South Asian polls expose a delicate regional balance

Since last year, democratic elections have been the theme of South Asian politics. That ought to be good news, both for democracy and regional stability. But is it really? Tom Hussien analyses

Since the beginning of last year, democratic elections have been the constant theme of South Asian politics. Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal have had them, Afghanistan is awaiting results, India has started voting, and Sri Lanka is heading towards the polls next year.

That ought to be good news, both for democracy and regional stability. But is it, really? The Bangladesh elections last year were boycotted by the opposition, rendering the results a farce. Similarly, the results of Pakistan’s polls were skewed because of the selective targeting of political parties by Taliban militants and, allegedly, by the deep-state’s interference in the voting process in two provinces where insurgencies are ongoing.

This year's elections promise no improvement. The partial results available for this month's Afghan presidential elections have highlighted deep-seated internal divisions. Even in India, the region's bastion of democracy, the campaign for the election has turned into a referendum for or against its hitherto secular credentials.

Viewed collectively, the results of those elections reflect a voter preoccupation with issues other than the accountable good governance that ought to characterise democracy. Rather, they’ve been the affirmation of biases and vendettas, be they between rival political dynasties, competing ethnic groups or extremist religious sects. Driven by intolerance, there has been little, if any, reflection of a desire for collective betterment – the quintessential ingredient of nation-building.

The consequences for regional stability are frightening, given rival countries’ propensity to wage proxy wars on each other’s territory, as well as in the neighbouring states where they vie for influence.

Specifically, that applies to India and Pakistan. Both now possess nuclear weapons and sophisticated strategic missiles. Assuming that sanity prevails, the political upside of these warheads is India and Pakistan are far less likely to go to war. The downside is their penchant for black-ops, which exploit and manipulate the hate-driven politics within their own borders and elsewhere in South Asia.

Bangladesh is a pertinent example. India backs the incumbent prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, whose father led the 1971 secession of the erstwhile East Pakistan, made possible by India’s military intervention. Her chief political rival, Khaleda Zia, who’s about to go on trial on corruption charges, is covertly supported by Pakistan, both financially and through religious political parties like the Jamaat-i-Islami, which has been banned for its role in the pre-secession genocide of separatists.

What might happen next? Lashkar-i-Taiba, the Pakistan-based militant group responsible for the November 2008 Mumbai attacks, has tried to infiltrate Bangladesh in the past, leading to a rash of arrests in 2010. If encouraged to, it may well stir trouble there. The Pakistani militants’ favoured infiltration route, in the past, has been via Nepal, because of its lax visa requirements. Years of political unrest there came to a close in February, following the election of the sole candidate for prime minister, but that happy situation may well be compromised.

Similarly, India and Pakistan were not-so-secretly on opposing sides during Sri Lanka’s lengthy civil war, with Indian Tamil groups supporting their rebellious ethnic brethren with money, arms and sanctuary, and Pakistan breaking international sanctions to train and arm the Sinhalese-dominated government and, in some operations, deploy specialist military personnel.

Without doubt, Afghanistan represents the greatest threat to regional stability, especially now that partial results for this month's presidential election point towards a victory for the anti-Taliban coalition of ethnic Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara minority communities previously known as the Northern Alliance. They've been a thorn in Pakistan's side since its independence in 1947, with Afghanistan being the only UN member state to oppose Pakistan's membership.

Pakistan has returned the favour since 1975, by training and deploying ethnic Pashtun rebels against what was then a communist government in Kabul. As such, its interference there predates the Soviet occupation and continues unabated, in part because India has created a network of consulates along Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan, from where it has worked with Afghan intelligence to support some elements of the Pakistani Taliban and the nationalist insurgency in Pakistan’s Balochistan province.

Such violent interstate bickering has been contained, to some extent, because of the physical presence of American-led international security forces in Afghanistan since the September 11, 2001 attacks. Had that not been the case, India and Pakistan would probably have gone to war in 2002, following an attack by Pakistani militants on India’s parliament. The same was applicable after the Lashkar’s bloody rampage through Mumbai in November 2008, when the US worked with China, Pakistan’s closest ally and India’s major strategic competitor, to prevent an escalation.

However, with US-led international forces on the verge of exiting Afghanistan, the civil war between the Northern Alliance-dominated government and the Taliban, inevitably, will go into overdrive, as would interference by a list of other states that includes India and Pakistan, but extends far beyond them.

As such, the results of India’s election are key. If the next administration is led by ultranationalists, there is a real danger that South Asia’s strategic competition could be rewound to pre-9/11 circumstances – with potentially harmful consequences. The coming year will tell if the region’s elected leaders have learnt from the past or not.

Tom Hussain is a freelance journalist based in Islamabad