Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi, who is considered a close associate and frontman of Pakistan’s Army Chief, delivered a speech at the Economic Summit in Islamabad on 29 July, in which he referred to the “collapse of the existing system.” The following day, on 30 July, the statement by the DG ISPR regarding good governance once again sparked debate across the country about a change in the governmental structure. However, this debate over change is not taking place because of a desire to resolve Pakistan’s problems. Instead, it is essentially an institutional struggle between the political and military leadership over authority and control of legislation and state funds. On this matter, Hizb ut Tahrir would like to make three points clear to the Ummah.

1) Democracy is an un-Islamic system of government that was introduced to the Indian Subcontinent by Britain. In democracy, the authority to make laws rests with human beings, who determine what is permissible and prohibited for society, as well as what constitutes reward and punishment and what is halal and haram. In democracy, the supreme objectives of society, the direction in which society should proceed, and the red lines of society are themselves determined by human beings through the legislative assembly. According to Islam, the authority to make laws does not belong to human beings. Instead, Allah (swt) the Creator and Owner of the universe, alone is the Legislator and the Sovereign.

The authority of human beings to make laws, and particularly the authority to acquire and spend economic resources through legislation, causes a struggle and competition among the elites and various institutions in a democracy. This is why, whether it is a parliamentary or presidential system, in a democratic system of government there remains an ongoing struggle between the military and political elites for the authority to make laws. This is the power inherent in legislative authority, and it is in pursuit of this power that political parties and military leadership attempt to influence elections so that laws of their choosing can be enacted.

Even if the political and military leaderships do not interfere in elections, attempts to influence the decisions of members of legislative assemblies, the buying and selling of their votes, and efforts to persuade them to safeguard their interests are characteristics of the democratic system of government and democratic politics. This can be observed in Pakistan and in every country where a democratic system of government exists.

It is only the system of Khilafah (Caliphate) in which the authority to legislate belongs neither to the Khalifah nor to the Majlis al-Ummah. Instead, in the Khilafah, only the Shariah laws are implemented, and it is part of the contract of allegiance (bay’ah) to the Khalifah (caliph) that the people give their Bay’ah to him on the condition that he implements the Shariah. The failure of democracy and the capitalist system is a natural consequence, and only the system of Khilafah will place Pakistan on the path towards lasting stability and development.

2) The system whose failure is currently being debated in Pakistan is a governmental, political, judicial, and social system based on Western civilisation, Western political experience, and Western historical experience. This system has been formed upon Western secular ideas and the notion of separating religion from worldly affairs. The concepts concerning ruling governance that are implemented in Pakistan today are Kufr and un-Islamic concepts.

These include the three-tier governmental system based on federalism; the division of power between the legislature, judiciary, and government; the concept of private ownership; the concepts of freedom of opinion and religious freedoms; the distribution of resources based on free markets; interest-based investment; the issuance of fiat paper currency; subordination to the global order; the enforcement of English Common Law in the courts; the formulation of foreign policy on the basis of the nation-state; and obtaining riba-loans from major world powers and relying upon them for military equipment.

These are the political concepts whose implementation has brought Pakistan to the brink of destruction, and which have no connection whatsoever with Islam, its Shariah rulings, or the history of the Muslims. Until these political concepts are abandoned and the commands of Islam are implemented through the establishment of the Islamic system of Khilafah, Pakistan and the Muslim World will not be able to embark upon the path of development and strength.

3) The Islamic Ummah has completely rejected both the existing hybrid system and the democratic system that preceded it. This is because these systems of government contradict the beliefs of the Muslims and their worldview. Indeed, it would be more accurate to say that the Ummah never adopted these systems in the first place. These Western systems were imposed upon the Islamic Ummah through force and coercion by Western colonialism following the dismantling of the Uthmani Khilafah (Ottoman Caliphate).

In the Indian Subcontinent, the Muslims struggled against British colonialism, but although they succeeded in expelling Britain from this region, they were unable to rid themselves of the system it had established. Pakistan’s ruling elite, from 1947 to the present day, has implemented and operated the very system left behind by Britain. In order to operate this system, the political, military, and technical elites have relied upon education, assistance, and training from Western universities and Western institutions. This system has no connection whatsoever with the Ummah, Islam, Islamic history, Islamic culture, or Islamic law and fiqh.

This is why the Ummah today is ready to completely bury this system.

Genuine stability in Pakistan and throughout the Muslim World can only be achieved through the system of Khilafah, when the authority to legislate belongs solely to Allah (swt) rather than to various interest groups. It is obligatory upon the Islamic Ummah to struggle for the elimination of the existing system of disbelief, and the establishment of the Khilafah Rashidah (Rightly Guided Caliphate) on the Method of the Prophethood. The success of the Ummah in this world and the Hereafter depends upon the establishment of a system of government based upon revelation. Allah (swt) said,

[وَمَنْ لَمْ يَحْكُمْ بِمَا أَنْزَلَ اللَّهُ فَأُولَئِكَ هُمُ الْكَافِرُونَ]

“And whoever does not rule according to what Allah has revealed, it is those who are the disbelievers.” [TMQ Al-Ma’idah: 44].