s Act 1976, the ECP can invalidate results from any constituency where there is proof that women were barred from voting.

Even though there are examples of women being barred from voting via the collusion of political parties, the absence of even the opportunity to vote because they have been unable to procure national identity cards should also be considered an invalidation of results.

International Women’s Day 2018 would be an ideal occasion to renew the commitment to make the upcoming election not a male election but a Pakistani one, its results representing both genders.

To do this, NADRA’s capacity to register more women and provide them with national identity cards should immediately be increased. In addition, social media and media campaigns urging women to obtain the cards and register to vote should be implemented immediately.

Pakistan’s women deserve the opportunity and access to voting in elections; the effort is crucial to insuring that the government that is elected in July is one that both genders want.

— Rafia Zakaria is the author of “The Upstairs Wife: An Intimate History of Pakistan” and “Veil.” She writes regularly for The Guardian, the Boston Review, the New Republic, the New York Times Book Review and many other publications. Twitter: @rafiazakaria