Iftikhar Chaudhary's Long March Back- Part 2

The Punjabi middle class and intelligentsia: Many of the lawyers and leaders would love to claim that the whole nation united for change yesterday. The fact of the matter is, they did not. This day belonged to the people of Punjab, with a handful of people from Balochistan and NWFP. Sindh stood resolutely behind the government, and Karachi’s people remained quite disinterested, pleased to see that for once their city was not at the center of the tension. But yes, this was all about Punjab, and that is in no way a criticism. For what we have witnessed in the Punjab is the rise of a new force for political and social change. The Lawyers Movement has brought together the new burgeoning Punjabi urban middle class, with the urban elites, giving them a political consciousness and a political enthusiasm. They are both willing and able to come together to bring about change, and so they are a very potent force for the future. We finally have a middle class that is convinced of democracy and public participation, and is willing to fight for it, come out on the streets for it, as they did in large numbers yesterday, and we also have an urban elite that is willing to join them. Now, all they suffer from is a lack of leadership. Their leaders unfortunately, are predominantly people like Imran Khan and Qazi Hussain Ahmed, reactionary right-wingers, who wish to take this country in the wrong direction with their ardent anti-Americanism, and their dangerous religious populism. It’s time the progressive segment of society acknowledged the power and potency of this new class, and gave it some kind of positive direction. Men like Aitzaz Ahsan really need to be catapulted to the front of Pakistani politics, to give them the leadership they really need, because we know from yesterday, that what the Punjabi middle class wants, they can get.

Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhary: Of course, there can be no doubt the big winner from this drama was the man himself, the deposed and now restored Chief Justice. Throughout all this, I marveled at the fact that Iftikhar Chaudhary remained totally silent. He could have come out, riled up the people, and tried to force some agitation but he did not. He has shown remarkable restraint, something we rarely expect from our leaders. This one man has proven himself a giant. The government did not want him back, the army did not want him back, and the US did not want him back. None of the powers-that-be were hoping for his return. But, yet all have been forced to give way. Many of Pakistan’s experts were of the opinion that the movement to restore him did not have any lasting traction, and after last years’ election and ousting of Musharraf, the movement would fragment and he would become irrelevant. But that did not happen. Many disagree with his judicial activism, or find his politicization of the judiciary worrisome, or even distrust his character, but they cannot doubt the grip he has on the political imagination of our people, and hence the power he wields to bring the entire establishment to its knees. His return represents the victory of the people against the establishment.

The people are joyous. Different people hope he will take on different segments of the establishment. Some hope he will put Musharraf on trial (well I certainly wish he could, at any rate, thought I doubt it). Others hope he will revoke the National Reconciliation Ordinance and delegitimize Zardari’s presidency, look into the Missing Persons cases, even prosecute the MQM in Karachi for the violence of May 12th. Some even claim he will bring increased foreign investment to Pakistan. People see him as a panacea for all Pakistan’s problems.

The reality is he is not. And no, there is no guarantee that things will get better now.

Quite the contrary.

The conflict between the PPP and PML-N is far from over; there is yet more chaos to come. The Long March exposed clear schisms between Sindh and Punjab that do not bode well for the future. The pro-Islamist crowd still leads the Punjabi middle class. Zardari is still very much in power, albeit isolated. The economy is still in a downward spiral. And moreover, the dangerous Taliban continue to expand their hold over this state. We do not even know where Iftikhar Chaudhary stands on these issues, and we hope he does not take the line of his right-wing supporters in Punjab, making the war on the Taliban even more difficult. Finally, the army still reigns supreme within the establishment, and continues to play its own political games. In fact the great unanswered question remains: what role did the Army play in all this? Some speculate that the army helped orchestrate all this, and has even been involved in deals with Iftikhar Chaudhary and Nawaz Sharif. I myself do believe the army had an important role to play, but that we will understand better as time reveals further facts about what transpired behind the scenes these last few days.

Yet in spite of all this, I think for this one day, the cynics and pessimists must acknowledge one thing, that this could have gone a lot worse, and that on this one day, regardless of whatever was going on behind the scenes, people came out in large droves, believing they could make a difference, zealous in exercising their democratic right to hold their leaders responsible, and confident they could change the political face of this country, and they did just that. So today, the people can give themselves a pat on the back. This was Pakistan’s ‘Yes we can’ moment, and the people should be proud.