Forgetting the dharna ‘Judicial Commission’

The final report of the General Election 2013 Inquiry Commission has had its fifteen minutes. This is an impressive feat. It can now join the pantheon of models of Pakistan’s extensive expertise in the drafting of English-language memos and reports that mean almost nothing.

Where will the dharna ‘Judicial Commission’ report rank relative to the all-time greats? It may be too early to tell. The Munir Commission report of 1954, the Hamoodur Rehman Commission report of 1974 and, the Abbottabad Commission report of 2013 are all classics. And they all show us what a great culture of learning, renewal and institutional growth we have developed in the Islamic Republic.

The Munir Commission report was about anti-Ahmadi riots in Punjab. The last paragraph should be etched in the minds of anyone that claims to fear Allah:

“Consequently, we are prompted by something that they call a human conscience to enquire whether, in our present state of political development, the administrative problem of law and order cannot be divorced from a democratic bed fellow called a Ministerial Government, which is so remorselessly haunted by political nightmares. But if democracy means the subordination of law and order to political ends – then Allah knoweth best and we end the report.”

The fear of Ahmadis in Pakistan and the loathing they endure is dramatically more widespread today than it was in 1954. For years, we’ve laid this down to some innate obsession with violence or extreme views here. The truth is uglier. We have cultivated violence and extreme views to accommodate political expediencies. Justice Munir ended his report despondently in 1954. In 2015, one can only marvel at the report’s haunting accuracy and depth.

The Hamoodur Rehman Commission report was about the atrocities Pakistanis committed against Pakistanis in 1971, as we tried to quash a vast conspiracy to dismember Pakistan (by dismembering Pakistanis). Perhaps the most poignant passage is found in the early paragraphs of its conclusions, particularly this, from Paragraph 8 in the conclusions:

“The arbitrary methods adopted by the Martial Law administration in dealing with respectable East Pakistanis, and then sudden disappearances by a process euphemistically called ‘being sent to Bangladesh’ made matters worse. The attitude of the Army authorities towards the Hindu minority also resulted in large-scale exodus to India. The avowed intention of India to dismember Pakistan was only too well known, but even then the need for an early political settlement was not realised by General Yahya Khan.”

Our collective and sustained contempt for history shines through particularly well in light of the Hamoodur Rehman report. People still disappear in Pakistan. There is much more widespread and insidious contempt for minorities in our country. Perhaps even more hostile actors than ever before conspire to hurt Pakistan than was the case in 1971, but we are decidedly invested in making ourselves vulnerable to every enemy with our callous disregard for the lessons of our own history.

The Abbottabad Commission report concluded that the May 2 raid on Abbottabad to kill Osama bin Laden was rooted partly in the culture of violent extremism that festers in our country and recommended that Pakistan urgently deal with the problem, else risk the following:

“A continued lack of commitment and priority in addressing the problem of illegal violent and parallel governance in support of extremist agendas through acts of terror in the false garb of sacred causes will progressively sink the country.”

Of course, Pakistan did not urgently deal with violent extremism. Then the Peshawar APS attack happened. It seems we may now be committed to the fight, but only to the extent of the clarity of General Raheel Sharif and Lt Gen Rizwan Akhtar’s wisdom. There is little evidence of a broader societal or political awakening. The Abbottabad Commission report, in its conclusions, minces no words on why this is the case:

“If institutions and the whole system of governance were ‘dysfunctional’, they were so because of irresponsible governance over a sustained period, including incorrect priorities and acts of commission and omission by individuals who had de jure or de facto policy making power.”

The dharna ‘Judicial Commission’ report was a remarkable and epochal event in our political, legal and social history. It was prompted by an incredible display of brute political power sustained over 126 days. This political power was able to produce a ‘judicial commission’ in part because it was aided and abetted by a national discourse driven by hyper nationalism, faux piety and a feigned respect for rule of law. This ‘rule of law’ argument is insincere because too often it seems to resemble a dupatta for the relentless contempt for democratically-elected leaders in Pakistan that is a rite of passage for commentators, opinion-makers and thought-leaders in the Islamic Republic.

Despite the obvious temptation for the commission judges to do otherwise, the report avoids general commentary in a commendable departure from the societal norm. But the intensity of the burden they were asked to carry is expressed in paragraph 679, where they write:

“Some failings of the ECP and irregularities have remained the subject of election petitions filed by losing candidate before Election Tribunals. However it is for the first time that a commission has been constituted to holistically examine the manner in which the ECP organised and conducted a particular general election.”

The juxtaposition here is stark. “The first time that a commission has been constituted to holistically examine” how an election was conducted. The other times we have had commissions were all instances that shook the state to its very core. Pakistan required a major, politically controversial but important commission after the anti-Ahmadi riots of the 1950s. No one then would have imagined that Pakistan would have suffered a vivisection in the brutal and bloody manner that it did in 1971. Thus another commission. Several others were formed, without as much memorable fanfare, of course, probably until the Abbottabad Commission, which once again, was dealing with a national black eye with few parallels.

Elections are a massive, unruly and messy undertaking in even the healthiest democracies. The dharna gave us the impression that the 2013 election was special. It was supposed to have been exceptionally messy. So much so, that it shook the state to its very core. It supposedly changed who we were, who we are, who we will be. As it turns out, the hot air from that version of history is escaping rapidly. It may be a puncture.

The now concluded story of the 2013 elections is that it was ‘the great national tragedy that never was’. These were the elections that proved the also-ran status of the PTI, and the enduring vitality and robustness of the role of pure brick-and-mortar patronage in winning Punjab. It doesn’t feel very good to those that wanted to change Pakistan, or want to change Pakistan. And that’s a good thing. Some of those folks need to work harder on things that matter in the real world, and less hard on hashtags and offensive memes and caricatures. The only thing worse than a loser, is a sore loser.

These elections were many things, but they were not a national tragedy. They were simply a healthy expression that Pakistan deserves no better and no worse than leaders like Nawaz Sharif and Imran Khan.

Of course the bonus could be that the dharna ‘Judicial Commission’ report could spur a generation of electoral reform. Ha, ha. That may have happened in a country that had not ignored Munir, Hamoodur Rehman, or Abbottabad. This is not that country. Countries that can ignore the lessons of such deep traumas will be able to forget the dharna Judicial Commission report sooner than you can say puncture. News cycle over. Next.

The writer is an analyst and commentator.

www.mosharrafzaidi.com