--- description: TIME's Aryn Baker spoke recently to Aitzaz Ahsan, the leader of the lawyers protests that shook the regime of Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf last year.... title: Q&A with a Lawyerly Rabble-Rouser image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [World](/section/world/) # Q&A with a Lawyerly Rabble-Rouser by [Aryn Baker](/author/aryn-baker/) Feb 16, 2008 5:00 AM CUT by [Aryn Baker](/author/aryn-baker/) Feb 16, 2008 5:00 AM CUT TIME’s Aryn Baker spoke recently to Aitzaz Ahsan, the leader of the lawyers protests that shook the regime of Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf last year. He was allowed to speak publicly but briefly in early February before being returned to the house arrest he has suffered since Musharraf imposed emergency rule on Nov. 3\. **TIME: You were arrested, jailed and then put under house arrest for your support of Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry three months ago. Do you regret your decision to pursue this cause?** **AHSAN:** Why should I regret it? I play a clean game of cards. It is a shame that the world doesn’t notice this most unprecedented move — in all history around the world, from ancient, medieval to modern, there is no precedent of an emperor or a shah or a king or a sultan or a Caesar dismissing 60 judges and arresting them. And some of them continue to be detained. Imagine the Supreme Court justice being dismissed by the president of the United States. Think of John Roberts being detained with his family as the chief justice of Pakistan has been detained with his family — \[he has\] three young children who are all going to school. One boy is a special child \[i.e., developmentally disabled\]. One is surprised that your top American officials are talking about Musharraf as if he is god’s gift to America. It’s sad and it is counterproductive. Would you suspend the U.S. constitution and then hold elections? So why is Pakistan any different? Are we any less deserving of democracy? **Why is Musharraf such a problem?** Musharraf is a bad loser. Vis-a-vis the people of Pakistan, he is a bad loser. He arrested the judiciary under the fear that the justices would decide against him. \[Until then\] it was a fair fight. He was represented by the top lawyers in the country. The judiciary had earlier decided against him \[and his bid to run for office while remaining Army Chief\] unanimously. We were expecting a second judgment, which might only have said he had to remove his uniform. It probably would have bound him to be re-elected by the new assembly \[which is to be voted in on Feb 18th\]. Because the fact is, the constitution says that the president has to be elected after the expiry of the term of the assembly. Faced with that argument he just sort of became a wild bull in a china shop **Does the Pakistani military see him in the same way?** I hope so. You see, the good thing about the Pakistan army is that it is one man’s army. One man has total control over it and that is the Chief of Army Staff. The army does not think except the thoughts of the Chief of Army Staff. Now Musharraf is no longer the chief. But he remains the most unpopular, in fact the most hated man in the country. Stick with him and a lot of that hate will get passed on to the army. And it’s not just unpopularity. It’s visceral hatred. Because of the way he has dealt with so many things. **What is the American Administration missing?** Pervez Musharraf has two faces, one for the Americans and one that is seen by the Pakistanis. The Pakistanis see him presiding over an economy that has just unraveled. The poverty line is inching up. There is enormous unemployment particularly in the past three months because of a shortage of power, and now the flour crisis. They look at the face of a man who is repressive at home, who locks up judges, imposes martial law and amends the constitution on his own with the endorsement of his handpicked judges. You know he is a man who is arbitrary, a man who has no respect for rule of law, he just wants to cling to power, a man who was the cause of a total breakdown in law and order, and a man who is absolutely economical with the truth. He’s a liar. One thing I would like the Americans to realize is that you cannot have democracy without a free judiciary. In the West an independent judiciary came several centuries before full democracy. In England, from where you get all your values historically, the chief justice was exercising the power of habeas corpus in the early 17th century. An independent judiciary is the plinth upon which the structure of democracy was constructed. Had the courts not been independent for 200 years, the non-landholding gentry would never have won the right to vote. Independence of the courts preceded democracy. You see what the Americans are trying to institute in Iraq as the most important weapon against the war on terror there. It’s justice, democracy, and empowered people. And here they have participated in the demolition of the same structures. We have a judicial tradition and reasonably independent judges. We had a reasonable tradition of empowered votes. \[Allowing the government of Pakistan to dismiss\] the judges is going to prove to be as ill-advised and as disastrous as dismissing the entire Iraqi army. The Americans are going to rue the day that they allowed — without a whimper — Pervez Musharraf to arrest the judges. If they continue to keep the status quo on that issue, they will find that their man and their policies will become more and more unacceptable. **Americans are looking for a solution for the war on terror — does Musharraf fulfill that end?** He only exacerbates the war on terror. There is the Newtonian law that every action causes an equal and opposite reaction, I don’t know why the Americans seek to pursue this war on terror in the wrong fashion. This war on terror is all about misguided and ill-informed notions of justice. If you lock up the justices then people — particularly people who are armed and have little value of life — will take to alternate means of justice, particularly if they are possessed also with a sense of deprivation. **Pakistan seems to be stumbling from one crisis to the next — militancy, extremism, and the assassination of Bhutto. Are elections going to help?