The News

Monday, January 25, 2010
By Shahid Husain

Karachi

Vying to emerge as an “alternative” to the existing political parties in the country, the Workers’ Party of Pakistan (WPP) was launched after the National Workers’ Party (NWP) and the Communist Mazdoor Kisan Party (CMKP), two left-wing parties, agreed to merge. The name of the new party is tentative, however, and would be finalised at a convention in March.

“We want to break the status quo and we cannot do it without becoming a political force,” eminent lawyer and NWP President Abid Hasan Manto said on Sunday while addressing a gathering of left-wing activists at the PMA House.

Manto said that the “alternative” party would be secular, anti-religious extremism, anti-feudalism and anti-imperialism, and will safeguard the interests of the toiling masses, especially industrial workers and peasants. “We are striving to make a party of the Left and anybody who is non-communal and wants to bring about a change in society is welcome to join it,” Manto, whose political activism spans more than 50 years, said.

He further said that representatives of different political parties who were sitting in parliament today represented “Pakistan’s elite” and despite having differences, were unanimous that the status quo should prevail. “They have conflicting interests and differ with each other on many issues; but if somebody talks to them about increasing the wages of workers, they will act unanimously against such a proposal,” Manto said.

Previously, colonial powers fought wars to grab colonies. Today the imperialist countries were vying to control oil and gas fields in the Central Asian Republics, he claimed. Just as these imperial powers agree on certain issues and disagree on others due to their conflicting interests, political parties in Pakistan agree on certain issues despite having conflicting interests.

Manto said that it has become crystal clear that the US invasion on Iraq was not to establish democracy in that country but to control its oil resources. Similarly, the war in Afghanistan was strategic in nature since that country borders Central Asia which is rich in energy resources, he said.

The US has as many as 1,500 military bases across the world and obviously these bases have not been established to fight the Taliban or al-Qaeda, he said. He said that some people think that the Taliban were anti-imperialist but it was not true. The Taliban, he said, were reactionary and were identified by their acts of terrorism. Their behaviour, however, has also created awareness among the people, albeit indirectly, since they were now realising that religious extremism could only bring harm and misery, he said.

The Pakistani State was a “novel situation” whose idiom was religion despite the August 11, 1948, speech of Quaid-e-Azam, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, in which he made it clear that Pakistan would not be a theocratic state, Manto said, adding that despite Jinnah’s categorical statement, religion was so ferociously used by Muslim League leaders that the August 11 speech got immersed in religious bigotry.

The other mistake that Pakistan’s rulers made after the creation of the country was to go to war against India, which was eight times bigger than Pakistan and had a solid industrial base, he said. This mistake transformed Pakistan into a security state and short of resources, Pakistan rulers had to rely on military assistance from the United States, thereby converting Pakistan into a satellite state.

He said that the United States was more than happy to lend a helping hand to Pakistan, because it was eager to contain the former Soviet Union and Pakistan provided an excellent opportunity to the United States, which forced Pakistan to joint notorious security pacts such as SEATO and CENTO.

“No wonder our finance minister, Shaukat Tareen, says today that Pakistan can’t make its budget without the Kerry-Lugar Bill,” Manto regretted.

He said the Communist Party of Pakistan (CPP) had only 600 members before it was banned in 1954 but it was extremely influential and had effective fronts, such as the Progressive Writers’ Association (PWA), Pakistan Democratic Women’s Association (PDWA), Peace Committee, and the Democratic Students’ Federation (DSF). “No wonder the elitist leadership in Pakistan that was subservient to the interests of the United States, not only banned the CPP, PWA and DSF but even newspapers and literary magazines that were dominated by progressive elements,” he said.

It was high time to break the shackles of feudalism since it was the first step to break status quo and bring about change, Manto said. “It is also high time to think whether we would continue indulging in unproductive criticism or make a contribution in a political movement,” he said.

WPP Coordinating Secretary Akhtar Husain advocate said that the ruling elite were not ready to invest in the domain of health and education. He said that at a meeting with parliamentarians at the PMA House some time ago, it was suggested by the PMA that major health problems in the country could be solved if six per cent of the budget were allocated to health but not a single parliamentarian endorsed that suggestion.

Yet another WPP leader, Yousuf Masti Khan, said that despite the fact that the leaders at the helm of affairs in Pakistan have been elected, it was not true that a “democratic system” prevailed in Pakistan today. CMKP leader Sufi Khaliq Baloch also spoke on the occasion.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=220642

Pervez Fateh

Coordinator South Asian Peoples Forum UK

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