‘Why single us out?’ Pakistan’s Ahmadi minority boycotts elections, again

The community was officially declared ‘non-Muslim’ four decades ago. Today, it is increasingly under attack.

Islamabad, Pakistan – Amir Mahmood remembers a meeting between his Ahmadi community and top officials of Pakistan’s government last September. He can’t forget how the community, for long a victim of persecution in the country, saw a decline in attacks on its graves and shrines in the days after that meeting.

But that respite did not last.

As the world’s fifth-most populous nation prepares to vote on February 8, its half-million-strong Ahmadi community will boycott the election, after a spike in attacks on its members, institutions and even burial sites in the weeks leading up to the vote. For many Ahmadis, like Mahmood, the brief decline in attacks following the September meeting was proof of what could happen — if the country’s leaders wanted it.

“What the decline in attacks told us that if the state wishes, it can easily control the violence against us but unfortunately, the impression we get is that either some government is not clear-minded about its action, or is unwilling to help,” he said.

It is a sentiment driven by decades of entrenched discrimination, including in the electoral system. And it has led the community to boycott the elections. In a statement last week, the community’s leaders announced their “disassociation” from the vote. “Although the elections are ostensibly being held under a joint electorate, there is, however, a separate voter list prepared only for Ahmadi citizens due to their faith,” said a statement released by an organisation representing the community on Wednesday.