By Yousuf Nazar
While we mourn the murder of Salmaan Taseer by a religious lunatic, let’s get this straight. In the recent history, no country in the Muslim world or the developing world has been able to counter the rise of right-wing radicals or extremism when the secular or liberal parties were led by discredited, corrupt, and incompetent politicians. That is lesson number one. The other is no Muslim leader has been successful when he was or seen as a western stooge. Two most successful Muslim countries that can boast of a functioning democracy over decades and economic development are Turkey and Malaysia. I would encourage Pakistani liberals to dig deeper into the recent history of the two countries. The lesson is clear: discredited and corrupt moderates cannot fight the battle of moderation with outside (read western) help. It has to be fought by credible and popular leadership with strong nationalist credentials like that of Mahathir and Erdogan.
Almost 19 years ago, I wrote a paper at the request of Kamal Azfar, titled ” The Poverty of Policy”. This was published by the Newsline (Karachi) magazine in its May 1992 issue. The article posed what I considered to be the most critical question to the PPP leadership:
“Now faced with fundamental changes in power structures, political parties have two choices: either they play the role of junior partners (to the Army) or give a new and original programme to the masses. This is a historic opportunity. Will Pakistan become a battleground for xenophobic ethnic-ism, religious fundamentalism, and eco-medieval-ism or will the secular and democratic forces be able to prevent the explosion that this combustible convergence of forces may cause, if not in 1992, then perhaps in 2001.”Benazir was aware of the seriousness and magnitude of the danger but her corruption (and that of Mr. Zardari) made her vulnerable to the blackmail of the establishment and the US. Her compromises weakened her political and moral authority and despite her heroic struggle against Zia, her later year’s track record seriously damaged her stature. She had to give her life to redeem herself.
Turkey’s secular parties and their corrupt leaders like former prime ministers Mesut Yilmaz and Tansu Ciller mismanaged Turkey so badly in the 1980s and 1990s that the disenchantment of the otherwise liberal Turks grew to a degree that they have voted for the moderately religious Justice and Development (AK) party- established in 2001- in every election in the last decade. The AK party has givenTurkey its first single party majority government in almost 50 years and has transformed Turkey’s economy in less than 10 years. Compare this with Iran or Algeria. Shah of Iran’s liberal and modern philosophy became irrelevant because the people were fed up with his corruption and oppression. They, in desperation, and wrongly turned to the Mullahs and the rest is history.
In Lebanon, not one but three so-called ‘liberal, pro-western’ but corrupt presidents have been assassinated in the last forty years and public discontent with the traditional political parties has seen the rise of the radical and fundamentalist Hezbollah. In the neighbouring Afghanistan, Karzai cuts a sorry and discredited figure and ridiculed and reviled as a corrupt, drug-pushing, western puppet.
I once worked with Salmaan Taseer in the 1970s. In fact, I started my working life as an intern with his accounting firm in Karachi. He wanted to me to be a director of his new firm First Capital in 1994 and was not happy when I politely refused. As much as I am sad about his death, people like him weakened the liberal cause in Pakistan by supporting Mr. Zardari. The liberal cause in Pakistan cannot be won (and it is very counter-productive) when Pakistan’s largest liberal party is headed by a completely discredited person like Mr. Asif Zardari. There is no hope in hell. Every war needs a credible and competent political leadership for war is too important a business to be left to the generals. Pakistani liberals and the Americans do not seem to get this. What the PPP can do under the less than ideal circumstances if nothing else then for its own survival. It has to make best of what is available. The PPP MNAs and other leaders would be well advised to elect a person like Aitzaz Ehsan as prime minister and replace Zardari with Amin Fahim as president. Better one of them succeed Zardari instead of Faryal Talpur. That would be the proverbial last straw.
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