A medical doctor by profession, Dr Malik belongs to a middle-class and educated family of Kech district.

Born in Sigenisar village near Turbat in the family of Haji Abdul Salam, a zamindar, Dr Malik got his early education from a village school and did his intermediate from the Government Collage, Turbat.

He completed his MBBS from the Bolan Medical College and later specialised in eye surgery. He ran a clinic in Turbat for a brief period before entering active politics.

Dr Malik played active role in Baloch Students Organisation (BSO). In 1987, he formed a political party — Baloch National Youth Movement (BNYM).

Not satisfied with the performance of the BNYM, he later formed Balochistan National Movement (BNM) with Dr Abdul Hayee Baloch as its chairman.

Dr Malik first contested election in 1988 for a Balochistan Assembly seat from the platform of Balochistan National Alliance headed by Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti and Sardar Ataullah Mengal.

He won the seat and was made health minister in the cabinet of Nawab Akbar Bugti.
In 1993 general elections, he won a provincial seat performed as education minister in the cabinet of Nawab Magsi.

In 2004, the National Party (NP) came into existence as a broad-base political party with the merger of Dr Malik’s BNM and Mir Hasil Khan Bizenjo’s National Democratic Party.

Dr Hayee was elected first president of the NP and now Dr Malik is its head. From 2006 to 2012, Dr Malik remained member of the Senate raised his voice on the issues of Balochistan in the upper house of the parliament.

He played major role in discussions over the 18th Amendment and in encouraging the PPP to surrender the entire Concurrent List of the constitution to provinces.

Dr Malik is considered as the most popular leader of the NP among party activists.

During campaign for 2013 general elections he managed to win sympathies and support of tribal chieftains and sardars who won their traditionally seats.

Main challenges before Dr Malik as chief minister would be the problem of corruption in the province, the missing persons issue, security challenges and good governance.

Political observers are of the opinions that Dr Malik would have face big challenges as the chief minister of the province.

But most of them say he has the ability to get the province of its ills and put it on the right track.

Iraqis gather at the scene of a car bomb attack at a used cars dealers parking lot in Habibiya neighborhood of eastern Baghdad, Iraq, Monday, May 27, 2013.  — Photo by AP

BAGHDAD: Violence in Iraq has killed more than 500 people in May, AFP figures showed on Tuesday, as authorities struggled to contain a wave of unrest that has raised fears of new sectarian conflict.

And the UN envoy to Iraq urged the country’s leaders to meet to resolve long-running political crises that have paralysed the government and been linked to its inability to reduce the violence.

As of Monday, 503 people were killed and 1,273 wounded, making May the deadliest month in at least a year, according to the data, based on reports from security and medical officials.

May is the second month in a row in which more than 400 people have been killed, for a total exceeding 960 people in less than two months.

A wave of attacks, including bombings in Baghdad that mainly targeted Shia areas, killed 58 people on Monday and wounded 187, officials said.

“I once again urge all Iraqi leaders to do everything possible to protect Iraqi civilians. It is their responsibility to stop the bloodshed now,” UN envoy Martin Kobler said in a statement on Tuesday.

“It is the politicians’ responsibility to act immediately and to engage in dialogue to resolve the political impasse and not let terrorists benefit from their political differences,” he said.

Iraq is faced with various long-running political crises over issues ranging from power-sharing to territorial boundaries, that have paralysed the government.

The US embassy, meanwhile, issued a statement in which it said it “strongly condemns the wave of bombings,” expressing condolences to the victims.

Iraq has seen a heightened level of violence since the beginning of the year, coinciding with rising discontent among Iraqi Sunnis that erupted into protests in late December.

Members of Iraq’s Sunni minority, which ruled the country from its establishment after World War I until Saddam Hussein’s overthrow by US-led forces in 2003, accuse the Shia-led government of marginalising and targeting their community.

Analysts say government policies that have disenfranchised Sunnis, coupled with Shia-led authorities’ refusal to make any major concessions to the protesters, have given militant groups fuel and room to manoeuvre among the disillusioned community.

The government has made some concessions aimed at placating protesters and Sunnis in general, such as freeing prisoners and raising the salaries of Sunni anti-Al Qaeda fighters, but underlying issues have yet to be addressed.

