There
is a clash of interest between the Mullahs and the Military
Religious Right:
Shattering all the myths, one by one
Dr
Riaz Ahmed
General
Musharraf rigged the elections by making rules to disqualify opponents,
not allowing public rallies and demonstrations and creating a
King’s Party in almost every province. Despite the pre-poll
rigging the Muttahida Majlis Amal is now recognized as a credible
contender in sharing power. This has shattered the myth that people
of Pakistan are moderate Muslims, least interested in the fundamentalist
brand of Islam. The October 2002 elections have broken that myth
forever.
However
that wishful thinking has led to yet another one of similar kind.
One argument is that the Mullah alliance will fragment because
of its contradictions and the other hope is that the Mullahs will
not prove to be as anti-people as their rhetoric suggest. It is
argued that the alliance of Mullahs in MMA is a fragile one, the
eleven parties that differ on fundamental issues of religion,
follow different sects and are supportive and opposite to the
state in various ways.
This
is supported by yet other conceptions that the anti-terrorist
alliance of US-supported General Musharraf will not allow Mullahs
to share power; there is a fundamental clash of interest between
the Mullahs and military; or the liberal state which will soon
fragment the fundamentalist like it did in Algeria; economic condition
of Pakistan will force the fundamentalists to appear in direct
confrontation with the world powers. While none of possibilities
can be out-rightly denied but once again wishfulness dominates.
The rise of Islamists is a serious issue. Before it withers away
it will play havoc with the lives of the ordinary people and destroy
institutions of resistance. Thus any attempt to challenge the
fundamentalist rise has to be realistic about the situation today.
There is little doubt that the Islamists have gained from the
depoliticisation of the society under various military rules.
The three-year rule of General Musharraf ensured that the life
of 
the
ordinary people was made more miserable and it is these people
who now distrust the word ‘politics’. This situation
favors the Islamists as other traditional parties vacillate and
compromise on all issues and everyone, just to gain power, while
the Islamists appears firm in their stance.
The material situation in the society can generate conditions
for political expressions and formation of the unbelievingly intolerant
kind to come to power. The outgoing state and its agencies come
to play their role when, for them, there is no way but to join
the in-coming ruling class. That process can take place very rapidly.
During the inter-war period the fascist forces in Spain, Italy
and Germany grew their support from a few hundreds to millions
within a short span of time. Neighboring India saw a deeply divided
rightwing grew into a huge organized political machine such as
the BJP, and within a few years it came to take over power and
set its own agenda for exploiting the poor.
However,
as is the case with the current right-wing forces in Pakistan,
the Indian fundamentalists did not come to power suddenly, though
the BJP's successes at polls in 1998 may make it look like that.
It was the weakening of the Indian economy, marginalisation of
hundreds of millions, massive poverty, which pushed the BJP to
the fore.
Similarly there are examples from the Muslim dominated countries
(Egypt, Algeria) where Islamism has shown itself to from a credible
alternative. At others (Iran, Sudan) they have succeeded in nasty
replacement of the state in other conditions. In both the cases
the right gave voice to the popular anger against misery and imperialist
domination. However in all these cases, like other challengers
to the capitalist world that failed to spread their revolution,
the Islamists also proved to be the ones either ready to play
by the rules set by the repression of the state or to back-track
and re-integrate their economy with the world system. The most
recent example being that of the Islamists in Indonesia who are
now part of a government implementing the ferocious IMF conditionalities..
In Pakistan the amalgamation of the right knows that it will have
to follow the rules of the system. The system which is dominated
by the accumulation of wealth by the powerful multinationals in
combination with the local military, industrialists and the landed
masters. The main core of the right has been and is deeply rooted
in various sections of these forces and it is next to impossible
for it to challenge the interests of these without risking its
own survival. The history of Islamism in 20th century shows that
it will side with the state in order to protect its own interests
and it is only when the state, for various reasons, is internally
weak that the right can impose itself as an alternative.
The examples of Islamists in Egypt and Algeria show that while
the Islamists attempted to become a legal opposition they campaigned
for the existing regime to incorporate Shariat laws into the legal
system. And in doing so the Islamists were faced with their own
contradictions. The more powerful the fundamentalists become the
more they are caught between ‘respectability and insurrection’.
In 1991 the FIS in Algeria were against strike by factory workers
and a few months later they were calling for an overthrow of the
state. They failed in Algeria but were successful in Iran because
the weak ruling class had little organized workers opposition
allowing the fundamentalists to make bid for power.
Now where can we place the Pakistani MMA? They will side by the
military and the state and would rather like the state to reform
laws to comply with Sharia rather than taking over the state.
This conclusion is based on the following argument. Its recent
history shows that the jihadi element in it tactically did not
confront the Pakistani military while it was hunting for terrorists
within the jihadis. This is clear from the reactions of the jihadis
against the raids and arrests within Pakistan before and after
9/11. The jihadi fundamentalists may have targeted the US interests
but have not confronted the Pakistani establishment. The jihadis
know that the roots of the Pakistani military are in the landed
class which forms the core of the military and the military is
against a section of the jihadis as long as US wishes so. That
is why the military regime has refrained from attacking those
supporting Taliban within MMA even though it has carried out intrigues
against PML-N and PPP vociferously.
