Politics is the most fascinating topic for the people of Balochistan in their simple social life whether it be activists of political parties, hidden sympathizers of insurgency or open sceptics, even the common citizens of the province. One can always witness locals debating various issues from their own perspectives with a subjective, street-politics orientation. Politics is a struggle for power; to bag, and to maintain it. Whereas, political culture is a set of norms, values, attitudes, and beliefs of people that shapes their political behaviour.
Due to a historically low literacy rate, poor quality of education, an added sense of marginalization and very little comprehension of set practices of national and international politics, the political culture of the province has been more anti-centre and somehow anti-state.
People debate about political issues but with the colossal influence of utopian views which unfortunately do not apply in the prevailing real-politics of the world. It is not ethnicity which makes a modern nation-state, instead compromised interests of individuals make them a nation, and citizens of a modern nation-state. But this is perceived neither by the politicians nor by the people, and that is why its political culture is more exclusive than inclusive.
Understanding the social set-up is a pre-requisite for analysing the political outlook of a province where nepotism is the hallmark of its political culture. This is the dilemma of the entire country’s democratic practice but it stands truer in Balochistan. One may say that it is shaped by the limited choice of rural-tribal democracy.
People vote for the candidate who constructs bridges and roads to their village or finances tubewells to water their agricultural land. Votes are often purchased by bribing the head of a village, Mir or Malak, and so all the votes of that village are assured in said candidate’s favour.
Tribal system is not only based on Sardari, Mirri or Nawabi, but also on strong kinship and ethno-tribalism, which is highly embedded in majority areas of Balochistan’s political system. It is equally true that no educational improvement has been promoted here, nor have any economic activities been professionally endorsed in a catalytical way to challenge such traditional practices, but invisible gradual evolution can be deeply observed.
Political culture in Balochistan is different from division to division. It is extremely different in Pashtun-populated areas, where there is no insurgency at all and a sufficient hold of religious parties. In Baloch areas, it is quite variant. Growing politics of reconciliations may be witnessed as well as the uncompromised guerrilla warfare of ongoing insurgency in some areas. In the southern areas of Balochistan, an extremely negligible presence of religious political parties may be observed.
43 percent of the people voted in the previous election of 2013, which was almost a ten percent increase than the previous one. This was despite the threat of separatist militants who warned the locals, ‘not to walk towards polling-stations for casting vote’.
It is obviously more challenging to figure out how to deal with public opinion in Balochistan. Hard core techniques clearly fail to acquire maximum success here as empirically proven. However, soft tactics could be effective, as is now seen even in the military which is promoting cultural activities and other events for projecting peace. This said, these steps should be taken considering the concerns of the people. Public opinion matters more than dissent voices, and such opinion is moulded by middle-class sub-nationalist political parties. Relatively educated youth are more involved in this aspect.
Social media warfare is a challenge for states not only in international politics but also in domestic politics, referring to Facebook and Twitter in particular. Social media, one of the tools for the implementation of soft power tactics, can perform cost-effective tasks that cannot be replaced in today’s war of social media.
There have been two mainstream political parties, PML(N) and PPP in the province. The former is presently leading a coalition government in the province while the latter was leading the previous provincial cabinet. PTI is spreading rapidly and may gradually replace other sub-national political parties.
In central and southern Balochistan, there is unambiguous variation. Southern areas of the province, Awaran, Kech, and Panjgur can be witnessed on a peak in terms of insurgency and recorded the lowest turn-out of 15-20 percent in the last general election. Jhalawan and Sarawan areas of central Balochistan are comparatively performing much better in political activities. The Sibbi division is in between political activities and low insurgent threats from Kohlu and Dera-Bugti. Whereas, surprisingly, Lasbela on the east of Awaran recorded the highest turn-out in the general election of 2013.
More than ten national and sub-national level political parties promote the manifestos of their parties among the public of Balochistan. That results in the formation of a coalition provincial government which is more bound by its coalition partners. It simply depicts the political division of people within the province where several political parties campaign in elections for only 51 general seats.
The provincial government is correctly criticized for its incompetence, but that should not remain so and is positively changing. The quality of government influences political activities up to a mark but its failure produces an immense lack of trust which is bad for the provincial government as well as the federal government. It is generally assumed that the centre has more authority than the province and that might be true but it can be observed to be changing after the 18th Amendment in the constitution. It is now a publicly acknowledged fact, even by the Centre, that Balochistan has been neglected day by day, both due to the incompetency of provincial officials and less than adequate attentiveness of the federal government which represents the entire country.
Female participation is considered a modern weapon to empower political voices of half of the population but there is not a single woman directly elected as an MPA, not even in the local body election. This deficiency is felt across the country but much more in Balochistan which lacks political consciousness of women to vote independently.
Presently, the speaker of Balochistan’s provincial assembly is a female, Raheela Durrani, but there is no woman in the provincial cabinet. In the local body government, thanks to the Musharraf regime which reserved 33 percent quota for women in 2002, one-third local body government consists of females. The reserved quota for women in national and provincial legislative houses is also very low.
Balochistan’s government was the first government to hold local body elections after the warning of Supreme Court to the cabinets of all provinces and that is an indicator of the political progress of the province.
The ongoing developmental projects and the reforming education system are indicators of optimism to improve the political culture of Balochistan, but the contribution of people to the province in presence of separatists is yet a matter of concern. Particularly the voices against CPEC which include a series of other essential projects. Keeping in mind that multiple steps have been taken for educating the youth of the province, technical and professional skill-building is still required to minimize the dominating sense of marginalization.