Violence in Iraq has fallen from its peak at the height of the sectarian conflict in 2006 and 2007, but attacks remain common.

An illustration picture shows the log-on icon for the Website Facebook and Twitter on an Ipad in Bordeaux, Southwestern France, January 30, 2013. — Reuters Photo

Shahbaz Sharif- @CMShehbaz We are all about the people – whatever makes them happy. #VotersChoice

The use of social media is rising in Pakistan. Over a six-month period from late 2010 to early 2011, the number of Facebook users doubled from 1.8 to 3.6 million, while between August 2011 and January 2012 the number of new Facebook accounts increased by a million.

Facebook, according to internet traffic monitoring data, is currently the most popular website in Pakistan. Pakistanis are also increasingly found on Twitter. The micro-blogging platform was the tenth-most visited website in Pakistan in June 2010, compared to 14th the previous year. Additionally, growing numbers of people have the means to access social media in Pakistan. The number of internet users has increased by at least several million since 2009.

In 2010, mobile internet usage soared by 161% – this in a country where every other resident uses a cell phone (Pakistan has one of the highest rates of cell phone ownership in South Asia).

Social media has enabled prompt circulation of news stories which may otherwise be overlooked by traditional media. Furthermore, it facilitates group mobilization, primarily by disseminating information about protests or gatherings quickly. Third, it allows greater communication between politicians and their constituents at minimal cost.

Rasul Baksh Rais, a well known academic and commentator, recently stated in an interview that due to the expansion of social media, Pakistanis were taking a greater interest in politics. According to him, social media allows for an informed assessment of political parties and their candidates.

Social media forums are used in Pakistan by political parties to strengthen their vote bank. The idea is to target a young populace, aged 18-24, who have never cast votes in any elections, to vote for their party in the upcoming elections, especially in the cities and towns where internet access is available.

While some conservative groups refuse to interact with liberals on Twitter and block their tweets, others participate in spirited, although reasoned, discussions – interactions that rarely happen offline in Pakistan, where hardliners and liberals are loath to share the same room, much less a conversation.

Twitter has managed to become a favourite of different parliamentarians and politicians, as it allows them to understand public discourse. Similarly, Twitter has given potential voters a platform to engage directly with party leadership.

Farahnaz Ispahani, one of the most active users with over 14,000 followers, joined Twitter in 2010 as an“open intellectual space,” which, according to her, was much needed in a Pakistani society that is becoming increasingly conservative.

Amongst the political parties operating in Pakistan, PTI has the most prominent online presence. Express Tribune reported that the digital media campaigns for PTI – which has more than 87,000 followers on Twitter and more than 522,000 ‘likes’ on Facebook – are run by more than 50 volunteers, based all around the world.

A sample tweet, which mobilizes Imran Khan’s young supporters is as follows: @ImranKhanPTI: “I told r youth that 2day they r seeing history being made & will be able 2 tell their children they were present at start of #NayaPakistan!”

Maryam Nawaz Sharif, daughter of PML-N head Mian Nawaz Sharif, has emerged as a strong political activist, engaging Twitter by replying personally to everyone who contacts her. PML-N has also made a cell for closely monitoring internet and SMS messages.

This is how she bridges the communication gaps between elite leaders and their supporters: @MaryamNSharif Am a proud PMLN worker “@IrfanPMLN:  @votepmln Ur speech was so good really impressive we want to see you as a chief minister Punjab.”

Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s Haider Abbas Rizvi says Twitter has helped him understand and analyse political trends. He currently has two twitter accounts with more than 7,000 followers combined. Being the media head of the party, Rizvi has subordinates working around the clock. He takes Twitter and social media very seriously and the MQM is now expanding its presence on Twitter as well as other platforms.

Bakhtawar and Asifa Bhutto-Zardari also have a considerable presence on the social media network. Bakhtawar is the most active and engages with her followers and posts animated tweets which generate immense discussion. The positions that the three children of President Zardari take indicate their political stances and the courage they have inherited from a family of “martyrs”.  Using her handle @BakhtawarBZ, the 23-year old tweeted the following in recent days:

Since the interior ministry has given IK security (..from his own supporters) – can they now protect #PPP + #ANP from extremists?

