However, there is widespread disappointment and despondency both within the legal community and amongst the general public at the manner in which the Long March ended without a sit-in or dharna. The Bar leadership’s decision not to go for a sit-in is being severely criticized in the lawyers community. It is being perceived as a great let-down of the hopes and aspirations of the people, particularly lawyers. It is being seen as an anti-climax to a much hyped-up Long March – a much ado about nothing.
To err is human. While we trust them and hope to continue to trust them, this does not mean that the Bar leadership – comprising, among others, Aitzaz Ahsan, Munir A. Malik, Justice (Retd.) Tariq Mahmood, Hamid Khan, Ali Ahmed Kurd and Athar Minallah – are infallible and cannot fall prey to errors of judgment. Although, it is difficult to believe that the fire-brand Ali Ahmed Kurd would not be in favour of a dharna or sit-in. Could this explain his conspicuous absence from the rally despite assurances from the Bar leadership that his absence was due to ill health?
The question, which requires an explanation from the Bar leadership, is why did they not call for a sit-in or dharna?
Aitzaz Ahsan, during and after the rally, has provided the following reasons to explain why there was no sit-in: (i) no sit-in was announced by the Bar leadership in the first instance, (ii) no planning and logistics was done for the sit-in, i.e. no shade, food, water and toilet facilities; (iii) the Bar had no finances to successfully execute a sit-in and (iv) only a few people would have carried out the sit-in which would have diminished the impact and achievement of the Long March.
Aitzaz Ahsan’s explanation raises more questions than it answers.
(i) It is correct that no sit-in had been formally announced by the Bar leadership, yet neither did the Bar leadership ever make it clear that there would be no sit-in. There is not a single news item in the press in which anyone from amongst the Bar leadership is on record saying that there would be no sit-in. The announcement to this effect only came from Aitzaz Ahsan at 6:00 a.m. on 14 June, which ended the Long March with a whimper rather than a bang. Never did the Bar leadership formally decline a sit-in and, in the charged atmosphere of the Long March, this omission created a perception amongst its participants that was justified. The Bar leadership, being the learned men of law that they are, should have known better that, in the circumstances, silence would be construed as consent. It is difficult to fathom why the voices of “dharna” did not reach the ears of the Bar leadership in the preparatory stages leading up to the Long March, during the Long March and during the rally in Islamabad. For anyone who was in Lahore during the departure of the Long March convoy to Islamabad on the evening of 12 June, the sound “dharna” was in the air and most participants were proceeding on the assumption of a sit-in in Islamabad. Indeed, they were looking forward to a sit-in. In such circumstance, having heard these voices, why did the Bar leadership chose to remain silent on the issue and not come up with a clarification? Failure to do so created an assumption in favour of there being a sit-in and raised the expectations of many participants.
(ii) It is illogical to assume that if someone is going to travel by road from Karachi and Quetta all the way to Islamabad in a Long March for something as important as the restoration of the judiciary that they would be undertaking such a difficult, tiring, expensive and arduous journey just to sit on the parade ground in Islamabad and hear speeches, songs and poetry, which they have heard a thousand times before and that too at odd hours of the night when the rest of Pakistan slept. Granted that we are willing to stay awake until dawn for such a cause but we have already passed such nocturnal tests in past rallies and for a change we’d like a daylight rally when the rest of the nation is awake and takes better notice.
(iii) Aitzaz Ahsan’s explanation of there being no finances for a sit-in also doesn’t sound convincing. Finances for what? 500,000 Pakistanis are already “sitting-in” in front of Parliament and Aiwan-e-Sadr, what further finances do you need to extend the sit-in even for just a day? Most participants were expecting to stay on till Saturday night. They had already factored in the sit-in for duration of Saturday into their budgets and schedules. None of the participants complained of running out of finances. Why did Aitzaz Ahsan even raise this issue?
