Politics of police reform.

Byline: Afzal Ali Shigri

AT the time of elections and during their tenure, political parties vehemently profess their commitment to police reform. It is educative to read the manifestos of the three leading major political parties of Pakistan as a way of evaluating their intentions about reforming the police.

In their manifesto, the PPP deals with the police along with the civil armed forces, broadly mentioning the need for enhancing the autonomy, intelligence and operational capacity of law-enforcement agencies. This is followed by random mention of computerisation, counterterrorism, gender imbalance and response capacity.

The PPP manifesto then talks about the enhancement of resources and induction of police officers in terms of the UN peacekeeping experience to benefit from their work in conflict zones. This part of the document seems to have been drafted without any understanding of the role of civilian police as an essential part of the criminal justice system.

It is ironic that political governments have not built on the democratic principles of a law introduced by a dictator.

On the other hand, the entirety of the PML-N's wisdom and reflections on police reform seems to have been encapsulated in a single spare sentence pledging to 'reform the police service through initiatives such as smart policing and community policing in order to make the police force citizen friendly and an efficient crime-fighting agent'. To say the least, this is a sad reflection on the commitment of these major parties in reforming the most important arm of the state to maintain public order and peace in the country.

It is only the PTI that accorded this issue due importance and identified the broad fundamental issues of depoliticisation and strengthening of police. In addition to delineating the steps for achieving these objectives, the PTI undertook to replicate the KP Police Act, 2017, in other provinces, professionalise police through reorganisation and provide specialised training. It further undertook to improve public outreach to police and to address the gender imbalance by recruiting more females into the force.

The manifestos of 2018 rightly gave hope that the PTI would address this most important aspect of reforms comprehensively with due impact on the entire criminal justice system. However, it is unfortunate that after winning the 2018 election, the PTI demonstrated conspicuous reluctance to follow the KP Act, 2017, with IGPs keen to implement...