Abusing animals becomes norm of political rallies, gatherings to fuel protests

Kamran Ali

Peshawar: Although, there are 18 political parties which have been allotted animals or birds as election symbols, yet abusing animals has become an unfortunate norm at the political rallies and gatherings. Donkeys, dogs, tigers, lions, and wild boars are among those unfortunate animals.

There are so many examples of animal abuse in the Pakistani politics:  During the by-elections campaign in October last year, when PTI Chairman Imran Khan and ANP provincial president Aimal Wali Khan were contesting the NA election for the constituency in Charsadda, the senior leaders called each other “Shadu” and “Melo” many times in their speeches. These are animal names in Pashto language.”Shadu” means monkey and “Melo” means bear.

A month ago, PPP Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zarfari also compared Imran Khan with a dog. Such insensitivities words create a culture of demeaning and abusing animals. If we look back at the political history, in 2014, supporters of PAT Chief Tahirul Qadri captured a wild boar near the Parliament House and wrote “Go Nawaz Go” on its body. They tied the bear with wild wires and beat it brutally with sticks.

As a result, the bear was killed. For the  civilised societies such brutal acts against animals are considered disgusting but here the case is quite different.

In 2018, Imran Khan again allegedly called the supporters of PML-N as “donkeys”. Consequently, the PTI workers attacked a donkey in Karachi’s Gulshan Iqbal area and injured the donkey seriously. The animal was brought to the shelter of Ayesha Chundrigar Foundation (ACF), an organization working for the protection of animals, the donkey could not survived and succumbed to severe injuries. The ACF had termed the brutal incident against an animal as a hate crime.

In our society, ‘donkey’ is used in a reference to a person to imply an unthinking fool without sense and a mind of his own.  It is used to demean and degrade a person. This is the reason why donkeys are used symbolically to refer to political opponents in many political rallies and demonstrations by the demonstrators who beat them as though they are beating their opponents.
University of Peshawar Assistant Professor of Zoology. Dr Zaigham Hassan believes that “Shado” or “monkey” is used to refer to an ugly or hasty person while “Melo” or “bear” is used for a stout or lazy person, which is highly offensive with negative connotations.

Although calling a human by the name of an animal is not an insult to the animal or a violation of its rights, the practice can encourage a culture of animal abuse as people start associating these animals with these negative traits believing that it is ok to abuse of  animals, according to  Dr Zaigham.

Calling someone an animal reinforces the narrative that humans are superior to animals and therefore justifies the violation of animal rights: PETA

The Zoologist further stated that all species have equal status; however, human beings are considered as “the noblest of creatures” in our society, and calling a human being an animal in a negative sense is equal to insulting humans.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), an organization working for the rights of animals, believes that calling someone an animal reinforces the narrative that humans are superior to animals and therefore justifies the violation of animal rights.

According to PETA, animals are humiliated by referring to the negative traits of humans; which is cruelty and injustice to animals.

Nick Heslam, a professor of Psychology at the University of Melbourne, Australia, writes in his research article that many animal metaphors are simply offensive rather than representing a specific trait, and calling someone a pig, rat, monkey, dog are offensive and insulting.

In the paper, Prof Nick states that the comparison itself is inhumane and the use of animalistic words shows that these people are literally inhumane.JUI-F provincial spokesperson Abdul Jalil Jan, in this regard, said that leaders like Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Mufti Mahmood and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto never used abusive words for their political opponents, no matter how severe their political differences were, but now the use of abusive language is unfortunately becomes a norm in politics. He deplored such inhuman norm is a sign of an uncivilized society.

Many political parties or candidates are given different animals as electoral symbols in elections, which should be completely banned because opponents hate the same animal in case of winning or losing in elections or in protests and demonstrations against each other:Dr Zaigham

“Seeing the same animal anywhere, they think of it as their enemy and think of hurting it, of which there are many examples”, he stated.
According to the document available on the ECP website, 147 political parties have been allotted election symbols, in which 18 political parties’ election symbol is an animal or a bird. These include horse, camel, elephant, deer, lion, dolphin, eagle, and pigeon.

Similarly, 180 electoral symbols for independent candidates have been allocated, which includes crocodile, goat, kangaroo, rabbit, honey bee, parrot, ostrich, spider etc. PTI provincial spokesperson Shaukat Yousafzai when asked, said, “The protection of animal rights is certain in foreign countries, but unfortunately it is lacking in Pakistan, and no one has thinks about this or they rather do not consider it an issue or violation of animal rights”. PTI Yousafzai demanded of the ECP to ban animal or birds as political party or candidate electoral symbol while through code of conduct all the parties or workers should also be stopped from name-calling, using or bringing animals in rallies and demonstrations.

No candidate can be allotted any symbol other than the symbols contained in the election rules, while political parties registered with the ECP have been issued symbols of their choice under the Election Act 2017 and Election Rules: ECP Additional Director General Shahid Iqbal

However, there are no rules or regulations related to not giving animals as election symbols, so no one has been banned from giving animals as election symbols. “If the political parties take a joint decision, not only animals can be banned as election symbols, but also, rules and regulations can be made”, ECP website opined.

Lucky Animal Protection Shelter, Peshawar Head Zeba Masood says that injured or abused animals are often taken in her shelter and it is very shameful to torture an animal in the context of political differences. “There is a law in the form of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act which prohibits any person from harming, causing, or allowing, if he is the owner, any unnecessary pain or suffering to any animal, but it has been implemented thus far”, says Zeba.

Zeba demanded that in order to ensure the protection of animals, not only should the electoral symbols named after animals be changed, but the existing law should be amended to include stricter provisions and punishment, and then ensure the implementation of the law in all circumstances.