Pakistan - Military courts and our politicians

Atif Hussain

It is easy to heap all the blame onto ‘dictators’ for everything from the destruction of institutions to the rise of terrorism. However, might we remind ourselves that we are into our seventh year of the post-Musharraf era? What have our democratic governments done to reform institutions like the police and lower judiciary?

Outraged at the acquittal of terrorists, the military establishment has decided it has had enough. It will now expand its role and assume judicial functions also to prevent terrorists from walking away from courts scot-free. To legitimise its new role, it has talked politicians into amending nothing less than the Constitution, its basic features actually.

This is really not a good idea. Setting up military courts will not only result in increased miscarriage of justice and undermining of the independence of the judiciary but the fruitfulness of these courts in terms of controlling terrorism is also highly debatable. To think that speedy (not necessarily fair) trails and harsh punishments are all we need to cure the scourge of terrorism is extremely naive if not entirely stupid. No doubt, crushing the terrorists is absolutely necessary but to ensure that the problem never surfaces again we need to strengthen institutions, not undermine them.

But there is more than just over-simplistic khaki logic in the whole episode to be concerned about, for it signifies a complete failure of the constitutionally sanctioned civilian institutional setup and admittance of the same fact by the political leadership, which must now must accept blame for not only giving in to military demands too easily but also for letting the situation deteriorate to such a point where they had had no other option left. Our politicians never tire of lecturing us on the blessings of democracy, denouncing anti-democratic forces (read generals), recounting ‘sacrifices’ they have made for the cause of democracy, eulogising their ‘martyrs’, branding agitation as conspiracy aimed at derailing democracy and displaying bravado about saving democracy. However, every now and then something happens that reminds us of who they actually are: a bunch of pygmies who not only lack the will but also the vision, courage and competence to carve out solutions for the real problems of this country.

Babbling on about democracy is one thing; actually strengthening it is another. It requires reforming, developing and empowering institutions. It is easy to heap all the blame onto ‘dictators’ for everything from the destruction of institutions to the rise of terrorism. However, might we remind ourselves that we are into our seventh year of the post-Musharraf era? What have our democratic governments done to reform institutions like the police and lower judiciary, which are of vital importance not only in maintaining law and order but also in instilling in the public a sense of security and trust in the system?

What our politicians are still doing to these institutions is evident from a media report according to which only 15 percent of the cases in the Islamabad and Rawalpindi Anti-Terrorism Courts (ATCs) involve actual incidents of terrorism. The rest are either against politicians or are related to petty crimes.

The National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA) is still waiting to be made fully functional five years after its inception. The inefficiency of the federal and provincial governments and law enforcement agencies can be gauged from the fact that after every incident of terror we learn that the concerned government was informed about the possibility of the attack well in advance but it either did not do anything or failed to prevent it.

Nothing has been done to stop political manipulation of the police either. Nor has anything been done to equip the police force with modern skills and technology. If Imran Khan is to be believed, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police still do not even have call tracing equipment.

Also, time and again politicians have proved themselves unable to make big decisions. They have had to be arm-twisted into sanctioning military action against the Taliban and they still do not seem to have mustered up the courage to launch or even mention madrassa (seminary) and mosque reforms.

It is about time our politicians realised that they cannot hide behind the smokescreen of fustian attitudes forever. They will have to actually start delivering now.