Truth sans reconciliation?

This week the head of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) made a strong pitch for establishing a truth commission in the country. This is hardly the first time the idea has been floated and several politicians, including outgoing prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and former president Asif Ali Zardari, have advocated a truth commission with the same fervour for a larger goal over the past decade or so. The Charter of Democracy signed in 2006 was perhaps the first official document that recognised the need for such a commission in Pakistan. The inspiration behind the proposal was of course South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission — an emblematic body formed to heal the wounds suffered during that country’s shameful apartheid era wrought by active confessions and truth telling.

There is seemingly a vast difference between the objectives of the body proposed by JI chef Sirajul Haq and the Charter of Democracy approved version. Whereas the JI chief seems more interested in uncovering the facts behind the country’s major mysteries such as the assassination of the first premier, Liaquat Ali Khan, the fall of Dhaka and terror assaults on the army’s GHQ and Kamra airbase, the CoD version envisages truth telling about Pakistan’s deeply divided political history and confessions about the role played by different individuals and groups. For Pakistan, as it was for South Africa, it is nearly impossible to arrive at the truth without accepting the need for reconciliation. This should be the formula used in any national initiative aimed at uncovering the truth and sifting fiction from fact.

Siraj’s proposal to set up a commission that would unveil facts about tragedies befalling the people of Pakistan is still useful as it would hopefully lift the veil of secrecy surrounding these events and put them in the public domain — right where they belong. The power to heal, however, will come only through offers of amnesty to those who apply for the same and disclose all relevant facts about their role in acts of wrongdoing. In this way the perpetrators themselves contribute to reconciliation by acknowledging the wrongfulness of what they have done. Let’s start already!

Published in The Express Tribune, June 20^th, 2018.

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