Pakistan Press On Gang-Rape in Pakistan, Women in Politics and Death Penalty: New Age Islam's Selection, 9 October 2020
By New Age Islam Edit
Bureau
9 October
2020
• One Woman Is Raped Every Two Hours and
Gang-Raped Every Eight Hours in Pakistan
By Dr Tania Nadeem
• Afghanistan: Heading For Peace through
Landmines
By Asif Durrani
• Women In Politics
By Foqia Sadiq Khan
• World Day against the Death Penalty: Killing
Justice
By Sarah Belal
• Discourse on Language in Education Has Taken
the Intelligentsia by Storm
By Zubeida Mustafa
-----
One Woman Is Raped Every Two Hours and
Gang-Raped Every Eight Hours In Pakistan
By Dr Tania Nadeem
October 08,
2020
Rape is
prevalent in Pakistan, as it is throughout the world. According to a study by
Human Rights Watch, one woman is raped every two hours and gang-raped every
eight hours in Pakistan. Data for men is not available. Rape is extremely underreported
and most perpetrators get away with it. Most survivors never seek help for
their own trauma. This happens due to an explicit and implicit rape culture
which silences the survivors with no consequences to the perpetrator.
This
culture is evident every time a rape case is highlighted in the media. After
every rape there is extreme anger and cries for justice and at the same time an
uptick in a rhetoric which highlights the patriarchal mindset of some. Such
people usually blame the survivor, questioning their decision-making capacity.
Others wage a war on social media with anger and indignation. Everyone blames
one or the other for perceived failures. In this debate, the trauma of the
individual, empathy for her/his suffering is forgotten. Do the survivors want
people to judge them, talk about them, write about them, and further violate
their control over their lives? Does this encourage further reporting and
change or dissuades survivors from coming out as they will lose any power over
their privacy? Maybe we should all think about this — a survivor is not public
property. They have a right to feel their pain without all of us pitching in.
So how
should we stand up against a rape culture of silence and survivor shaming?
Firstly,
mind-sets need to change, which means each and every one of us needs to work at
it individually, within the family and then more widely. No matter what people
say in support, how many will hesitate when their sons want to marry a rape
survivor and how many will disclose and file legal proceeding against
perpetrators? Rape is about control, objectification of women and
permissiveness towards male aggression (often excused as admi ki fitrat).
Children, women, and men all suffer from it whenever these dynamics come in
play. In our culture it is also associated with izzat and thus used to
disrespect an individual or a family. This mind-set change can only happen from
within. The education system needs to play a role where sexual abuse and rape
is discussed; respect and consent is talked about; and women/transgender are
taken as equals. When someone is sexually abused, it needs to be reported and
the perpetrator taken to task. Unfortunately, often if fathers are raping their
daughters, mothers are asked by the family not to leave or report, due to the
stigma of divorce. The same happens when extended family members are involved
as the survivor is asked to stay quiet to prevent a family dispute. It is
horrifying to hear but it happens regularly in families of all socio-economic
backgrounds. This is our collective shame and we need to take responsibility
and change it.
Secondly,
the reporting and legal systems need to be made easier and more empathetic. The
way a forensic examination happens after rape and the uncompassionate attitude
of the medical personnel, needs improvement, as it is extremely traumatising
for a survivor. The police and our courts need to review their systems, and
perhaps take on mental health professionals on board.
Lastly, how
a survivor becomes public property needs to change. Confidentiality needs to be
maintained. The media should play a responsible role in reporting. Television
programmes should not sensationalise information just for the sake of ratings.
People should come out on the streets to support the survivor’s rights and
legal battle but personal commentary on how that individual feels or should
have acted needs to stop. Also, entertainment programmes need to reconsider how
they objectify women and idolise male aggression.
Ultimately,
the protection of civilians is a responsibility of the state and the state is
lacking.
Finally,
families should support a survivor by being there, by listening to them, by
supporting their feelings. They should not say things like: be happy you are
alive; don’t think about it; don’t look so sad; it happened three months ago,
why are you still so depressed; and so on. Be respectful of the trauma the
individual is going through and realise that if you have not gone through it
then you do not know how they feel.
