[sacw] sacw dispatch #2 (16 Oct.99)

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Web Dispatch #2
16 October 1999

#1. A Flawed Democracy Failed to Hold Pakistan Together
#2. For Many Pakistanis, Coup Premieres to Applause
#3. Lokshahi Manch (Mumbai, India)
#4. Dazed & Unorganized/ Book Review
#5. Indian Supreme Court Decides Not To Prosecute NBA Or Arundhati Roy
______________________________
#1.
International Herald Tribune
Paris, Saturday, October 16, 1999

A FLAWED DEMOCRACY FAILED TO HOLD PAKISTAN TOGETHER
By Philip Bowring

LONDON - There may be an aura of inevitability surrounding the coup in
Pakistan. But it would be foolish to welcome it just because Nawaz Sharif's
government had become very unpopular, abused its power and proved
incompetent at tackling the nation's myriad political and economic crises.
-----
That said, it is important that the international community refrain from
knee-jerk, death-of-democracy responses to retaliate with aid cuts and
other sanctions. International influence should be kept in reserve for use
in dissuading the generals who are now in power from adventurism in
Kash-mir or other Indian fronts.
It is certainly sad to see another Pakistani attempt at parliamentary
democracy end in this way. But the reactions of some of Mr. Sharif's
political opponents scarcely suggest a deep commitment to the democratic
process. For one, his predecessor, Benazir Bhutto, appears to think that he
got his just deserts for abuse of power and for hounding her in the courts.
The emphasis of so much other comment and the muted public reaction in
Pakistan so far point in the same direction of apathy or antipathy. Yet the
failings of Mr. Sharif, like the statements
of Miss Bhutto, point to two fundamental flaws in Pakistani democracy.
=46irst, the elite has failed to agree on the rules of the game. This has
meant not merely the use of extraparliamentary methods against opponents.
It is reflected in the clashes between the prime minister and the
president, the executive and the judiciary, the center and the provinces.
Strains between power centers take place everywhere, but they have been
especially destabilizing in Pakistan.
Some recent difficulties may have been generated by Mr. Sharif's political
maneuvering, but underlying them was a broader failure to agree on making
the constitution work. Mr. Sharif may have failed as prime minister, but
the failure of institutions is more serious.
Second, democracy has failed to undermine the grip of feudalism on rural
Pakistan and to invest scarce government resources in areas such as
education, which would have social as well as economic returns.
A weak and highly politicized central government, meanwhile, has been
unable to cope with regional disorders, which are often financed by drug
money or related to small but highly virulent Islamic groups. Both of these
major ills are legacies of the Afghanistan war.
Can the military do any better? Conceivably it can and will be more
ruthless in dealing with some of the drug-financed gangs and in asserting
central power more effectively and less corruptly.
But there are dangers here, too. A democratic system, however flawed, has
given voice to the major regional differences that exist and that must be
accommodated if the nation is to hold together other than by the force of
the army.
The military's attitude toward religion will also be important in
assessing its contribution. Will it accept that the majority of the
electorate has given scant support to fundamentalist parties, preferring
the concept that Pakistan is a ''state for Muslims'' rather than one that
must apply Islamic tenets to all things? Or will the military try to use
religion both as a domestic crutch and as reason for a more aggressive
attitude toward India?
Whatever his other failings, the underlying reason for Mr. Sharif's
downfall was the disastrous adventure in Kashmir, whose failure was a
humiliation for the army. The army, however, bears much responsibility for
this ill-judged action. The world has reason to thank Mr. Sharif for giving
in to international pressure and to Indian arms, and backing off.
The army may be accepted for now. But it will soon have to prove that it
has a coherent political agenda and is not just motivated by antipathy
toward Mr. Sharif. Pakistan may need better and less corrupt government,
but it also needs to maintain some well-entrenched traditions of freedom of
speech. It must keep government in civilian hands within a more disciplined
framework.
The army will have to avoid the reprisals and blood feuds that have marked
Pakistani politics for so long. It should also continue the policy of
accommodation with India that Mr. Sharif generally tried to practice. It
must show that it wants to take a lead in Pakistan's social and economic
modernization.
General Pervez Musharraf, the army chief of staff who is now in power, is
likely to be judged more by what he does in the future than what he did in
leading the coup on Tuesday. He must prove that his action was not yet
another step backward for a beleaguered state.
______________________________
#2.
New York Times
October 16, 1999

