Pakistan
A tale of two Labour Parties
Accompanying article: The left and Islamic fundamentalism
Farooq Tariq, General Secretary of the Labour Party Pakistan addressed a packed meeting of over 70 people on a wet Friday night in London on January 25. Below we print his speech:
I would like to thank the International Socialst Group for organising this meeting and to thank you all of you that have come in large numbers to hear the point of view of the Labour Party Pakistan and the role we have played in the peace movement in Pakistan.
The Labour Party Pakistan has nothing to do with the Labour Party in Britain. The Labour Party in Britain is on the side of the dictators, on the side of the fundamentalists, on the side of the bombings. We are on the opposite side – on the side of the socialists, the Marxists, the side of those who want to promote peace and human rights with the active participation of the working class.
Comrades, twice in the last 10 days I have visited the border area between India and Pakistan, about 20km from Lahore where I live. We wanted to counter the endless government propaganda pushed by the media saying the peasants in the border area wanted to fight with India, that there is a feeling for war. This is total nonsense.
The LPP, with the help of some NGOs, organised a delegation including journalists – and not a single villager from 75 villages in the area said that they wanted war in Pakistan.
This is probably the first time that the overwhelming majority of Pakistanis are against war with India – very different to 1965 or in 1975 when there was war between us. Then there was a "Crush India" movement launched by fundamentalists but which whipped things up. Now there is a mass sentiment for peace which is strengthened by the fact that people know what it means if war starts with India over Kashmir.
Today in Pakistan the dictator Musharaf is taking some measures against fundamentalists – the very same people that were promoted not only by sections of the Pakistan Intelligence Service, the ISI, but also by Bush and Blair.
It was their neo-liberal policies that led to the poverty and wretched conditions that allow fundamentalism to develop a base in countries like Pakistan. The ISI wanted to create a war-like situation to justify the existence of a large army in Pakistan. There is an army of 1 million in Pakistan and more than that in India, which is taking up 46% of GNP spent on defence.
But when the fundamentalists get out of control, US imperialism wants people like Musharaf to crack down on them. So Musharaf dutifully announced a ban on some of the terrorist groups. He didn’t take these steps because he is a liberal, or a peace loving person.
The measures are very superficial; they don’t deal with the real problem. The only way to combat fundamentalism is to deal with its causes.
Musharaf has praised the role of the madrassas – 35,000 schools with over 1 million students who get religious education when the state system is almost non-existent. These schools promote mis-education and fundamentalism. We want to see these schools nationalised, we want to see a normal curriculum introduced into them. That is one of the way that fundamentalism can really be undermined.
Musharaf also avoided sensitive issues like the blasphemy laws, under which death sentences are still handed out – including in cases where there has clearly been a frame up. There was a famous case three years ago where a Christian bishop, John Joseph, committed suicide to protest about a particular frame up. Despite this, the Lahore high court recently confirmed the death sentence in that case.
The Islamic Ideological Council, which is the main base for the promotion of fundamentalism in Pakistan, has not been touched. The system of Sharia law under which women are worth half of men remains in place. This means a woman can’t give evidence on her own – there must be two women. If you murder a woman you are fined half what you would pay if it were a man.
Bush and Blair hail Musharaf for taking action against fundamentalists but laws like this still exist. These superficial actions have been taken to please the Americans – but also the Indians, in the hope that the tension that arose after the bombing of the Indian Parliament will go away.
This confirms that no section of the bourgeoisie has any progressive aspect. Pakistan had 10 years of civilian rule under Benazir Bhutto, and then Nawaz Sharif and now we have had nearly 2 years of military rule under Musharaf. These years confirm that the ruling class – in whatever form- can only play a reactionary, conservative role. The task of modernising our society lies on the shoulders of the working class.
The truth of the theory of permanent revolution has been vindicated time and time again by the total failure of the different sections of the ruling class to carry out any reforms in the interests of the workers. The Labour Party Pakistan believes that only when the working class takes power will any fundamental measures to modernise our society be carried through.
Since September 11 we have seen that when there is a dispute between states, the language of war predominates. After the attack on the Indian Parliament on December 13, the Indian Prime Minister Vajpayee, who leads a Hindu chauvinist party, took the same line as Bush. He sent an army that was more than half a million strong to the border and threatened to start a war.
Across the world, discussions are not about how to negotiate, but to threaten and use the language of war to terrorise your opponents. Since September 11, the ideology and philosophy of war has been promoted – and the working class has suffered. This is the path that has been trodden by rulers in different parts of the world, cracking down on dissidents be they from the left or religious fundamentalists.