For
survivors, I hope that this will not define you and this will not be the end of
you. You will grow older; you will find happiness and you will see your
children grow. Take one day at a time, do not try to forget the incident rather
seek help to address the pain, so it does not hold you back in the future. Do
all of this at your own pace, do not feel pushed. Distance yourself from those
who are unhelpful or those who try to shame you. You have nothing to feel
guilty about. You have survived and will live beyond this and we all salute you
for your perseverance.
https://tribune.com.pk/story/2267551/standing-up-against-the-rape-culture
----
Afghanistan: Heading For Peace Through
Landmines
By Asif Durrani
OCTOBER 9,
2020
Should
there be a glimmer of hope with Afghan leader Abdullah-Abdullah’s visit to
Islamabad which he undertook last week after 12 years? As a Chairman of High
Council for National Reconciliation (HCNR) he holds the most unenviable job of
conducting peace talks from the government side with an interlocutor which has
the upper hand and, after the Doha Agreement, the militant religious group has
developed much better understanding with the Americans. Taliban’s refusal to
reduce violence or agree to ceasefire has become a bone of contention in the
ongoing intra-Afghan dialogue at Doha, which Abdullah-led HCNR delegation has
been insisting from the day one. Still, there is no agreed agenda for the
talks, at least this is the impression one got during Dr. Abdullah’s
interaction with officials and think tanks.
Dr. Abdullah,
who received an unprecedented welcome normally reserved for the heads of state,
conveyed to his interlocutors in Islamabad that since Pakistan has been
instrumental in bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table with the
Americans, it should also nudge the religious clerics to be reasonable at the
intra-Afghan dialogue. In the meantime, he reminded his audience that if there
was internecine war in Afghanistan then “no one will be a winner”. However, if
there was an agreement for peace then “everyone will be a winner”, he argued.
Dr. Abdullah assured Islamabad that “Afghan soil would never be allowed against
its neighbours or beyond”. He also hinted at the tremendous potential in trade
and transit opportunities between Pakistan and Central Asia via Afghanistan
should peace returns to Afghanistan.
Pakistani
officials were equally warm to Dr. Abdullah and his delegation, and assured him
that peace in Afghanistan was of prime concern to Pakistan which immensely
suffered during the past two decades for being part of the war against
terrorism. Prime Minister Imran Khan’s advice to Dr. Abdullah was to forget
about the past mistakes and look for the future. In his twitter message he
said: “We had a very interesting conversation: theme being the past is an invaluable
teacher to learn from but not to live in”.
Symptomatic
of the future contours of Afghan scene, where after two decades of war and
destruction, one can feel the change in the offing although full of
uncertainties
Dr.
Abdullah was also assured by Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi that
Islamabad had no favourites and that “Pakistan fully supported the demand for
reduction of violence by all sides leading to ceasefire”. Hopefully, these
words would have sounded music to Dr. Abdullah’s ears which was evident in his
reiteration of Mr. Qureshi’s assurances to his other interlocutors, including
Islamabad-based think tanks and international media.
Despite
well wishes displayed by both sides during Dr. Abdullah’s visit, Afghan
watchers were skeptical about the possible role Pakistan could play in the
intra-Afghan dialogue which is purely an Afghan-led and Afghan-owned process.
It is altogether a different matter to nudge the Taliban to sit with the
Americans and thrash out withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan, but it
would be entirely a different matter to stick our neck out on an issue where
Afghans would be suspicious of Pakistan’s role. We should not forget that
Afghanistan is heading towards peace through a path strewn with landmines.
