By: Asem Mustafa Awan
ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency (PILDAT’s) 2023 report about quality of democracy in Pakistan highlights a deepening democratic crisis, urging an urgent shift from a hybrid system to functional democracy, citing concerns about electoral fairness, media freedom, and President Alvi’s controversial role.
“The past year had only made the hoped transition towards improved democracy that much harder for the country now called an electoral autocracy by some international democracy rating think tanks”, said the report.
PILDAT pointed out that remedies and lessons are obvious but the people who have the power and capacity to pull the country out of the rut have not taken the right steps for the last ‘seventy years’, borrowing the phrase of former Chief of Army Staff, Gen. (Retired) Qamar Javed Bajwa used while referring to his institution’s interference in the country’s political affairs. PILDAT believes that the transition could be initiated with a simple change of perspective and by marshalling the required will followed by purposeful consultations in the National Security Committee. PILDAT advised that the only option available was to urgently design and execute a transition from the so called hybrid system to a normal functional democracy.
Within its report, PILDAT analysed that political parties and popular leaders continually suffer from a crisis of confidence as their political fate depends not on their popularity or the cogence of their governance policies but how adept they are at keeping the establishment positively engaged and play second fiddle. The cyclical political process in Pakistan also forces political campaigns to oscillate between pro and anti-establishment and not focussed on serious solutions to Pakistan’s economic and governance issues. Neither the Army is learning to steer clear of politics and focus solely on the security domain defined in the Constitution, nor the politicians have agreed on an unbreakable set of rules to never seek or receive the Army’s support for coming into power.
PILDAT believes delay in holding of the General Election has meant an unusually prolonged role in office of the five (5) caretaker governments in Pakistan which raised valid concerns that continuation of unelected caretaker governments for extended periods runs counter to the spirit of democracy and the Constitution
PILDAT believes prospect of its fairness appears just as bleak as the 2018 General Election largely agreed to be a manipulated election. Despite the oft-repeated interference in the political process, leading political parties appear “addicted to the establishment’s patronage” to win a managed public popularity and form fractured governments. The outgoing Chief of Army Staff, rather conveniently and belatedly publicly admitted to the Pakistan Army’s interference in the political and electoral processes.
PILDAT believes that conclusion of the 5-year term of the 15th National Assembly in 2023 left democracy just as vulnerable and manipulated when the Assembly members took oath on August 12, 2018. The National Assembly and its members allowed themselves to be manipulated by one elected government to the other, with active control of the establishment, in carrying out basic functions such as legislation.
Similarly, Senate could not evolve beyond a debating club where, instead of initiating and leading a meaningful engagement on policy issues, its sessions remained just as mired in partisan political blame-game, infighting and political mocking of opponents. Poor performance was evident in four (4) provincial assemblies as each provincial government used Provincial legislatures to rubber-stamp required legislation including the most important provincial budgets. PILDAT noted that during their 5-year tenure, Provincial Assemblies wilfully began to regress and withdraw public information from the citizens. Their websites provided scant, outdated and incomplete information for citizens and media alike.
PILDAT believes, to its credit, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) withstood the public pressure from a leading political party as well as the Supreme Court in 2023 until the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) voiced his opinion in a letter to presiding officers of the Parliament complaining of ‘judicial overbearing’ diluting its Constitutional writ. The letter proposing legal amendment to remove President’s role in appointing date of an election, the CEC lamented that the writ of the ECP had systematically been challenged on several occasions by citing examples of the Daska by-polls in February 2021 and the contempt proceedings initiated by the ECP against PTI leaders and suspension of its orders by high courts, effectively binding the ECP’s hands in the face of brazen attacks which raises Questions whether ECP can perform its bedrock duty to conduct free, fair, and transparent elections to the best of its ability in the given environment
PILDAT believes Chief Justice of Pakistan, Qazi Faez Isa, in his latest, and, somewhat controversial, achievement to-date in the context of Pakistan’s democracy, has been nudging the reluctant decision-makers to finally appoint a firm date and issue a schedule for the 12th General Election to be held on February 08, 2024. The Supreme Court has no constitutional role in appointing the date of the election or in influencing the ECP or the President to do so. To some, the ECP’s independence was compromised when it was made to consult the President and announce the election date.
News media of Pakistan including press, electronic or even social media, has not seen an improvement in freedom in 2023. 2023 proved yet again the silencing of independent voices, the management of media and the propagation of the sickening culture of buying media voices in support of or against a political party or group to sow polarisation and dissent in the society. Media is not allowed to air images, messages or statements from political leaders newly fallen out of favour.
PILDAT analysed that unencumbered by the criticism against him for playing a blatantly partisan role, President Dr. Arif Alvi continued to use his office for pushing for the PTI’s agenda in holding premature or early General Election. His role became especially controversial in appointing a date for general election to the dissolved Punjab Assembly when he unilaterally, and without constitutional authority, appointed the date of election. Dr. Alvi’s chose to defy his Constitutional role repeatedly in giving his assent to various laws passed by the Parliament after the coalition government came in place of the PTI government in April 2022, and continued to do so in 2023 especially in refusing assent to amendments in laws.