Fickle Pakistani liberals

The News
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
By Ahmed Quraishi
Welcome to the fickle politics of Pakistani liberals. At any given time, less than thirty liberal political 'experts' are found rotating on fifty or so Pakistani television networks regaling us with their twisted logic. Last week, all of them suddenly re-discovered our late prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. The PPP has every right – and a moral obligation – to make a show out of the 29th death anniversary of its founder. But the way our fickle liberals gushed out emotions in unison, almost on every television screen, begged a question: Where were they earlier? Does this mark the onset of the 'herd mindset' in Pakistani media?

Raising an ethical question in Pakistani politics is a contradiction in terms. But last week I dared offer one: If you have campaigned hard to boycott the election of a parliament, is it ethical for you to join this parliament after it has been elected despite all your efforts? I was referring to Mr Aitzaz Ahsan's decision to try to get inside our new parliament through the backdoor, a by-election, if PPP grants him a ticket. Suddenly, I was inundated with lectures on how it's legal and there is nothing wrong with it. But if you are a fair-minded person, you can still smell a rat in there. It is far more convincing – and ethical – to stick to your principles and stay out of this assembly. President Musharraf, after all, is still around. Mr Ahsan wanted everyone to boycott a parliament elected under this president. Why jump the ship of the lawyers' movement now?

And what does Mr Ahsan do when he does not get a good response from his party? He goes to Quetta with his client, the former chief justice, and sends indirect warnings to his own party's new federal government that he is a dangerous man if ignored. How come you didn't hear most of the thirty or so liberal political analysts on our television screens put the story this way? It's because hard blows are reserved for the likes of Arbab Ghulam Rahim. One more sign that in Pakistani politics, revenge trumps civility, any time.

Pakistani liberals fume when you talk about how Pakistan needs to evolve its own version of democracy and that we are not suited to the British democracy no matter how admirable it is. If not checked in our hands, British democracy has the potential of exploding in our faces. The deliberate mistreatment given to Sindh's former chief minister, Arbab Ghulam Rahim, shows that revenge remains an integral part of our politics. Our political discussions are devoid of any tolerance for opposing opinions and respect for those who hold them. You might excuse our tribal and feudal politicians for this culture but a disturbing fact is that this culture has slipped into Pakistan's middle classes, the supposed engine of future political change in our homeland.

While we are busy in these sideshows, real games are being played out elsewhere. Some of our liberals sprang out to defend a foreign terrorist, Sarabjit Singh, convicted of killing innocent Pakistanis. But none of them paused when an Indian supreme court judge took notice over the weekend of the fact that his country has jailed scores of Pakistanis without trial, some for more than ten years. The only reason New Delhi is beginning to take this issue seriously is because of our firm stand on the death sentence for the Indian terrorist, convicted after a fair due process.

Another area where we need to show some toughness is Afghanistan. Make no mistake, our American friends are making all the necessary preparations to invade our western regions. Washington has brought unprecedented pressure on the Europeans to beef up NATO contingents in areas close to our border.

We need to make our American friends understand that Washington cannot win in Afghanistan if Islamabad does not win too. The post-9/11 deal has to be a win-win for both of us. And it is not. Stating this specific reciprocity is far better than a blanket opposition to America's war on terror. Let's create consensus on this issue. This is a far more urgent matter than the nonissue of the deposed judges.

The writer works for Geo English. Email: aq@ahmedquraishi.com