At the heart of this recent tension between India and Pakistan is the question of Kashmir. Kashmir is an independent nation with its own identity, its own culture, its own language, its own territory. LPP stands for the right of self-determination of the Kashmiri masses independent of both Pakistani and Indian occupation. We want a plebiscite to be held – not under the UN but under committees of the Kashmiri masses. Until then there will be tension between India and Pakistan.
The overwhelming majority of Kashmiri masses are in support of independence, but the fundamentalists of Pakistan, sponsored by the ISI have tried to change the direction of the national liberation movement – wanting to give it the colour of religion. They want to pose it as a movement of Muslims against Hindus rather than a movement of Kashmiris against the occupation of both Pakistan and India.
The Pakistani state has consciously supported them in this, the ruling class have always said that they are in favour of jihad in Kashmir. But now Musharaf wants to appear as the darling of the west. Newsweek recently wrote a 5 page article about how progressive he is, how modern, how liberal, how much of a democrat. This dictator who cracks down on any political dissent inside the country is portrayed in this false way because he supports the interests of the West.
He has been promoting jihad in Kashmir, but now he is trying to control that because of the pressure of American imperialism. But his efforts will not last very long, and his attempt to curb fundamentalists will not bring fundamentalism under control.
We see fundamentalists as a new sort of fascists who have to be opposed. There is nothing progressive, nothing anti-imperialist, in the strategy of fundamentalists against America.
We have seen in practice that fundamentalists are an extreme right wing, antidemocratic force who have nothing in common with progressive ideas.
Some left groups say that we should side with the fundamentalists because they are opposing American imperialism. But we in Pakistan have learned this lesson through hard realities.
We saw what happened in the Iranian revolution. Before Khomeini took over in 1979, the Tudeh Party, the Communist Party of Iran, made an alliance with Khomeini’s fundamentalists against the Shah. The Tudeh Party had played an important part in the mass movement but when the Shah was overthrown, and Khomeini came to power the first thing he did was to hang the General Secretary of the Tudeh Party. Hundreds of activists were hanged. And we saw a total collapse of those left forces who thought that we should make a temporary alliance with those fundamentalists who seem to be anti-imperialist, who make a lot of noise against imperialism.
We also had a similar experience in Pakistan. In 1977, when there was mass opposition to Bhutto, sections of the Stalinists aligned with Jamat-Al-Islami to launch a movement against her. The Stalinists argued that Bhutto was a fascist and that we should join hands with fundamentalists to liberalise Pakistan and to get rid of him. But the result was that the military took over and Zia put these left forces into jail.
Another example comes from Afghanistan. During the Nijibullah period, most of his opponents within the party collaborated with the mujhadeen and thus gave ammunition to Nijibullah. They thought that first they could have an alliance with the fundamentalists to defeat Nijibullah and that afterwards they could deal with the mujhadeen – and do so easily. But in 1992 when the mujhadeen took over the Nijibullah party was totally finished and now you don’t hear any more about this party, Afghanistan Motherland Party of Nijibullah.
After September 11, we condemned the terrorist action and also said war is no way to stop terrorism. The headline in our weekly paper, Worker’ s Struggle, said "No Terrorism against Terrorism". Our paper played an important role at this time and we anticipated that there would be an immediate attack on Afghanistan.
We also said there should be no alliance with fundamentalists. This was nothing new for us. Since the LPP was in formed in 1997 we have always said we will never have any alliance with the fundamentalists or with any section of the religious parties.
There have been many offers to us, in the trade union field, in the political field where they have said let’s have a joint campaign. Some fundamentalists said, we are against privatisation, let’s get together and fight against the privatisation of the railways.
But we replied if we look at your philosophy, you are in favour of private property, you are in favour of feudalism, in favour of capitalism – how can you fight privatisation? We won’ t go along with your demagogy. We know you only say you are against privatisation under the pressure of the working class. You are taking this initiative to develop a social base in the working class in order to attack working class rights more effectively.
The Pakistani and Arab fundamentalists who went to Afghanistan to fight with the Taliban were massacred whereas the local, Pashtun Taliban left the jihad, melted into the background and just became Pashtun. Mullah Omar and Osama left the foreign fundamentalists to be massacred by the Northern Alliance and the American army. Most of the Taliban leadership were not killed, they made a compromise with Karazai – maybe with the approval of American imperialism – and they escaped to safety out of Kandahar. So Karazai will be able to use them in the future if there is a tension between Uzbeks and Hasarahs and Tajiks and so on.
When it came to saving their own necks they forgot about the jihad, about the slogans that "we will fight until death" – it was only to Kandahar that they fought! They ran away on motor bikes and all this – and this has left a very bad taste in Pakistan because the Pakistanis did not escape.
It seems that there is some feeling in the West that if Osama is alive, or Omar, they could regenerate. But I think that Osama as a leader of this section of the Taliban is finished. They are totally exposed. No fundamentalists in this area of the world will believe them again, will follow them. There will be new leaders with different forms of fundamentalism, but this current is finished.