For Pakistan,
an equally important issue has been the role of spoilers in the Afghan
imbroglio during the past four decades, especially after the 9/11 when India
got the opportunity to use Afghan soil against Pakistan with the help of Afghan
intelligence, NDS, to cause death and destruction in Pakistan. It is no secret
that Tehreek Taliban Pakistan (TTP) have been receiving financial assistance
from the Indian intelligence agency, RAW, through the NDS and/or Afghan
intermediaries. Dr. Abdullah would not directly address the issue of India’s
spoiler role, but was emphatic that Afghan soil would not be allowed to be used
against any of Afghanistan’s neighbours. It is yet to be seen how Dr. Abdullah
conveys to India during his visit to New Delhi to “lie low”, as commented by
prominent Indian journalist Jyoti Malhotra in her recent article in The Print.
While Dr.
Abdullah was still in Islamabad, diplomatic circles were rife with speculations
that Americans have reconciled to the idea of accepting lion’s share for the
Taliban in the future dispensation in the country provided the Taliban stick to
their assurances of denying sanctuaries to Al-Qaeda or ISIS. Reportedly,
Taliban seem to have sounded out the requisite assurances to the Americans. The
foregoing assumption may have merit due to ground situation but it does not
augur well for a negotiated settlement through the intra-Afghan dialogue unless
government interlocutors receive huge inducements or armed twisting to accept
Taliban’s dominance. Articulating the American thinking, eminent Afghan expert
from the US, Barnett Rubin, said in a twitter message: “Like it or not Afghans
have to figure out how to live with each other and their neighbours without the
US. US might stay engaged, but don’t count on it.”
Secondly,
Americans also seem to have convinced themselves that a democratic order in
Afghanistan is still a far cry given the tribal structure of the Afghan society
which prefers tribal norms over democratic principles. Added to this complexity
is the past nineteen years of rent seeking by the Afghan warlords, including
those supposedly elected through a democratic process. While Americans found
themselves clearing the muck, Afghan warlords continued to thrive under the war
economy; poppy cultivation reached its peak making Afghanistan the largest
poppy producing country (92%) in the world. Ironically, it all happened under
the US-NATO watch.
Third, a
positive development for the Americans is that since the signing of the
agreement in February this year both the Taliban and US forces have avoided
attacking each other, which has facilitated withdrawal of over 7000 American
troops from the country during the past seven months. This should serve as a
major confidence building measure for the US to negotiate future arrangements
with the Taliban in case the US may want to keep its residual forces in the
country. Naturally, other Afghan groups currently enjoying share in power are
unlikely to look at the emerging scenario favourably.
Symptomatic
of the future contours of Afghan scene, where after two decades of war and
destruction, one can feel the change in the offing although full of
uncertainties. There are lessons for Pakistan: having burnt its fingers during
the past four decades, those dealing with Afghanistan in the power corridors of
Pakistan would be well advised to tread carefully and stay clear of the
intra-Afghan dialogue. Let the Afghans decide for themselves, good or bad. What
we can doin the emerging scenario is to manage Afghanistan, facilitate Afghans
in transit and trade, assist in reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts, and
maintain a strict vigil along the borders. We should support any efforts,
within Afghanistan or abroad, that may bring peace and stability in the
war-ravaged country. Chances are, if Pakistan plays no favourites Afghans would
prefer Pakistan as a partner.
https://dailytimes.com.pk/675613/afghanistan-heading-for-peace-through-landmines/
----
Women in Politics
By Foqia Sadiq Khan
October 9,
2020
One field
where the women’s movement has succeeded in Pakistan to a large extent is
women’s political participation. Ayesha Khan’s perceptive book, ‘The Women’s
Movement in Pakistan: Activism, Islam and Democracy’ (2018), deals with the
larger woman question; however we are going to focus on the women’s political
participation aspects of it in order to have a focused debate.
The book
chronicles the contemporary history of Pakistan in a well-researched
descriptive manner; the real contribution is added by referring to the
qualitative interviews of women rights activists often associated with the
Women’s Action Forum (WAF). WAF is an advocacy group that has been actively
campaigning for women rights since the 1980s. The book is also objective; it
brings out the achievements of the women’s movement very well – despite the
enormous challenges – by interweaving both desk and primary research but also
discusses its shortcoming through the sources’ voices.
