On October 12, 1999, the Pakistan Army once again ousted the Civilian Government. At that time Prime Minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif headed the Government. The coup immediately followed the premier’s attempt to replace the Army Chief while he was on a tour to Sri Lanka. After two days of chilling uncertainty, Chief of Army Staff General Pervez Musharraf assumed the title of Chief Executive. Although the use of the term “Martial Law” was avoided, Pakistan once again came under military rule. It was claimed that the Army was forced to take this step to save the country from “turmoil and uncertainty”.
The Supreme Court, in a ruling on May 12, 2000, accepted that a constitutional deviation had taken place in pursuit of rather noble objectives, such as economic reforms and bringing to book the corrupt politicians, bureaucrats and businessmen. The 12 judges based their ruling on the principle of “salus po puli ex supreme lex”, meaning that the welfare of the people is the supreme law of any land. The court took the view that there was no other way to remove a corrupt Government except through the intervention of the armed forces. The Supreme Court also directed General Musharraf to hold general elections within three years.
After the military takeover, the former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Shahbaz Sharif (his brother and former Chief Minister of Punjab) and five other officials were booked on charges of hijacking, kidnapping and attempted murder in the “Plane Conspiracy” case. The prosecution’s case was based on a police report filed by an Army Colonel. Nawaz Sharif, in his capacity as Prime Minster, was accused of giving orders to the Civil Aviation Authority to prevent a Colombo-Karachi Pakistan International Airlines commercial flight, with Musharraf on board, from landing at Karachi or anywhere else in Pakistan. He was to face a charge of attempted murder endangering the lives of General Pervez Musharraf and 200 other passengers on board by disallowing the plane to land when its fuel was at a low level. The case was tried by an anti-terrorism court in Karachi, ironically established by Nawaz Sharif himself, which sentenced him to life imprisonment. In their appeal to the High Court, Mr. Sharif’s lawyers maintained that no charge of corruption was proved against the former Prime Minister, and that it was the Prime Minster’s constitutional right to remove the Army Chief.
Later on, Mr. Nawaz Sharif was, however, pardoned and exiled by the military government to Saudi Arabia on conditions that he would forfeit Rupees 500 million (equivalent to roughly US$ 8 million) in property and stay out of politics for the next 21 years.
Pervez Musharraf Becomes President [June, 2001]
General Pervez Musharraf while he was also Chief Executive took over the office of the President of Pakistan on June 20, 2001, under the Provincial Constitutional Order (PCO) by removing Rafiq Tarar before he was allowed to complete his five-years tenure. With immediate effect he dissolved the suspended Senate, National and Provincial Assemblies and dismissed the Chairman of the Senate and the Speaker of the National Assembly. After assuming the new office as President, General Pervez Musharraf announced, “The change will augur well for the future of Pakistan”; and said, “I think I have a role to play; I have a job to do here; I cannot and will not let this nation down”. He gave three reasons for taking over as the President of Pakistan: constitutional, political, and economic.
The critical moment in General Musharraf’s presidency was 9/11, when Washington suddenly and direly needed his support the international antiterrorism campaign and to crush the Taliban in Afghanistan. Thus he became a pivotal player on the world stage and a close ally welcomed in Washington and London alike as a statesman of international standing. General Musharraf did his best to highlight the core issue of Kashmir at every international forum. In July 2001, he held his first summit meeting with Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee at Agra but couldn’t make much headway in solving the Kashmir problem. Due to his consecutive efforts, however, a lot of tension between the two neighboring countries with nuclear-armed rivalry has been eased as they have restored diplomatic relations and started to build up warming ties mutually by means of confidence building measures. General Musharraf has given a new formula for solving the protracted dispute of Kashmir. After the Taliban were ousted, he offered all possible help to the new government.
President General Musharraf kept his word to restore democracy and hold elections in October 2002 as mandated by the Supreme Court. He gratified the nation when after general elections, Pakistan’s National Assembly and Senate in November 2002 met for the first time since the coup three years earlier. He also relinquished the post of Chief Executive when Zafaullah Khan Jamali became Prime Minister of Pakistan in November 2002. President Musharraf, however, continues to hold the offices of Chief of Army Staff, and Chief of the Staff Committee. The opposition parties refused to accept Framework Order (LFO) 2002 as it empowered the President to sack the prime minister, dissolve parliament and also recognize him as both head of the army and head of the state. According to the opposition the provisions of the LFO were unconstitutional and illegal, and against the sovereignty of the Parliament. As a result, the business of parliament remained in deadlock for a year. In December, 2003 as part of a deal with MMA (Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal) to end the stand-off, General Musharraf agreed that he would step down as military head of the country on December 31, 2004 and also give up some of the powers he assumed after the coup while on January 1,2004. After getting vote of confidence from parliament and the four provincial assemblies, President Pervez Musharraf would now serve full five-year term as President till 2007 under the constitutional provisions after the seventeenth amendment was passed by a two-third majority of the Parliament. He secured 658 votes (56.23 per cent) with simple majority from a total of 1,170 members of parliament and the four assemblies amid MMA abstention and opposition boycott.
