DEMOCRACY IN PAKISTAN

1988 TO 1999

Problems of democracy in Pakistan from 1988 to 1999

The Era of Benazir Bhutto

Democracy is a latest and durable foam of government, it means government

run by people, and with out of active participation the democracy could not flourish,

it is regarded as decisive foam of government. Democracy faced a lot of problem in

Pakistan from earlier and remained in week position.

Three major problems have been singled out for this purpose: the ethnic

structure, the political structure and the role of the military Holmqvist, Mats (2010).

This research paper also shows how similar problems have appeared throughout

Pakistan’s history especially from 88 to 99 and for this reason the obstacles to

democracy are described as long-term, structural problems. There is also a discussion

that why democracy could not flourish in those circumstances.

Democracy came due to plane crash in 88 and went by plane case in 99 so

between military governments democracy was guest in Pakistan in tenure of 88 to 99,

flourish. But unfortunately Pakistan has been lacking strong and efficient party

system which is very vital ingredient of Democracy. Democracy can neither exist nor

can consolidate its process without strong, vibrant, vigilant and efficient political

parties. There were four elections held in this era but all were fully rigged and

manipulated. Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif came to power twice each, amidst

constant bickering and accusations of corruption.

On Zia’s death, Ghulam Ishaq Khan, who was made chairman of the Senate

by Zia, became acting president. He was elected president by the assemblies on Dec.

13, 1988. In 1988, President Zia-ul-haq dissolved the Junejo Government and

announced that fresh elections would be held in November 1988. But on August 17,

1988, he was killed in a plane crash.

Ghulam Ishaq Khan was the chairman of senate in the rule of Zia, but after

the death of Zia he became president of Pakistan. In the election of 1988 Pakistan

people parity got 94 seats and with the coalition of 8seats of MQM and 13 seats of

Federal Administered Tribal Areas, Benazir Bhutto, daughter of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto,

became a president of Pakistan. Benazir became the first female Prime Minister of

any Muslim country.

At the time of swearing in, she was merely 35 hence the youngest Prime

Minister at the time. Benazir, the eldest of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto’s four children was

born on 21 June 1953. She was educated from the top universities of the world like
Harvard and Oxford. Her father envisaged for her a career in Foreign Service that

exactly was the reason that she accompanied Z.A. Bhutto on such occasion like Simla

Agreement. However it was not meant to be her destiny. Her father’s deposition from

office and later on execution at the hands of Zia regime gave a new twist to her

career.

She lifted up the ban on students and trade unions first of all. She had a secret

deal with Ghulam Ishaq Khan that she would be the prime minister of Pakistan and

G I Khan would be the president of country. So people party was in favor of G I Khan

and Islamic Democratic Alliance was also in favor G I Khan in election of president.

People party had to face many difficulties from political side. MQM broke the

alliance with Pakistan people party after few months of election. A N P also started

opposing of government. Less than two years later, on August 6, 1990, her

Government was accused of corruption and dismissed by the President.

Fresh elections were scheduled on October 24, 1990. President Ghulam Ishaq

Khan appointed Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi as the caretaker Prime Minister.The Pakistan

General elections, 1990 took place on 24 October 1990 to elect 217 MPs to the

Pakistan Parliament, and resulted in surprise victory of Islamic Democratic Alliance

(IDA), a massive conservative front led under the leadership of Nawaz Sharif. The

IDA compete for the Prime minister secretariat and initially campaign on

privatization and national conservative polices, meanwhile the MQM, a liberal front,

led under Altaf Hussain tightened its support in Sindh Province. The result was a
victory for Islami Jamhoori Ittehad, which won 106 of the 207 seats. Voter turnout

was 45.5%.

Two Army Generals – Mirza Aslam Baig and Asad Durrani (Head of the ISI)

– along with President Ghulam Ishaq Khan provided financial assistance to favored

parties. On 18 July 1993, following reported pressure from the military, Prime

Minister Nawaz Sharif (Pakistan Muslim League-PML) and President of the Republic

Ghulam Ishaq Khan resigned to end their heated power struggle and a caretaker

government headed by Acting Prime Minister Moeen Qureshi was sworn in five days

later until the October general elections.

This interim administration was widely praised for stabilising the country

while an often bitter one-month campaign was waged. Provincial assembly elections

were for their part scheduled for 9 October.

Chief opponent to the Nawaz-group PML was the centre-left Pakistan

People’s Party (PPP) of former Prime Minister (from 1988 to 1990) Benazir Bhutto.

As the two parties had largely similar platforms, the personalities of their leaders took

on added importance. Mr. Sharif pledged justice, education and jobs for all while Ms.

Bhutto criticized his economic policy, promising to pursue reforms in the sector

undertaken by the caretaker government as well as to fight corruption in politics.

Altogether 1,485 candidates were in the running for the National Assembly’s

popularly elected seats.

marked by a particularly low turnout. Balloting resulted in a hung Parliament as none

of the main parties gained a controlling majority, PPP obtaining 86 seats to PML’s 72.

For their part, Islamic fundamentalist candidates did not fare well. Given this

inconclusive outcome, the National Assembly met to elect the new Prime Minister;

Ms. Bhutto was sworn in to this post on 19 October after securing added support from

minor parties and independents and thus being chosen by 121 votes to 71 for Mr.

Sharif. She then named a coalition Cabinet, smaller in size than before. The results of

the provincial elections favored the PPP and were regarded as strengthening the

Prime Minister’s chances of maintaining a durable government. On 14 November,

former PPP Foreign Minister Ahmed Leghari was elected President by members of

the national and provincial assemblies.