Coming to
the history, as early as 1947 women legislators demanded political
participation, suggesting five percent reserved quota in the Constituent
Assembly. This demand led to a provision in the 1956 constitution of reserving
10 seats for women; however, it did not materialize since no elections were
held. The 1962 constitution reserved six seats for women through indirect
elections. The 1973 constitution reserved five percent seats for women in the
national and provincial assemblies, again through indirect elections. The 1985
Inquiry Commission on the Status of Women made a recommendation for 20 percent
reserved seats for women amongst other demands.
In the 1985
non-party elections, 20 seats were reserved for women in the National Assembly.
However, this provision lapsed in 1990 when the 1988 election assemblies were
dissolved and there were no reserved seats for women in the next 12 years.
Restoration
of women’s reserved seats was a key demand of WAF and advocacy NGOs such as
Aurat Foundation – along with a broader agenda of women’s inclusion in
political life such as increasing women’s turnout as voters, increasing general
seats tickets for women, and promoting women’s wings within the political
parties. This set of demands also included quota for women in the local
government.
This
consistent advocacy for women’s political representation was accepted to a
large extent and the local bodies elections of 2000-01 gave women 33 percent
reserved seats on the all three local government tiers and general elections of
2002 reserved 17.5 percent seats for women National and Provincial Assemblies
and the Senate. This is in addition to some women contesting on general seats.
The large
impact was made at the local level where almost 40,000 women were elected on
reserved seats. However, in the 2005 local bodies election, the reserved seats
for women were decreased to over 24,000 as the government decided to reduce the
size of union councils to half. Post return of democracy in 2008 onwards, the
local tier has not been consistently held up and women’s representation largely
moved to the national and provincial assemblies.
Despite
being considered ‘inexperienced’, women’s participation in these assemblies
“added a significant dimension to proceedings”, says the author. In the 2002-07
National Assembly, women elected on the reserved seats attended parliament
sessions regularly compared to men. Their legislative performance exceeded
their ratio. According to the book, women “moved almost half of private member
bills and a third of resolutions”. The same trend continued in the assemblies
of post 2008 onwards, despite women’s decreasing numbers on general seats.
Women
achieved this legislative performance despite not being taken seriously by
their male colleagues, challenged by the lack of independent financial
resources, weak party support, and sometimes faced by outright discrimination
and harassment.
Women on
reserved seats pushed for the passage of legislation for women’s rights, human
rights, and democracy by working through cross-party women’s caucus
particularly in the post 2008 period. Women lobbied for changes in honour
killings, rape and adultery laws amongst others. The 18th Constitutional
Amendment accepts Pakistan’s CEDAW commitments under Article 25 (2). Post 18th
Amendment, most legislation is devolved to the provinces.
Women
legislators actively worked to pass laws to check domestic violence, sexual
harassment laws, law to stop anti-women practices, acid crimes laws, Hindu
marriage law, law for standardizing the age at marriage etc. Women often moved
these progressive bills as private members as their political parties did not
want to overtly support them due to fears of backlash and they managed to pass
these bills through cross-party women members solidarity.
The last
chapter of the book has an interesting discussion on whether activism for
women’s rights can be called a movement or not. The overwhelming feeling is
that women have come a long way in the last 40 years when the editors of
leading papers used to refuse to publish WAF statements on women’s rights to
the present day where women’s rights is a legitimate national agenda despite
the massive challenges of mounting violence and sexual mutilation of women and
girls. Women have also been combating the selective use of religion to suppress
their rights.
Khan says
that it is ironic that Western governments were supporting dictatorship and the
Afghan jihad during the 1980s, yet still supporting a small number of women and
their NGOs who were resisting the dictator’s Islamization (though WAF never
accepted foreign funding).
It has been
an uphill battle over the years. Despite the patriarchal and exclusionary
biases of the state in Pakistan; women have focused on making demands from the
state and its policies and tried to fight the discrimination of its legal
framework. The non-formal arena of jirgas and violence of the non-state actors
is much worse for women. The state has to deliver for women and their struggle
for equality and empowerment will continue till it does.
