By passing a new ordinance that bars former prime ministers from contesting a third term, President Pervez Musharraf has let the cat out of the bag. And, with it, his aversion to a person who has ‘B B’ for her initials and who was born on the longest day of the year in 1953.Lt Gen Tanvir Naqvi’s proposed constitutional package, followed by changes in the Political Parties Act, is full of contraptions that will deny the people of Pakistan their right to rule as well as keep Benazir Bhutto out of Pakistani politics. The only other person to be hit hard by this ordinance—Nawaz Sharif—had already burnt his boats when he chose personal freedom over a fight for his honour.The constitutional package has tried to give the military a formal political shape and position it as Pakistan’s most formidable political party. And General Musharraf has been sculpted into a national supremo with all powers vested in him. By not undermining the role of smaller regional and ethnic groups, his junta has confirmed that now, only two parties matter: the Pakistan People’s Party and General Musharraf’s Pakistan Military Party. The constitutional package has tried to position the military as Pakistan’s most formidable party. Musharraf has confirmed that only two parties matter: Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party and the General’s Pakistan Military Party The quest for a permanent constitutional arrangement has kept Pakistan on tenterhooks right since its creation. In 1956, the elected representatives of East Pakistan sacrificed their numerical superiority and agreed to the principle of parity to resolve the constitutional stalemate with West Pakistan, where the Establishment had always dreaded the Bengali majority. Had presidents—both generals— Iskander Mirza and Ayub Khan not played foul with the 1956 Constitution, Pakistan’s two wings would not only have remained united, the country might have blossomed into a model democracy.Indeed, Ayub Khan’s abrogation of the Constitution and the decision by the Supreme Court to uphold it as legal, inflicted the first fatal blow to Pakistan’s federal integrity.That was the beginning of the end. Ayub’s 1962 constitution was made to protect him and it vanished with him, opening the floodgates for several traumatic events including the creation of Bangladesh and the surrender by Pakistani generals and 90,000 troops and 5,000 square miles of West Pakistani territory under Indian occupation. Even in this hour of national ignominy, Yahya Khan and his generals had no intention of relinquishing government. They brazenly floated a constitutional package of their own—on the lines of Naqvi’s modern-day package—to keep themselves in power just when Pakistani troops were surrendering to the Indians.A revolt by young army officers who had not yet lost their integrity forced Yahya’s coterie to transfer power to the popularly elected leader, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Had it not been for Bhutto, Pakistan would have been but a footnote in history. He saved it from further disintegration by providing it a pragmatic framework in the form of the 1973 Constitution and resolving the tricky issue of the quantum of provincial autonomy.The 1973 Constitution has proved to be a greater binding force than religion in keeping the country together. When General Zia tried to play tricks with it, he gave birth to strong, lethal fissiparous, ethnic and sectarian forces that have now grown into a major threat. But the Constitution failed to protect itself, the Parliament, elected governments and prime ministers against extra-constitutional interventions by Bonapartic generals. What Pakistan now needs is a decision on who’s the real ruler: the people of Pakistan or successive generals. Ziaul Haq tried to break PPP but failed. So did Ghulam Ishaq Khan, Nawaz Sharif and Farooq Leghari. Now again Musharraf and his bandwagoners are trying to prop up political orphans—as was done by the ISI’s Hameed Gul and Asad Durrani in 1988 and 1990—to oppose Benazir Bhutto and PPP.Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s battle cry was ‘All Power to the People’. It’s now his daughter’s fate to be the main challenger and threat to the ‘‘other political party’’. The constitutional package, followed by a ban on any one becoming prime minister for the third time, is a crude attempt to keep Benazir out of power and deny the people genuine democratic participation. It’s time Musharraf and his generals cured themselves of their diseased aversion to the Bhuttos and learnt to live with the Bhutto phenomenon if they don’t want to see Pakistan end up as a failed state.(The writer is Pakistan’s former high commissioner to the UK)