=46OR MANY PAKISTANIS, COUP PREMIERES TO APPLAUSE

By TIM WEINER with STEVE LeVINE

RAWALPINDI, Pakistan -- If there is such a thing as a good coup, this
one is winning raves in the bazaars of Rawalpindi.

A decade of crooked and incompetent civilian rule before the
takeover this week, a decade of competently brutal dictatorship before
that, and life keeps getting harder for Pakistan's 138 million souls. A
Pakistani poet, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, once was asked what would become of his
nation. "My great fear," he said, "is that nothing will happen. Things
will go on the way they are."

There is not much passion for politicians or for going to the
polls again. There is a thirst for leadership, or even something
stronger.

"I don't think there should be any elections," said Kalsoon Syed, an
elementary school principal. "There should be a strong dictator."

The American Ambassador, William B. Milam, met Friday for 90 minutes with
the coup leader, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, at the army's headquarters here
just hours after the general declared himself the country's chief
executive, suspended the Constitution and dismissed Parliament. The
general's Government also froze the assets of more than 500 politicians,
including Nawaz Sharif, the ousted Prime Minister, and his predecessor,
Benazir Bhutto. Western diplomats said the Ambassador had given the
general a message from President Clinton calling on him to return the
nation to civilian rule as early as possible.

Clinton may be calling for a return to democratic principles, but
politicians here have rarely practiced them. For 11 years since the end of
the last military dictatorship, most of them have behaved like medieval
barons, plundering what remained of the nation's wealth.

What was left was not enough to run a civil society. The principal
export of Pakistan today is Pakistanis. The most talented, the best
educated, the potential leaders are gone.

So nostalgia for a strongman fills the marketplace.

That feeling may support the military Government of General Musharraf, who
seized power this week, becoming the latest in a series of rulers who
have led and misled the nation for 25 of its 52 years.

Pakistan was created in 1947 out of the violent partition of India. While
it often has been ruled by military dictatorships, it has also had the
trappings of democracy: a Parliament, a lively press, political debate.

But to many Pakistanis, democracy is a facade.

Waheed Zaman, 30, the well-spoken owner of a trophy shop in Rawalpindi,
said his middle-class family was "like other people; we are fed up with
politicians; we have love for our armed forces despite their checkered
history."

Zaman and others in the teeming bazaar here, 25 miles southwest of the
national capital, Islamabad, spoke in heroic terms of a man who was once
was a national demon: Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq. He ruled Pakistan for 11
years until he died in 1988 in a plane crash, a still unexplained mid-air
explosion that also took the life of Arnold Raphel, the American
Ambassador.

"General Zia was an angel," said a grizzled rickshaw driver named Amir
Khan, 59. "Then there was no inflation. Crime was under control. When I
heard he was killed, I thought Pakistan was an orphan."

That sentiment is sometimes tinged with blood; many Pakistanis
want their political miscreants punished.

"These smugglers, these bribe-taking people, should be behind bars or
hanged," said Mrs. Syed, the school principal.

"Pervez Musharraf, my prayers and my best wishes are with him,"
she said. "This man is a general. He knows law and order and how to get
things done. We expect him to do things for the common people."

Much needs to be done. Pakistan is a basket case, and the coup may
make things worse.

Friday two-thirds of the country's wealth goes to the military and
to paying its debts. Three-quarters of the aid Pakistan receives from the
International Monetary Fund goes to pay off i.o.u.'s to the I.M.F. That
aid was immediately suspended after the coup, as was a trade agreement
with the European Union.

