The Herald Annual: January 1999
Rights and Wrongs
By Zohra Yusuf
Nineteen ninety-eight began with two young people, Riffat Afridi and Kanwar Ahsan, facing death threats simply because they chose to marry of their own free will. They year ended with 13-years-old Salim being sentenced to death by a military court. In between, the basic rights of citizens continued to be violated by the authorities…
The human rights debate took on special significance in 1998 as the world commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But when the media and human rights organisations around the world analysed the balance sheets of specific countries, violations of fundamental rights clearly tipped the scale in Pakistan.
The year began with two young people, Riffat Afridi and Kunwar Ahsan, facing death threats simply because they chose to marry of their own free will (Ahsan later survived an assassination attempt at the premises of a court in Karachi). It ended with 13-year-old Salim being sentenced t death a military court in blatant contravention of the government's commitments under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. In between, the basic rights of citizens continued to be violated by the authorities. The death toll in "police encounter" in Lahore alone stood at 88 by mid-December. Following the nuclear tests in May, fundamental rights were suspended by the government, even though there was no organised opposition to the explosions.
Despite a clear majority in the National Assembly, the government chose to function primarily through ordinances without allowing sufficient time for debate. In January 1998, Senator Rafiq Tarar, a retired judge known for his retrogressive views, became President of Pakistan. Even the cabinet was taken aback by this surprise development.
On August 28, the government conjured up yet another trick in the shape of the proposed 15th National Assembly, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif announced his intention of introducing Shariah to "establish a social order based on Islamic values." However, a study of the bill left little doubt regarding its real objectives. While the amendment gives the federal government unbridled powers of prescribing what is "rights" and forbidding what it deems "wrong" it seeks to atrophy the judiciary's authority by letting the executive determine whether an issue concern the Shariah or not.
Commonly referred to as Sections 295(A) and (C) or the Pakistan Panel Code, the blasphemy laws continued to jeopardise both the status and the lives of Pakistan's religious minorities. The Ahmadi community remained the primary target of the fundamentalists. During Census '98, an Ahmadi farm worker in Golarchi, who mentioned his religion on the form, was forced by the local clergy to recant and implicate the person who had filled out the form. But perhaps the most tragic manifestation of the desperation felt by the minorities was Bishop John Joseph's suicide in May 1998 in protest against the death sentence awarded to Ayub Masih. In spite of the concerns expressed both within and outside the country, the government refused to consider amending the so-called blasphemy laws. The religious terrorism that such laws have unleashed also led to several attack on churches all over Pakistan, the last one being a bomb explosion in a Karachi church two days before Christmas.
If the religious freedom of non-Muslim came under renewed threat in 1998, Muslims of various sects fared no better. Sectarian killings continued to exact a heavy toll. The savage attack on a prayer congregation at the Mominpura graveyard in Lahore claimed 24 lives on January 11.
The government's tolerance for the opposition, or criticism in general for that matter, remained at an all-time low throughout the year. The leader of the opposition, Benazir Bhutto, her husband Asif Zardari and other PPP leaders were pursued relentlessly by the Ehtesab Bureau, headed by Senator Saifur Rahman, a Sharif loyalist who is himself embroiled in many legal cases. The press, meanwhile, continued to be harassed ostensibly on charges of alleged tax evasion. These included Karachi's monthly news magazine Newsline and the Jang group.
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) also found itself on the receiving end following its refusal to support the government in securing the passage of the 15th amendment in the Senate. The assassination of Hakim Mohammed Said in September signalled the beginning of another crackdown on MQM activists, many of whom had been voluntarily released under an earlier agreement between the PML and the MQM. The post-mortem report of Fasih (Jugnoo), an MQM activist, who was arrested in connection with Hakim Said's murder, listed no less than 30 marks of torture. Dr. Asim Raza, another MQM worker, was tortured to the point that his kidneys ceased to function.
Also in 1998, arrested MQM activists were paraded before the cameras on the state-run PTV to confess their crimes. Freedom of expression was trampled in other areas as well. The pop group Junoon was served with a show-cause notice and banned from PTV for reportedly speaking against the "two-nation" concept in India.
The status of women in Pakistan remained among the lowest in the region. Many women became the target of physical abuse and forced marriages. A Human Rights Commission of Pakistan study found that two women fell victim to rape in Lahore every day during the first eight months of the year. In Sindh, there was no let-up in cases of karo-kari and an adult woman's right to marry of her own will continued to be challenged. In a show of inter-provincial police strength, the Karachi police took the unprecedented step of raiding a women's sanctuary, the Edhi home, to forcibly take away Humaira, the daughter of a Punjab MPA. The 28-year-old women had committed the "crime" of marrying Mahmood Butt against her family's wishes.
With 49 minors already on death row, 13-year-old Salim became the 50th child to be sentenced to death. Meanwhile, over 3,000 children bided their time in prisons, mostly on account of minor offenses such as vagrancy.
The bonded haris of Sindh continued to rank among the most exploited and maltreated communities in Pakistan. Mureed Khan Marri, an influential Sindhi landlord, managed to kidnap more than 80 haris from Matli in September. These haris had been freed from Marri's captivity three years ago through the efforts of the HRCP Task Force for Sindh. It was only after protest demonstrations and sustained campaigning that they were ultimately released from the landlord's custody.
The government added fuel to the fire by countering criticism with outright threats. Interior minister Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain warned that the government bar human rights organisations from operating in the country. More recently, Punjab social welfare minister Binyamin Rizvi announced that in order to be registered, NGOs would have to give an undertaking that they would not indulge in "anti-state" anti-government and anti-religion" activities. He also accused a Lahore-based NGO of "brainwashing young women and making them pursue a course that clashed with government policies."
What our policy makers failed to realise amidst all this muscle flexing, though, is that human rights issues are no longer a domestic matter. Violations of human rights attract international attention and, in turn, have an impact on foreign relations, on trade and aid, and even among consumers who have started to demonstrate a greater sensitivity towards the cause in their choice of products and services.