BACKGROUND: Under the new law, the North West Frontier Province government would appoint ombudsmen (mohtasibs) – those who hold others accountable – at provincial, district and village levels to ensure that people respect the call to prayers, pray on time, and do not engage in commerce during the Friday prayers besides stopping unrelated men and women from appearing in public places together, and discourage singing and dancing. With a religious police under his command as an enforcement arm, the army of newly-appointed mohtasibs would also monitor the media to ensure ‘useful for the promotion of Islamic values’. Besides General Musharraf’s regime, human rights organizations, politicians and media bodies see the attempt by the religious clerics to ‘effectively install ultra-conservative rule’ in the province, conflicting with fundamental rights enshrined in the 1973 constitution and violating personal freedoms. Although Pakistan’s ruler, General Pervez Musharraf, has hastened to file a rare presidential reference in the Supreme Court seeking its opinion in a ‘damage control’ measure, the atmosphere is highly charged to the benefit of six party religious-political alliance – Muttahida Majlis Amal (MMA) - ahead of nationwide local government elections. The Frontier province, is the only one amongst Pakistan’s four federating units to be ruled solely by the Islamists while the same alliance is a coalition partner with the pro-Musharraf Pakistan Muslim League in Balochistan province which also borders Afghanistan. For the first time in the country’s history, the religious parties grouped together ahead of the 2002 electoral alliance in reaction to the invasion of Afghanistan by United States and its allies. The religious-political alliance managed to gain an unexpected number of seats, predominantly in the NWFP and Balochistan provinces. Besides playing on the anti-US and anti-Musharraf sentiments, the MMA leadership promised replacing all secular laws and practices with the Islamic ones once they were voted to power. MMA Secretary General Maulana Fazl-ur-Rahman, a religious cleric representing the Deobandi shade of Islam, congratulating the people after the passage of the Hisba bill with a 68-43 vote, said, “We have delivered what we had promised to you in the election campaign and with your cooperation, more such Islamic laws would be implemented in the province.” Although the law and order situation in the MMA-led province has by far been the best over the past three years, there has been little change in the standard of living of the common man in the Afghan refugee-infested province. While the alliance’s leadership mulls creating an Islamic society, their chosen chief minister and some of his cabinet members are being alleged to have involved in corruption and nepotism. “To cover up their failings and weakness, once again the mullahs are hiding behind Islam,” said Asma Jehangir, former chairperson of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. Except cricket hero and philanthropist Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf party, every political circle in the country is questioning the timing of the move. “More than their desire to Islamize Pakistani society, the mullahs have timed the passage to regain support ahead of the local body elections,” said Senator Farahatullah Babar of Pakistan Peoples’ Party. Still MMA leader Hafiz Hussain Ahmad defended the passage of the controversial bill and questioned the basis of General Pervez Muaharraf’s reference in the Supreme Court. The superior court can interpret the laws but cannot reverse them or give a judgment on their practicability, he said. Meanwhile, the 9-member court bench led by the chief justice is set to start hearing into the presidential reference under the Supreme Court Advisory Jurisdiction (Article 186 of the Constitution) to extend its opinion on constitutionality and validity of the legislation in question.

IMPLICATIONS: Creating a religious watchdog body to monitor the observance of religious values in public places not only runs contrary to the much publicized ‘enlightened moderation’ but is also being propagated as ‘violation of fundamental rights’. Although the passage of Hisba bill has temporarily united the anti-Musharraf forces, the same circles continue to blame the country’s military elite for creating an enabling environment for the MMA’s advances in the 2002 general election. While analysts foresee a tough turf battle between the liberals and the Islamists, constitutional experts believe that the enactment of the Hisba bill would encroach on an existing justice system by creating a parallel one on religious lines, undermining judicial independence and denying citizens their right of access to courts. Many analysts blame the Musharraf regime for deliberately failing to engage the MMA government in talks but instead to opt to confront a democratically elected provincial government. “The insecure general needed something fresh to remind the west how volatile the situation in the frontline state is and how indispensable he remains as war on terror goes on without an end in sight,” says Tariq Mahmood, former judge and president of Supreme Court Bar Association. Politically speaking, the implications are serious for the camps, pro-Musharraf and the Islamists with local bodies’ elections just around the corner in August and a general election likely in 2006 after a likely deal with the liberal-minded but power-hungry Peoples’ Party led by Benazir Bhutto. On the ground, the gulf within the Pakistani liberal elite and common people, majority of whom is relatively conservative, has further widened after a recent crackdown on religious schools all over the country following General Musharraf’s promise with British Premier Tony Blair to extend all help in a probe into the 7/7 perpetrators.

CONCLUSIONS: Following the government’s flawed handling of the MMA in the NWFP and the crackdown on religious schools, the MMA, with its enormous and pro-active street power, already seems to emerge as beneficiaries while Musharraf and his associates as losers. Whether the Hisba is enacted into a law after ceremonial approval from the governor or shut down by the supreme court, the MMA stands a fair chance to gain politically in the forthcoming polls for attempting to Islamize the largely conservative northwestern province in particular and the rest of the country in general. Since the fresh row with Musharraf’s administration, the internal cracks of the MMA seem to have filled up and the alliance is ready to contest the forthcoming series of elections. Last time, it was 9/11 and the subsequent carpet bombing of Afghanistan by the US-led coalition; while this time, Musharraf regime’s mishandling of the Hisba bill and poorly planned actions against religious schools in the backdrop of 7/7 are setting the tone of the election campaign for the theocratic alliance. The MMA’s move to enact the Hisba Bill has more political undertones than theocratic; yet civil society activists are harping to create a paranoia amongst their ‘valued audience’ in the western capitals. AUTHOR’S BIO: Naveed Ahmad is an investigative journalist, broadcaster and academic whose work regularly appears in the Pakistani daily newspaper, The News, and the monthly magazine, Newsline. He also hosts a 30-minute current affairs talk show, Insight, for Radio Pakistan’s News and Current Affairs Channel. He serves on the panel of the Global Journalists Program, which is associated with the International Press Institute and U.S. National Public Radio.