Mohammad Shehzad

Retrogressive legislation by the alliance of six pro-Taliban religious parties Mutahidda Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) that rules the Northwest Frontier Province has got the antennae of the diplomatic community, donor agencies and non-governmental organisations up.

The diplomatic community has already begun to make noises about MMA’s shenanigans. Last month, Arno Keller, the outgoing head of German Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, lambasted the MMA for pushing Pakistan into medieval age in the name of Islam by banning music, dance, co-education, women sports and kite-flying, closing down cinema houses and defacing billboards that carry female images. “Pakistan’s conundrum is [the] mullah. It is a country of dynamic people but the clique of mullahs would never let it progress. They are the biggest hurdles in the way of foreign investment,” said Keller at his farewell.

A couple of weeks later on June 18, the German envoy Dr Christoph Bruemmer told a group of journalists that MMA had closed down a shelter house for women constructed by Aurat Foundation, a social organisation for women welfare, with the assistance of the German government. “The German government, through Aurat Foundation, set up a shelter house for ill-fated, helpless and abandoned women. It has unfortunately been closed down by the MMA government. Such steps will impact negatively on foreign investment in Pakistan. Germany has traditionally been making huge investments in NWFP but the MMA government has created many hurdles for our work,” he was reported as saying.

The German ambassador also said that the NWFP chief minister, Akram Durrani, “has been avoiding me. I had requested a meeting with him and wanted to apprise him of the hurdles women were facing in having access to education and their development.”

The plight of women in the NWFP is harrowing. Cases of domestic violence and divorce are on the rise. The shelter house in Peshawar was set up to cater to needy women just before the MMA government came to power. The building was provided by the provincial Social Welfare Department before the democratic transition. The house consisted of a hostel that could accommodate around 100 women, a library, and a mosque. By the time the shelter was closed down by the MMA government, it had handled 150 cases of destitute women successfully.

An Aurat Foundation official told TFT: “The MMA government started creating problems for us immediately. First it said that the centre was set up without the consent of the local community. We assured them that it was working with the consent of the local population. In fact, a number of cases were referred to us by the local prayer leaders.”

Apparently, this information fell on deaf ears. The MMA government closed down the shelter, accusing its management of spreading obscenity and promoting adultery. The management strongly contests this allegation. “It was not closed down because of any religious reason. The charge of obscenity or adultery is absurd. In fact, the house had started functioning smoothly. Jama’at-e Islami’s Khidmat Foundation wanted to hijack it. We were asked to surrender it to the Jama’at, a move we resisted. So the MMA used the trump; it closed us down in the name of religion,” says this Foundation official.

The German envoy and the NWFP’s governor had to inaugurate the centre officially. But the MMA government started threatening Aurat Foundation. “We cannot ensure the security of the German Ambassador. Therefore, he should not come,” was the response Aurat Foundation received from the MMA government. The governor, too, sent his regrets. The house was never inaugurated formally and simply closed down.

However, Aurat Foundation is committed to continuing its work for the women of the province. It has vacated the house but has not shelved the project. “We will continue to work with the German government and rent a building to set up another shelter house, if it comes to that,” says another Foundation official.

Most observers are agreed that women are the worst victims of MMA’s retrogressive legislation. TFT has learnt that last year around half dozen female singers took to prostitution to survive after the MMA government banned music and singing. Three women who had taken refuge in the shelter house were dislocated when it was closed down. Foundation sources say they are now working as sex workers in the Punjab. Two women who moved to the Punjab were abducted by a group of people from a railway station where they had taken refuge and gang-raped. They have failed to file a report with the police.

“If the MMA is not toppled sooner or later or leashed, this country will literally be Talibanised,” says a women activist.


Copyright ©2002 Mohammad Shehzad and The Friday Times. About the author