The democrat and the dictator

July 9 marked the 53^rd death anniversary of Fatima Jinnah. A woman who should be remembered as a role model across Pakistan. Instrumental in helping her brother grapple with running the nascent Muslim League, Ms Jinnah was also committed to democratic principles, humanitarianism, and the rights of women.

However, many of our history texts, taught to children across Pakistan, relegate Ms Jinnah to the role of a background character in history — disappearing from view once the state of Pakistan was formed. A sidekick whose legacy is defined exclusively by virtue of her association with her brother.

Women will be familiar with this narrative of stripped autonomy; of being labelled as passive participants in history. But Ms Jinnah was no peripheral character, despite what our woefully misguided history texts teach. She was, in fact, one of the strongest proponents of democracy in Pakistan. It is criminal that our youth is denied knowledge of her legacy in favour of reverence for her biggest opponent, a dictator, Ayub Khan.

Societal discourse is often an insight into the hierarchy of power. As Michel Foucault wrote, one of the mechanisms for perpetuating power in society lies in the moulding of a certain discourse to reinforce that power structure. Narratives, in short, matter.

Early on in our history the forces opposed to democracy seized on this and proceeded to, literally, rewrite history. History textbooks eventually began peddling their narrative, with the main body of work to achieve this beginning, according to KK Aziz, during Ayub Khan’s dictatorship.

Pick up history texts used in our schools and observe the evidence: Ayub’s glorious “decade of development”; Ayub charming the Kennedy’s; Ayub slapping Lyndon Johnson’s cheek. The opponents of civilian supremacy swoon over this glorious past. Unfortunate for them that it is a myth.

While Ayub is put on a pedestal, the work of Ms Jinnah against his regime is shunned. We are not taught how Ayub’s dictatorship usurped the constitution, rigged an election, and sowed the seeds for the bloodshed in East Pakistan. We are not taught how Ms Jinnah opposed his undermining of democracy and the consequences she faced because of this.

Manufactured history tries its best to make us forget how Ms Jinnah was treated by successive governments after her brother’s death. In 1951, Radio Pakistan cut off her speech on the Quaid’s death anniversary as soon as she started criticising the current government. She responded by saying: “If one does not enjoy the freedom of expression in a democratic country, I would like to withdraw my speech instead of changing it.”

Contrast this commitment to principle with Ayub Khan’s comments on Pakistan being unsuitable for democracy because the people were “too hot blooded to run orderly parliamentary democracy”.

Yet, Ayub is remembered as a hero. Ms Jinnah initially welcomed Ayub’s coup in 1958, but by 1961 she had changed her stance to become a vocal critic of Ayub’s attempts to undermine democracy. Eventually she stood against Ayub in the 1965 elections. By this point, Ayub had already put in place his system of ‘Basic Democracy’ in which people voted for 80,000 pre-selected representatives who then voted for the presidential candidate. As Christina Lamb described it: “Basic it was, and crude too. In February 1960 the 80,000 Basic Democrats, who were rather easier to manipulate than an entire electorate, mostly answered yes to the question, ‘Do you have confidence in President Ayub?’ Allowing him to declare himself elected by a 96.5 percent vote.”

This rigged system was not enough to set Ayub’s soul at ease when faced with Ms Jinnah as an opponent. He proceeded to accuse her of conspiring against Pakistan, labelling her a traitor. Historian Tahir Kamran writes that during the election, the names of people who were said to oppose Ayub would mysteriously disappear from voter lists, while in East Pakistan, where Ms Jinnah enjoyed popularity, voters attempting to register themselves were turned back.

Through the second amendment to the then constitution, Ayub was entitled to stay as president until the elections were over. This allowed him to control the entire machinery of the State during the election — something he did not shy away from doing in order to accomplish his victory. He egged on the religious parties to question whether a woman could lead an Islamic country, and when he saw that Ms Jinnah’s momentum was growing, he moved the date of election forward by two months.

Ayub of course won the election, but even after such a massively unbalanced electoral environment, Ms Jinnah made him fight for it. Ayub obtained 49, 951 votes in his favour, while 28,691 voted for Ms Jinnah. Ayub lost Dhaka and Karachi.

None of this is described in our history curriculums. No wonder we remember Ayub as some sort of hero despite the fact that heroes do not bestow upon themselves titles such as ‘Field Marshal,’ or call the people of East Pakistan an “inferior breed”.

The youth of Pakistan deserve role models like Ms Jinnah who, unlike Ayub’s titles, earned the name Madar-e-Millat. She was a humanitarian who worked to resettle female refugees from India; an advocate for democracy against an authoritarian regime; a leader who saw the plight of the people of East Pakistan at the hands of the West before 1971 brought it to the forefront.

It is time to give Ms Jinnah her rightful place in our history, and condemn Ayub to his.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 14^th, 2020.

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