Measure of Success

The quality of a democracy cannot be measured by the power and treatment of the majority, because that would effectively justify mob rule, the Nazification of post-World War I Germany and that radical imposition of majority religious laws as governance for those who do not share majority beliefs as evidenced by Iran. The measure of success for democratic rule is so much more the power and treatment of those who do not share the majority’s mandate. Our forefathers quested for that compromise, reeling from the treatment of religious minorities seeking sanctuary after decades, if not centuries, of religious persecution and even prosecution in continental Europe. That protection of minorities still had a long way to go, even under our system of government, a path that led to the passage of Thirteenth Amendment (banning slavery) and a spate of Supreme Court decisions that bolstered that protection for minority rights.

Any nation that does not cherish its divergent minority elements cannot claim status as a true democracy, and those nations that claim to be democracies but crush minority rights are nothing more than failed or failing states. And so it is with Pakistan, our very uncomfortable “ally” in our desire to subdue those who, by means of murderous terrorism, seek to destroy true democracy and any semblance of rights to any grouping that does not adhere to their strictest application of repressive religious law.

As local political candidates seek to formalize reversal of that policy which seems to have died a long time ago – Pakistan as America’s partner engaged in eliminating these repressive and violent segments of society – these extremist adherents themselves, the Pakistani Taliban, have made it clear that voting in an election to impose any government other than their own governance-by-God system of crushing rules is a sufficient justification for death to such blasphemous voters. Suicide bombers have taken more than a few victims in these discomfiting elections, the first civilian-to-civilian transition of power in Pakistan’s 66-year history!

In the notorious and seemingly ungovernable Tribal Districts, extremists Sunnis, often Taliban-affiliates, have taken to slaughtering their unpopular minority Shiites. This past February, for example, in Quetta, 84 Shiites were killed in a bombing attack, joining the approximately 1,000 other Pakistani Shiites slaughtered in the last five years. Murders brag of their slaughter, ranging through the countryside without the slightest fear of prosecution, as long as the victims are members of unpopular minority sects. What went wrong in this clearly failing state?

In the late 1940s, as England released the subcontinent to self-rule, violence between Muslims and Hindus resulted in bifurcation between primarily Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan (later losing East Pakistan, which formed the independent state of Bangladesh). Writing in the May 10^th New York Times, Manan Ahmed Asif reminds us: “The makers of Pakistan were peasants and laborers. In 1940, they passed a resolution in Lahore to demand a separate homeland for Muslims and an end to British colonial occupation. In 1946, their votes brought a political party, the Muslim League, to power. They chose Muhammad Ali Jinnah, a modernist technocrat, as their leader.

“Jinnah asked his party’s legislators to focus on the well-being of the ‘masses and the poor’ and demanded that ‘every one of you, no matter to what community he belongs, no matter what relations he had with you in the past, no matter what is his color, caste or creed, is first, second and last a citizen of this State with equal rights, privileges and obligations.’ Men like Muhammad Zafrulla Khan (an Ahmadi diplomat) and Raja Amir Ahmad Khan (a Shiite noble) had worked alongside Jinnah for decades to fulfill this dream of equality.

“Yet the birth of Pakistan was not auspicious for minorities. The original claim of Pakistan — religious equality — was the first claim proved false. Muhammad Zafrulla Khan, though he became the first foreign minister, was hounded by religious conservatives, who branded him an apostate because of his Ahmadi faith. Ahmadis, followers of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835-1908), consider themselves part of the Muslim tradition but have faced stern resistance from Sunni Muslims, who accused them of following a false prophet…

“Today, tolerance is under siege from all directions. Even Imran Khan, the sports star turned politician — who enjoys a near-divine status among young, urban Pakistanis — has contributed to the marginalization of minorities. On May 4, he said at a rally that he did not regard Ahmadis as Muslims and would not campaign for their votes. Mr. Khan has based his campaign on a message of ‘change’ reminiscent of President Obama’s in 2008. His statement on Ahmadis was therefore particularly damaging and chilling.

“As a candidate marketing himself as a political outsider, he could have opened up a national conversation on equality of citizenship and reached out to all voters, including Ahmadis, Hindus and Christians. Instead he reaffirmed the political exclusion of minorities and legitimized intolerance in the eyes of his millions of idealistic young followers, who quickly echoed his dismissal in online networks.

“Over the last five years, hundreds of Ahmadis have been targeted and killed in Pakistan’s cities. In 2010, 94 were killed in a terrorist attack in Lahore, and since then their burial grounds, mosques and homes have been under assault. There has been no response from the government, which still refuses to grant them equal status as citizens of Pakistan. Christian communities have also been targeted, and prominent Christian leaders, like Shahbaz Bhatti, the minister of minorities, have been assassinated. While the state has done little to punish these acts, various militant organizations have brazenly claimed credit for them.

“The candidates campaigning in this election, rather than arguing for the rights of all Pakistanis, have further marginalized religious minorities and given license to those who attack them… Despite the rise of satellite television and online media that have allowed mass participation in politics outside of old patronage networks, a new form of majoritarian tyranny has taken hold. It is built on the classic anxieties of the rising middle class: the fear of the other, the conspirator among us.”

The violence-marred elections are over in Pakistan, a “new” leader has emerged. Deposed almost a decade and a half ago by the military, the victor (with less than a full majority) – primarily by reason of the votes generated in his population-heavy Punjab – is former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Thus, he will rule only with a coalition that makes effecting major change more than just an ordinary challenge. While the right wing religious parties were effectively diluted and coopted by Imran Khan (whose party came in second) and therefore pulled a much smaller minority vote than anticipated, their willingness to use violence and intimidation augurs badly unless Sharif and his former military opposition are able to join forces to contain the rampant lawlessness. Unless violence is curtailed and tolerance for minority rights becomes re-prioritized, the failing Pakistani experiment in democracy will fall one giant notch to “fully failed state.” Time will tell.

I’m Peter Dekom, and Pakistan, a nuclear power with a history of spreading that contagion, could easily become the most dangerous country on earth.