How the Establishment
is reacting to the surprise MMA Victory
Aasim
Sajjad Akhtar
Very
few people are likely to say that they accurately predicted how
well the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) would do in the general
election. Indeed, most people were quite shellshocked –
at least initially – at how many seats the MMA actually
won.
And
while the country as a whole continues to experience a limbo state
in which the level of interest in who actually forms the government
decreases by the day, it is worth it to consider how the establishment
itself has reacted to the MMA establishing itself as a contender
for state power.
There
seems to be relative consensus amongst most objective observers
that systematic attempts were made to marginalise the Pakistan
People’s Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League (N).
To the extent that it was possible, the Pakistan Muslim League
(Q) was the benefactor of the military’s attempts to ensure
that its influence in government remains intact.
That
said then, only a massive intelligence failure could explain the
MMA sneaking in through the backdoor. But such a massive intelligence
failure is unlikely. So, without propagating any more theories
about the way in which outcomes were engineered, the fact is that
there are a lot of questions that hang over the entire exercise,
and whether one should really be that surprised about the MMA’s
success.
It is possible (although unlikely)
that there was less interference by the agencies than has been
suggested. But the very fact that this sort of drama now seems
to have become an integral part of the election process is incredibly
disturbing. There are many possible permutations of how the elections
were manipulated, and what the eventual outcome will be. If we
did not already know that there is a serious problem with what
has been termed – to give just two examples - “guided
democracy” and “sustainable federal democracy”,
we are now aware of just how farcical things have become.
The
weeks after elections have given us the wonderful opportunity
to witness even more horsing around than took place before elections.
There have been new twists reported in every morning newspaper,
and the whole spectrum of potential political alliances seems
to have been exhausted. Between the three parties who have been
at the forefront of this almost comical topi drama, there has
been no shortage of playacting and posturing. And at the end of
the day, the one and only thing that remains clear is that the
parties that eventually come together to form the national government
will still be answerable to big brother in uniform.
And
so the state’s date with a crisis of legitimacy seems to
have been set. At times such as these, one might expect mortals
to rise to the occasion, to commit to extraordinary acts. But
even if we cannot expect a unique response from those in positions
of responsibility, perhaps we can rely on good old-fashioned long-term
interest to inadvertently help us out of a bad situation. Ultimately,
given the military’s continuing banter about continuity
of its so-called reform agenda, it is difficult to expect that
government will provide anything new in the coming months (or
years if this government actually lasts). Following from this,
it would not be surprising if the general public starts to feel
even more desperate than it already does. And so is likely to
come more disgust, disillusionment, and possibly even agitation-inducing
anger.
That
being assumed, it would be left to the third party, the one that
stays out of government, to, quite crudely, capitalize on the
likely public support that will follow opposition of what will
essentially continue to be an anti-people agenda. This is precisely
what the MMA did in this election. The state was pushing people
to the margins after having already alienated them by supporting
the demolition job of Afghanistan, and the MMA simply had to fuel
the simmering discontent (notwithstanding what now almost everyone
affectionately refers to as pre-poll rigging). Therefore, the
third party should really be thinking at least as much about being
in the opposition as about being in government.
After
all, if and when elections come around again, one could well expect
the electorate to hand the protest vote to the third party just
as it did to the MMA this time around (the pre-poll rigging qualification
again here). While all of this is merely hypothesizing, the practice
of power politics has as much to do with perception as anything
else. And so the third party would do well to think about how
much it has to gain in the longer-run by staying out of government,
perhaps engaging in more people-centred politics, and then really
making a go at it the next time around.
Being
in the opposition – whether in a formal parliamentary democracy
or by way of a radical political movement - is an art, a form
of politics that has all too often been overlooked in this country,
as has any other practice of politics that has not involved the
establishment and patronage. In the opposition, political parties
are usually more willing to articulate democratic principles and
support what can become populist struggles, especially in a country
like Pakistan, and especially while the global tidal wave of unresponsive
market-oriented electoral politics persists. So it is not even
necessarily a question of making the more principled decision,
but one of making the more logical decision as far as long-term
interest.
Who
will the third party eventually be? The PML (Q) secured itself
a place in government a long time ago. In the interests of democracy
and long-term stability, it may well be that the PPP would be
the best candidate for the job. Benazir Bhutto would do well to
think back to 1988 and her willingness to take office despite
the clear influence she knew the military would continue to have
on her government. The compromises of 1988 set the tone for the
next 11 years, and in actuality, that saga continues today. If
Benazir is truly convinced that Pakistan needs to move away from
army-controlled government, then now would be the time to make
a definitive move.
In
the final analysis however, all parties seem willing to discard
the baggage of principled positions in the interest of capturing
state power. But Pakistan needs something more than this to have
any hope of resuscitating this bad excuse for democracy. Even
if the PPP ends up the third party and in the opposition by virtue
of being frozen out, one hopes and expects that it will provide
a spark to what will otherwise become an even more lifeless political
process. Regardless, it is only when some robustness is introduced
into this entire process that we can genuinely expect forward
movement.
There
are other considerations such as the fact that the MMA’s
vote came almost exclusively from NWFP and Balochistan, and that
the United States and the Western world at large have as much
influence and interest in all of this as anyone else.
These issues are critical to the entire equation, the former reflecting
an increasing ethnic divide within the country as well as the
establishment’s conviction that Punjab politics is the only
politics that matters (in terms of this being where the PML (Q)
was given the real push), and the latter the loss of sovereignty
of the state in general. But in many ways, being able to do something
about these negative trends is contingent on acknowledgement that
the perennial experiments with military-monitored politics have
badly failed the country.
And
then, somewhere down the line, we can start thinking about who
actually comprises our political parties, if and how they represent
our interests, and what we need to do to make them more responsive.
The
military’s long-term romance with the affairs of the state
has meant that our mainstream parties remain hostage to specific
interest groups, groups that develop on-off alliances with the
establishment to secure state power. Once this unfortunate pattern
is disrupted can the people of this country finally start to think
about actually getting something out of the electoral process.