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/726557-women-in-politics
-----
World Day against the Death Penalty: Killing
justice
By Sarah Belal
09 Oct 2020
Frankly,
we’re tired. We knew there would be two scenarios as to how the pandemic would
end. A medical end through the result of either widespread immunity or
vaccination, or one which has already arrived. A social end. When we no longer
fear it the way we did. The unknown isn’t as scary as the known. The kind of
mortal certainty that comes with being a prisoner on death row.
Pakistan
has over 4,000 of them, the second largest reported number of condemned prisoners.
Where the slightest slight can send you to the gallows if you’re poor, while
even damning video evidence of a wealthy politician running over a poor
policeman cannot lead to conviction. Where people can be hanged and then
acquitted of the crimes they were charged with. Dead until found innocent.
It takes a
long time to prove your innocence when you don’t have means. A prisoner, on
average, spends 11 years on death row before they are acquitted or hanged.
Eleven years lost to faulty investigations; a fatal cocktail of forced
confessions and shoddy defence that result in the Supreme Court overturning
around 80 per cent of death penalty convictions.
Too many
have been hanged for too little.
But we like
extreme punishments. A spectacle. A lesson for others. An end in itself. Even
when we know they are not the solution. Because real work takes time, effort
and collective responsibility. Much easier to blame the victim and hang the
rapist. It’s easy to be swept by rage. Rage that is disingenuous because it only
fixes blame and kills the perpetrator but doesn’t put an end to crime.
In our
anger, we do not care who it is we are killing. The mentally ill, physically
disabled, those tortured into confessing the crimes of others. As if only those
on the margins are capable of murder. Those already fighting to hang on to the
very thread of life. Let’s hang them.
I once
represented a poor Christian plumber who was barely 15 years old when he was
arrested and sentenced for murder. Not only did two witnesses who had testified
against him later withdraw their testimony, one of them — dying of guilt and
old age — stood outside the prison gate the night before Aftab Masih was going
to be executed 23 years later. He pleaded with prison officials to not hang the
teenage boy he had falsely accused. The teenage boy who was nearly 40 years
old. And dead before the sun came up.
I have seen
too many hanged for too little. For being too poor, for loitering nearby, for
just existing. Legal counsel is simply inaccessible for many prisoners accused
of serious crimes. It doesn’t help that state-appointed counsels are paid a
pittance. Most don’t bother to show up at hearings and almost never meet their
clients. One prisoner, sentenced to death as a teenager because he did not have
effective legal representation at the time, was released nearly 20 years later
by the Lahore High Court. After his release, he told me being poor is like
being blind. And that he’d rather be blind than dead.
The death
penalty discriminates wherever it is implemented. It takes stock of the branded
watches and deep pockets and discards the foul odoured and the wretched in the
unwanted pile. In Saudi Arabia, for example, a large number of Pakistanis have
been executed on drug-related charges. Most of them were poor labourers duped
by kingpins into carrying contraband, often without their knowledge or consent.
Many of them were shown dreams of employment or pilgrimage. Dreams that
eventually turned into their worst nightmare.
Tomorrow
marks the 18th World Day Against the Death Penalty. It is observed every year
to shed light not only on the conditions of prisoners on death row but also how
their executions are part of a cycle of violence that affects everyone. The
trauma does not end with the family. It seeps through the entire jail. The
shame of killing a person is such that the jail administration turns off the
lights and only turns them back on after the hanging has taken place. The
execution leaves everyone, from officials to inmates, indelibly traumatised.
Even in a place as inherently morbid as a prison, the dread is palpable.
This year’s
theme is access to justice. Justice that is elusive in the best of times. But
in a lockdown, with a pandemic wreaking havoc all over the world, it is not
very different from chasing rainbows. Rainbows that eventually fade to black.
No lawyers, no legal counsel, no visits from relatives. The pandemic has been a
second death sentence for those already living through one.
