Hard situations always bring bad laws. As Corona virus ravaged Wuhan, Chinese government used every weapon in its arsenal from shutting down Wuhan, isolating the infected and monitoring their movement to control the outbreak. China is an authoritarian country and need not look at the checks and balances of any of their decision. Singapore another autocratic state acted with the same zeal. They succeeded. South Korea a centralized democracy did not shutdown but succeeded by testing and quarantining the infected.
Almost half the world is now engulfed by the deadly virus. Countries round the world has become war zones. Crisis always bring citizens together as they stand united to take it on. It is time of national solidarity, When twin towers were brought down on September 11, 2001, USA united with war on terror and brought in a law called the Patriot Act which the citizens would not have accepted in normal times. The USA became world’s most expansive surveillance state. The country accepted that.
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To fight COVID-19, countries have made a health calamity into a security issue by a series of repressive measures. Shutting down industries, enforcing physical distancing, banning large gatherings, and movement of persons and vehicles to break the transmission chain. The WHO and experts have recommended these measures.
The Pandemic is a God sent opportunity for autocrats. Victor Orban, the Hungarian PM got the parliament to arrogate to him to rule by decree by suspending the existing law, In Israel, the PM Netanyahu has used the emergent situation to postpone his corruption trial and blocked parliament and got extraordinary domestic surveillance powers. Azarbaijan president has used this to attack the opposition. All liberal democracies like UK, Germany, Italy and Austria have gone for lockdown and taken measures to monitor citizens by tracking their movement through cell data. South Korea used this method to enforce quarantining the affected – something which no liberal democracies would tolerate in normal times. It is feared that Donald Trump could declare emergency which would give him powers to deploy military for domestic purpose. It is also feared that the November elections would be postponed. Jordan has ordered closure of all print news outlets. Philippines declared a state of calamity for six months and suspended public life.
Various countries have tried to gag the media and social media issuing warnings and threatening with heavy penalty. The government of India even sought Supreme Court’s approval to bring in some sort of censorship on the media. Transparency and sharing of information has always been a weak point of states with authoritarian tendencies.
India did not require emergency powers. There were already legal structures in place The colonial Epidemic Act of 1897 was brought in as people refused to be quarantined, They did not mind death and infecting others. Isolation was seen as worse than death due to the stigma attached to it. A law was required to give powers of search, inspection of persons and property and take any measures to deal with outbreak of the epidemic. The law gave power to the plague commissioner to do virtually anything that needed to be done. That included even power to bring down buildings and physically inspect people to find out whether they are infected so as to isolate them. The disaster Management Act of 2005 is a clear carte blanche to the executive. It empowers the executive with a battery of powers to combat disasters including restricting or controlling traffic and people’s movement and deployment of military forces.
Both the laws give unprecedented powers to the executive and the law enforcing agencies. This is one aspect that could be behind the states pushing for extension of the lockdown period.
Considering the exponential rate at which the virus has hit Europe and USA and taking into consideration our poor health infrastructure , the citizenry accepted to be foot soldiers of the commander in chief in these distress times, though the 21 days lockdown came in a totally irresponsible and unplanned manner with a three and half hours’ notice. The country accepted the ruthless shutdown as the only way to halt the corona march. In fact, in Goa there was acceptance in certain sections of a total lockdown with even the groceries, milk booths and other essential items being shut off. The deployment of Central paramilitary forces to deal with the hungry and poor in search of food was even welcomed.
The fear is that the infringement of civil liberties which is seen as a war time measure, could continue peace time with the pandemic reshaping political systems by solidifying of autocratic tendencies and destroying democracies.
The United Nations is alert of that fact and certain UN affiliated experts have already warned that emergency measures over the pandemic should not be used by governments for political ends. They said “while we recognise the severity of current health crises and acknowledge that the use of emergency powers is allowed by international law in response to significant threats, we urgently remind the states that any emergency responses to the corona virus must be proportionate, necessary and non-discriminatory.” Basically, a sledgehammer is not required to crack a nut.
The problem is that the pandemic is being fought at a time when there is decline of democracy around the globe. There could be further decline as history shows that emergency violations of civil liberties are not easily rolled back. It is crucial that there is self-restraint by liberal democracies and vigilance by citizens. “Those who sacrifice individual liberty to secure temporary safety deserve neither” said Benjamin Franklin. Wonder what he would have said in times like this!
(The writer is practicing
advocate, senior faculty in law and political analyst)
