In the immediate aftermath of Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s declaration of emergency rule, for no less than the thirteenth time in Pakistan's sixty-year history, a text message began circulating. It read, "Wishing you and your family a very happy and blessed Emergency. May God shower his blessings on you through the Pakistan Army and protect you and your family from the germs of independent thinking and the curse of an independent judiciary.”

Emergency rule in Pakistan may be considered fairly standard for a country plagued by a politically extended military and so-called ‘democratic’ demagogues who have plundered the country's economic reserves during their time in office, but this November, something different has happened.

The politicians, ineffectual and transparently perceived as enablers of the status quo, did not mobilize any demonstrations against the government; they couldn't.

Benazir Bhutto, the twice-disgraced former prime minister rendered herself politically redundant very early on by agreeing with the dictator's insistence that the judiciary in Pakistan had been irresponsible and needed to be tamed. Ms. Bhutto's party, the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) is now known as the Pervez People's Party on the streets of Karachi, which doesn’t help either.

Nawaz Sharif, also a twice-failed prime minister, (until recently) languished uselessly in exile in Saudi Arabia. Altaf Hussain, the leader of the Muhajir-based MQM party and an ally of Gen. Musharraf, stayed purposely mum and didn't utter a word against the abrogation of Pakistan's constitution.

Resistance and protest came squarely from civil society. The real movement of opposition came not only from Pakistan's legal community, but also from the youth — students, artists, and writers. Rogue resistance, if you will, has reenergized the political conscience of the country. This resistance is not grouped under any political banner, it's not moved by religion or caste, rather it comes from deep within the younger generation of society.

The United Nations estimates that more than 60 percent of Pakistan's population is under the age of 30. It is this generation — a generation that has endured successive mauling of the democratically drafted 1973 constitution, a generation that has witnessed the usurpation of power by a rich, feudal class of politicians, a generation that has survived the political machinations of the military — that is meaningfully countering the repression of emergency rule.

The streets of Karachi, often marked by political graffiti, have become a canvas for discontent and distrust. Artists and young student groups have spray-painted eject signs accompanied by the words “One coup per dictator” all over the city.

Television screens with fuzzy static have become familiar in a country that has lost access to news channels and popular broadcasters. Covering office buildings and residential neighborhoods are the words “Hum dekhain ge” or “we will see” . These words come from a poem by Faiz Ahmed Faiz, one of Pakistan's most beloved poets and a vocal critic of dictatorships, notably Musharraf's predecessor General Zia ul Haq who exiled Faiz from the country in the 1980’s. “We will see,” wrote Faiz, “when the mountains of cruelty and torture will fly like pieces of cotton. Under the feet of the governed, this earth will quake. And over the head of the ruler, when lightening will thunder, we will see …”

In the province of the Punjab, the college students of Lahore University of Management Sciences or LUMS, a highly respected institution, began a hunger strike to protest the arrests of their fellow citizens, including some members of the faculty who joined human rights activists and journalists rounded up by the local police.

A Management Sciences student, who asked that he not be named in this article, clarified the position of the protesting LUMS students. He said it was political, not personal: “The protest was always against the arbitrary manner in which our judiciary was desecrated, and emergency imposed. The arrest of our teachers further angered the student body who had one more reason to show up to protests.”

The students did not belong to any political parties; they were ordinary students who had semester exams around the corner. But they were tired. They were tired of living in a world where violence was often employed as the state's standard response. They gathered on campus between noon and 4 p.m. and set up a 'hunger camp'. The LUMS students protested peacefully in a rally around the main academic block of the university. They recited the poetry of Habib Jalib, listened to speeches from student leaders, and proceeded in a silent march. There were 1,500 students present at the rally. No political party was able to draw a thousand people out onto the streets, not a single one.

In Islamabad, the lion's den, it was a group of high school students that took out the first significant protest against emergency rule. The students were swiftly marched off to the F-8 Jail, only to be let out a short while later with a stern warning.

This may only be a beginning, and a small one at that, but it is promising to see the youth of Pakistan actively claiming a stake in the political process. Just how far the youth of Pakistan are willing to go has yet to be seen but the hour is upon them. With elections being promised for January of 2008 we have many hurdles to cross, and perhaps the young of Pakistan must take heed once again from Faiz 'Speak, your lips are free. Speak, it is your own tongue. Speak, it is your own body. Speak, your life is still yours… Speak, this brief hour is long enough. Before the death of body and tongue: Speak, 'cause the truth is not dead yet'.

____________________ 

FATIMA BHUTTO is a columnist for Jang, Pakistan’s largest Urdu newspaper and the daughter of Mir Murtaza Bhutto, a member of Pakistan's Parliament who was killed in 1996 in Karachi when his sister, Benazir Bhutto, was prime minister. She is currently working with the Pakistan People's Party-Shaheed Bhutto, a movement that calls for reform in the larger Pakistan People's Party