English Essay :)

Topic: Democracy in Pakistan: Hopes and Hurdles.

1. Introduction

What is Democracy?

Democracy, according to the modern definition, is a way of governing the country in which the
citizens can take part in the elective procedure of representatives who will run the government
afterward. Although there are some age restrictions on taking part in the elective procedure in many
countries – like in Pakistan where you can exercise voting after turning 18, there is such a balance in
the democracy that no single person holds the power to change the odds. So it’s rather a right of
masses to decide.

History of Democracy in Pakistan:

Pakistan was established on the ideology of Muslim motherland but it is often disregarded that one
of the key ideologies of the establishment of Pakistan was a democracy. Pakistan is still a democratic
parliamentary republic in constitutional terms as the electoral system is practiced in Pakistan.
However, the country is widely regarded as one of the most politically disturbed ones because of so
many deviations from democracy in the past. Pakistan has seen several military coups since its
creation and political uncertainty is seen more often due to variations in the past.

2. Military rule:

There have been several attempts of military coups in the history of Pakistan since 1951 but not all of
them were successful. However, three successful attempts led to an era of military rule beginning
just 11 years after the creation of the country in 1958 when Iskandar Mirza – then Major General,
announced a coup after dismissing the assembly. He was then replaced by Ayub Khan shortly after
being appointed as the chief martial law administrator.

There was another successful coup attempt in 1977 when General Zia ul Haq overthrew the Pakistan
National Assembly and dissolved all the provincial assemblies in an operation called “Operation fair
play”. General Zia ordered custody of all the top political leaders of the country at that time –
including Mr. Bhutto and the leaders of Pakistan National Alliance. His rule is regarded among the
strictest ones in promoting religious movements and demolishing the democratic movements.
There have been another enforced but bloodless coup just two decades ago in 1999 by the Chief of
army staff General Pervez Musharraf who ceased the functioning government of publicly elected
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Tensions between the Prime minister and chairman joint chief of staff
led to the military coup when Gen Musharraf wasn’t allowed to land after his official visit to Sri Lanka
– loyal officers of Pakistan army didn’t accept orders of newly appointed army chief of staff and
arrested Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

3. Renewals of democracy:

Pakistan has always managed to take up a democracy after every military coup by forming a large
struggle each time. Political decisions of democratic representatives have long been refused to
accept since the Kashmir war between Pakistan and India when then army commander-in-chief
General Gracy and air force commander-in-chief Air Vice Marshal Richard Atcherley didn’t follow
orders of Pakistan’s first Governor-General Mr. Jinnah.

There was a successful democratic uphold in 1951 when a military coup attempt by Major General
Akbar Khan was foiled. The hope of democracy rose once again after a long era of military rule by
Gen. Ayub Khan when Field Marshal Ayub Khan was accused of failing the Kashmir Mujahideen
Movement just after the Sino-Indian war of 1962 and then after 1965 Indo-Pak War in 1970
elections.

There was a chance of fresh democracy after the death of long-ruling General Zia ul Haq in 1988 and
it was so. There were numerous publicly elected governments after that till the coup of 1999 led by
General Musharraf. After the issuance of pardon to Nawaz Sharif by then Chief Executive Pervez
Musharraf and legalization of 1999 coup by the Supreme court of Pakistan, there was a slight hope of
things changing a bit towards democracy. But that became certain when the right groups inside
Pakistan labeled the referendum held by Gen. Musharraf as fake. Pakistan Muslim League challenged
the results of the referendum but their claims were rejected by the Supreme Court.

4. Hopes for democracy:

Qaed was strongly in favor of democracy as he was mentioned too many times saying that Pakistan
will have a democratic system in which people would be free to elect their leader. Hopes for the
development and continued democracy are very high due to the optimistic ongoing civil-military
relations in Pakistan. People are learning to choose what they stand for and what they need from a
leader and that is a sign of transition towards a permanent democracy. People are becoming
increasingly aware of the tactics used by previous governments and they prefer those who, in their
minds, is the real savior of democracy in Pakistan. However, there is still a space of improvement for
far off areas of Pakistan where the literacy rate is low so they can be manipulated into thinking about
anti-democratic agendas.
Accountability is improving in Pakistan since the National Accountability Bureau Ordinance of 1999
and National Accountability Bureau is active against any government or local official who is a
defaulter or is under suspicion on such charges. The mutual intelligence sharing of different law
enforcement agencies and the National Accountability Bureau has boomed in recent years so it is
easy to say that history can be avoided to repeat itself in the matters of accountability.

Recently in 2017, Election Reforms Bill was passed in Pakistan by the constitutional national assembly
which will be the leading hope for continued democracy in Pakistan as it strengthens and increases
the role of Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) by providing autonomous and legal right even
before and after the elections. This act is functional since 2017 and it will be a solid hope for the fair
elections in Pakistan first of which will be in 2018. It is a general perspective in Pakistan that the foul
elections would be the fall of democracy and history has proved it but now with election commission
monitoring every activity during elections with greater strength, there is a very optimistic vibe for fair
elections.

There wasn’t enough settling time for democracy after the martial laws in the previous times but
now a second publicly elected government is set to complete its tenure and that is a great reason to
think of safe future for democracy in Pakistan. No threat from the armed forces is yet active for
democracy and militant organizations that were in favor of military rule have also been banned and
eliminated to some extent. There have been many attempts of a coup in Pakistan just because of
civil-military conflicts but times are changing now because Pakistani armed forces have never been
so in favor of democracy as now. The political system in Pakistan is stable since the PPP government
and it looks like it’ll continue to be the case in the future too.

