Compare and contrast

Two demonstrations ended on March 30. In Islamabad, the government provided 10 buses to transport those who were terminating their protest outside parliament. In Karachi, a group of teachers, a few hundred at most, were hit with water cannons and dispersed. They were protesting at not having been paid despite being in post a year. The teachers had damaged nothing, the protesters in Islamabad had wrecked a Metro station and assorted official vehicles. A team of senior members of the government negotiated with the Islamabad protesters. The teachers never got the option to negotiate with anybody despite having a legitimate grievance.

So ends — for now — the latest struggle between the state and the theocracy. The sacerdotal classes wield immense power and have the capacity, as amply demonstrated in Islamabad, to command the state in such a manner as to gain rapid compliance. That representatives of the government did not actually sign the seven-point ‘agreement’ that eventually brought the demonstration to an end is immaterial. A precedent has been set that will stand as the benchmark for any future moves to bring pressure on the government. That precedent will be cited every time there is a meeting of irresistible forces and plastic objects. All the deadlines set by the government to disperse were ignored and it was not until it acceded to those making demands that there was movement. In essence, the protesters got what they wanted from a government too weak to effectively confront them and terrified of the national consequences if it did.

Undertakings have been given that now hold the government as a hostage to fortune. If it is seen to be non-compliant, then we can expect more of the same despite assertions by the Interior Minister that the area around D-Chowk will never again be allowed to be used for protests of any nature. As for the unfortunate teachers protesting in Karachi, they got, and can expect, little from a state that is shameless in its exploitation of them and bullies them into submission when they complain. Two demonstrations with very different outcomes, neither of them satisfactory or indeed desirable.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 1^st, 2016.

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