Fight b/w those who support terrorists +those who oppose them. Parties hold jalsas risking lives vs those who hold concerts with no fear.

Terrorism MUST be condemned by every1 -sick 2 c ppl value party affiliation above human life. Attack on one is an attack on all #Pakistan

Of late, the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) faction, headed by Fazlur Rehman, have also joined the bandwagon. After their initial contempt, they have been swayed by the lure of the medium and its far reaching influence.

The Awami National Party (ANP) has also joined the platform and increased its presence. ANP’s Bushra Gohar, with almost 12,000 followers, has emerged as a powerful voice of the Pakhtun population and its rights. She displays exemplary courage and is not afraid of calling a spade a spade. Not unlike other bold politicians, Gohar has been viciously attacked and even threatened. But this does not deter her from speaking her mind and engaging in vital debates on national and local issues.

Despite the popularity of social media as a campaign tool for the upcoming elections, it alone cannot guarantee success. There are about 8 million Facebook users in the country, of which a great majority are under the age of 36. Similarly, some two million Pakistanis use Twitter and just over a million are LinkedIn users. Experts say that the number of social media users in Pakistan is increasing by an average of 7 percent a year. However, outreach is still limited as a majority of the 80 million registered voters live in rural areas of the country and do not have internet access. Currently, only about 15-20% of the total population has access to social media networks, which indicates a rather low penetration rate. Nevertheless, social media still manages to inform the electronic media and other debates.

There is additionally the risk of manipulation of social media by traditional media outlets for their own gain. Pakistan’s major television channels all boast Facebook and Twitter accounts with tens of thousands of likes and hundreds of thousands of followers.

Other risks posed by social media in Pakistan include their succumbing to the same ideological divisions that afflict Pakistani society, and even becoming a haven for extremist online communication. Yet another risk is that the lack of regulation supports unethical content.

Many events in Pakistan spark much noise within the social mediasphere – yet the outrage rarely leads to protests, much less actual change. On so many occasions, in the words of one Pakistani blogger, “Twitter was clogged with dissident discourse and Facebook statuses sprung up to register protests and yet it all resulted in absolutely nothing”.

Some argue that the country’s shrinking liberal sphere is retreating to Twitter and Facebook to promote its views, leaving hardliners to shape debate on offline venues such as television news shows and the streets. As a result, social media may create another wedge between Pakistan’s liberals and conservatives. On a positive note however, it may also serve as a platform for dialogue and debate, bringing different points of view together.

In the immediate term, the outcomes of the forthcoming elections will be influenced by the media at large: electronic, print and social, perhaps in that order. However, in the urban areas and with respect to the new voters, internet and mobile telephones are likely to play a major role. The real challenge in urban Pakistan, especially Punjab, is to increase the voter turnout. The influence of social media in doing that must not be underestimated.

Raza Rumi is a policy analyst and a journalist. His writings are archived at www.razarumi.com. He can be reached via Twitter @razarumi.

— File Photo by Reuters

TRIPOLI: Gunmen surrounded Libya’s foreign ministry on Sunday demanding it be “cleansed of agents” and ambassadors of ousted dictator Muammar Qadhafi, an official said.

The group prevented staff from entering the building in Tripoli, said the ministry official who spoke to AFP on condition of anonymity.

Around 30 vehicles, some mounted with anti-aircraft guns, and dozens of armed men surrounded the office, an AFP photographer at the scene reported.

The official criticised the group’s “extremely offensive” behaviour, even if their demands were “legitimate”, saying this did not justify “paralysing the whole work of a ministry”.

The General National Congress, Libya’s highest political authority, is studying proposals for a law to exclude former Qadhafi regime officials from top government and political posts.

The proposed law could affect several senior figures in the government, and has caused waves in the country’s political class.

In March, demonstrators encircled the assembly, trapping members in the building for several hours as they called for the adoption of the law.

After the siege was lifted, gunmen targeted Congress chief Mohammed Megaryef’s motorcade without causing any casualties.

Libya’s government is struggling to assert its influence across the country, where Megaryef’s militias who fought Kadhafi in the 2011 uprising still countrol much territory.