The non-jihadi element in MMA is more obviously pro-state and
pro-military. How these Islamists will cobble together with the
state can be seen in the recently elected local governments in
Pakistani cities. The Karachi City Nazim (mayor) Naimatullah is
a staunch fundamentalist from the Jamat-e-Islami which is similar
in class character to that of the Egyptian Ikwans and the Algerian
FIS. Mayor Naimatullah came to power just a few months before
9/11 when the Jamaat was gifted the city by the military. It forced
the dominant ethnic nationalists to abstain from elections and
ditched its own pampered liberal and military supporting groups
at the last minute to install the Jamaat Mayor in exchange for
the Jamaat moving its jihadi outfits from the Kashmir border back
inside Pakistan. Throughout the last 14 months in office the fundamentalist
Mayor was never in conflict with either the military or the provincial
government run by the military with a civilian face.
After
9/11 Islamists have shown their disdain to independent working
class action. In Algeria, where they won the local elections in
1991, the FIS opposed strike of workers for higher wages. Before
its local governments were overthrown, while it was facing opposition
from the military, they opposed strikes by dust workers, civil
servants and other general strikes. Chirs Harman writes that Madani
justified breaking the dust workers’ strike complaining
that it was forcing respectable people like doctors and professional
engineers to sweep up. But when the FIS was attacked by the military
it called on mass insurrection. Similarly City Nazim, Naimatullah
threatened to break the strike of sanitary workers with his Town
Nazims (own supporters heading offices in the local government)
but supported protests from Jamaat supporting students opposing
restructuring of varsities.
The Jamaat Nazim proved to take sides with the establishment and
the city industrialists when it came to workers strikes and struggles
for better conditions or pay. Recently when the entire sanitary
staff of the maintenance department of the municipality headed
by the Nazim went on strike, he ignored it for 8 days as junk
remained trash was not picked up in vast areas of the city. However
when 45 students belonging to the student organization of Jamaat
were arrested after clashing with the police in a protest against
reforms in varsities and colleges, the Nazim rushed to the scene,
got the students released within hours and made headlines for
his consideration of welfare of the students. The incident happened
only days before the parliamentary elections and added to create
an image that the fundamentalists are actively involved in struggles
of independent teaches and students. No other political party
lent its support to the teachers and student’s struggle
against restructuring of universities.
There is little doubt that the Islamists will find no problems
in coexisting with the military regime of state-bureaucracy. However,
there is a real danger that the rise of the right is going to
hit back at the weakest sections of the society, the working class
in its dormant state being the chief target. The right will surely
replace the repression of the state in various ways. When the
state acts violently then any resistance against the state should
not provide the right to force its will against the weak sections
of the society. In those situations the rightists in power usually
find it difficult to satisfy the basic needs of the masses which
expect elimination of poverty, unemployment and disparity. The
rightist will implement the agenda of the IMF and World Bank as
much as the military regime of today. Hence it will face criticism
and eventual resistance from the people. In that situation the
fundamentalists would attack the weakest sections of the society.
The question that is faced by those opposed to the policies of
fundamentalists and their appeasement by the traditional parties
and the state is that of resistance. While the fundamentalists
gain ascendancy, resistance against the military regime and the
globalization has gained spread as well. The fundamentalists may
have become the ‘sole proprietor’ of protests against
the US led war but they are far from being the resistors against
other effects of world institutions such as WB, WTO etc. The working
class in Pakistan is a small minority but the post 9/11 scenario
has seen greater levels of resistance to the globalization policies
led by the Pakistani state. Formation of government of national
consensus or any other with representation from the fundamentalists
will ensure continuation of policies of multi-lateral institutions
and thus the continuation of the struggles against them, This
struggle has been peculiar for its defensive nature.
The
problems of ordinary Pakistani are unemployment, rising prices,
absence of education and health care. The struggle of the working
class has been about retaining jobs and land. Thus teachers are
fighting to retain jobs in schools, colleges and universities
which are being denationalized, restructured and privatized by
the state. The doctors and nurses are resisting the privatization
of hospitals and medical colleges to protect their job-security.
The port-workers are protesting against imminent downsizing and
privatization. The peasants are waging a huge resistance against
their displacement from lands they tilled for centuries. Their
resistance at state farms, military farms against the government
leasing out their land to the military bosses and finally to multinational
companies has been phenomenal. The right wing is present in some
of these struggles for their anti-US stance but not for its opposition
to the whole process of liberalization.
Transformation
of the role of a political entity in or out of power has never
been an act enacted in a day or week or even months. This applies
both to the working class and the fundamentalists. For a change
from below, by and for the masses, it takes a long, hard, united
and fighting working class to organize, strike and capture power
-- in all these acts the working class shows for itself that in
its day to day activity, of organization, demonstration and strike,
it acquires and resists power. The traditional parties have lost
touch with the masses while the Islamists have gotten involved
with campaigns against liberalization, restructuring and war and
that is the source of their ascendancy. The greater the organization
of working people against the atrocities of the world institutions
and state repression the greater are the possibilities of halting
the rise of the Islamists.
The
writer is a Professor at the Department of Applied Chemistry,
University of Karachi. Email: riaz_ahmed@hotmail.com
