A great deal of soul-searching is required
The government is always looking to launch high-profile projects which they can show to their opponents when the time for election campaign comes. He said the government needs to set its priorities right as the common man’s issues like healthcare and education are clearly being ignored
Pakistan’s democratic system is in shambles because of the growing trust deficit between the masses and the government. When it comes to the internal structure of the political parties, none of them are truly following the democratic principles.
The recent critique came from Chief Justice of Pakistan Zaheer Jamali who said that there is monarchy in the name democracy and bad governance under the garb of good governance in Pakistan.
During hearing of the case pertaining to construction of Lahore’s Orange Line Metro Train (OLMT) project, the petitioner told the apex court that Punjab government initiates the project first and acquires no objection certificate (NOC) later.
The chief justice further remarked that the rulers should stand up against such practices.
Even though the statement was later denied and the chief justice clarified that he had only asked the people to be careful and pick the right choice while casting their votes, it did raise very important questions. The political parties in Pakistan are dominated by families and close relatives of party leaders and the democracy in the country is in immediate need of reforms and improvements.
Recently, the ruling party Pakistan Muslim League – N (PML-N) held its intra-party elections where all the candidates were elected unopposed. The same was seen during the party elections of opposition party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) where no one contested against the party chief Imran Khan and most candidates were elected to their posts without having to actually contest the elections. This practice is common among all mainstream political parties, as all the power resides with the party head’s office and any leader cannot challenge his authority. If a leader dares to disagree with the party head, he is sidelined in the name of ‘party discipline’.
The intra-party elections where the workers don’t get to make any changes in the central leadership do not in any way promote democracy. If anything, they show the opposite. The authority of the powerful leaders who enjoy backing of their party heads cannot be challenged. Government’s critics say the important positions in federal government are dominated by those who are on good terms with the rulers as decisions are not being made on merit, and that is what is destroying the national institutions.
If we look at the landscape of three major political parties of Pakistan, there is a one-man show going on. The party head and some of his right-hands get to decide the affairs of the party and the rest of the members do not have a say in the whole process. The ruling PML-N is said to be confined within the Sharif family, with the Sharifs and their children running all the affairs. Same is the case with Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) that is being led by a 24-year-old inexperienced chairman, who is the boss of seasoned politicians like Aitzaz Ahsan, Raza Rabbani and Sherry Rehman. The democracy that makes someone as inexperienced as Bilawal Bhutto Zardari the head of a political party is not actually democracy. That is more like a monarchy where the throne gets transferred to heirs of the family. Bilawal Bhutto is trying hard to ‘revive’ the party by playing the victim card and talking about the ‘sacrifices’ the leadership made for democracy. But, realistically speaking, that is no longer going to work for the PPP. Action is all that matters and currently the party is lacking that.
Things are not very different in the camp of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) that claims to be a reformist party. The PTI also held intra-party election that was just about as controversial as that of the PML-N. The party’s central leader Justice Wajeeh-uddin, who was assigned to find out the flaws in the party elections, accused senior leaders of massive rigging. But no action was taken against them by the party chairman; perhaps because they were ‘electables’ and the party could not function without them.
Not only has the democracy in Pakistan been unable to solve the common man issues, it has also multiplied the existing problems of the country. Corruption has destroyed the state institutions like Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) and the Railways, causing losses of billions of rupees. This is because institutions are led by political appointees with little or no expertise.
“It is the quality of the democracy that matters, and in Pakistan we can’t say that the democracy is solving any issues”, said political analyst Hassan Askari Rizvi.
He said the behaviour of our political leaders is not democratic as they have failed to bring democracy within their own parties. “The prime minister and the cabinet members don’t even bother to attend the National Assembly sessions and then they talk about supremacy of the parliament”, Rizvi said.
When asked about the recent intra-party elections of the ruling party, in which all contestants were elected unopposed, he said such is the case with every political party in Pakistan.
“None of them have democracy within their ranks”.
Rizvi said the problem with Pakistan democratic system is that we don’t strengthen institutions and practice personalisation of power, which affects the credibility of the system.
When asked to comment on the government’s obsession with construction projects, he said the government is always looking to launch high-profile projects which they can show to their opponents when the time for election campaign comes. He said the government needs to set its priorities right as the common man’s issues like healthcare and education are clearly being ignored.
“The problem with the democratic governments is that they are just concerned with getting the next term so they don’t focus on any long-term projects for the people.”, said researcher and academic Qamar Cheema.
He said the democratic leaders only work on visible projects and that is why issues that concern the people get ignored. He said corruption in Pakistan is deep rooted and favouritism in appointments to key posts is now considered a normal practice. Transparency needs to be brought to the system if Pakistan really wants to move ahead, he concluded.