Pakistan has only $1.4 billion in foreign reserves -- just enough to buy
three weeks of imports.

In the troubled two-and-a half-year tenure of Sharif,
Pakistan's currency, the rupee, lost half its value against the dollar.
Everything in the bazaar seems to cost far more than it did in 1997.

And the $600 million in annual military and economic aid Pakistan
received from the United States in General Zia's day ended after he died
and when the cold war was over, blocked by law after the United States
acknowledged that Pakistan was building a nuclear bomb.

Washington is now uneasily contemplating the prospect of dealing with a
Pakistani dictator once more.

Western diplomats said the general had given Ambassador Milam a preview
of the speech he is to give on Saturday, in which he is expected to set
forth his plans for dealing with Pakistan's crushing problems.

Those plans may include a slow return to what the West would like to
call democracy. It may come, but for now the bazaar has spoken, and in
much the same voice as that of Talat Massoud, a retired lieutenant general
who served as Defense Secretary from 1988 to 1990.

"The coup was a good thing," he said, in a voice devoid of happiness or
anticipation.

"There was no choice left for the military. Our politicians put us on the
brink of disaster. They were making a mockery of democracy. The Prime
Minister had corrupted every institution. The judiciary was bought off;
there was no justice. The police were run as a fiefdom. What kind of
democracy was that?"

______________________________
#3.
[16 October, Message from Mumbai, India]

Dear Friends,
Lokshahi Manch was formed by coming together of different groups who
have been percieving the threat to democratic rights in the wake of
rise of the communal politics. It is a broad platform to campaign and
agitate for the democratic freedoms and to oppose the machinations of
communal politics, which is out to suppress the Human rights of weaker
sections of society particularly minorities, women, dalits and
workers. As a first attempt in this direction we prepared and
published a booklet 'Defeat Communal Forces "' in English and Marathi
before the elections. We are aware that this platform can succed only
when more and more social activist groups associate with this
endeavour, and look forward to your valuable. association. In the
aftermath of the General elections we need to plan the strategy of our
future work in this direction. For this we have arranged a small
meeting as follows :

Agenda of the meeting :-
1. Talks by Teesta Setalvad, Jairus Banaji and Sabdeep Pendse on
the "post-Election Scenario - Tasks for Secular Movement' followed by
discussion
2. To plan and take responsibilties for the tasks emerging from the
discussions
3. To make a rough outline for organisational aspects of Lokshahi
Manch

Day : Date and time-Saturday,23 Oct. 3.30 P.M.
Place : Joseph Cardijn Technical Institute,Scheme 60,Road
16,Naigaon,Dadar East. [Mumbai, India]
(Land mark-The institute is close to Bhoiwada Police station and St.
Xaviers Ground)

Look forward to seeing you.
P R Ram Dolphy D'Souza
Tel # : 5783522 Tel. # : 6194205

__________________________
#4.
The Teleghraph
16 October 1999

DAZED AND UNORGANIZED/ BOOK REVIEW

By Murari Mohan Mukherjee

Social security for all Indians
Edited by Wouter Van Ginnekan,
Oxford, Rs 425

Social Security for All Indians analyses how social security can be
extended to all Indians, especially women and workers in the unorganized
sector. Divided in two parts with eight papers, the book focusses on the
contributions made by various labour groups and nongovernmental
organizations in the unorganized sector.

At the outset, Wouter Van Ginneken gives an excellent overview of the
impact of the National Social Assistance Programme. R. K. A. Subrahmanya
discusses various dimensions of the problem of extending social insurance
schemes in cases of ailments, maternity, old age and work related injuries.
T. S. Sankaran discusses the operation of state sponsored social
assistance schemes in Gujarat, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh. For the purpose
of the study the author adopts field survey techniques to find out the
concerned state's position in extending pension benefits and cost
estimates of an extended social assistance package.

