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The way forward for the minorities of Pakistan
Yasser Latif Hamdani
The tragic assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti, the federal minister for minorities, was the direct consequence of Pakistan People’s Party’s (PPP’s) abandonment of Salmaan Taseer’s cause. After the cold-blooded murder of Salmaan Taseer, the PPP responded with its usual inaction. This was in keeping with the Bhutto legacy of course. As a student of history and politics, Bhutto had rightly concluded that Pakistan’s establishment had mounted the first religious coup in Pakistan against Khawaja Nazimuddin’s Muslim League ministry by feeding the Ahrar against it on the Ahmedi issue. Therefore, when the anti-Ahmedi riots broke out in 1974, Bhutto outflanked (or so he thought) the establishment by excommunicating this small urban sect from Islam. It did not work out for him though and he was soon dispatched by a fascist military dictator.
The consensus in the PPP from top to bottom on the evening of January 4, 2011 was that the hidden hand is mobilising the right wing against the PPP government again. The answer according to the think tanks of the party was to appease the mullahs at all costs. I wonder if that included sacrificing another key PPP stalwart?
The media has predictably reacted badly to Shahbaz Bhatti’s assassination. Everyone from the American CIA to Indian RAW has been accused of conspiring to destabilise Pakistan, desperately trying to deflect attention from the real issue. So emboldened by the state’s appeasement are the extremists that they are now able to kill and maim people with impunity and then celebrate it with banners on key roads of Pakistan’s urban centres. Unless the state moves decisively against them, our country is in for further heartbreak.
For days now we have heard the right noises but no action. We have heard religious leader after religious leader preach how Islam treats minorities equitably and justly. One wonders, then, why all the ulema of Sunni Tehreek and other sectarian groups are so unwilling to follow the glorious traditions of Islam and treat minorities generously? The rhetoric of the ulema sounds quite hollow given their actions. It was the bearded gentlemen of the Sunni Tehreek who had threatened the people who condemned Taseer’s murder with death. For them to turn around and condemn Shahbaz Bhatti’s murder is strange to say the least. Perhaps they realise that the world is not going to allow them to carry on with impunity. Therefore, every mullah and his mother-in-law are claiming the existence of a hidden foreign hand as being behind the atrocity. There is no foreign hand behind it. It is the three decades of General Ziaul Haq’s warped ideology that is behind it and it is the remnants of his illegal rule, the Jamaat-e-Islami and other self-styled thekeydars (guardians) of religion who are responsible.
However, there is a very important lesson for the minorities and liberal groups in the country. Silence is not an option and supporting the PPP as the lesser of the many evils is not going to work anymore. Even by conservative estimates Pakistan’s religious minorities number close to 10 million. That is more than the populations of Libya, Bahrain and the UAE combined. All religious and sectarian minorities need to come together on one platform with the Left and liberal groups in the country and form a grand coalition on a one-point agenda — holding the state to Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s August 11 pledge to the people of Pakistan and the world. The clearest duty on the part of every church and minority community organisation is to gather together their flock and take a cue from the civil rights movement to mobilise them in order to achieve real equality of citizenship and their stake in that ever-elusive Pakistaniat. Depending on the good behaviour of the majority is bad strategy, especially when we have a majority that is not only callous and cruel but is incapable of doing the right thing even in its own interest. The minorities and liberals must forge the power required to protect themselves constitutionally and legally. Only then can Pakistan be pulled back from the brink.
Meanwhile, Pakistanis in general — of whatever faith — can start by being honest: minorities in Pakistan are neither safe nor prosperous. Lying about it and claiming that minorities enjoy fundamental rights and freedoms, which were promised to them as citizens of Pakistan by Jinnah and the constitution, will only discredit us further. The first thing would be to stop pointing fingers at others for human rights violations.
The writer is a lawyer. He also blogs at pakteahouse.net and can be reached at yasser.hamdani@gmail.com
Yasser Latif Hamdani
The tragic assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti, the federal minister for minorities, was the direct consequence of Pakistan People’s Party’s (PPP’s) abandonment of Salmaan Taseer’s cause. After the cold-blooded murder of Salmaan Taseer, the PPP responded with its usual inaction. This was in keeping with the Bhutto legacy of course. As a student of history and politics, Bhutto had rightly concluded that Pakistan’s establishment had mounted the first religious coup in Pakistan against Khawaja Nazimuddin’s Muslim League ministry by feeding the Ahrar against it on the Ahmedi issue. Therefore, when the anti-Ahmedi riots broke out in 1974, Bhutto outflanked (or so he thought) the establishment by excommunicating this small urban sect from Islam. It did not work out for him though and he was soon dispatched by a fascist military dictator.
The consensus in the PPP from top to bottom on the evening of January 4, 2011 was that the hidden hand is mobilising the right wing against the PPP government again. The answer according to the think tanks of the party was to appease the mullahs at all costs. I wonder if that included sacrificing another key PPP stalwart?
The media has predictably reacted badly to Shahbaz Bhatti’s assassination. Everyone from the American CIA to Indian RAW has been accused of conspiring to destabilise Pakistan, desperately trying to deflect attention from the real issue. So emboldened by the state’s appeasement are the extremists that they are now able to kill and maim people with impunity and then celebrate it with banners on key roads of Pakistan’s urban centres. Unless the state moves decisively against them, our country is in for further heartbreak.
For days now we have heard the right noises but no action. We have heard religious leader after religious leader preach how Islam treats minorities equitably and justly. One wonders, then, why all the ulema of Sunni Tehreek and other sectarian groups are so unwilling to follow the glorious traditions of Islam and treat minorities generously? The rhetoric of the ulema sounds quite hollow given their actions. It was the bearded gentlemen of the Sunni Tehreek who had threatened the people who condemned Taseer’s murder with death. For them to turn around and condemn Shahbaz Bhatti’s murder is strange to say the least. Perhaps they realise that the world is not going to allow them to carry on with impunity. Therefore, every mullah and his mother-in-law are claiming the existence of a hidden foreign hand as being behind the atrocity. There is no foreign hand behind it. It is the three decades of General Ziaul Haq’s warped ideology that is behind it and it is the remnants of his illegal rule, the Jamaat-e-Islami and other self-styled thekeydars (guardians) of religion who are responsible.
However, there is a very important lesson for the minorities and liberal groups in the country. Silence is not an option and supporting the PPP as the lesser of the many evils is not going to work anymore. Even by conservative estimates Pakistan’s religious minorities number close to 10 million. That is more than the populations of Libya, Bahrain and the UAE combined. All religious and sectarian minorities need to come together on one platform with the Left and liberal groups in the country and form a grand coalition on a one-point agenda — holding the state to Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s August 11 pledge to the people of Pakistan and the world. The clearest duty on the part of every church and minority community organisation is to gather together their flock and take a cue from the civil rights movement to mobilise them in order to achieve real equality of citizenship and their stake in that ever-elusive Pakistaniat. Depending on the good behaviour of the majority is bad strategy, especially when we have a majority that is not only callous and cruel but is incapable of doing the right thing even in its own interest. The minorities and liberals must forge the power required to protect themselves constitutionally and legally. Only then can Pakistan be pulled back from the brink.
Meanwhile, Pakistanis in general — of whatever faith — can start by being honest: minorities in Pakistan are neither safe nor prosperous. Lying about it and claiming that minorities enjoy fundamental rights and freedoms, which were promised to them as citizens of Pakistan by Jinnah and the constitution, will only discredit us further. The first thing would be to stop pointing fingers at others for human rights violations.
The writer is a lawyer. He also blogs at pakteahouse.net and can be reached at yasser.hamdani@gmail.com