Constitutional crisis in Pakistan has been a reason for riots, chaos, coups, and protests in the past but
now Pakistan has a great functional constitutional system. Although there have been some
corrigenda in the constitution of 1973 that reflect the immediate response of the judiciary system
towards the changing needs in law. People trust the justice system and there are near to none cases
of disobedience of court orders recently. Supreme Court of Pakistan is taking promising measures to
ensure the robust and unbiased justice served to every citizen of Pakistan. Functional judiciary
system points toward the thriving democracy while a failed justice system leads to the end of it and
Pakistan is on the thriving road if looked justly.

One of the key roles of Former President Gen. Musharraf was the implementation of local level
government in which the locals can take part in the elections of union councils which then manage
the needs of locals and the development of local infrastructure. This resolved the issue of
overdeveloping state-level structure and not involving locals in the authoritative decision-making
process. It is as good as the democracy gets and because of the implementation of this idea, a lot of
improvement in the democracy is seen in Pakistan – the scale of which is higher than during most of
the history of Pakistan.
Illiterate leaders always fail to take mature decisions in the dynamic world and thus cannot
guarantee fair play before, during and after the elective procedure. Illiteracy of Pakistani leaders has
always been a problem for democracy because of less knowledge about the importance of
democracy but now young, energetic, and educated leaders are coming forward which hold
promising future for both democracy and development of Pakistan. One such example of educated
leaders is current Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi who is an engineer.

5. Hurdles in Democracy:

Since the start, there is one main hurdle in the development and revival of democracy in Pakistan
and that is civil-military relations. There are still chances of coups in the future if the military and
elected government do not cooperate in a good fashion. Lack of democracy always fills with a greater
influence of military involvement in the matters of government and that leads to permanent control
of a publicly elected government.

The literacy rate must be escalated quickly in order to maintain a peaceful culture of democracy in
Pakistan because people need to understand the importance of democracy and its benefits towards
the whole country. At least the current elected government should focus more and more on the
development of minds by educating people and then letting them choose the right decision. That
way, there’ll be no political tensions as the people will learn to elect those who are beneficial to both
the country and the nation.

Politics of Pakistan is not what it used to be because of the remains of military teachings in the minds
of today’s political leaders. It is changing gradually but political decision making among even the top
Pakistani politicians is biased so the key factor of non-democratic forces taking the advantage is still
out there which can lead to the demise of struggled democracy. There is a dire need of right
decisions from the representatives of government because history has given us this lesson that the
political instability arises due to bad decisions of reigning governments.

Corruption is also a great factor which plays an important role in the ousting of democracy. People
demand military rule when either they don’t see any development or they see a great increase in
corruption in the government. One such example is of Nawaz Sharif, the three-time elected prime
minister. His government has been overthrown two times due to suspicion of corruption. So
corruption in any department is a bitter hurdle in Pakistan’s democracy. Corruption can be stopped
however by issuing strict verdicts and it is a national obligation for both government and Supreme
Court to counter corruption.

When a government fails to provide justice to the citizens, there is a greater chance of people getting
out of their homes and protest. When that happens, riots emerge from every corner of the country
and eventually, the military has to take control of the governing body in their hands. There will be no
such incidents and eventual ending of democracy if the government keeps its promises and provide
timely justice to its citizens.

Mr. Bhutto was able to rise up with a huge following because of his motto – Food, Cloth, and House.
That was just because humans crave these basic needs and they prefer basic needs over even
national interests sometimes especially in Pakistan where poverty is one of the largest issues since its
creation. Because of that, the elections can be manipulated by illegal campaign money which could
be donated as charity to the poor masses in order to drive them into ticking the desired sign on the
ballot paper. It’s obvious that there will be protests by both the actual literal society who had voted
and the losing party which will not be settled until the military gets involved and that too can lead
away from democracy. The same case would occur if the justly elected parliamentary government
fails to provide basic needs to the people, this time having to face more resistance from the
opposition too. So poverty and lack of provision of basic needs is amongst the deadly hurdles in the
democratic future of Pakistan.

Accountability is important for the continued support of people in any country and Pakistan is no
exception. Democracy demands that the voice of masses must be heard whether it is for their rights
or it is for the accountability of the elected members of government whom the nation trusted.
Pakistan has a dark history in this matter where accountability wasn’t forced to be practiced even for
the highest-ranked officials. Recent role of National Accountability Bureau in the case against Nawaz
Sharif and other elected members of Pakistani Parliament is a good sign but no one is sure about the
future as the history schools Pakistanis not to be so optimistic when it comes to accountability of
officials. There are hundreds of case studies in Pakistan showing that lack of accountability has
always loosened the influence of government. And it is a well-known fact that when the government
loses control, the anti-democratic forces start to gain too much influence which eventually leads to
the immaculate transition of democracy. So the government’s control in the matters country as a
whole is an important factor which might derail the democracy.

6. *Conclusion:*

Pakistan is still a young and developing country struggling to fit democracy into its roots for longer
periods than past. Countries like the United States and the United Kingdom have a long history of
civil wars and civil-military conflicts which led to an eventual understanding of the importance of
democracy among people. But for Pakistan, there is still plenty to look forward as our homeland is
just 70 years old. Future of democracy in Pakistan is bright as long as the civil-military relations stay
on the course and neither of both starts a conflict with each other. There are some hurdles in the
continual support and supremacy of democracy in Pakistan but these are being removed from the
scene as Pakistan leans toward a harmonious future of democracy.