Dear Readers
Karachi tethered almost on the brink of anarchy when certain areas resounded with the crackle of automatic weapons as armed gangs ran amok for five long days in an ethnic and political warfare. The situation was ultimately restored as law enforcers stepped in but by that time 100 innocent people had been killed, dozens of vehicles and homes set alight and countless wounded. Who is to blame for the death and destruction caused? As sanity prevailed and the situation limped back to normalcy, the unguided missile of ex-Home Minister ZulficKir Mirza who was recently upgraded to the position of Senior Minister in the Sindh Cabinet, took time out to launch a vitriolic attack against the Urdu speaking community, the MQM and its leader Altaf Hussain. The comments were in bad taste and extremely provocative. The city once again descended into chaos and violence and seventeen people were reported killed and several vehicles torched. The violence also spread to interior Sindh where several people lost their lives. Surely such confrontation was not needed. The PPP was quick to disassociate itself from Mirza’s remarks saying they were his personal views and did not reflect the official party line. Who should be held responsible for the lives that were lost? Meanwhile, Zulfiqar Mirza was summoned to Islamabad by an irate President and soon enough a brief apology was recorded and shown on television; one hopes Mirza is sincere this time around. In every democracy and in every civilized society political problems do crop up and are resolved through discussion and dialogue in a spirit of give and take. This is not how it is done in Pakistan where the problems are almost always compounded by the party that holds the reins of governance as was on display in the case of differences between the PPP and MQM after the MQM decided to part ways and sit on the opposition benches.
Many say that there appears to be a definite agenda behind the recurring violence in Karachi. The carnage that took innocent lives appears to have been planned and executed meticulously. Our rulers must be vigilant and beware of the many threats that the nation is faced with, internal and external. A civil strife in the port city of Karachi will strike at the very heart of Pakistan and would be disaster for the country and especially for an economy that is on the decline. Meanwhile President Zardari, working his magic managed to woo back the MQM into the PPP’s fold with Dr. Ishratul Ebad back as Governor of Sindh. The PML(N)’s dream of what could have been a grand opposition against the PPP lies shattered. Such are the games our politicians are adept at playing. But the PPP-MQM relationship is fragile and it remains to be seen how the MQM will read to the recently established commissionerate system which the MQM opposes tooth and nail because the system is outdated and a relic of British colonial rule. For the benefit of readers I am reproducing my article “TURNING BACK THE CLOCK”.
The latest round of violence in Karachi has converted what essentially was a political problem into an ethnic one, a dangerous development by any measure. Fed up with bureaucratic rule, which in Pakistan’s case was simply a continuation of colonial mastery after Shaheed Liaquat’s Ali Khan’s assassination in 1951, the people in Pakistan in 1971 craved for power at their doorstep at the grassroots level. These aspirations for a more just social order being championed by Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader Zulfikar Ali Bhutto were overwhelmed by the predominantly ethnic agenda pursued by Awami League’s (AL’s) Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in East Pakistan. The sustained violence, the likes of which one would rather not witness at first hand again, saw Pakistan come apart at the seams.
Instead of learning from this traumatic experience and addressing the worsening situation politically, the govt has added fuel to the fire by bringing back the Commissioner-ate system. This is political bankruptcy at its worst, throwing in an administrative monkey wrench into problems of democratic governance. Asif Zardari has been politically sure-footed uptilnow, successfully running circles around the Opposition, but someone has certainly given him very bad advice. Whether a bureaucrat or a feudal does not matter, their nexus stand to benefit by turning back the clock on the people’s aspirations. On Feb 22, 1990, in the series “THE SINDH FACTOR”, I wrote, “the city of Karachi is a hotch-potch of overlapping administrative responsibilities. For a city of 9 million peo-ple, this tantamounts to unmitigated disaster of the highest magnitude. Without Local Bodies elections or elected councillors, it becomes a farce perpetuated in the name of democracy. The violation of demo-cratic principles at the very foundations of administrative tier creates grounds for malfeasance up the line. Nepotism and corruption are endemic in bureaucracy, all the problems stem from appointments and promotions based not on merit but on corrupt practices which provide the fuel for corrupting authority”, unquote.
