The Masquerade of Democracy

The Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah has labeled 5th July as the “darkest day in the history of Pakistan”. For General Zia-ul-Haq’s coup-de-tat left the Pakistan People’s Party in ruins, only to rise again from the ashes a decade later. And so, by 1988, Benazir Bhutto, the charismatic daughter of the East, became the first woman Prime Minister of a Muslim state; only to be the first one to be thrown out on corruption charges. The decade of 90s saw a successive shift of power between the two leading parties of Pakistan, a tug of war to reclaim the seat of power. Here, the Pakistani nation showed an attitude that is best termed in the words of Kahlil Gibran, who said, and I quote; “Pity the nation... that welcomes its new ruler with trumpeting, farewells him with hooting, only to welcome another with trumpeting again.”, and we have doing that since the day of our birth.

So, why is 5th of July the darkest day of our history? Are there not better contenders in the lugubrious past of Pakistan then a coup-de-tat that is not even the only one? How about 16th December, when this country, did not lose a government, but East Pakistan? Perhaps, September 11, 1948, when the Father of the Nation died? But no, the darkest day was when the government led by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, which had lost much of its popularity by then, was toppled by a military dictator. That way, Pakistan has had many a dark days. Under the veil of democracy, our government has guilefully managed to rewrite history. For it is no longer that we hear the National Anthem, no longer is it that our newspapers and television channels talk about the Father of the Nation, or Pakistan in itself.

It is either 5th July, or 27th December. Either Benazir, or President Zardari, and either Pakistan People’s Party, or the Pakistan People’s Party. The capital has been decorated by not Pakistani flags, but by Pakistan People’s Party flags. The real Bhuttos have been lost in history, while the new ones reign. Instead of building cities and airports in remembrance of the assassinated leader, we have renamed whole cities, roads, and airports, things that were here before the martyr was even born. In an attempt to mould the past, our future has been put at stake, in the hands of the architects of this masquerade of democracy.

The Grand Monarch, Louis XIV, known as an absolute sovereign in France, was much more accessible to his subjects, than the democratic leaders of this country. At the grand palace of Versailles, anyone could just come in and not only move around the palace, but actually go inside the King’s Chamber and meet the King himself. And that was absolute monarchy. Here in Islamabad, we see the opposite. Let alone being inside the President House, it has become impossible to be on the President Road. The democratic leaders have turned the Capital of Pakistan into a land divided; one for the rulers, one for the ruled. Is this what democracy stands for? If the answer is yes, I will gladly say I have nothing to do with such democracy. Fortunately, however, this is not the real democracy, this is a false pretense, which was welcomed by trumpeting, and will be given a farewell of hooting. But perhaps, we still have time, maybe..; just maybe, we are still building our democratic foundations. And like a poor man who cannot get enough of money, we are a country, a nation long ravaged by dictators and military takeovers that is unable to understand what to do with the new found freedom. However, the question that arises in the mind of the average Pakistani citizen is that, whether this freedom is for all, or freedom for the elite?