PAKISTAN: Laying Down the Law

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In Pakistan the constitution is gone, the Parliament dissolved, the country's first elections indefinitely postponed. But not since the days of Founding Father Mohammed Ali Jinnah has Pakistan had so popular a government. "On the day De-fore the revolution last October," said a now jobless politician, "I thought one of the most dangerous things you can do is to break a constitution, even if it is to stop evil. On the day after, I thought: 'Thank God someone had the courage.'" Says beefy, Sandhurst-trained General Mohammed Ayub Khan, Pakistan's military dictator and president: "We have a few jobs to do. Then we shall hand back the power of choice to the people."

The land that Ayub took over five months ago was so corrupt that even such tolerant agencies as CARE and the Catholic Relief Services had given up on it; gifts clearly labeled NOT TO BE SOLD invariably ended up, not in the hands of the hungry, but in the hands of the black-marketeers. Soon the effects of the bloodless military takeover began to be felt. Streets became clean, bus queues orderly, scooter-ricksha boys unexpectedly polite. Instead of dragging themselves to work any hour of the morning, government clerks began showing up at 9. General Ayub jailed about 100 politicos, but he has since so tightened up the processes of justice that there are now fewer prisoners in jail than at practically any point in Pakistan's twelve-year history. In one province the Ayub government found 300 people still awaiting trial after being arrested as long as three years ago.

Ayub rules through a Cabinet of three generals and eight nonpolitical civilians, four each from East and West Pakistan. Ayub listened hard to West Germany's Economics Minister Ludwig Erhard when he passed through, and has since leaned heavily for economic advice on Wilhelm Vocke, former president of West Germany's State Bank.

Among Ayub's reforms: ¶ The government has ordered all civil servants to write out a detailed history of their financial dealings since independence. Since businessmen and landowners now face up to 14 years in jail for tax dodging, treasury clerks have had to work day and night to handle the long lines of delinquents. Pakistan has reclaimed $16 million from private illegal holdings of foreign exchange, found two tons of gold in the seaside hiding places of a band of smugglers.

¶ Top priority has been given to doing something about the country's 12 million refugees who fled India to end up jobless in wretched slums. Ayub ordered new housing projects; with a stroke of the pen his Rehabilitation Minister gave permanent title to 6,600,000 acres in the Punjab to 1,400,000 refugees. The new program cuts two ways. Under the law, the refugees can lay claim to land with the same value as that which they left behind. Now faced with the threat of prison for filing false claims, 5,500 refugees have decided to withdraw or reduce their claims.