Though female participation helps in terms of making specific policies related to women, MNA Bushra Gohar of Awami National Party thinks serving women is not the only purpose of a woman politician. — File Photo

KARACHI: Whether it’s Badam Zari from Bajaur, or Veeru Kohli form Hyderabad, women are trying their luck by running for the upcoming elections on general seats, highlighting more than ever the role of women in Pakistani politics.

Though female participation helps in terms of making specific policies related to women, MNA Bushra Gohar of Awami National Party thinks serving women is not the only purpose of a woman politician.

“We shouldn’t be asking these questions now. Women politicians have played an active role in everyway. Why is nobody asking a male politician whether his joining politics has helped men in anyway?” she asks. Gohar believes that women make their own space in a party and that space is never available on a platter. “It also depends on how much space the party is willing to give a woman politician depending on the party leaders’ mindset,” she adds.

Former deputy secretary general of the PPPP, Dr. Nafisa Shah, says that women participation is more necessary than ever. She says that ideally the representation should be 50 per cent but blames the “cultural mindset” in preventing that.

Beginning her political career on a reserved seat, Shah feels that reserved seats are fine as far as creating a space is concerned. But after that one needs to push forward. “Our male contemporaries do grumble about women elected on reserved seats, getting equal space as them. But we are pushing forward.” She says that many women get tangled in dynastic politics and though the reserved seats are looked down upon, she feels that it is “generally a good system for introducing women.”

Nafisa Shah. — Online Photo

Given the recent shuffle of reserved seats in Punjab, which largely went to family members of politicians, the president of the Jamaat-i-Islami women’s wing Dr. Samiha Raheel Qazi said that Pakistan still has a long way to go in terms of placing a deserving candidate on a reserved seat.

“Political parties need democracy within their own cadres in order to give women a chance to fight on general seats. A reserved seat is only a cosmetic presentation not a real one. Those who deserve it still can’t make it to parliament,” she adds.

With the recent attacks on offices of political parties, Shah explains: “The continuing attacks on the election offices of ANP, PPPP and MQM, will shrink the space women have created for themselves,” adding, “Progressive parties need to come back to power in the upcoming elections.”

Badam Zari from Bajaur has already made history by contesting elections independently. And there are other candidates who are contesting elections from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa this time around, which was previously very rare. While Badam Zari kept up her efforts, another candidate Gullana Bibi, from Tank, had to withdraw her candidature following threats.  Gohar adds that, “Zari is supported by her family, and that helps a lot, especially in such cases.”

Speaking of space and the impact of having a woman politician on board, Muttahida Qaumi Movement Senator Nasreen Jalil says that there have been many positive developments too. At present, there is a caucus of women representatives in parliament who discuss burning matters irrespective of party affiliations. “It wasn’t the case previously. There was no impact of having a woman candidate, as most get elected on reserved seats,” Jalil says.

She adds that earlier, the only advantage of having women candidates on a reserved seat was “in terms of prominence, to show we have women in parliament.” But today it is becoming our need to have women candidates, especially those who work and deserve to be there, because when it comes to taking an initiative, Jalil says that many politicians seem hesitant, in making a woman in charge.

“There is an hesitation among parties and among women themselves to go for general seats,” she says, adding at the same time that, women who come from lower middle class families understand issues better, whereas those who come through “family links, can’t play an active role, as they don’t know the issues at hand.” For that purpose, Jalil believes that more women need to contest on general seats than on a reserved seat.

Giving an example of a military operation in the 90s, Jalil said that it was mostly women workers, from middle and lower middle class, who demonstrated against the operation and took hold of party offices, while men had to go underground. “Those women were workers too. They did their part irrespective of the consequences.”

Badam Zari is contesting from Bajaur. — Photo by Abdul Majeed Goraya/White Star.

Just like Gohar, Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PML-N) member Marvi Memon, thinks that women candidates, if “competent and hardworking” can achieve a lot. However, she believes that the real fight is with the “feudal mindset and the fear wall” that keeps political parties as well as people from moving forward. Referring to reserved seats as crutches, she said that, “My party allowed me to walk without crutches. In order to bring in real change, we need women who can walk without crutches.”

While a lot of legislation regarding women’s rights has been passed in the past five years, female representatives feel that there is still a lot that needs to be done.

Women representing the three mainstream parties, ANP, PPP and MQM said their first priority will be the domestic violence bill, which was under debate in the previous parliament.  Gohar said that for her, the domestic violence bill and the Hudood Ordinance will be a priority. “The former became a victim of political reconciliation and the latter has been distorted way beyond recognition,” she added. Nasreen Jalil, apart from focusing on the domestic violence bill, said she would make education and economic empowerment of women her priority.

Though a bill on preventing crimes against women was passed, Shah said that crimes against women are still compoundable. “We need dedicated laws for acid crimes and to make crimes against women non-negotiable, not to be settled by families or murderers. That is a serious issue and needs to be addressed,” she added.

For Samiha Qazi, apart from health, security and education, she wants to specifically focus on Islamic inheritance laws for women. “We need to understand that participation of women is necessary in politics. But it needs not to be imposed. We are still a long way back from letting a woman decide what she wants to do or be,” she concludes.

ANP leader Ghulam Bilour.. — Photo by AFP/File

Consisting of crowded old-city neighbourhoods and unplanned semi-urban residential areas, Peshawar’s National Assembly constituency NA-1 has always mainly been closely fought over by the Awami National Party (ANP) and the Pakistan Peoples Party.

Since 1988, candidates belonging to the ANP and the PPP have emerged victorious alternatively on NA-1, except for the 2002 general elections when the religio-political Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal alliance won the majority of the National Assembly seats from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

While the faces fielded by the PPP have been changing, on the ANP side it has always been the Bilours. Ghulam Ahmed Bilour led the family’s forays into politics, except for 2002 when he was handicapped because candidates were required to have a graduation degree.

Though not unbeatable (they were defeated by PPP candidates in 1988 and 1993), the Bilours know what it takes to defeat others at the polls no matter how massive the challenger. In 1990, Ghulam Bilour snatched victory from the jaws of defeat against none other than Benazir Bhutto.

The constituency has odd political dynamics. Unlike numerous other urban centres within Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, NA-1 has never been a simple political chessboard that can be studied through merely ethnic, biradri (clan) or dharra (groupings) lens. It presents candidates the challenging task of building a winning combination by taking into account a perplexing mix of electorates from conservative cultural and religious backgrounds, enlightened political activists, and uneducated or undereducated working-class voters.

Comprising a voter base that has been historically divided along strong ethnic lines of the Pakhtun and Hindko-speaking communities, the constituency has been an equal-opportunity game for the ANP and the PPP. Both parties have successfully maintained connections within the two ethnic groups with the Bilours, an ethnic Hindko-speaking family from the inner city, performing the lead role in making the ANP a Peshawar party. No matter how formidable his opponent, the senior Bilour has always enjoyed the status of a front runner with equal chances of victory. This could be set to change.

Never before has the family confronted a one-man army that is the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf’s Imran Khan.

With mass appeal among the young, Mr Khan has the added advantage of being able to run his campaign freely. The Bilours, meanwhile, are under attack from the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). The April 16 suicide bomb attack on Mr Bilour’s election event in inner city Yakkatoot, which left 20 dead and over 40 injured, was a harsh reminder of this reality. In December last year, the TTP succeeded in killing Bashir Ahmed Bilour, a senior minister in the ANP-led Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government. According to Farid Toofan, once a close associate of the family and now a political rival, though younger to Ghulam Bilour, Bashir was the most politically amenable to maintaining public appeal.

But “if Imran holds appeal for the right-wing voters in Peshawar,” said an ANP man requesting anonymity, “Ghulam Bilour has also made some inroads.” He was referring to the $100,000 bounty that the senior Bilour announced last year for killing the producer of a short film that triggered a violent controversy in Pakistan.

Though he has never contested before from Peshawar, Mr Khan and his supporters are 100 per cent sure about victory. They have their reasons for such optimism. “If the current media hype remains unchanged, Imran appears set to win from wherever he is contesting,” said the ANP supporter.

However, the PTI is unlikely to sail through unchallenged. The Bilour appeal for a divergent vote bank is just one of the hurdles. “If the PPP had not fielded its candidate, its votes would have gone to Imran Khan because a good number of PPP voters have shown the tendency to vote against the Bilours in the absence of their own candidate,” said Malik Naveed, a PPP worker in NA-1.

The other sword hanging over Mr Khan on NA-1 appears to be the Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) candidate, Bashir Ahmed Khan, who has the proven capacity to deprive Mr Khan of the right-leaning vote bank. The JI’s candidate won in NA-1 against Usman Bilour in 2002, securing over 37,000 votes against the 23,000 polled by the later.

Similarly, while the Bilours have ample financial resources, a battery of party workers and well-established party organisation for election day, Mr Khan’s team is a new entrant to the logistics in an election. Nevertheless, “we have more than 50,000 registered voters just in Peshawar to work for our party leader on polling day,” said Zaffarullah, a PTI Peshawar leader.

Yet journalists in Peshawar say that the PTI managed to bring out only a few thousand registered members to vote in its recent party elections, casting doubts about the organisation of the PTI’s Peshawar chapter. The same doubt is implied by Zaffarullah’s own stance: “I will only vote for Imran Khan on NA-1, and not for the party’s ticket-holder on the provincial assembly seat because the party ignored those who worked hard to put it on Peshawar’s electoral map,” he said. Zaffarullah withdrew his candidature for PK-1 after initially deciding to run as an independent candidate against the party decision.

A Pakistani couple walk past an electoral billboard with the message “Pakistan is calling, your country your future,” in Islamabad, on April 24, 2013. — Photo by AFP

ISLAMABAD: Next month’s elections should mark the first democratic transition of power in Pakistan, but Taliban threats, social taboos and poor organisation will likely deprive millions of women their right to vote.

Out of a population of 180 million, 37 million women and 48 million men are registered to vote in the May 11 polls in a country that has been ruled by generals for half its life and where military coups have repeatedly interrupted democracy.

But in the conservative northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, adjoining tribal areas on the Afghan border and southwestern province Baluchistan, few women voted at the last election and officials fear it will be the same again.

“We waited the whole day… but not a single woman turned up because of a ban imposed by tribal elders,” remembers Badama Begum, a 33-year-old teacher who worked at a polling station in 2008 in the northwestern district of Mardan.

Election authorities set up a separate station staffed only by women to guarantee around 350 registered female voters complete privacy, but it was a waste of time.

“We closed the polling station in the evening, returned the blank ballot papers and empty boxes to the election commission, and left,” she said.

In 2008, not a single vote was cast at 564 of 28,800 women’s polling stations, 55 per cent of them in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, officials said.

In the most conservative areas, officials estimated women’s turnout at 10-15 per cent of those registered.

That year, 76 women ran for parliament and 16 won seats. The election commission says there are more women candidates this time, but had no precise number.

Registering to vote is a routine process conducted by officials who go door-to-door to compile a list of adults with ID cards in each household
But this in itself leaves millions of women disenfranchised.

Women’s rights activist Farzana Bari estimates that at least 11 million eligible women will not be able to vote simply because authorities have not granted them national identity cards.

The elections themselves present further barriers to women, with some religious leaders believing women voting is un-Islamic.

Voting for a man they do not know, some clerics counselled in 2008, was grounds for automatic divorce, a social taboo few are prepared to entertain.

“Our society does not allow us to bring our women to vote,” said Sharif Khan, 50, a solar energy dealer in Miramshah, the main town in the tribal district of North Waziristan, the most notorious Taliban and Al Qaeda stronghold in Pakistan.

“We are afraid of the Taliban. They oppose women voting, so why should we take the risk?” he asked.

In tribal communities such as these, women live in purdah, confined to women’s only quarters at home. They do not go shopping, they do not work outside the house and they only go to the hospital in a dire emergency.

Literacy rates are low, even lower for women. General disillusionment also runs high in some of the most remote and deprived parts of the country.

“Women in our area don’t even know how to vote,” said Miramshah cloth merchant Adam Khan, 35. “Our MPs do nothing for our welfare. So it’s not just our women, I won’t vote this time either,” he fumed.

In urban areas, politicians lay on transport to ferry voters to and from polling stations, but in the countryside it becomes more complicated when women are not allowed to travel without a close male relative.