President Musharraf presents to the world vision of a modern, tolerant, democratic, Islamic Pakistan and favors economic reforms and free trade with the West. He has also played a vital role in negotiating an economic package to assist Pakistan out of its problems.
Agra Summit
A historic summit meeting was held between Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf and the Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in Agra, from July 14 to 16, 2001. The summit started amid high hopes of resolving various disputes between the two countries including the five decades’ old Kashmir issue. Both sides started the summit with hopefulness and in a spirit of good will; especially President Musharraf used the phrases “cautious optimism”, “flexibility” and “open mind” to describe his buoyant views for the summit. The Indian President also promised to take “bold and innovative” measures and to discuss the “core issue” between the two countries.
Various rounds of one-to-one talks were held between President Musharraf and Prime Minster Vajpayee. On the first day, a 90-minute one-on-one session was held between the two leaders. The Kashmir issue, cross-border terrorism, nuclear risk reduction, release of prisoners of war, and commercial ties were discussed. The talks went in the right direction and were declared by both the leaders as “positive, frank and constructive”. There were hopes that both the leaders would arrive at an agreement and a joint statement or declaration would be made at the end of the summit as the two leaders plunged into serious talks.
Despite reservations from the Indian Government, President Musharraf also held face-to-face meetings with the top Kashmiri leadership represented by the All Parties Hurriyat Conference.
The two-day Agra summit between President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, however, collapsed and no formal agreement could be attained. The two sides remained inflexible on the core issue of Kashmir, despite five long and arduous one-to-one rounds between the two leaders and hours of discussion between the two delegations. Despite the failure of the talks, General Pervez Musharraf joined Vajpayee to call on the two countries to bury their past. He also invited the Indian Prime Minister to visit Pakistan as he felt that the issues between Pakistan and India were much more complicated and could not be resolved in a short time.
Local Government System [2001]
In order to establish democracy at grassroots level, the regime of General Pervez Musharaf, introduced the Local Government System. This was not a new experiment in Pakistan. Ayub Khan had undertaken a similar effort in this direction by introducing the Basic Democracy System.
This new system of Local Government was installed on August 14, 2001, after holding of elections. Direct elections on non-party basis were held in five phases for members of Union Councils, Union Nazims, and Naib Union Nazims during 2000 thru to 2001. On the basis of these direct elections, indirect elections were held in July-August 2001 for Zila Nazims and Naib Zila Nazims and also for Tehsil-Town Nazims and Naib Nazims. In order to attract people towards electoral politics, the minimum age for local government elections was lowered from 21 to 18 years. One-third seats were reserved for women.
The main purpose of introducing the Local Government System was to empower the people at the grassroots level and to transfer power from the elite to the masses. This system of grassroots democracy envisaged yielding new political leaders. It was also anticipated to solve people’s problems at local level, allow public participation in decision-making and ensure the provision of speedy justice. The essence of this system was that the Local Governments would be accountable to the citizens for all their decisions. It would enable the proactive elements of society to participate in community work, development related activities and would remove rural-urban divide. The new Local Government plan was an effort on the part of the Military Government to lay the foundations of an authentic and enduring democracy.
The new System provided a three-tier Local Government structure:
1. The District Government
2. The Tehsil Government
3. The Union Administration
The District Government
The District Government consisted of the Zila Nazim and District Administration. The District Administration consisted of district offices including sub-offices at Tehsil level, who were to be responsible to the District Nazim assisted by the District Coordination Officer. The District Coordination Officer was appointed by the Provincial Government and was the coordinating head of the District Administration. The Zila Nazim was accountable to the people through the elected members of the Zila Council. A Zila Council consisted of all Union Nazims in the District, which consisted of members elected on the reserved seats. These seats were reserved for women, peasants, workers, and minority community. The Zila Council had its Secretariat under the Naib Zila Nazim and had a separate budget allocation. Adequate checks and balances were introduced in the System.