The PPP won the largest number of seats in the 1993 election and Benazir

Bhutto became prime minister at the head of a coalition government. However on 5

November 1996, President Leghari, a former ally of Bhutto, dismissed the

government 2 years early for alleged corruption and abuse of power. The allegations

included financial mismanagement, failing to stop police killings, destroying judicial

independence and violating the constitution. A number of PPP party members were

detained including Bhutto's husband Asif Ali Zardari who was accused of taking

commissions for arranging official deals.

prime minister. The National Assembly and provincial assemblies were dissolved and

elections called for 3 February 1997. Bhutto denied all the charges against her and

petitioned the Supreme Court to reverse her dismissal. However, the court ruled in

January that there was sufficient evidence for the dismissal to be justified legally.

The Pakistan general election of 1997 was held in on 3 February 1997 to elect

the National Assembly of Pakistan and the four provincial assemblies. The election

featured a fierce contest between ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) led by

incumbent prime minister Benazir Bhutto and the PML(N) led by conservative leader

Nawaz Sharif. Nawaz Sharif was highly benefited and aided by the controversial

death of populist leader Murtaza Bhutto, the worsening economy at home and won

the election in a landslide, receiving the highest number of votes ever won by a no

incumbent prime ministerial candidate. Sharif subsequently became the 12th prime

minister of Pakistan.

The election took place after the previous Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP)

government of Benazir Bhutto was dismissed by President Farooq Leghari for

concerning matters of national security. Benazir Bhutto's government suffered with

financial mismanagement, corruption charges, racial tensions in her native province,

issues with Supreme court, the serious violation of the constitution, and leaders in

PPP, notably Murtaza Bhutto, who were determined to end Zadora’s involvement in

government affairs. The Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) of Nawaz Sharif won a
landslide victory in the election, for the first time in the history of Pakistan. Sharif

was sworn in as Prime Minister on 17 February. Voter turnout was 36.0%. Pakistan

Muslim League (N) won 137 seats and PPP won 18 seats out of 207.1

Sharif took the risk of moving against the military establishment, by pushing

through an amendment of the constitution depriving the all-powerful President of the

right to dissolve the National Assembly at his personal discretion. That was regarded

by the leadership of the armed forces as an attack on the military’s core interests and

brought Sharif closer to his political end, as proven shortly afterwards (Plamen,

Tonchev 2002).

In this way our democracy went to back in a plane from where this came, as

earlier I have explained that in era of 88 to 99 our democracy came from a plane

crash of Zia and went in plane case of Musharaf. Once again, at the end of this period

of democratic rule it turned out that civilian governments in Pakistan were too weak

to oppose the military establishment. Worse still, the general impression is that the

Bhutto-Sharif years inflicted a grave blow to the credibility of any dynamism that

parliamentary democracy could have in the country. (Plamen, Tonchev 2002).

There were four governments in this period but due to lack of democratic

practice there was very less turnout in this period. We are also used to the

1
Election result of 88, 90, 93, 97 in Pakistan (vikepedia)
interventions of military in our political system in Pakistan due to weak party system.

Some other major causes of failure of democracy are discussed here.

Weak party system is the major cause of failure of democracy in Pakistan not

only in 88 to 99 but also from birth of Pakistan. Especially in this era the government

came from dictator rule so the influence of military was there in grass roots of

political system, because our political party system was frail and weak so it could not

protect the pure democracy. Mostly Pakistani politicians were on dictation of army

generals and agencies. Army generals and agencies also used the political parties and

particularly some politicians for there purpose and some benefits. Political leaders

continue to reveal lack of commitment to the principles of democracy and, above all,

have found it difficult to develop the National Assembly as the primary forum for

national debate, dialogue and legislation. To make parliamentary democracy succeed,

the parliamentarians need to strengthen the parliament

Behavior of nation was also a major cause of failure of democracy in

Pakistan. People in Pakistan in bulk are uneducated so they had no idea of vote.

Mostly people coasted their vote on the behalf of either baradari system or due to

some minor interest like a bag of flour, plate of brayani, and some sweets items etc.

Democracy is not an only a slogan of campaign in election. In order to

achieve it there are many important issues to be solved, like unity and sincerity in
nation, economically condition, education and ration among nation also required.

Some briefly discussion is following.

Constructing and promoting democracy is not an easy task; it requires

patience, time and, most importantly, a consensus among the powerful groups and

elites in a society on the desirability of rule of law and governance through the

consent of the people. Thus, the onus of responsibility for constructing democracy,

promoting democratic norms, and institutionalizing democratic practices and

principles is on the elites. Political leaders and elites through their actions and

conduct, influence the formation of democratic norms at the popular level. A large

number of people in a society have to accept and demonstrate faith in democratic

principles.

(Saeed, Shafqat, 1998)

1- Nohlen, D, Grotz, F & Hartmann, C (2001) Elections in Asia: A data

handbook, Volume I, p678 ISBN 0-19-924958-X

2- Saeed, Shafqat (1998), the Pakistan Development Review 37: 4 Part II (Winter

1998) pp. 37:4, 281–298

3- Holmqvist, Mats (2010) a state of transition - Structural problems and

Pakistan’s failed transition to democracy 1988–1999

https://helda.helsinki.fi/bitstream/handle/10138/17214/abstract-eng.pdf?sequence=1

4- Plamen, Tonchev (2002) Pakistan at Fifty-Five: from Jinnah to Musharraf

http://www.eias.org/sites/default/files/EIAS_Briefing_Paper_March_2002_Plamen_T

onchev.pdf

5- Askari, Hasan - Rizvi (2010) - Democracy in Pakistan

http://www.democracy-asia.org/qa/pakistan/Hasan%20Askari.pdf