Three districts were chosen in each state and detailed field studies were
conducted in two villages and one small town, of one block in each of these
districts. Informal discussions with people who had intimate knowledge of
the state concerned were made in selecting the survey areas. A total of
263 people were selected for the study.

Meanwhile, the experiences of two NGO sponsored schemes are also
reviewed. One such effort was taken by Action for Community Organization,
Rehabilitation and Development, an organization working among the tribals
in Gudalur, Tamil Nadu. It attempts to present the context in which ACCORD
and subsequently the adivasi, Munnetra Sangam, emerged as an organization
among tribals.

The next section focusses on savings and credit scheme run by the Society
for Promotion of Area Resource Centres, an NGO based in Mumbai. For SPARC,
the home is the fulcrum on which revolve the very concepts of development
and empowerment. It believes in emphasising social and family oriented
values in an increasingly consumerist world.

It is commonly known that women are not given adequate social security
protection. The greatest gap in social security coverage is in the
unorganized sector where many workers are financially capable of
contributing to social security schemes tailored to their needs.

Another chapter highlights the basic characteristics of female employment
in the unorganized sector. The distinguishing feature of this study is
that the author, Anita Kelles-Viitanen, provides some valuable
recommendations that should influence the design of any future social
security programmes for the unorganized women workers.

It is a matter of concern that the vast majority of unorganized workers
remain outside the protective cover of social security legislation and
social insurance programmes. To remedy the situation it is necessary to
identify and remove factors that impede accessibility. S. Jain suggests
that one way to achieve greater social security coverage is to adopt the
area based social insurance for the unorganized sector.

In addition to social assistance, reform and extension of social
insurance based measures, development of private insurance and ways to
strengthen the social security administration are explored. The book is a
valuable addition to literature on the subject. It will be useful reading
to students, policymakers, social security organizations and international
agencies.

_________________________
#5.
[Comment from Narmada Bachao Andolan Activist Himanshu Thacker citing an
Indian Supreme Court Judgement on 15 October 1999]

Subject: SUPREME COURT DECIDES NOT TO PROSECUTE NBA OR ARUNDHATI: WAIT
=46OR DETAILS.

=46riends,

There are two separate orders. One page order of Justice S P Bharucha says:

"While I record my disapproval of the statements that are complained of, I a=
m
not inclined to take action in contempt against Medha Patkar, Shripad
Dharmadhikari and Arundhati Roy because the Court's shoulders are broad
enough to shrug off their comments and because the focus should not shift
from the resettlement and rehabilitation of the oustees.

I acknowledge with gratitude the assistance rendered to the Court by the
learned amicus curie and by learned counsel for the parties.

The IA (no. 14) is accordingly, disposed off.

Some of the important extracts of the seven page order of the Chief Justice =
A
S Anand and Justice B N Kirpal.:

"After hearing learned amicus as well as other learned consel appearing in
the case, who all rose above the case of their clients to assisst the court,
we are of the opinion that the petitioner - NBA and its leader Ms Medha
Patkar have knowlingly made comments on pending proceedings and have prima
facie disobeyed the interim injunctions issued by this Court on 11.4.1997 an=
d
5.11.1996. Prima facie the threats held out by the petitioners and its
leaders also appear to be an attempt to prejudice or interfere with the due
course of judicial proceedings. Litigants must realise that Courts cannot be
forced by pressure tactics to decide pending cases in the manner in which th=
e
concerned party desires. It will be a negation of the Rule of Law if the
Courts were to act under such pressure."

Then after quoting "some of the objectionable passages" in the AR book, the
order says,

"Ms. Arundhati Roy is not a party to the proceedings pending in this Court.
She has, however, made comments on matters connected with the case being
fully alive to the pendency of the proceedings in this Court. The comments
made by her are prime facie a misrepresentation of the proceedings in this
Court. Judicial process and institution cannot be permitted to be scandalise=
d
or subjected to contumacious violation in such a blatant manner in which it
hs been done by her.