Innocence
is often a privilege in our criminal justice system. And guilt an indication of
deprivation. It is absurd to risk the fate of thousands of faceless individuals
languishing in death cells because some of them might be guilty. That is not
what justice looks like. Russian roulette perhaps. But not justice.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1584066/killing-justice
-----
Discourse On Language In Education Has Taken
The Intelligentsia By Storm
By Zubeida Mustafa
09 Oct 2020
THE
discourse on language in education has taken the intelligentsia by storm in the
wake of the Single National Curriculum (SNC). The polarisation between various
points of view is so intense that a meaningful debate is impossible. It is
intriguing why the supporters of English distort some issues beyond
recognition. Hence here is another attempt to clarify issues.
First it
must be restated that the discussion is not whether children should learn
English or a local language. Those who support the local languages as the
medium of instruction have always added ‘and English must be taught as a
foreign language’. I have yet to figure out why we are accused of pushing out
English from our education system to make our children backward and incapable
of handling technology. It seems to imply that even if we are failing to teach
English correctly it is fine so long as we stick to our mantra of English and
English alone.
The
supporters of English also imply that if a child starts her education in one of
our indigenous languages, her education comes to a dead end and she can never
learn English thereafter. We must remember that we are not a country of fools.
All the highly qualified people from earlier generations began their primary
schooling in a native language and that includes Prof Abdus Salam, our only
Nobel Laureate in science.
My
position, like that of many others, is simple. When the child starts schooling,
let her continue her education that began in her cot in her mother tongue or
the language of the environment with which she is already familiar. She can
start learning Urdu, the language of wider communication, a few years later.
English should be introduced even later and as a foreign language. It is the
language ladder that needs to be discussed. That means we have to decide which
language should be introduced when and how. For instance, if English is introduced
before the child’s hold over her mother tongue has been consolidated she will
be dumbed. In other words, she will not learn any language or communicate
coherently.
It is the
language ladder that needs to be discussed.
Language
experts in Pakistan mainly study socio-linguistics and do not go into the
physiology/anatomy of language acquisition which is a natural process. Dr Maria
Montessori, an Italian physician, psychiatrist and educationist, wrote about
the language organ more than 100 years ago. Noam Chomsky is now speaking about
it after retracting his universal grammar theory. This organ comprises the
speech and hearing mechanisms and the Broca’s centre in the brain where
comprehension takes place. These develop in coordination in a child from the
time of birth and follow a certain pattern. This is Mother Nature’s way. Our
attempts at tampering with it amounts to trying to make an infant walk even
before it can sit.
Even Lord
Babington Macaulay didn’t try to perform this miracle in his infinite wisdom.
The brown sahibs he envisaged began their English learning at the secondary
level.
What is the
result of our misconceived language ideas? To see that, just step into the
classroom of a so-called English medium school in a low-income area. You will be
shocked at the hybrid language system it follows. The textbooks are in English
but the teachers have no competency in the language. They read the text in
broken English, explain it in Urdu, write the questions in English on the
board, and copy the answers in English from key books (which should in any case
be consigned to a bonfire). The children dutifully memorise what they copy from
the board. They understand nothing. This is the rote culture which stays with
them for life. Since the teachers don’t know any better nothing can change. It
demoralises them for life.
There is
another insidious evil this hybrid system breeds. The child struggles with an
‘alien’ language at a time when her mind is growing and cognitive development
is taking place. She fails to learn how to think critically or write
coherently. This phenomenon of a struggle between cognitive development and
language learning is present in the students of the elite English-medium
private schools as well. The focus on mentoring in their pedagogy and the
overload of private tuition manage to mask the shortcoming. This damage is
irreparable.
Finally, an
appeal to private English-medium schools. They are trendsetters and owe a moral
and ethical responsibility to society to think of the greatest good for the
greatest number.
Admittedly,
it is the government that is basically at fault. The poor learning outcomes in
government and low-cost private schools are due to corruption, misgovernance
and poor learning tools that include the language of instruction. Reform is
needed and only the government can undertake it. Without the language issue
being addressed, reform will not be a holistic and integrated process and will
not work. Unfortunately, the SNC is diverting attention from the real issues.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1584067/get-issues-right
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