On Tuesday 12^th February, many Pakistani newspapers including The News, Dawn, The Nation and Daily Times reported a conference held on Monday 11^th February at Pakistan National Council of the Arts to commemorate National Women Day. It was attended by different human rights and women rights NGOs and was arranged by the Aurat Foundation, South Asia Partnership-Pakistan (SAP-PK), Strengthening Participatory Organization (SPO), Sungi Development Foundation and Sustainable Development Policy Initiative. Its objectives were to pressurize the government to enhance the role of women in politics and improve their participation in the economic life of the country. The speakers also urged the authorities to "repeal discriminatory laws against women and take more steps for protecting their human rights, ensuring a congenial atmosphere for becoming respectable members of society". I.A. Rahman, a human rights activist in Pakistan, remarked that the political situation was not encouraging especially for women and that women were not allowed to represent their constituency but only given a space to sit in legislative buildings. He said, "Political participation means to play a role and unfortunately political parties are not allowed to play a political role" and also, "that without economic empowerment women would not be able to play a political role."

 

It is most regrettable that this conference failed to offer the real solutions to the problems faced by women of economic hardship and having little influence in the political process of the country. Infact these problems are faced by women all over the subcontinent including in Bangladesh, India and Afghanistan, because the same capitalist system along with its secular and liberal values is being implemented there. Based on these values and system, the law makers within these countries decide the fate of millions of men and women by making such economic policies that serve their own vested interests and  safeguard  the interests of their masters - the IMF, World Bank, and Western states. How can the women or men for that matter, be provided a secure economic life or their standard of living be improved when we are the economic slaves of such institutions and foreign governments and our countries are run on debt, fuelled by the capitalist interest-based financial model of economics that has crippled ordinary women and men with severe poverty? During the last fiscal year, Pakistan's  public debt grew by 493.6% as a percentage of its revenues, while the country consumed roughly 40% of its revenues for servicing such debts according to  the Debt Policy Statement 2012-13 from the Ministry of Finance. Under flawed capitalist policies, inflation  has increased to such a level that one dollar is now equivalent to more than a hundred Pakistani Rupees because the government is printing more money to pay back the loans without the paper currency being backed by the relevant amount of gold or silver. This has resulted in the spiraling of food and commodity prices. Being a net importer country with a weak manufacturing base, Pakistan's capitalist government oversees the devaluation of the Rupee, in accordance to IMF orders. The economic condition of women will only deteriorate if these policies according to the Capitalist mindset continue.

 

It is ludicrous to believe that under this rotten system that has caused the economy of Pakistan and the Muslim world to sink under a mountain of debt, imposed policies that have destroyed domestic markets, robbed states of their wealth and resources, and placed an economic stranglehold on the people by subjecting them to high taxes and extortionate prices for basic necessities including gas and electricity, that simply pushing women into employment will alleviate their economic woes. Also  pushing women to do jobs and earn for themselves under the Capitalist sytem simply creates other problems as they are then exposed to the exploitative capitalist environment of the state, where individuals, businesses, and corporations are allowed to exploit cheap labour for huge profits, subjecting women to dangerous and back-breaking working conditions.

 

Secondly, the idea that increasing female MP's will increase women's influence in the political process of the state is false. Pakistan has a higher percentage of women parliamentarians in the lower house (23%) than the USA which has only 17% women but this has meant nothing to the political rights or voice of ordinary women in Pakistan. How useful have these seats in parliament been when the whole system favors only the elite class - the daughters and nieces of the feudal lords and wealthy businessmen to run in elections, who then like all the other politicians make laws for their own benefit and not for the masses?

 

So the real solution lies in rejecting these liberal and secular capitalist values and system. The solutions promoted by Capitalism causes more problems for women. The real solution lies in the implementation of the laws made by the Creator(swt) who knows his creation better than we know ourselves due to our limited intellect. Allah (swt) says:

((أَلَا يَعۡلَمُ مَنۡ خَلَقَ وَهُوَ ٱللَّطِيفُ ٱلۡخَبِيرُ))

"Should not He Who has created know? And He is the Most Kind and Courteous (to His slaves), the Well-Acquainted (with everything)." [TMQ al-Mulk: 14]

 

The real solution lies in implementing a system wherein the men and women will not be able to make laws according to their own whims and desires to save their seats, or folllow the orders of the IMF and World Bank and implement harmful trade agreements, or run an economy upon the exploitative and detrimental principle of interest. Rather it will be a system, where Allah (swt)'s laws - like the  currency being based on gold and silver, the prohibition of interest, the economy being founded on wealth creation rather than debt, and the local currency being delinked from foreign currencies like the dollar - are implemented. Only a sound economic system  that provides the basic necessities of life to every citizen by way of being an obligation and not only as a "good thing to do" can secure the economic rights of women. It is a system that is obliged to create good employment opportunities for men for they are obliged to provide for their families, and where women have the choice to work or not to work as their basic necessities of life are fulfilled by their menfolk or the state. It is a system that will not accept any exploitative environment within the society, ensuring that women in employment enjoy safe and just working conditions. All this will only be achieved by  the Khilafah "Caliphate" state.

 

It is also a system where the women as well as men have a full say in the political affairs of the country, i.e in accounting the ruler and making him implement the laws of Allah (swt) completely and comprehensively. It is a state where a common woman can account the ruler like at the time of Khalifah Umar (ra), where an ordinary woman fearlessly challenged Umar (ra) who was the leader of the state on his order to limit the mahr (dowry), saying to him, "Umar! You have no right to intervene in a matter which Allah the All-Mighty has already decreed in the Qur'an" mentioning the ayah in Surah An-Nisa, verse 20.  Umar changed his decision based on the evidence from Islam, saying, "I am in the wrong and she is correct" - reflecting the fact that under the Khilafah "Caliphate", the reference for resolving disputes is the Islamic texts and not the whims of the ruler who cannot legislate laws according to his own interests or to favour his family and friends.

 

And it is a system where ordinary women and men both have the same political rights to elect their ruler and  become members of the Majlis al Ummah to represent their  respective provinces and to account the rulers but they do not legislate as this is the right of the Creator alone. I call upon the women's rights and human rights activists of Pakistan and the Muslim world to reject these flawed and harmful capitalist values and system and call towards the implementation of the Khilafah "Caliphate" state which is the only savior of women from their current plight. Allah (swt) says:

((أَفَمَنْ أَسَّسَ بُنْيَانَهُ عَلَىٰ تَقْوَىٰ مِنَ اللَّـهِ وَرِضْوَانٍ خَيْرٌ أَم مَّنْ أَسَّسَ بُنْيَانَهُ عَلَىٰ شَفَا جُرُفٍ هَارٍ فَانْهَارَ بِهِ فِي نَارِ جَهَنَّمَ ۗ وَاللَّـهُ لَا يَهْدِي الْقَوْمَ الظَّالِمِينَ))

"Is he, therefore, better who lays his foundation on fear of Allah and (His) good pleasure, or he who lays his foundation on the edge of a cracking hollowed bank, so it broke down with him into the fire of hell; and Allah does not guide the unjust people." [TMQ al-Taubah: 109]

 

Umm Musab

Member of The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir