i Citizens’ Report of the Citizens’ Campaign for Women’s Representation in Local Government in Pakistan 2000-2001 Aurat Publication and Information Service Foundation ii This document is an output from a project funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) for the benefit of developing countries. The views expressed are not necessarily those of DFID. iii Contents The Beginning of the Beginning v Acknowledgements 8 Contributors 9 Glossary 10 1. Voting, Supporting, Agitating 13 2. Looking for the Women Out There 17 3. The Foundation and the Lifeline 23 4. Chipping Away at Centuries of Resistance 37 5. Political Rivalries Allow Space for Women Candidates 65 6. Mobilising the Women and Standing by Those Who Dared 73 7. DCCs Lead by Example 95 8. Checking Rejection of Women Candidates 101 9. The Hotline Between State and Citizens 109 10. Knowledge is Power 121 11. Reaching Out to the Women Out There 129 12. Citizens’ Organisations Interact with Political Parties 139 13. Preparation to Move into the Political Arena 149 14. A Citizen’s Movement Comes of Age 157 Appendices 163 A. National Steering Committee of CCWR 165 B. Provincial Advisory Committees of CCWR 166 C. Aurat Foundation Staff Participating in CCWR 169 D. Government Officials Participating in CCWR 172 E. District Coordinators and Joint Coordinators of CCWR 174 F. CCWR Support Organisations by Province and District 177 G. Electoral Results of Candidates on Women’s Reserved Seats 223 H. Map of Women’s Seats Filled by Province and District 224 iv The Beginning of the Beginning The very discreet entry of about 36,000 women into the jealously guarded domain for public representatives transpired in a dramatic way through direct elections to union councils. It is just as well that it has taken place without too much fanfare, because it would otherwise have sounded so many alarms that there might almost have been a backlash from retrogressive forces in our society. The fact is that when these 36,000 women councillors filled 90 per cent of the seats reserved for women at this level of Local Government, there was a silent revolution, whose reverberations will continue to provide some very significant signposts to the dynamics of the ongoing social transformation in Pakistan. However, these signposts cannot properly be recognised without having some knowledge and understanding of the socio-economic and political backdrop to these elections. For while these numbers are in themselves very exciting, they do not enable us to assess whether this remarkable event was just a historical accident or a reflection of positive trends in social attitudes and behaviour that promise a more supportive and encouraging political environment for women from now onward. This requires an analytical inquiry into the structural changes taking place in our society that have a bearing on these factors. These structural changes are certainly manifesting themselves but they do not form part of our social discourse because not everyone is aware of them. Take, for example, the composition of our population that has undergone an important transformation as reflected in the 1998 Fifth National Census of Pakistan. Although only 32 per cent of our population is urban, we are not predominantly a rural society. Of the remaining two-thirds, half reside along major highways or in peri-urban localities. Thus even though a part of their livelihood is derived from rural sources, their consumption and expenditure patterns, their lifestyles and aspirations, would be strongly influenced by their easy access to urban centres. This exposure has set in motion very different socialisation forces for this half of the rural population. The remaining one third of Pakistan’s population, which is categorised as rural, also has external impulses of its own, especially where the rural economy is unable to sustain the population subsisting on it. This has a ‘push effect’, which creates its own interdependencies with external economic and social subsystems. In this age of mass communications, these forces and factors are further weakening the hold of traditional social mores and practices. In these results of women councillors elected during 2000-2001, there are indications of a more open society, responsive to the changing social realities on v the ground. Both the willingness and determination of the women to stand for elections, despite an unfavourable environment, and that of the social activists to stand by their side to ensure their participation as decision makers in political institutions, confirm and reinforce this conclusion. When Aurat Foundation brought out a very coordinated group of civil society partners, with their middle class backgrounds, throughout the country to launch the Citizens’ Campaign to mobilise women to participate in Local Government elections, it was because we had a very distinct sense of something critical going on at the grass roots level. Even seasoned political party members could not quite see what was happening right under their noses. What transpired is now recognised as a political upset for those claiming that direct elections to the reserved seats for women were “unrealistic in the context of Pakistani society”. We are gratified that our political intuition was proved right! However, this does not imply that we measure the success of the Campaign by the numbers elected, mainly because we cannot possibly evaluate the contribution of the citizens’ groups in quantitative terms. There are many other stakeholders in the electoral process – for example, the political parties and political groups would certainly nominate their party women against the reserved seats for women. But it would, in any case, be difficult to assess the quantitative impact of the Citizens’ Campaign, because their role was not only to assist any woman who was willing to contest, but also to build an enabling environment for all women who wanted to do so. It is, therefore, difficult for us to assess how many women came forward because they saw the district level Campaign committees stand solidly behind a woman candidate who was being pressurised to withdraw. Or, for that matter, how many women were able to file nominations because the Campaign committees’ advocacy successfully paved the way for their participation with the traditional social and political leadership or had some condition relaxed for them by the Election Authorities. However, the citizens’ groups can still claim to have played their historic role in their Campaign in 2000-2001. Political parties in our country can, at one stroke, deprive the female electorate of their constitutional right to vote by drawing up mutual agreements to keep them out of the electoral process. To the extent that the presence of civil society activists as mobilisers and supporters of women candidates checked these ‘unholy’ arrangements, they helped keep more women in the political arena. Where the contribution of these activists is clearly visible, it is in enabling the participation of dissidents of political groups or parties, as well as that of independent candidates, especially from the middle and lower middle classes, that are considered the backbone of the democratisation vi process in a society. In this they were able to provide services and support to middle and lower middle class men as well. The same assistance was given to the peasants and workers who contested elections on the seats reserved seats for them. But this input of the citizens’ groups towards laying down the foundations of a ‘government at the doorstep’ would not have been recognised without a proper documentation of the process and the effort to ensure that the reserved seats for women were filled in the 100 districts of Pakistan. We decided to both document and understand what went on behind the scenes of the Campaign, as this would enable us to build a historical record of the process accompanying the political milestones. A more practical reason was to identify successful strategies for future mobilisation and programmes to support women’s participation in Local Government elections in Pakistan. Knowing our activists’ predilection for indifferent reporting and documentation, we did not visualise an easy time ahead. Perhaps the idea of a collective Citizens’ Report was a novel one and most of them have little or no experience of writing about or analysing their activism. So it was a difficult and time-consuming process to get the main actors to supply the minimum information required to ‘tell a tale’. So much has been left unsaid. So many questions remain unanswered. So many stories are still untold. It remains an unfinished agenda. It is hoped that this rather bare account in the form of a Report entices many of them to offer to complete the stories. It may also cast some light on the signposts to the dynamics of the transformation of our society. This is the beginning of the beginning. Nigar Ahmad Executive Director Aurat Foundation vii Acknowledgements This Report is an output of a capacity building project of Aurat Foundation’s Documentation and Resource Centre, funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) and managed by the British Council through the Gender Equality Programme (GEP). We are grateful for their support in its production For the Citizens’ Campaign itself, we again acknowledge the UK Department for International Development (DFID) for making possible an undertaking of this scale with our networks. They provided the major funding for the Campaign, along with the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD) and UNDP Pakistan. The Federal Election Commission and the Provincial Election Commissions must be specially mentioned for their prompt and positive response to most problems referred to them during the electoral process. The Provincial Ministries of Local Government and the District Administration in most of the districts provided support for the Campaign. The collaboration of most of the national and provincial NGOs and other civil society groups was significant in providing the direction for the Campaign.