- Getting the government to act according to the constitution is the responsibility of our judicial system
For a while now, there has been chatter in the media about eliminating the 18th Amendment from the Constitution of Pakistan. On the basis of the 18th Amendment, several institutions were transferred from the domain of the federal government to the control of provincial governments. The relative financial performance of provincial governments has greatly improved since the 18th Amendment was passed. Anyone with a basic knowledge of economics could study and analyse the data for the economic performance of the provinces over the past two decades and discover this truth by themselves. If both the 18th Amendment and Article 140 were to be analysed, these two clauses are the greatest hindrance in the path of non-democratic powers.
The underlying reasons behind the introduction of the 18th Amendment can be analysed from many perspectives. This amendment was made by the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP). It probably happened after the then president of the party, Zardari, realised that in the near future his party’s popularity would be limited to the province of Sindh. After thus foreseeing the future, he engineered the 18th Amendment as a way to give sufficient autonomy to the provinces and to decrease their dependency on the federal government. That is how, despite being limited to Sindh during subsequent governments, the PPP’s political influence did not decrease.
Another possible reason behind this amendment and its implications could be found in the knowledge that the Punjab Assembly has the highest number of seats in the National Assembly in comparison with the other provinces. So, any party who gains the majority in Punjab is almost sure to gain power in the federal government. This makes other provinces feel that they are at an automatic disadvantage. Therefore, the 18th Amendment was made to offset the political monopoly held by the province of Punjab and to overcome the resulting deprivation felt by the other provinces in terms of limited administrative power by making all provinces more autonomous. This amendment also proved to be a milestone on the path to realising Article 140 of the 1973 Constitution of Pakistan, which talks of economic, political, and administrative powers being shifted to the administrative bodies at a local level.
Now, let us look back towards history. In the past, Pakistan made two major decisions whose implications are still visible. First, when Pakistan agreed to become an ally of the US in its war in Afghanistan, the country suffered extremely negative consequences that can still be found today in the in form of religious extremism within the country. Similarly, Pakistan was exploited again at the hands of the US after 9/11 when the country’s monetary reserves increased at the very dire cost of the lives of thousands of citizens and security forces as well. Examining this situation, it is clear that if democratic governments really existed during those tenures of dictatorship then they would not have taken such drastic measures in such a haphazard manner and the country’s honour would not have been badly hurt.
This amendment was made by the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP). It probably happened after the then president of the party, Zardari, realised that in the near future his party’s popularity would be limited to the province of Sindh
If we were to delve a little deeper, we would discover that the military coups of the past would have been harder to pull off if the provincial governments had been truly autonomous and if the economic, political, and administrative powers were mostly, if not completely, controlled by the local bodies. If our municipal institutions were powerful and had the public standing behind them, then the dictators would not have dared to assault the country’s constitution. When a dictator comes into power, they only have to control a few politicians and then they are able to govern the whole country with ease. The underlying reason is that, when counted, all of the seats, including those in the national and provincial assemblies, only total a few hundred politicians and controlling them is not difficult for a powerful dictator. On the other hand, if the power is transferred to local bodies, then controlling the municipal institutions and their representatives who are spread all over the country would be extremely difficult, if not impossible. For this reason, international powers are constantly conspiring against the transfer of power and autonomy to the local governments within Pakistan. The powerful non-democratic forces within Pakistan are also party to this conspiracy as they can feel the circle of their influence shrinking as the provincial governments gain power.
One of the biggest blunders committed by the last government was the rollback of power from the local bodies of government. As a result, the structure of the government became politically shallow. If the PML-N would have contributed to the autonomy of the local bodies then their power would have been deeply rooted in the country by now. But the real problem is that every political party that comes into power in the country wants to confiscate and consolidate all of the power and authority within the country. This approach has negative consequences on the progress of the democratic process, however. Simply look at the provincial government during the PML-N’s tenure when Kahadam-e-Aala confined all of the power to himself and did not transfer authority to municipal institutions. This resulted in an unjustified division of resources and a large chunk of Punjab’s budget being spent on projects in Lahore. This, in turn, gave rise to an extreme wave of disillusionment in southern Punjab.
Now, if we were to look at the current government of Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI), their political campaign was full of claims that they would strengthen the municipal institutions. However, now the same PTI seems to have forgotten its promise to make the municipal institutions autonomous. Adding insult to injury, some of the influential officials of the party are even in favour of diminishing provincial autonomy by rolling back the 18th Amendment. It was this same power-hungry behaviour that led to the downfall of the previous government.
Getting the government to act according to the constitution is the responsibility of our judicial system. As such, we can hope that the Supreme Court will take measures to ensure that the present government acts in accordance with Article 140-A which talks about the transfer of political and administrative authority to municipal institutions. This measure will ensure that Pakistan becomes stable on the economic, political, and administrative fronts.
