Dawn, June 6, 2006
The dangers from within
By Dr Tariq Rahman
PAKISTAN faces many dangers from within and without. This discussion looks at the former. There are three broad categories of dangers from within: ethnic conflict, class conflict and ideological conflict.
Let us take them one by one. Pakistan is a multilingual state. In such a state, it is possible to consolidate a group identity in terms of one’s language. As language is one component of culture, such an identity also takes into account cultural elements.
The Bengalis were the first to forge such an identity during the language movements of 1948 and 1952. The Sindhi nationalists did the same but with less strength and success in January 1970 and July 1972. Other groups, such as the Pakhtuns and the Seraikis, also used their respective languages to express separate identities. The reaction of the Pakistani state and the Punjabi-Mohajir elite of the 1950s and the 1960s to such expressions of identity was to declare these as old-fashioned ‘provincialism’.
The fact, however, is that ethnic identity — whether based on language, religion, common experience or some other distinctive perception — is deployed under modern conditions. Identity politics comes into play when different groups compete for jobs, admissions in educational institutions, development funds, powerful positions in the state structure and other goods and services.
It requires modern communications to disseminate the symbols of group identity, to create group solidarity and to organise protests and lobby the state. Pre-modern societies are tied to local economies and they think in terms of tribes, sub-tribes, clans, fraternities (biradaris) and families or in terms of occupational identities (weaver, potter, serf etc) rather than in terms of large identity groups.
Thus, the Pakistani elite dismissed the claims of ethnic leaders during the fifties and sixties as old-fashioned, backward-looking ‘provincialism’. They also used conspiracy theories to portray the ethnic leaders in a bad light. The favourite charge of the establishment was that ethnic movements were inspired by communists and foreign agents. While leftists favoured emancipation and some foreign powers did extend help to certain ethnic leaders, the left was actually weak and disorganised and foreign help did not amount to much. In the last analysis, the movements were as strong as their local supporters. And local support was driven by common grievances.
Ethnic movements are sustained by grievances. Thus, making symbolic concessions does not weaken them. Bengali was made one of the national languages of Pakistan but that did not weaken Bengali nationalism because the grievances did not go away. On the other hand, when Pashto speakers got a greater share in goods and services — through recruitment in the military and bureaucracy, work in the Gulf states, driving, manual labour, trade and smuggling — they abandoned all ideas of an independent Pakhtunistan and started talking about using the name for their province.
Thus, if we analyse the present dangers to the state in Balochistan, we must approach the problem through the grievances of the Baloch. These grievances are based on the distribution of resources, demographic balance and exercising power in the province. The fact is that natural gas is not available as easily to the Baloch as it is to people in Punjab.
The new port of Gwadar promises new jobs, plots of land, urban assets and a new home to the non-Baloch but to the Baloch it is tantamount to taking away a part of their land from them. Moreover, the Baloch feel overwhelmed anyway in their province because of the large Pakhtun presence and the cities being open to settlers. Now the Gwadar port is likely to be mostly non- Baloch.
As regards power, the Baloch are painfully aware that the army exercises the real power. As the army lives in cantonments which are like oases — completely different from Baloch cities and villages — they perceive these cantonments almost as colonial outposts. That is why they oppose them. During my own research on language politics in 1994 in Quetta and Mastung, when the area was quiet, I noticed that everybody resented the way people were stopped and searched in the cantonment. The club in the cantonment, whose facilities were excellent compared to those in the city, was closed even to university faculty. The Baloch considered this deeply insulting. The bitterness must have increased now.
In Sindh, too, the issue of ethnicity is a ticking time bomb. The province is virtually divided between the Urdu-speaking urban areas which support the MQM and the Sindhi-speaking people who look to various nationalist groups for leadership. Both resent the centre’s pocketing of revenues from the sale of cotton and those from the port and city of Karachi. But both have an inbuilt rivalry also. The potential for destabilisation is there and only by realising this can a solution be found.
Class conflict is possible because the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer. Moreover, the electronic media depicts a high quality of life which must be frustrating for most viewers. At the same time, because of privatisation and the withdrawal of subsidies, the state is no longer pushed about providing essential services to the people. Then, the judicial system is so weak that people do not believe they will ever get justice.
Under these circumstances, it is not unusual for people to take to rioting. This conflict can be expressed through the idiom of Islam but the young men used as cannon fodder, are driven by hunger and a sense of vengeance no matter what emotive slogans they use and what they profess to believe in.
Ideological conflict relates to the polarisation of views between the religious lobby and the secularists. Up to now the ruling elite, above all the military, had used the religious lobby to further its own interests, suppress pro-democracy secularists, fight for Kashmir and frighten the West into supporting strong men (mostly military) at the centre. But the religious lobby may become too powerful to be controlled.
After 9/11, the ruling elite is itself deeply divided. Part of it genuinely wants to reverse the policies of the Ziaul Haq era but there are some among it who still want to see a continuation of these. Thus the religious lobby retains its street power and can bring about civil conflict to counter secular forces. This can be really dangerous. Pakistan has survived many undemocratic interludes because even military governments have used the name of democracy to govern the country. The religious lobby may not use this fig leaf at all. And if this happens, we will be sent hurtling back into the dark ages.
Such are the internal dangers to Pakistan. Only seeing them for what they are can make us resolve them.
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