In the everlasting public debate on constitutional matters, opinions differ on the division of powers between the president and the prime minister. But all sections of civil society appear to agree that civil servants of all vocations, police included, should be neutral, the judges independent and soldiers not meddling in politics.
Interestingly enough, the state of the nation’s mind at its birth was no different.
Jinnah was in no hurry to make a new constitution as he thought the adapted Government of India Act was serving the purpose well in transition from a dominion to a sovereign republic. When doubt arose as to where the authority at the top rested, Jinnah had to remind the armed forces that all command to them flowed from the governor-general who was the executive head of the government.
This apparently reveals his thinking that even in the presence of the constituent assembly (parliament) and prime minister, the head of state should not be a mere figurehead.
Then he laid down a rule — which held sway but not for long — that the armed forces must ungrudgingly obey civilian authority. It seems that Jinnah never got down to addressing the judges in the way he did legislators, military officers, civil servants, tribal elders and Baloch sardars on more than one occasion. The principle of judicial independence, however, was firmly driven home when Pakistan’s first chief justice, Sir Abdur Rashid, declined the prime minister’s invitation to dinner and Liaquat Ali Khan, to his credit, acquiesced in the snub.
Alas, that precedent did not hold for long. Rashid’s successor, Munir, was said to be Governor-General Ghulam Mohammad’s frequent companion at dinner.
In refusing the prime minister’s invitation, Justice Rashid risked being discourteous but handed down a message to the next generation: in order to be independent, a judge has to be a recluse. Justice Munir, undoubtedly, was the ablest of judges. His constitutional judgments indeed showed his ability — but not his independence. The obvious lesson emerging from the examples of the first two chief justices is that judges must not look for public acclaim nor socially associate with politicians, much less seek favours from them.
By ignoring this golden rule, many from among the present lot have put their independence at peril though hardly any can boast of Munir’s ability. In the background of the events of the past two years, most among them have yet to establish even their rudimentary judicial credentials. The action of the Punjab governor in recommending, on his own, four more judges to join the multitude of 66 in the Lahore High Court shows that politicians and judges are not going to part company any time soon.
One would like to believe that Jinnah, a lawyer of high repute in his time, did not address the judges lest he should be seen influencing them. But he addressed the civil servants on three occasions to tell them that it was ‘a very common fault of politicians and of those with influence in political parties to put pressure on the service people, which would lead to nothing but to corruption, bribery and nepotism’. He advised them to ‘make the sacrifice’ if they had to ‘for not satisfying the whims of ministers and for doing the right thing’.
That advice was never fully heeded. And when the civil servants did not get the ‘security and safeguards’ that Jinnah promised and later even lost whatever little of both they had at the hands of Z.A. Bhutto, Ziaul Haq and Pervez Musharraf, the majority among them chose to collude with the politicians. The ‘sacrifice’ that Jinnah had asked for was made rarely and by only a few.
The nepotism and corruption that Jinnah cautioned against have now come into full play. Recent reports allege that the selection of airline pilots, ambassadors, teachers, policemen and people for other jobs is based on every consideration but merit. Resultantly, there are allegations of misconduct against a chief justice, the harbouring of terrorists against a commissioner and the embezzlement of billions in fixing petroleum prices etc.
Particularly interesting are the rumours surrounding the appointment of an official as ambassador to France, who is not in the foreign service and is too junior for the post even in his own cadre.
According to an Urdu columnist, he was commended to the notice of our president by the French president. Gossip has it that it was not him but a dress designer from France. The noteworthy fact, however, is that Pakistan’s foreign service, which has produced some world-class diplomats, having already lost ambassadorial posts in the UN, US and UK to political nominees have now lost another next in rank.
Nominations can be justified, and are even necessary, but only for people like Jamshed Marker and Maleeha Lodhi.
The nation would have been spared the loss of East Pakistan and now the agony of terrorism had the leaders of public opinion adhered to the fundamental principle that the founder of the country had put forth in his address to the Constituent Assembly on the eve of independence. ‘Religion,’ he said, had ‘nothing to do with the business of the state’ and ‘we are all citizens and equal citizens of one state’.
Lastly, there would have been no discontent in the tribal borderlands nor in Balochistan had Jinnah’s assurances to the jirga at Peshawar and the darbar at Sibi been kept. Pakistan, he said, had ‘no desire to unduly interfere with your internal freedom’ and, further, ‘neither my government nor I have any desire to modify the existing arrangements except in consultation with you’.
Jinnah saw Pakistan one day ‘becoming one of the greatest nations of the world’. Flouting every rule that he had set and lacking his integrity, latter-day ideologues and autocrats reduced it to a failed state — one among the 10 out of 200 or more. We must go back to the beginning to fulfill Jinnah’s dream.
COURTESY: DAWN