** The ballot will not provide all the solutions to the problems Pakistan faces today. It a decoy, and a diversion. It’s the turn on the road that Musharraf has taken fervently, but it is not the road to a solution. He is running along this road because he can deceive the West more easily by saying he is going through the process of free and fair elections, and the West, alas, is ready to be deceived by him. The West is dying to be deceived by him. Secondly it avoids the main issue. The main issue is the restoration of the constitution, and of the recognition that the arbitrary will of an individual has to be subservient to a document that is sacred to the people as a whole. Now people have to be given the faith that their lives and futures do not depend upon the whims of one man before they go to the ballot. The timing is very important. Otherwise the ballot itself will be meaningless and will not empower the people. These elections, if they are held under a dispensation in which one man can brutalize the constitution and get away with it, will only contribute to the disempowerment of the Pakistani citizen. Democracy means empowerment, not just voters queues on polling day. That empowerment is essential, and it cannot come without an independent judiciary. Without that empowerment you cannot fight terror. The tools, the weapons to fight the war on terror are an empowered people who are assured that no man has arbitrary will upon their lives. Now when an election is held without that kind of empowerment, you can feel the lackluster response…. This should be an alarm bell for all those who want to fight terror. And it’s not because of the threat of suicide bombers, it is because the people are not taking interest. They know the problem will remain. You know it’s like the story of the dead carcass of an animal that fell into the village well. The villagers ask the local wise man how do you purify the waters, and he says take out 40 buckets of water. Still the water was polluted, so he said take out another 40 buckets. It didn’t make a difference because the carcass remained there. So as long as the problem remains, the water will stay polluted. And here the problem is General Musharraf, who has violated the constitution and he is getting away with it only because he has hand-picked the current judges and arrested all the independent ones, he has not just removed them, he has arrested them. And the people know it. **So what is the solution?** The people need a recognition that they will be empowered. And that empowerment is through either the humbling of this one man who has demolished the constitution — that sacred document that shared belief among the citizenry across the country — either his humbling or his willing submission to the constitution. Not the changed constitution, but the constitution before he brutalized it, the constitution of the 2nd of November — that would empower the people. And that includes the restoration of the judiciary. Pervez Musharraf has openly and vigorously held out that the PML-Q is his party. He has campaigned for Q… If Q fails to get a simple majority on the 18th, Musharraf must resign. He should admit defeat and resign. The election is a referendum on \[Musharraf’s\] Q league. **What is your role?** That is not important. I think anybody who is representing civil society and its aspirations today must be seen as the real ally of the West for restoring civilized living and for the end of conflict. The tools that will help are the tools of Western civilization: due process, rule of law, constitutional supremacy, an independent judiciary with powers like habeas corpus and citizens who feels secure in their relationship with the state. These are all the things that Pervez Musharraf has denied and denuded the country of, and these are all the deprivations that the militant and the extremist thrives on. You have got to start thinking, is a mass of 160 million people deprived of their rights and of due process, witnessing the sheer helplessness of its most prominent citizen, the Chief Justice… does this contribute to the fight against terror or does such a mass not become that dry tinder ready to burst into flame? Do we have to wait for the storming of the Bastille? People will rise, and let me tell you, what disturbs me is that we’ve not had so far in all our demonstrations — and we’ve had massive demonstrations, tens of millions have come out on the streets — and not once have you seen the flag of a foreign country burned. But last week in a demonstration we saw an American flag burning. There is a whole mass of people that the West is alienating. You know there is a feeling that there is discrimination against Muslims by the West. Pakistanis look at Iraq and Palestine and they identify with the victim. They see themselves also as exposed to the arbitrariness of a gentleman whom the West continues to embrace, encourage and sustain. He violates the constitution, declares emergency rule and \[U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John\] Negroponte says he’s an indispensable ally. And this is the man with whom they have a problem. **So what is your next step?** What is required at the moment is a grand new compact between the major players in Pakistan. And whether anyone likes it or not, these will have to be the major political parties, the Pakistan army, and the judiciary. One \[of these\] can impart political legitimacy — the parties. The second has power. And the third can impart constitutional legitimacy. None of these three can be written off, and there can be no solution without a proper effective participation of all three. I think there has to be a major rethink, a dialogue, a stepping back. Both forms of extremism have to be avoided: praetorian extremism and dogmatic or religious extremism. The middle ground has to be found. The tragedy is that Pakistan before Musharraf had always stood the middle ground. It was a moderate and enlightened society when Pervez Musharraf began to enforce his so-called moderate enlightenment. He didn’t have to say that. Unfortunately while he was using that rhetorically, he bludgeoned everything that was moderate and everything that was enlightened. **Could you be the person to bring these three segments together?