I want to say a few words about the role of the LPP. The first demonstration we organised was before the attacks of American imperialism on Afghanistan, on September 27. The Women Workers Helpline took the initiative to launch the first peace demonstration, with more than 500 activists.
This is an organisation we have set up over the last year which is helping women to break into the trade unions, helping in the communities, which is fighting against domestic violence and against police brutality against women. The demonstration made the headlines across the country that women have come out for peace in Pakistan.
This brought an alternative view in the country because before that every day the fundamentalists were on the streets, with their slogans that Osama is the hero of the Muslim world. Generally these were not large marches, but there was a general feeling of support for what they were saying. This is hardly surprising given what American imperialism has done to Third World countries. That is why the majority of the Pakistani working class sympathised with the terrorist actions on September 11.
So this first action of ours on September 27 was very much a minority position. But then on October 15 in Lahore, over 1000 party activists rallied at the same time as the fundamentalists called a General strike.
The police pressured us to cancel our action but we said no, you’ re not telling the fundamentalists to cancel their action, why should we be the ones to back down? So over 1000 came, of which about 400 were women and we had a very militant demonstration against the war and against the fundamentalists.
We said that day that we totally oppose American imperialism but that we will not support Osama and Mullah Omer who have attacked women’s rights. We exposed the hypocrisy of American imperialism and their newfound support for women’ s rights. As one of our women activists said that day: "They are killing women in Kabul, how can they defend the rights of women?"
Then on November 6 over 8000 people demonstrated in Rawalpindi on our initiative and the majority of them were women. Some NGOs who were involved wanted to use the demonstration just against the fundamentalists and maybe in favour of the army. We had formed an alliance for justice and peace and some NGOs who were linked with the military regime said "OK we will take part in the demonstration, but on our terms".
But we made sure that the main slogan and the main tone of that demonstration was against imperialism, against the bombing and so on, but we also condemned fundamentalism on the same demonstration.
That demonstration really changed the mood in many organisations; it really gave courage to people to come out against both American imperialism and the fundamentalists.
Then on 10 December we had another demonstration in Lahore of 2000 and then on December 31 we had brought 2000 activists to the border with India and we had slogans on both sides of the border opposing war. This was the first time we had managed to reach the border itself – the area is fenced off and we had to force our way through the barriers.
The Indian people on the other side were there to see the ceremony of flag changing but when they heard our slogans they responded in the same voice that they want peace and not war. And then the baton charges started and we were all hurt including the former Chairperson of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan who was one of the main leaders of this demonstration.
For you I’m sure it is normal to celebrate New Year. But the fundamentalists have made a big deal of preventing any celebrations. In Lahore in particular, they roam round the streets in gangs on New Year’s night, trying to find out who has drink. If there is a party going on, they will attack it and try to disperse people – and the police will just stand by and watch while they do this.
This year the LPP announced in the press that we will go onto the main road to celebrate New Year’s night as a Peace Night. So 30 of us went there and we saw hundreds of police waiting for us and we were really afraid that we would be arrested. But actually when we got there they said, well at least someone has dared to come to this place to celebrate the New Year, and they wished us Happy New Year.
So this was a very good initiative by the Labour Party, and thousands of people waved to us. And it was maybe the first time in maybe 25 years that there was a little demonstration on the main street in Lahore to celebrate New Years night openly and publicly.
It was very symbolic – symbolic that someone has dared fight against fundamentalism and it gained us big publicity in all the newspapers and so on.
The most important initiative we have taken recently, together with comrades in the Scottish Socialist Party is the Afghan Workers’ Solidarity campaign. So far we have produced three issues of a monthly paper in Pashtu, and sent a truckload of material worth half a million rupees from Lahore. Our solidarity is practical but also about ideological help.
Seven radical left groups from Afghanistan met in Peshawar last month and agreed to form a committee. They are mostly ex-Maoists. The main group is the ex-Maoist Afghan Revolutionary Labour Organisation. They are closer to our politics now and have withdrawn their initial support for Zahir Shah, the former king of Afghanistan.
The Afghan left groups are quite influential in the refugee camps in Pakistan. They have done heroic work. Many, many of their activists have been killed. One of their women comrades came to Lahore and spoke very bravely without purdah in a meeting we organised of 200 people, mainly men.
The Afghan Workers’ Solidarity Campaign can create some sort of basis for a new left in Afghanistan. The old Stalinist groups have been defeated and disillusioned. The new groups have been making visits to Afghanistan for a long time, but they are still based in Pakistan.
There is a very big discussion among them about whether they should go back now the Northern Alliance is in power. The NA are fundamentalists as well, and the comrades don’t want to voluntarily hand themselves over to another fundamentalist group.