News
Sirajul Haq: JI’s next survival betBy Naveed Ahmad
ISLAMABAD: When it comes to housekeeping, the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan rarely makes headlines. From its tightly compartmented bureaucracy to its financial affairs, the JI’s disciplines match with any communist outfit of yesteryears.
In a departure from its traditions, not only the JI Ameer, Syed Munawar Hasan, decided to call it quits after his sole term in the office, but was also replaced by a much younger Pashtun member from the country’s northwest.
Despite his desire to step down for good, the JI shura included Munawar Hasan’s name alongside Liaquat Baloch and Sirajul Haq.
Like Liaquat and Munawar Hasan, Siraj was groomed by Jamaat-e-Islami’s student wing, Islami Jamiat-e-Tulaba (IJT). He had led the students’ political body for three years, 1988 to 1991, at a time, when the country was transforming from Zia’s military dictatorship to participatory democracy.
The Pakistan People’s Party-led government had announced students’ union election across the country and Siraj-led IJT happened to be the most organized contender. His followers were at the heart of political activities on the campuses, of which certain key institutions were under a total monopoly of the IJT. While the JI’s student wing was not the only one to enjoy ‘hold’ over certain top universities and professional colleges, it turned out to be the most influential as well as coercive grouping across the country.
Thanks to Jamaat’s role in Afghanistan’s insurgency, Zia era was the golden period for Islami Jamiat which could move freely across the country as well as inside the western neighbourhood. Violence on the campuses was routine with students inspired by Bhuttoism, Altaf-inspired All-Pakistan Muhajir Students’ Organisation and Islami Jamiat trying to dictate their terms through the barrel of AK-47s and sometimes more sophisticated weapons. Young lives were lost and killers were rarely proven guilty.
The IJT was too hot to handle for Sirajul Haq, given his soft-spoken demeanor and studious traits. By 1990, the 27-year-old from Lower Dir was complaining about severe backache due to extensive travel across the country that observers’ believed was his attempt “to reform the country’s oldest student bloc”.
“With Afghan war being a priority for the IJT and its political masters, its activists had deviated considerably from what the party was meant to stand for,” says one of his contemporaries from the alma mater, University of Peshawar.
“Siraj was dealing with an enormously powerful, over-confident set of youth. Reining them in was not quite simple,” he explains. The party discipline had waned and the Islamist youth was eyeing at Jammu and Kashmir after Afghanistan.
The IJT Nazim-i-Ala’a was inspired by none other than JI chief Qazi Hussain Ahmad. Siraj shared a lot with late Qazi. They both hailed from the same province and shared similar cultural values.
After completing his stints as IJT’s chief organiser, he had no option but to enter politics.
The JI elders saw enormous potential in Siraj for mainstream politics. Siraj did not shy away either. By 2002, he had not only bagged a provincial assembly seat but also sat in the Cabinet as a senior minister, or deputy chief minister. He happens to be the only chief of Jamaate-e-Islami to hold a public office while being the party’s top office-holder.
“There’s no likelihood of Siraj quitting the office of senior minister in PTI-led KPK government,” says a top JI member. He believes the dual office will strain his nerves and test his workaholic tendencies yet again.
According to Siraj’s friends, he is the man of a few words. Unlike his predecessor Syed Munawar Hasan, he has never been the centre of controversies.
His other key strength is working relationship with rival political parties, which Munawar Hasan lacked for he never was elected to national or provincial assembly or became a member of the Senate. Like Qazi Hussain Ahmad, Siraj has experience of worked tough political partners like Fazlur Rahman’s JUI and rivals seasoned rivals like the Awami National Party and Aftab Khan Sherpao.
He inherits a political party which his predecessor in Mansoora, JI’s headquarters in Lahore, has pulled into isolation and dormancy. Until a few months ago, certain observers often used to comment implying that Munawar Hasan was carrying the coffin of Jamaat-e-Islami in search of an appropriate place to bury it.
“Jamaat’s establishment realized the way party was becoming irrelevant to the national politics, especially after poor show in the general elections,” says one of Hasan’s critic in Mansoora.
Like many others, Hasan had quite late realised the disconnect between his leadership and the party’s sympathizers. “Quitting the party leadership would have been even more damaging to the JI’s image, thus completion of his five-year was awaited,” says the source in Lahore.
The fifth Ameer has before him many a challenge, the top most being reclaiming 2002 voter support in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and revival of the party’s district level leadership in the Punjab. JI’s isolated and politically incorrect leadership resulted in loss of voters base to increasingly popular Tehreek-e-Insaf in Punjab as well as southern Sindh. The JI political strategists fear again losing their dormant voter to PTI instead of PML-N or other Islamist outfits.
For Siraj’s Jamaat-e-Islami, the PTI will continue to pose a challenge. Many compare him with Qazi Hussain Ahmad and him replicating his style of leadership. Siraj is a smart man, groomed in tough political climate since his adolescent years. He will reform the JI on the lines of Imran’s party as far organization issues and positioning before media is concerned.
Siraj does not inherent a pro-active and confident Islami Jamiat-i-Tulaba like Qazi Hussain Ahmad did since the mid 80s. Owing to mushrooming of private educational institutions and lack of reforms within IJT, the JI’s student wing has shrunken in influence if not in numbers.
The new JI chief will invest more in IJT’s revival as a significant political youth bloc owing to his own emotional attachment and strategic need. Given a stronger, vibrant and popular youth base of the PTI in the form of Insaf Students Federation, Mansoora will have to strengthen its right arm in Ichhra, Lahore.
Finally, Siraj is a man of consultation as has been the general tradition of JI, exceptionally ignored by Qazi and Hasan. The new chief will have spent more time in housekeeping than making bizarre statements like his predecessor. Instead of aging, political isolated ameers in district, Siraj will promote younger, politically savvy activists to Jamaat’s bureaucracy.
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk