Politcs And We

Jamiat Ulema Islam-Fazal (JUI-F) Roots JUI-F’s roots lie in Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind (JUH), a conservative Sunni (Deobandi) party in India. JUH was opposed to Jinnah’s All India Muslim League and (along with two other Islamic parties, the Jamat-i-Islami (JI) and Majlis-e-Ahrar), accused the Muslim League of being a secular organisation of ‘misguided Muslims.’ During the all-important election of 1945 in the Punjab in which the Muslim League needed to win big, Jinnah gave the green light to sponsor the creation of a pro-Muslim League religious party(26) that could divide the religious vote of the JUH and the Ahrar. Thus emerged the Jamiat Ulema Islam (JUI) which, at the time, had leadership from both Deobandi as well as the Sunni Barelvi Muslm communities. However, after Pakistan’s creation in 1947, the Barelvi leadership of the party formed its own party and the JUI became a strictly Deobandi Sunni Muslim outfit. Shabir Ahmad Usmani: The founder of JUI JUI w...

 Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Roots PTI was formed by former Pakistan cricket captain, Imran Khan, in 1996. The formation of the party was the political expression of the spiritual transformation Khan had been going through ever since the death of his mother (from cancer) and the Pakistan cricket team’s victory in the 1992 Cricket World Cup (under his captaincy). Throughout his cricketing career (1971-92), Khan had opted for a flamboyant and secular lifestyle and showed little interest in politics. Imran Khan as cricket captain: The spiritual wilderness years. Imran Khan with the World Cup, 1992 His religious transformation also coincided with him coming under the wings of former ISI Chief and close ally of Ziaul Haq, General Hamid Gul. After Gul was eased out from the ISI by the first Benazir Bhutto government (1988-90), he had formed a party called Tehreek-e-Ittihad and was trying to rope in Khan to join the party(19). However, not only did Khan moved...

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Roots The immediate roots of the PML-N lie in the merging of various PML factions in 1985 into becoming a single entity again. The merging took place on the behest of Pakistan’s third military dictator, General Ziaul Haq(11) who needed a civilian expression of his rule in a handpicked National Assembly. The factions that came together to form the 1985 version of PML had historical links with two PML groups that had emerged in 1962 during the Ayub Khan dictatorship (Council and Convention). PML-Convention was pro-Ayub whereas PML-Council oopposed him. Both the Convention and Council Leagues were mostly made up of members who had been active in Pakistan’s first ruling party, the Muslim League that in turn was an extension of the All India Muslim League (AIML). AIML was the leading Muslim party in undivided India during the ‘Pakistan Movement’. Though formed in 1906 to represent the economic, political and social interests of Ind...

Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) Roots MQM was formed as Mohajir Qaumi Movement in 1984 by Altaf Hussain and Azeem Ahmed Tariq as a party representing the political and economic interests of Sindh’s Mohajir (Urdu-speaking) population. Altaf and Azeem were students at the Karachi University in 1978 where they had first formed the All Pakistan Mohajir Students Federation (APMSO). The launching of the APMSO outside the Arts Lobby at the Karachi University, June 1978. The much overlooked reason behind the APMSO’s evolution into giving birth to the MQM is an economic one. According to famous Sindhi scholar, Ibrahim Joyo, ‘Punjabi economic hegemony’ increased immensely in Sindh during the dictatorship of Ziaul Haq(22). This situation had a negative impact on Karachi’s leading business communities (Memons, Gujaratis and other non-Punjabi business outfits). In such a situation these communities formed the Maha Sindh (MS) — an organisation set up to protect the intere...

Jamat-i-Islami (JI) Roots Formed in 1941 by Islamic scholar Abul Ala Maududi as a modern fundamentalist Islamic party. JI was staunchly opposed to Jinnah’s Muslim nationalism, suggesting that nationalism was a European concept that had no place in Islam. Another problem Maududi had with Pakistan was that he considered the new country to be in a state of jahiliyat(28) – Arab word meaning ‘ignorance’ and describing the time in Mecca before the arrival of Islam. Nevertheless, the party moved to the newly created Pakistan in 1947 and made its first dramatic entry into the new country’s politics by joining the Majlis-e-Ahrar in an anti-Ahmadi movement in Lahore in 1953. Abul Ala Maududi delivering a speech in 1955. Maududi was arrested for inciting religious hatred and rioting and sentenced to death. The sentence was soon overturned. Lacking electoral pull, the JI recruited educated urbanites into its fold in an attempt to infiltrate the bureaucracy and the verna...

Awami National Party (ANP) Roots The roots of the ANP lie in the National Awami Party (NAP). NAP was formed in 1957 by leftist Pushtun, Sindhi, Baloch and Bengali nationalists and Marxist Punjabi and Mohajir elements. In the 1960s NAP was the country’s largest leftist party until the arrival of the PPP in 1967. NAP mainly comprised of Pushtun and Baloch nationalist leadership. It won a majority of seats in the former NWFP and Balochistan in the 1970 election and formed coalition governments in these provinces. People gather outside NAP office in Quetta to celebrate the party’s victory in Balochistan during the 1970 election. In 1973 the PPP/Z A. Bhutto regime dismissed the NAP regime in Balochistan, accusing it of instigating a separatist movement in Balochistan. The NAP-led coalition government in the NWFP resigned in protest. NAP leader and Governor of Balochistan, Ghous Bakhsh Bezinjo, escorting foreign delegates at the Quetta Airport in 1973. In 197...

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Roots: Formed in 1967 in Lahore by 39-year-old Sindhi politician, Z A. Bhutto, and veteran Marxist ideologue, J A. Rahim(1). Conceived as a populist left-wing political party to challenge the Ayub Khan dictatorship (1958-69), the PPP soon grew into becoming an inclusive platform for progressives of all shapes and sizes, hue and colour. By the time it went into the 1970 general election, the party had developed four internal lobbies. The most prominent (at the time) was its radical left-wing led by Marxist and socialist theorists and Maoist radicals. The other powerful lobby in the party was led by ‘Islamic Socialists’ who had fused Arab Socialism and Marxism with certain egalitarian notions of the Qu’ran(2) . The third intra-party faction consisted of ‘progressive’ members of the landed elite, and the fourth, the smallest faction, consisted of moderate religionists. Z A. Bhutto shares a joke with party ideologues. In the front of t...