** Quite frankly the self-interest should bring them together. We can only suggest the kinds of platforms, or be a vehicle for that. but its — I think it’s in everybody’s self interest. **Have any of the parties reached out to you? Has the army?** No one really has, well, \[Former Prime Minister Nawaz\] Sharif has. The army hasn’t reached out to me. I think at the moment it is receding \[from political involvement\] more under General \[Ashfaq\] Kayani but I think it will be in everybody’s interest to work out a new social contract. Let’s hope we can do that without having to storm the Bastille. **Is Kayani someone civil society can work with?** I really don’t know. His statements about withdrawing the army \[from politics and civilian postings\] are certainly things that people want to hear. **How has the death of Benazir Bhutto affected you?** Well first of all it is very tragic. She had assurances of security that were obviously not kept. It’s easy later on to blame the victim. And you know, this is typically the mindset of extremists who want to cage up their women. They say if she goes out of the house it is her fault if she is hurt. So the theory that she invited her death by going out campaigning, by standing up in the jeep, well that’s a callous, heartless accusation from the President of this country. He should know better. **Is there a way to turn this tragedy into an opportunity?** Unfortunately Musharraf’s credibility stands in the way of turning it into an opportunity, because no body believes him when he says that \[al Qaeda affiliated militant Baitullah\] Mehsud did it. It’s Musharraf’s credibility on the line, unfortunately, and if people don’t believe him they won’t unite against terror. What people believe — and I don’t endorse this, but it is wide spread — is that the administration had a hand in her death. And that Pervez Musharraf’s dream of a PPP without Benazir, like in 2002 \[when the party campaigned for office while Bhutto was in exile\], has come true. Now obviously this may not be true, but skepticism and disbelief have been provided very strong grounds by the burial of Ms Bhutto without a post mortem. This belief has been provided further grounds by the immediate hosing of the crime scene. The evidence has been literally been washed down the drains of Rawalpindi, and nobody has been held accountable for that. So the credibility of the investigation is not only in tatters, but it doesn’t improve the credibility of the government. Musharraf is seen as having destroyed the evidence, even if Baitullah Mehsud was behind it. **Can anything be salvaged?** It’s quite painful at the moment to be looking for good in her death quite frankly. Had there been a credible government, and had that government with some authenticity pointed a finger at A, B, or C, there would be a movement forward. That would have been a positive element. Unfortunately Musharraf has lower credibility than Baitullah Mehsud. When Baitullah denies it, people believe Baitullah more than the man who is presiding over the destruction of evidence. And the whole thing happened two miles from where he lives. **What do you see happening after the elections?** I think that democracy and the post-electoral government are going to have a very difficult time. It is going to be a time of turmoil. I think people will turn to the leaders of the civil society movements. People will turn to the leaders who have credibility, and have spent this time pointing out the blind alley we are racing towards. So I think that the real relevance of the movement of the lawyers and of civil society is going to come after the people have realized that this election process — this parrot of democracy — has led them nowhere. **Obviously you have a role to play. What can you do?** Well, I have brought this issue to international attention. I think the Americans are starting to take notice. I’m grateful to the senators who have brought up this issue. It’s nice to see that at least Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama agree on something. **Would you want a leadership position in a new government? On the street people say they want to see you in the Prime Minister’s seat.** Being Prime Minister is a crown of thorns. I don’t mind being a facilitator at all, I think the country needs it desperately. But I am not necessarily vying or dying for any office. I think what is most essential at this moment is for somebody to be able to arbitrate a new compact between those three branches. **Do you think you have the skills to do that?** This can only be left to others to decide. If people were to place confidence in me, or any one else it would be the same. This person needs the confidence of the people more than skills. **This is not your first time in detention.** I’ve been in and out of jail — under Zia’s time in power \[General Zia ul Haq, who overthrew Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Benazir’s father, in 1977\] I was in and out of jail so often I was able to do all my research and write a book. I’m writing a book now too. One learns to make the best of the situation. **Have you always been a fighter?** My mother tells everyone that my first words were a political slogan. She was in jail for chanting slogans against the regime \[of pre-independence Pakistan\]. People would shout _Khizer wazirit_ \[the rule of Minister Khizer\] and I would say _Tordo!_ \[break it!\]. I don’t remember this of course, but my mother tells me about it. They were very excited that I learned my first word in prison. It was the “Go, Musharraf Go!” of the time. **So you are saying the same thing to this day?** You might say that. It’s been a long, long road. But I am not just saying _tordo,_ I am also saying _jordo,_ which means to fix it, put it together, repair it. And I think this nation needs to be put back together. 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