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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Pakistan
Index
The Badshahi Mosque, built by the Mughals in the seventeenth
century, as seen from Lahore Fort
Courtesy Embassy of Pakistan, Washington
General Mohammad Zia ul-Haq, chief of the army staff
(COAS),
took control of Pakistan by proclaiming martial law,
beginning
the longest period of rule by a single leader in
Pakistan's
history. It ended only with his death in a
still-unexplained
aircraft crash on August 17, 1988. President Fazal Elahi
Chaudhry
remained in office until his term expired in September
1978, when
Zia assumed that office in addition to his role as chief
martial
law administrator.
In announcing his takeover of the government, Zia
stated that
he had taken action only in order to hold new elections
for
national and provincial assemblies within ninety days.
Political
parties were not banned, and nominations were filed for
seats.
The country expected that a new "free and fair" poll would
take
place. It did not. Zia canceled the elections because, he
said,
it was his responsibility first to carry out a program of
"accountability"; he had "unexpectedly" found
"irregularities" in
the previous regime. As a result, a number of "white
papers" on
topics ranging from fraud in the 1977 elections, to abuses
by the
Federal Security Force, and to Bhutto's manipulation of
the press
were generated. The attacks on the Bhutto administration
increased as time passed and culminated in the trial and
the
hanging in April 1979 of Bhutto for complicity in the
murder of a
political opponent.
After elections were canceled by decree on March 1,
1978, Zia
banned all political activity, although political parties
were
not banned. The same month, some 200 journalists were
arrested,
and a number of newspapers were shut down. Zia, however,
maintained that there would be elections sometime in 1979.
Members of some of the PNA parties, including the
Jamaat-i-Islami
and the Pakistan Muslim League, joined Zia's cabinet as he
tried
to give a civilian cast to his government. But suppression
of the
PPP continued, and at times Bhutto's widow, Nusrat, and
his
daughter, Benazir, were placed under house arrest or
jailed.
Elections for local bodies were held in September 1979 on
a
nonparty basis, a system Zia continued in the 1985
national and
provincial elections. Many of those elected locally
identified
themselves as Awami Dost (friends of the people), a
designation
well known as a synonym for the PPP. Zia announced
national and
provincial elections for November 17 and 20, 1979,
respectively,
but these, too, were canceled. Many thought that the
showing of
the Awami Dost made him fear that a substantial number of
PPP
sympathizers would be elected. As further restrictions
were
placed on political activity, parties were also banned.
On February 6, 1981, the PPP--officially "defunct," as
were
the other parties--and several other parties joined to
form the
Movement for the Restoration of Democracy. Its demands
were
simple: an end to martial law and elections to be held
under the
suspended 1973 constitution. The Movement for the
Restoration of
Democracy demonstrated from time to time against Zia's
government, especially in August 1983, but Zia was able to
withstand its demands. Many of the leaders spent time in
jail.
Nusrat Bhutto brought a suit protesting the martial law
takeover. The Supreme Court ruled against her and invoked
once
again the "doctrine of necessity," permitting the regime
to
"perform all such acts and promulgate all measures, which
[fall]
within the scope of the law of necessity, including the
power to
amend the Constitution." After this ruling, Zia issued the
Provisional Constitutional Order of 1980, which excluded
all
martial law actions from the jurisdiction of the courts.
When the
Quetta High Court ruled that this order was beyond the
power of
the martial law regime, the Provisional Constitutional
Order of
1981 was issued. This order required all judges of the
Supreme
Court and high courts to take new oaths in which they
swore to
act in accordance with the orders. Several judges refused
to do
so and resigned.
In February 1982, in an unsatisfactory response to the
demand
for elections, Zia created an appointed Majlis-i-Shoora
(Council
of Advisers), claiming that this was the pattern of
Islamic law.
The body was clearly unrepresentative and had no powers of
legislation. It served merely as a tame debating body.