Aware of the problem, the election commission tried to introduce reforms that no candidate could win with less than 10 per cent of the women’s vote in his constituency, but it was rejected in parliament, said spokesman Khurshid Alam.

He says the commission will try to enforce legislation against those who try to stop women from voting, although it remains unclear how.

“Preventing a person from casting his vote falls in the purview of corrupt practices and is punishable by three years in jail and fine of rupees 5,000  or both,” Alam told AFP.

The result of a by-election in Batagram was declared null three years ago when few women participated having been threatened with divorce. They took part in the re-run at which the threat of divorce was not raised, he said.

Khalida Bibi a 39-year-old housewife from the northwestern town of Dargai told AFP that she was hopeful that a tough election commission would have some impact.

“My name was on the voters’ list for the 2002 and 2008 elections, but I couldn’t vote because on both occasions local people decided that women would not,” she said.

“I hope I will succeed this time because the election commission has warned against any ban on women voting,” she added.

Beyghairat’s new video, “Dhinak Dhinak” hits hard at Pakistan’s establishment. — Photo: Publicity

KARACHI: Saturday brought with it an explosive new music video by Beyghairat Brigade in an explosive political climate – just weeks away from the election and two days after former President Pervez Musharraf’s arrest was ordered by the Islamabad High Court.

‘Dhinak Dhinak’ by the band of young men whose earlier claim to fame was ‘Aalu Anday’, is far more innocent sounding than it emerges to be. Here’s a hint:

Gernailaan da aye jadoo,

sab ker lay ka kaboo aye, Aiween na tu khabra,

Paway vekh lay woh maazi, ay mar lain gay baazi ay

(The generals will make things alright Boy,

there’s no need to worry

They’ve done this in the past, they know how to ace this bet)

The hard-hitting satire aimed at Pakistan’s military establishment went viral on social media, with Twitter aficionados heaping praise on the biting and unusually bold attack.

Ali Aftab Saeed, the lead vocalist for Beyghairat Brigade told Dawn.com that “this idea isn’t new. We’ve been working on it for a year, because of several reasons — some monetary issues, and also because no studio was willing to record it (because of its content).” The timing is also not coincidental — Saeed explains that while initially the song was written during the time Nato supply routes had been shut, it was edited as time went by and and as political scenarios changed — until Musharraf’s arrest, when it was considered a good time to release it.

While Pakistani media and music has often, in the past, lashed out at the corruption and incompetence of politicians through satirical shows like Hasb-e-Haal or generally lamented the ‘political situation’ through songs like “Laga reh” by Shehzad Roy, taking on the powerful military through mainstream pop culture is almost unheard of. According to Saeed, the reason they decided to hit out at the military was because “Of our own political ideology… and because we really feel like on TV and in all the newspapers, the politicians face all the bashing. I mean, nobody’s a saint.”

He adds that so far, the response has been overwhelming, with the exception of a few abusive tweets — “And we haven’t received any calls so far,” he adds, perhaps in reference to the cheeky message at the end of the video which states, “ No need to like this video, we’ll be dead anyway!”

This isn’t the first time that Beyghairat Brigade’s politics have gone viral. Last year, Aalu Anday also hit out at the various players in Pakistan’s dramatic political landscape, from the chief justice to Ajmal Kasab to PTI, and in a rather more subtle way, the military.

A rather different message

Contrast this with the video “Jamhoori Chor”, which emerged just a day earlier by a band called Naa Maloom Afraad – who, significantly, haven’t revealed their identity publicly and choose to remain out of the video for their song. At first glance, the two videos seem like they fit in the same genre: Political satire, expressed through humorous videos and lyrics.

But a closer look reveals something far more different: The video shows people impersonating politicians on a (fake) talk show before the conversations interrupts into a full-fledged free for all, with all the politicians at each other’s throats. Make no mistake, the politicians bear an extremely close resemblance to a number of our political leaders, most notably President Asif Ali Zardari.

What’s so different then? “Jamhoori Chor” focuses on Pakistan’s ‘corrupt politicians’ with people from just about every province and ethnicity represented – except, notably, Punjab. There is no mainstream Punjabi political party or politician to be seen being made fun of.

