Meandering along
Democracy in Pakistan has just meandered along, without many successes to show for it, while spawning quite a few aberrations such as ambitious men on horseback and the corrupt business-politicians in the process, and which of the two has actually proved more damaging to the country is a question that still frays tempers among the chattering classes.
Political parties and even prime ministers have materialised out of thin air, it would seem, and having served their usually dark purpose, vanished into oblivion.
And one still waits (in vain) for the bold, reformist and nationalist-minded political leader of high personal integrity, who would bring progress and prosperity in his wake, though it is often said that ‘the hour produces the man’.
Dynastic democracy, although an oxymoron, has increasingly become an established part of our political system, and one in which the youthful scions of the rulers see themselves as being gifted with a divine right to rule because of their ‘exalted’ birth.
Political parties exist in a democracy to resolves national issues in a peaceful manner, but here the leaders’ personal likes and dislikes or rather spite and malice takes precedence over everything else, as happened with the PPP and the PML-N in the 1990s. Those watching from the fence were thus emboldened to jump into the fray. Thankfully, this mindset has begun to change, though a bit late in the day, as the problems have multiplied manifold while the leaders were busy settling personal scores with each other. But the emphasis over the past many decades has essentially been on a ‘cult of the personality’ rule rather than on developing and strengthening national institutions. Our politicians, of all hues, have hardly proved to be exemplary role models, and they have certainly not been paragons of financial orthodoxy, to put it mildly.
Provincial concerns have not been addressed, with the Balochistan grievances giving birth to a full-grown insurgency by a minority, with foreign involvement.
And in this simple statement lies the root cause of the failure of our peculiar democracy, the lack of political will on the part of the leadership in bringing about genuine reforms and change. The status quo clearly serves their needs and interests better.
The financial and social rewards of democracy have remained confined to a narrow section of society, and there has been a total absence of the ‘trickle-down’ effect. Poverty is all-pervasive and growing at an alarming rate, while there is no safety net of unemployment benefits, health cover or insurance facilities. Illiteracy, a curable disease, has turned into an epidemic of alarming proportions. Murderous sectarianism, terrorism, ignorance and bigotry as well as superstition are all its rightful adjuncts.
Our powerful feudal system also makes a mockery of the basic democratic concept with its captive tenant-voters who are offered voting choices they dare not refuse.
In February 1992, the founder and maker of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew visited Pakistan at the invitation of the then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who was much impressed by the city-state’s remarkable economic progress. He wrote in his autobiography, From Third World to First, published in 2000: ‘It was soon obvious that they (that’s us!) faced dire and intractable problems. They had a low tax base with income tax yielding only two percent of their GDP. Many transactions in land sales were not documented and tax evasion was widespread. They subsidised agriculture, railways and steel mills. Defence took 44 percent of the budget, debt servicing 35 percent, leaving 21 percent to administer the country. Hence their budget deficits were eight to ten percent of their GDP and inflation was also reaching double-digit figures… The solutions were obvious but political will was difficult to exercise in a country without an educated electorate and with the legislature in the grip of landowners who controlled the votes of their uneducated tenant farmers. This made land and tax reforms near impossible. Corruption was rampant and massive thievery of state property, including illegal tapping of electricity… Friendship, especially political ones, determined who got what (in the privatisation process)…He (Nawaz Sharif) always believed that something could be done to make things better. The problem was that often he had neither the time nor the patience to have a comprehensive study made before deciding on a solution…’ And he wistfully notes that, ’I discovered that many of my recommendations had not been implemented’.
And in this simple statement lies the root cause of the failure of our peculiar democracy, the lack of political will on the part of the leadership in bringing about genuine reforms and change. The status quo clearly serves their needs and interests better.