The Islamization of Pakistan was another of Zia's
goals. In
1978 he announced that Pakistani law would be based on
Nizam-i-Mustafa, one of the demands of the PNA in the 1977
election. This requirement meant that any laws passed by
legislative bodies had to conform to Islamic law and any
passed
previously would be nullified if they were repugnant to
Islamic
law. Nizam-i-Mustafa raised several problems. Most
Pakistanis are
Sunni, but there is a substantial minority of Shia whose
interpretation of Islamic law differs in some important
aspects
from that of the Sunnis. Zia's introduction of state
collection of
zakat (see Glossary)
was strongly protested by the
Shia, and after they demonstrated in Islamabad, the rules
were modified in 1981 for Shia adherents. There were also major
differences in the views held by the ulama in the
interpretation
of what constituted nonconformity and repugnance in Islam
(see Islam in Pakistani Society
, ch. 2).
In 1979 Zia decreed the establishment of shariat courts
to
try cases under Islamic law. A year later, Islamic
punishments
were assigned to various violations, including drinking
alcoholic
beverages, theft, prostitution, fornication, adultery, and
bearing false witness. Zia also began a process for the
eventual
Islamization of the financial system aimed at "eliminating
that
which is forbidden and establishing that which is enjoined
by
Islam." Of special concern to Zia was the Islamic
prohibition on
interest or riba (sometimes translated as usury)
(see Monetary Process
, ch. 3).
Women's groups feared that Zia would repeal the Family
Laws
Ordinance of 1961, but he did not. The Family Laws
Ordinance
provided women critical access to basic legal protection,
including, among other things, the right to divorce,
support, and inheritance, and it placed limitations on
polygyny.
Still, women found unfair the rules of evidence under
Islamic law
by which women frequently were found guilty of adultery or
fornication when in fact they had been raped. They also
opposed
rules that in some cases equated the testimony of two
women with
that of one man.
After the 1985 election, two members of the Senate from
the
Jamaat-i-Islami introduced legislation to make the sharia
the
basic law of Pakistan, placing it above the constitution
and
other legislation. The bill also would have added the
ulama to
sharia courts and would have prohibited appeals from these
courts
from going to the Supreme Court. The bill did not pass in
1985,
but after the dismissal of Prime Minister Junejo and the
dissolution of the national assembly and provincial
assemblies in
1988, Zia enacted the bill by ordinance. The ordinance
died when
it was not approved by Parliament during the first prime
ministership of Benazir Bhutto (December 1988-August
1990), but a
revised shariat bill was passed by the government of Nawaz
Sharif
(November 1990-July 1993) in May 1991.
Provincialism increased during Zia's tenure. He handled
the
problem of unrest in Balochistan more successfully than
had
Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Zia used various schemes of economic
development to assuage the Baloch and was successful to a
high
degree. The North-West Frontier Province, alarmed at the
presence
of Soviet troops next door after the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan in December 1979, remained relatively quiet.
But the
long-festering division between Sindhis and non-Sindhis
exploded
into violence in Sindh. The muhajirs formed new
organizations, the most significant-being the Refugee
People's
Movement (Muhajir Qaumi Mahaz). The incendiary tensions
resulted
not only from Sindhi-muhajir opposition but also
from
Sindhi fear of others who had moved into the province,
including
Baloch, Pakhtuns, and Punjabis. The fact that Sindhi was
becoming
the mother tongue of fewer and fewer people of Sindh was
also
resented. The violence escalated in the late 1980s to the
extent
that some compared Karachi and Hyderabad to the Beirut of
that
period. The growth of the illicit drug industry also added
to the
ethnic problem.
Pressure on Zia to hold elections mounted, and some of
it
came from overseas, including from the United States. In
1984 Zia
announced that elections to legislative bodies would be
held in
1985, and this time the schedule held.
