The News
International
Saturday, September 23, 2000

The turn of the screw

Mir Jamil-ur-Rahman

A public gathering held in London to celebrate the 47th birthday of MQM founder and leader, Altaf Hussain, has passed a series of resolutions. Besides Altaf Hussain, PONEM leaders Sardar Ataullah Mengal, Mahood Khan Achakzai and Syed Imdad Muhammad Shah addressed the gathering. It was a vehement demonstration of distress at the dominance of Punjab that the latter has acquired by the sheer weight of its numbers.

There are several ways to respond to these resolutions. We can deal with them a la six-points and live unhappily ever after. We can brand the MQM and PONEM leaders as traitors and excommunicate them from public life, which will not work. We can remain silent and let events take their course, which will amount to defeatism. We can get into debate and respond the argument with an argument. Either we convince the PONEM and MQM leaders that they are wrong or get convinced to their point of view. The choice lies with Punjab, which it should make most carefully.

The main resolution demands formulation of "a new liberal and democratic constitution based on equality of nations" according to the spirit of the Lahore Resolution of 1940. It further states that the new constitution should provide equal and democratic rights to all citizens and shall honour democracy and fundamental rights to all religious minorities and provide them the right to vote in a joint electorate system. In the proposed constitution, the resolution goes on to say, all the provinces should have total autonomy and all the present functions of the Federation with the exception of Defence, Foreign Affairs and Currency, be transferred to the provinces.

In support of its demand for a new constitution, the resolution states that the present constitution that was formulated by the elected representatives has been distorted beyond recognition. It accuses the civil and military autocrats of making so many alterations in the constitution of 1973 that it has lost its original form, spirit and utility.

There is a lot of substance in this argument. The 1973 constitution lost its sanctity in the fourth year of its existence. The COAS, General Ziaul Haq, subverted it by overthrowing the constitutional government of Bhutto in 1977. He suspended the constitution and in its place promulgated martial law. He amended the constitution at will, deleting an article or adding a new one to suit his requirements at a given time. Then through a fraudulent referendum, he became the President, thus dealing a deadly blow to the constitution.

The constitution is again in a state of suspension. For all practical purposes it is dead, only waiting for a decent burial. A constitution loses its sanctity and the reason for its being when it is kicked around like a football. It cannot be deactivated and energised at one's convenience. Either we have a constitution or we do not have it. It is akin to pregnancy. Either the woman is pregnant or she is not. As she cannot be 50% pregnant so a country cannot be 50% constitutional. Similar is the case with fundamental rights. Either one has them or one does not have them.

The demand for a new constitution will certainly gain currency. The smaller provinces have had it up to their necks. The MQM and PONEM have cast the first stone and soon other parties would join hands with them. Punjab should have no reason to resist this demand because it has suffered as much as the smaller provinces because of the subversion of the 1973 constitution. The problem arises when the nationalist parties equate Punjab with the military. They consider Punjab and the military as one entity, which is neither true nor justified.

How to go about framing the new constitution? The MQM solution is not only farfetched but outrageous. Usually it is the elected representatives who are given the task of constitution making. The normal course would have been to demand that General Pervez Musharraf call a constitution assembly to frame a new constitution. However, the resolution has demanded that the army should hand over power to those judges of the Supreme Court who had refused to take oath under the PCO and they should be entrusted with the task of formulating a new constitution.

If the constitution has to be remade, it should be done by the representatives of the people. The Supreme Court is the creation of a constitution, therefore, it would be a travesty of the basic principles of constitution-making to ask the creation to recreate its creator. The Supreme Court interprets the constitution; it does not make it.

If Punjab wants to save the 1973 constitution, then it should find a way to annul all the additions and deletions that have been made in it by military dictator General Ziaul Haq. Even a way should be found to undo those constitutional amendments that were rushed through the parliament suspending the rules and procedures.

The MQM and the PONEM consider that the Pakistan Army is not 'national' but Punjabi. Sardar Mengal is of the view that the Pakistan Army was not a national army, but an army of Punjab's four divisions. They have called for the reconstruction of the Army, having equal representation of nations from all provinces so that it could "effectively and practically be presented as the National Army of Pakistan." This is a very patriotic demand and the defence establishment should welcome it. The urge of the smaller provinces to equally participate in the defence of Pakistan should be appreciated. Why should Punjab be acting as the sole thakedar for the defence of Pakistan?

The Punjabis have come under heavy flak in the resolutions and speeches of the nationalist leaders, which have highlighted the Punjabis' mercenary character. A resolution says that it were not Mengal, Achakzai, Imdad Hussain or Altaf Hussain who opened fire at the holy Ka'aba, but the Punjabis. Mr Achakzai accused the Punjabis of having fought on the side of the British against Tipu Sultan. He forgot to mention a Syed family of Lahore that had served Maharaja Ranjit Singh most loyally. And also the Hayats of Wah who pride themselves having sacrificed their lives for Col Nicholson.

The PONEM and MQM have turned the screw throwing a very serious challenge that ought to be faced with courage and intellect. Punjab should atone for all its acts of commission and omission by getting into a productive dialogue with PONEM and MQM. An intellectual and political challenge should be answered intellectually and politically. Any other path would lead to catastrophe. The nationalist leaders have stressed that they do not want further dismemberment of Pakistan adding, "if the existing Pakistan breaks up, it will not be the doing of the smaller provinces but of the Punjabi Army, the civil bureaucracy and the intelligence agencies".