(iv) Aitzaz Ahsan’s claim that the sit-in would be a failure because only a few people would have carried out the sit-in which would have diminished the impact and achievement of the rally and the Long March is also based on false assumptions, which have no empirical basis. Had a survey been conducted of the participants to ascertain their wishes? None whatsoever. While taking note of a 100 or so excited, noisy and aggressive participants at the front of the rally, Aitzaz Ahsan assumed that the rest of the participants who were less noisy and less aggressive would not be in favour of a sit-in and only those 100 or so were in favour. Again, a totally false assumption because majority of the participants were indeed in favour of a sit-in and would have participated in the sit-in had the Bar leadership called for it. Most people do not desire to go against the leadership and they obey the leadership. Hence, no one proceeded with the sit-in after it was announced that there would not be any. This does not mean that they did not desire the leadership to call for a sit in. In fact, Aitzaz deliberately did not announce the decision of the sit-in until the dying seconds of his speech at the end of the rally. It is clear that he was expecting a negative reaction from the participants had he announced his decision in the beginning of his speech rather than at the end. When the decision was announced, the reaction of the participants could be seen from their body language and on their dumbfounded, flabbergasted and shell-shocked faces. This can be gauged by the fact that there was no applause after the final curtain fell on the Long March.
In giving his justifications not to proceed with the sit-in, Aitzaz Ahsan assumed too much. He assumed that if such a course was taken it would result in failure for such and such reasons. For a lawyer, assumptions can be fatal. Lawyers are not trained to assume the worst-case scenario; otherwise they would never take on any case. Failure is always an option when fighting any battle, even a legal battle, but the Bar leadership, according to Aitzaz Ahsan, assumed that the sit-in would be a failure thereby breaking a cardinal rule of being a lawyer: when deciding upon a course of action, never assume the worst and never make decisions or alter your course out of fear of failure. You have to take calculated risks and the risk of a sit-in was worth taking because you have amassed 500,000 people at your call in one place and you are unlikely to repeat such a feat again.
Aitzaz Ahsan says the impact of this Long March will be felt in times to come. The people of Pakistan are tired and weary of waiting for events to make their impact at some future date, which usually never happens. History is full of events that have immediate impact and this rally may have been one of them had a sit-in been announced. The people of Bangladesh and Ukraine have demonstrated this in recent times. The overnight presence of 500,000 people on an important capital road would have a different impact if the capital was in a country where there is democracy, accountability, the rule of law and a mature, responsive and answerable political set-up. It doesn’t have the desired impact in countries like Pakistan where you have deaf and blind leaders bereft of integrity, common sense and reason, who hold on to power till the bitter end at the cost of national interests, and where a more aggressive yet peaceful posture such as a dharna (in the least) is required to get the message across.
A sit-in did not mean crossing barbed wire, confronting riot police or entering the so-called ‘red zone’ that cordoned off the Constitution Avenue from the rally. The Bar leadership could have simply asked the participants of the rally to continue sitting on the parade ground for a few more hours until the National Assembly convened at 10:00 a.m. and until the session ended. It was a question of waiting for a few more hours till dusk on Saturday. It would have created a bigger impact for incoming and departing Parliamentarians to see, with their own eyes, that huge mass of their fellow countrymen and the impact it would have had for the rest of the people of Pakistan to wake up to see on TV that mass of people still sitting there overnight for the country while they slept. It was a question of turning it up just one notch further and it didn’t require the logistics, the money, the alliances and the risk that Mr. Aitzaz Ahsan so wrongly assumed it would and nor the weather: it was a cloudy Saturday morning in Islamabad with no sun beating down on us, and even if it did, it would have been worth the while and the most glorious tan we could ever get.
History is a series of events. Whether such events are remembered by posterity and are forever etched in history depends much on the impact and the directional-shift that they create on the course of a nation’s history. Moments like this come but rarely and when they do come, it is up to a nation to seize them or let them pass on into oblivion. On the night of 13/14 June 2008, we, the People of Pakistan, made history, but didn’t change it.