The new System also efficiently addressed the specific needs and problems of large cities. The District Government was responsible to the people and the Provincial Government for improvement of governance and delivery of services.
Tehsil Administration
The middle tier, the Tehsil, had Tehsil Municipal Administration headed by the Tehsil Nazim. Tehsil Municipal Administration consisted of a Tehsil Nazim, Tehsil Municipal Officer, Tehsil Officers, Chief Officers and other officials of the Local Council Service and officials of the offices entrusted to the Tehsil Municipal Administration. The Tehsil Municipal Administration was entrusted with the functions of administration, finances, and management of the offices of Local Government and Rural Development, and numerous other subjects at the regional, Divisional, District, Tehsil and lower levels.
Union Administration
The lowest tier, the Union Administration was a corporate body covering the rural as well as urban areas across the whole District. It consisted of Union Nazim, Naib Union Nazim and three Union Secretaries and other auxiliary staff. The Union Nazim was the head of the Union Administration and the Naib Union Nazim acted as deputy to the Union Nazim during his temporary absence. The Union Secretaries coordinated and facilitated in community development, functioning of the Union Committees and delivery of municipal services under the supervision of Union Nazim.
The Government allocated Rupees 32 billion to the Local Government in 2002. The funds were deposited in the account of the District Government. The District Government further distributed these funds to Tehsil and Unions. In addition to the fiscal transfers from the Province, the Local Governments were authorized to generate money from their own sources by levying certain taxes, fees, user charges, etc.
It is, however, pertinent to make a special mention that it is only in the absence of elected assemblies that local governments are the popularly elected bodies and play important political and developmental roles. After the election of Senators and members of the provincial and national assemblies, its role has been again substantially marginalized. The elected representatives of National and Provincial Assemblies usually take over some functions, which local governments used to perform and as such in many ways they are prone to intervene in the evolution of proper and improved Local government.
Local governments suffer from the fact that their existence is not constitutionally ordained and they are a mere extension of the provincial government. In the Constitution, the allocations of the functions of the federal and provincial governments are clearly specified whereas the existence of local government is not formally embodied in the Constitution. Moreover, financial, technical, and bureaucratic constraints plus limited revenue (merely 5 per cent of revenue generated by the government) cause the poor and almost non-existent local government for most of the time.
September Eleven 9/11 and Its Aftermath [2001]
On September 11, 2001, with the collapse of the World Trade Center started what the U.S. called “the war against terrorism”. U.S. President George Bush termed it an act of terrorism and threatened strong action against the people who had carried out the attack. It was the Taliban and the Saudi millionaire-turned-militant Osama bin Laden who were eventually held responsible for it. President Bush said that the U.S. would do “whatever it takes” to hunt down “terrorists” and that if Osama bin Laden thought he could hide, “he was mistaken”.
Pakistan became the center of world attention after the September 11 attacks. It was placed in a difficult situation as the U.S. threatened to carry out military strikes on the Taliban. Faced not only with international pressure to take part in curbing the war on terrorism, but also a strong domestic pressure not to side with the United States against an Islamic country, Pakistan sought to assume a delicate balance between the U. S. demands and an expected backlash from internal militant and religious organizations.
General Musharraf made efforts to persuade the country’s political and religious leadership to support an alliance with the United States but was partially successful in his efforts. Liberal-minded politicians agreed to fully back the government while leaders of some hard-line Islamic parties were not happy. Several groups threatened to start a countrywide uprising in protest against any U.S. attack on the Taliban. All the religious parties and various political parties like the Jamiyat-i-Ulema-i-Islam, Jamaat-i-Islami, Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf, shared the same opinion on the possible US military action against the Taliban regime and use of Pakistani soil. They were not only against attacking Afghanistan from Pakistan soil, but were also against offending Pakistan’s closest brotherly neighbor, whom Pakistan had supported against the Soviet Union at the cost of burdening itself with a large number of refugees.
Pakistan was faced with a tough choice and irresistible pressure from the United States, an old ally and sole super power, to support a military strike against Osama bin Laden. That pressure, however, was combined with extreme reluctance to abandon Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban, an old friend and neighbor. Pakistan in this difficult situation was left with actually little choice except to comply with U.S. demands. The Government, despite the protest of the religious parties, decided to cooperate with the U.S. However, it made it very clear that Pakistan would extend full cooperation to the international community in its fight against terrorism without involving its forces in any action beyond its geographical boundaries. The U.S. was given permission to make use of Pakistani airspace for U.S. missile or aerial strikes against targets in Afghanistan. Pakistan also agreed to the exchange of intelligence and logistic facilities and to the closing of Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan.
