Doctrine of reality

Thursday’s judgement by the Supreme Court rejected the ruling of the Deputy Speaker last Sunday that resulted in the dissolution of the National Assembly before the vote of no-confidence could take place.

Sticking strictly to the letter of the law and the constitution, were the SC holier than thou when they called Shahbaz Sharif to the rostrum while very delicately avoiding asking him why he was likely to be indicted on April 11, 2022? In short order, they set the stage for Pakistan to again be ruled by those who are known to have grabbed wealth with both hands over the decades and have even shipped a good chunk of it out of the country.

In my article “Fox protecting the Hens”, I had taken extracts from the NAB investigation report against Shahbaz Sharif and Hamza Sharif (likely to be the Pakistan PM and the CM of Punjab) and I quote, “Consider the case study of one of the families consisting of 5 members from a larger, corrupt to the core, family group during the period 2005 – 2015. Records show this faction of the family alone received 226 TTs worth Rs. 159.7 crores in their accounts in Lahore with Bank Alfalah (Circular Road Branch and Badami Bagh Branch), Silk Bank (Main Branch, Circular Road Branch and Gulberg CIBC), Faysal Bank (NGT Branch and Main Blvd Branch). The TTs were remitted by different money changers of UK and UAE under fake identities, this is well documented. And who were those who facilitated the internal remittances? Muhammad Irfan (US$ 165962), Roidar Khan (US$ 45950), Syed Dinar Ali Shah (US$ 99000), Imran Faiz (US$ 157880). A money exchange company in Lahore arranged 24 fake foreign remittances of US$ 24.30 million to these accounts by “ghost remitters”. Ghost remitters included Ghulam Rasool (US$ 159960), Mohammad Kamal (US$ 139980), Muhammad Shakoor (US$ 137440), Muhammad Aurangzeb (US$ 69960), Ghulam Ghous (US$ 663560), Mohammad Kashif (US$ 399860), etc. and it goes on and on. In fact, a different set of 9 individuals deposited Rs. 51.52 crores from a Benami account.”

The aforementioned is only the tip of the iceberg; the investigation report concerning Benami accounts, fake companies, money-laundering, etc runs into 152 pages. Maybe our Lordships in the SC can summon this report from NAB before anointing Shahbaz Sharif as PM?

The main task of the new government that is going to come up after Saturday’s no-confidence vote in the reinstated parliament – except for any abrupt and unexpected turns that are always to be expected in Pakistan – will be first and foremost to prevent NAB and FIA to pursue the cases against the now again ruling families. They will then stop overseas Pakistanis from voting; the feudal elite will continue using the tool of democracy with virtuosity in their own interest.

Today’s situation is just another proof that democracy without democratically minded people cannot work because the idea of equality of men and the commitment to the rule of law are preconditions for democracy to work in spirit and letter.

The verdict that the bench of five judges of the SC delivered could not have been ruled differently, but the mistake lies with the Deputy Speaker who should have attached the minutes of the National Security Council meeting which had met the day before the fateful meeting of Parliament, to the documents that were being submitted to the SC. Those proceedings would have given the judges a choice to rule differently in the face of a national security event that had been established by the NSC.

Our constitutional frame work is running upon the Doctrine of Separation of Powers under which the three branches of government i.e. the judiciary (courts), legislative body (parliament) and executive (government) are separate from each other and would not intervene in the domain of each other. Parliament is supreme and no one can give an order to summon the session of Parliament. In paragraph No. 09, the Supreme Court ordered the Speaker that the session be summoned on April 9, 2022. In fact, the session of National Assembly or Senate of Pakistan can only be summoned by the President of Pakistan and not by the Speaker. However, there were options available to Imran Khan’s government (i) Speaker or Deputy Speaker could have declared again with a new ruling in his chamber that Supreme Court has no right to intervene in the Domain of National Assembly (Parliament) and the Speaker has the right to pass the ruling (and this time attach Minutes of the National Security Council Meeting) either during the proceedings of the House or in his office. Both type of rulings would have the same effect and/or (ii) The PTI and allies could submit their mass resignations to the Speaker.

The sorry side effect of all this is that our relationship with the U.S has been damaged. In the past, during the Cold War era, Pakistan had not much of a choice to be in the U.S camp politically because Pakistan had to depend upon the U.S economically and militarily. We have paid a heavy price for the war in Afghanistan, first against the Soviet Union and then for US/Western geopolitical interests.

Our recent foreign policy strategy is to keep out of power camps and develop an equal distance to global power centres, but this was bound to affect Pakistan-US relations. This new geo-economic strategy does not mean to shy away from relations with the U.S. Of course, given the change in global power dynamics and our long-standing friendship with China – a neighbour that is bringing badly needed investments in our country – Pakistan’s relations with China and other immediate powers like Russia and the CAR have a certain pre-eminence. In any case, while preventing interference from any country in our internal affairs is a must, fanning anti-American feelings in a highly emotional country like Pakistan is not a good idea.

Given this state of affairs, is there any way out of the rather bleak future that is opening up in front of us? Well, one possibility could be, for instance, the mass resignation of the PTI members (and their allies) from their seats in parliament. That would necessitate by-elections so as to fill the seats necessary or the forthcoming budget vote.

For the time being, Imran Khan has lost power, but hopefully not his self-confidence. While mistakes have been made, learning from them is the way forward. Pakistan badly needs an alternative to the established and corrupt parties that over the decades have dominated by using illegally obtained money for getting legitimacy and subverting justice.

The writer is a defence and security analyst