Zia decided to restore the separate electorates,
abandoned
under Ayub Khan. In the National Assembly, ten of the 217
directly elected seats were set aside for minorities: four
each
for Hindus and Christians and one each for Ahmadiyyas and
"others," including Parsis, Sikhs, and Buddhists. There
were also
twenty indirectly elected seats reserved for women,
although
women could run for directly elected seats. Zia decided
that
parties would not be permitted to participate. Each
candidate,
therefore, would be an "independent."
Before the general elections, Zia held a national
referendum
ostensibly seeking a mandate to continue in office as
president.
The referendum, on December 19, 1984, focused on
Pakistan's
Islamization program. The electorate was asked simply if
it felt
the government was doing a good job of Islamizing the
various
social institutions of the state. Zia interpreted the
positive
results (98 percent voting "yes") to mean that he had
received
the right to a new five-year term as head of state. There
was,
however, little doubt that the vote was rigged.
After the "election," which most PPP supporters
boycotted,
Zia announced the appointment of Mohammad Khan Junejo as
prime
minister, subject to a vote of confidence in the National
Assembly. Junejo, a Sindhi, took office on March 23, 1985.
Zia
issued the Revival of the Constitution of 1973 Order,
which was a
misnomer. The constitution was so vastly changed by
various
decrees that it was much different from the one enacted by
the
Bhutto regime. In the 1973 document, power had been in the
hands
of the prime minister; by 1985 it was in the hands of the
president.
Zia promised to end martial law by the end of 1985, but
he
exacted a high price for this. The Eighth Amendment to the
constitution confirmed and legalized all acts taken under
martial
law, including changes to the constitution. It affirmed
the right
of the president to appoint and dismiss the prime
minister. With
the amendment passed, Zia ended martial law in late 1985.
Political parties were revived. In 1986 Junejo became
president
of a revived Pakistan Muslim League. The PPP, although
self-excluded from the National Assembly, also resumed
activity
under the leadership of Benazir Bhutto.
Junejo, however, was not able to accomplish all of
Zia's
agenda. For example, his government did not pass the
sharia bill.
It allowed the resumption of political parties, a step not
welcomed by Zia, who saw parties as divisive in what
should be a
united Islamic community. Nonetheless, the dismissal of
Junejo on
May 29, 1988, and the dissolution of the national and
provincial
assemblies the next day, came as a surprise. In explaining
his
action, Zia pointed to the failure to carry Islamization
forward
and also to corruption, deterioration of law and order,
and
mismanagement of the economy. Another important reason for
Junejo's dismissal was his interference in army promotions
and
his call for an investigation into an arsenal explosion
near
Islamabad; civilians were not expected to meddle in
military
affairs.
Zia procrastinated on calling new elections, which even
his
own version of the constitution required within ninety
days. He
finally set November 17, 1988, as the polling date for the
National Assembly, with provincial elections three days
later.
His reasons for the delay were the holy month of Muharram,
which
fell in August during the hot weather, and the lack of
current
electoral registrations (a point he blamed on Junejo).
Despite
the open operation of political parties, Zia indicated
that
elections would again be on a nonparty basis. Before
elections
took place, Zia was killed in a mysterious aircraft
accident near
Bahawalpur, in Punjab, on August 17, 1988, along with the
chairman of the joint chiefs committee, the United States
ambassador, and twenty-seven others. A joint United
States-
Pakistani committee investigating the accident later
established
that the crash was caused by "a criminal act of sabotage
perpetrated in the aircraft."
Court actions ended the nonparty basis for the
elections, and
parties were permitted to participate. A technicality--the
failure to register as a political party--that would have
prohibited the PPP from taking part was also voided. The
election
gave a plurality, not a majority, to the PPP. Its leader,
Benazir
Bhutto, was able to gain the assistance of other groups,
and she
was sworn in as prime minister on December 1, 1988, by
acting
President Ghulam Ishaq Khan. He in turn was elected to a
five-year term as president by the National Assembly and
the
Senate.
Data as of April 1994
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