US attack against the ruling Taliban started almost a month after the September 11 attacks as the Afghan Government refused to meet American demands of closing alleged terrorist training camps, handing over the leaders of the Al-Qaeda network, and return of all foreign nationals, including American citizens detained in Afghanistan.
As U.S. bombing on Afghanistan started, it was however forecasted on the bases of the Afghan resistance to the Soviets and all previous invaders since Alexander, that the Taliban would never give up their arms. The Americans would have to engage in a long, bloody, guerrilla warfare that would take months, if not years, to yield results. Snow would come and make fighting impossible. Further, sympathetic Muslim sentiment would topple the Musharraf regime and threaten others. It didn’t happen that way; history did not repeat itself. The Americans and their coalition partners carried out extensive aerial bombardment of Afghanistan that led to the killing of large number of innocent civilians and to the takeover of the Taliban strongholds one after another. The Taliban regime was toppled and a transitional government of Taliban opposition was installed in its place.
Pakistan was once again faced with the refugee problem in the wake of U.S. military action in Afghanistan. Thousands of Afghans fleeing their country rushed to the Pak-Afghan border. The Government of Pakistan, already bearing the burden of millions of Afghan refugees, deployed additional forces to prevent the entry of displaced people into Pakistan. In spite of the fact that the borders remained closed, some 10,000 people or more crossed at various border points from Afghanistan into Pakistan, further increasing the number of refugees.
After the aerial offense, the ground offensive eventually started to oust the number of Taliban left in Afghanistan. The U.S. continues to focus on tracking down the remaining Al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders in Afghanistan. This means that the U.S. will maintain a significant military force and continue to play a role in the region in the future.
Pakistan once again supported its old ally, the United States, in its military action against Osama bin Laden at the cost of forsaking its old friend and neighbor, the Taliban. But the question whether the American government abandons or continues to support Pakistan after it achieves its objectives still remains to be answered.
Referendum 2002
After General Pervez Musharraf sacked the civilian Government headed by Prime Minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif on October 12, 1999, he had assumed the title of Chief Executive. It was claimed that the Army was forced to take this step to save the country from “turmoil and uncertainty”. The General later on also ousted President Rafiq Tarar and himself became the President of Pakistan. After becoming the President, he reiterated his stance of holding elections as prescheduled by his Government in October 2002. But before the general elections, a referendum was held on April 30, 2002 for General Pervez Musharraf to be elected as the President of Pakistan for another five years.
The basic reason for holding the referendum was that the General wanted to abide by democratic principles and establish legitimacy for his rule though in the Constitution there was no provision to become President through referendum. According to the General, he wanted to stay as President in order to continue the economic recovery, ensure social stability, to counter unnamed destabilizing influences, and to eventually return to “true democracy”. The Opposition parties opposed the referendum. A 15-party Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy was set up, including Pakistan’s two main political parties, the Pakistan Peoples Party and the Pakistan Muslim League. The alliance considered President Musharraf’s decision as unconstitutional and announced peaceful rallies to oppose it. They called for a boycott of the voting.
The referendum took place on April 30, 2002, with no competition and no option but to vote for General Musharraf. The referendum question put forward to the people was: “For the survival of the local government system, establishment of democracy, continuity of reforms, end to sectarianism and extremism, and to fulfill the vision of Quaid-i-Azam, would you like to elect President General Pervez Musharraf as President of Pakistan for five years?”
According to the Government there were 78 million eligible voters. Eighty seven thousand polling stations were set up, including booths set up at prisons, hospitals, petrol stations, workplaces, and markets. However, there were no voter lists or constituencies, and anyone who could prove his identity and age could vote at any polling station. According to the Government estimate, around 98 percent of the counted votes backed General Musharraf continuing in office and the turnout of the referendum was said to be around 70 percent.
The referendum result was quite a big question mark. Politicians and political analysts considered the referendum to be unconstitutional, as under the Constitution, the President could be chosen not via direct vote, but by the elected members of the National Assembly, Provincial Assemblies and the Senate. The Opposition claimed that not more than 5 percent of the electorate bothered to vote, implying that President Musharraf did not have popular support. Pakistan’s Human Rights Commission also gave reports of some flagrant abuses, with few instances of multiple voting, and pressure on state employees to cast their votes.
However, the referendum certified the continuation of President General Pervez Musharraf’s rule for another five years, with him claim to have the popular mandate to govern and to carry on with his economic and political reforms.
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