While hpersensitivity and peevishness have no place in judicial proceedings =
-
vicious stultification and vulgar debunking cannot be permitted to pollute
the stream of justice. Indeed under our constitution there are positive
values like right to life, freedom of speech and expression, but freedom of
speech and expression does not include freedom to distort orders of the Cour=
t
and present incomplete and one side picture deliberately, which has the
tendency to scandalise the Court. Whatever may be the motive of Ms. Arundhat=
i
Roy, it is quite obvious that she decided to use her literaty fame by
misinforming the public and projecting in a totally incorrect manner, how th=
e
proceedings relating to Resettlemnt and Rehabilitation had shaped in this
Court and distorting various directions given by this Court. She seems to be
wholly ignorant of the task of the Court. The manner in which she has given
twist to the proceedings and orders of the Court is in bad taste and not
expected from any citizen, to say the least.

We wish to emphasise that under the cover of the freedom of speech and
expression no party can be given licence to misrepresent the proceedings fan
dorders of the Court and deliberately paint an absolutely wrong and
incomplete picture which ash the tendency to scandalise the Court and bring
it into disrepute or ridicule. The right of criticising, in good faith in
private or public, a judgement of the Court cannot be exercised with malice
or by attempting to impair the administration of justice. Indeed, freedom of
speech and expression is "life blood of democracy" but this freedom is
subject to certain qualification. An offence of scandalising the Court per s=
e
is one such qualification, since that offence exists to protect the
administration of justice and is reasonably justified and necessary in a
democratic society. It is not only an offence under the contempt of Court ac=
t
but is sui generis. Courts are not unduly sensitive to fair comment or even
outspoken comments being made regarding their judgments and orders made
objectively, fairly and without any malice, but no one can be permitted to
distort orders of the Court and deliberately give a slant to tis proceedings=
,
which have the tendency to scandalise the Court or bring it to ridicule, in
the larger interest of protecting administration of justice.

The action of the petitioner and its leaders Ms Medha Patkar as well as
writings of Ms. Arundhati Roy have caused us much anguish and when we expres=
s
our displeasure of the action of Ms Arundhati Roy in making distorted
writings or the manner in which the leaders of the petitioner Ms Medha Patka=
r
and Mr Dharmadhikari have, after giving assurances to this Court, acted in
breach of the injunctions, we do so out of anguish and not out of anger.
Maybe the parties were over-zealous in projecting their point of view on a
matter involving a large segment of tribal population, but they should not
have given to themselves the liberty of acting in the objectionable manner a=
s
already noticed. We are unhappy at the way the leaders of NBA and Ms
Arundhati Roy have attempted to undermine the dignity of the Court. We
expected better behaviour from them.

After giving this matter our thoughtful consideration and keeping in view th=
e
importance of the issue of Resettlement and Rehabilitation of PAFs, whch we
have been monitoring for the last five years, we are not inclined to initiat=
e
contempt proceedings against the petitioner, its leaders or Ms Arundhati Roy=
=2E
We are of the opinion, in the larger interest of the issues pending before
us, that we need not pursue the matter any further. We, however, hope that
what we have said above would serve the purpose and the petitioner and its
leaders would hereafter desist from acting in a manner which has the tendenc=
y
to interfere with the due administration of justice or which violates the
injuction issued by this Court from time to time.

After 22nd of July, when learned amicus was appointed, nothing has come to
our notice which may show that Ms Arundhati Roy has continued with her
objectionable writings insofar as the judiciary is concerned. She may have b=
y
now realised her mistake. We, therefore, consider it appropriate to now let
the matter rest and not to pursue it any further. The application (I.A. 14)
is accordingly disposed of."

"Let the main petition be now placed for directions on 4th Nov. 1999 at 2
pm."

I have typed out above most of the order.

Himanshu.

___________________________________________________
South Asia Citizens Web Dispatch is an informal, independent &
non-profit citizens wire service run by South Asia Citizens Web
(http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex) since 1996.