That the top down feudal mindset for dispensing selective justice cannot be in sync with the common man’s desires was quite apparent from the electronic images of the “Arab Spring” and Tahrir Square. This could very well happen in Pakistan, my article as far back as Feb 20, 1990, said, “Power must belong to the people in the real sense of the word, not just lip-service hyprocrisy to stroke democracy. The judiciary must be separate from the executive, taking such action that must be necessary under the circumstances”, and than the implicit warning, “God help us if we have to resort to martial law. That would be a Doomsday solution. The moves we must make should be political and economic, in that order of priority”, unquote. To what end is Pir Sahib Pagara demanding the Army intervene in Karachi? To pit the Army against the people so that after the death and destruction that would surely follow a handful of feudals and their bureaucrat associates could implement ‘Constitutional” rule over the debris? This was avoided only the skin of teeth in Egypt when the Army refused to fire on the people in the streets despite repeated orders by Mubarak and his cronies.
On Sep 22, 1992 in “THE STABILISING FORCE OF DEMOC-RACY”, I said, “We have a serious crisis on our hands because the representatives of the people have made themselves unaccountable to the people. Promises are media-fed to the masses while the real rulers, the feudals aided by bureaucrats, exercise their authority quite independent of the populace. Anyone can rule, history is replete with morons who have governed, posterity’s pages are full of their misdoings but is there anyone among us who can sit up and dare to change the system to one that is suited to the true genius of our people by allowing the people to really govern themselves? Unquote. Even within the bureaucracy the rank injustice is inhuman, consider the treatment meted out by the Federal DMG to the Provincial Civil Services (PCS) officers. Just ask Rai Mansoor of the (Punjab PCS) who has been knocking the door of superior judiciary in a futile exercise against their stranglehold on power. The expert opinion is that replacing Local Bodies with Commissione rates runs afoul of the Constitution and is subject to legal challenge. The Zardari gameplon may actually be to keep the matter in court for the next 18 months to successfully filibuster the NRO into oblivion. This already has repercussions in line with Newton’s Third Law of Motion, “for every action there must be an equal and opposite reaction”. For example, the demand for a separate Province suddenly surfacing out of the blue in Sindh? Or Hazara in KPK and Seraiki in Punjab demanding separate Provinces soon after their respective Local Bodies were dissolved? Remember, all these were Commission rates!
The Sindh govt is to be commended for revoking Police Order 2002. If it could not be implemented for nine years, far better to consign it to the dustbin. Jameel Yusuf and myself were part of the original TASK FORCE mandated by Lt Gen Moinuddin Haider, than Federal Minister of Interior, for effecting police reforms. The DMG representatives, effectively sidelined our suggestions by the normal bureaucratic sleight of hand of “being sent” intimations for Committee meetings but never receiving them. Police Order 2002 effectively destroyed the remaining potential of an already frustrated and demoralized police service.
Three different models of Police organization i.e. Commissioner-ate, Directorate and Inspectorate, came into being in South Asia. The worst one, the “Inspectorate” model was based on Irish Constabulary, designed to be militaristic, the prime aim being to crush the people. Suiting the feudal requirement this was unfortunately adopted in (West) Pakistan on the creation of one unit in 1956. Police Order 2002 focused on the perks and promotion of senior ranks rather than reforming the Police organization and making it people-friendly. The additional chain of Supervisors in a society heavily dependant upon “client-patron” relationship only added to the deterioration in the efficiency of the police force. On the other hand the primary focal point of service, the police stations were ignored in terms of resources and professional staff with consequent deterioration in the quality of leadership.
The overwhelming majority Provincial Police Officers (PPOs) are discriminated against (and feel deprived) by the well-entrenched powerful Federal Police Services of Pakistan PSP officers. Instead of career planning for lower and upper echelons, the direct induction of police inspectors blocked the promotion prospects of constables and junior officers and became an unmitigated disaster for police morale. Merit is overlooked and deserving PPO officers are either sidelined or given promotion only when they were about to retire. Going back to 1861 is no answer, there should be substitute legislation emphasizing on accountability. PSPs and PPOs must work out an equitable formula, between them-selves, or by a properly constituted judicial commission. Some feel that all this may be a deliberate attempt to foster total anarchy in Karachi, keep the Army engaged on one more front while on the other create a legal limbo in the superior judiciary by refusing to implenlent their decisions. Things seldom go according to plan, in such a volatile situation anything can happenl.