Dawn.com decided to investigate further, which ended up here at what appears to be the official website for “Jamhoori Chor”: No partisan choices have been declared, but the band’s song accompanies a playlist consisting of Pakistan’s classical ‘patriotic songs’ including Dil Dil Pakistan, Jazba Junoon and ironically, even ‘Hum Dekhain Ge’ by revolutionary poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz.

On the website is a rather sinister message about these “Jamhoori Chor”: “The sad and unfortunate part is that it is the very people of this beautiful nation who not only allow these Jamhoori Chor to carry on but rather put them on the mantle and that too repeatedly, again & again and again!!! This Jamhoori Chor has now become so self-absorbed in its misdoings & inflated in its ego that it believes itself indestructible and totally irreplaceable.”

Before an ill-informed similarity is drawn between the two songs then – will the real Na Maloom Afraad please stand up?

— File Photo

For a party committed to change the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf did something very conventional recently: it asked three men belonging to the same family to choose one of them for the PTI ticket in a Lahore constituency. Clearly, the individual did not matter, the biradri did.

NA-128 is a Lahore constituency that retains its link with the rural and, significantly, with tradition. In 2008, Afzal Khokhar won here beating his distant relative Karamat Ali Khokhar, then with the PPP, now with the PTI. Karamat’s nephew Zaheer Abbas Khokhar had won in 2002 on a PPP ticket and later joined the PPP-Patriots.

The members of the Khokhar biradri of Sistani and Shadiwal villages are once again arraying themselves on either side of the political Durand Line that has been most visible at the time of some recent elections. The Khokhars are a huge presence here.
“We may be divided at election time, but we never forget that we are one family, the Khokhars,” says Malik Humayun Khokhar of Sistani. “Others recognise this and that is why even the old settlers refrain from challenging our might, and candidates.”

The election time division that Humayun talks about is manifestation of the existence within the biradri of groups with their own desires and power aspirations. This entail party affiliations since going independent purely on the biradri strength is not a feasible option, at least it is not the best option here. The parties have to be selected carefully and local alliances with smaller clans in the area — the Bhattis, the Meos and the Arain — subtly worked out.

With the emergence of new power players, the landscape in the area has also been changing. The onset of new housing colonies in the area forces ever newer political strategies. The new voters who occupy the housing societies that have come up over the years have to be wooed, even if the nucleus provided by family has to be jealously guarded. For these ‘settlers’ it is more a choice between parties — or more specifically a choice between a Nawaz Sharif and an Imran Khan — rather than a choice between one Khokhar or the other.

When Karamat Khokhar left after a long stay in the PPP, the switchover was justified on the basis of the PPP leadership’s disregard for his services. But the decision could well have been informed by an understanding that it was getting extremely difficult for the Karamat group within the Khokhar clan to effectively fight the rival Khokhars in the PML-N under the fading PPP banner. The rising PTI offered a more feasible option for a biradri looking for an ‘electable’ political party.

The PML-Q in 2008 is a good example of a collection of powerful individuals with not enough party appeal to succeed. Armed with the influence of their own biradri and its alliances with other clans in a particular area the Q-League’s ‘electables’ were defeated by opposing ‘electables’ who had the party-biradri balance right.

Back to NA-128 in Lahore, the area does bear witness to journalist Suhail Warriach’s remarks that while elections do divide the big biradris they can unite smaller ones. The smaller biradris here, such as the Arain and the Rangars, close ranks to get the best deal in the election: if not from candidates outside the Khokhar biradri for the simple reason that this option is not available to them right now, then from any of the two Khokhar groups.

Veteran Shakargarh politician Anwar Aziz Chaudhry says divisions in biradris are not a new phenomenon since biradri means
blood relations who have disputes over land, marriages, etc. He says even a big biradri settled in a constituency generally does not form more than 50 per cent of the total votes. The rest of the voters belong to the smaller biradris which the candidates have to work for. Compromises are struck; sometimes in the shape of awarding of ‘choti’ or the provincial assembly seats or by offering other favours to create an inter-biradri alliance.

According to Chaudhry Anwar Aziz, the biradris are increasingly losing their structure. There is an exodus to towns to avail better facilities, and the more powerful a family is, the more likely it is that it will want to live in urban luxury. Intra-biradri marriages, he says, is the thread which still binds the clans.