Federal Minister Riaz Hussain Pirzada (Credit: dawn.com)ISLAMABAD, Jan 25: Federal Minister for Inter-provincial Coordination (IPC) Riaz Hussain Pirzada has accused the Saudi government of creating instability across the Muslim world, including Pakistan, through distribution of money for promoting its ideology.
Addressing a two-day ‘Ideas Conclave’ organised by the “Jinnah Institute” think tank in Islamabad, the federal minister said ‘the time has come to stop the influx of Saudi money into Pakistan’.
He also blasted his own government for approving military courts in the presence of an ‘independent and vibrant judiciary’ and said that military courts reflect ‘weak and coward leadership’.
“Such cowardly leadership has no right to stay in power,” Pirzada added.
In her opening remarks, Chairperson of Jinnah Institute Sherry Rehman said that the two-day conference would deliberate upon new ideas needed for a progressive and better Pakistan.
Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) leader Shafqat Mehmood said the government has failed to address the problems being faced by the common man.
Awami National Party (ANP) leader Afrasiab Khan Khattak expressed regret over military courts and said their establishment ‘has eroded democracy’. He called upon democratic elements to play their role in reversing the 21st constitutional amendment.
Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leader Farooq Sattar supported military courts and said there was no other option to deal with terrorists.
The Federal Minister for Commerce Khurram Dastgir while addressing the conference, said that for an elected government to deliver, they need at least a modicum of security that their leadership will exist tomorrow.
He said that lawmakers have little incentive to read legislation. They are judged by their constituents on how much patronage they can deliver.
“We are answerable to the people. No general would stand up here and take your criticism,” said Dastgir.
He further added that there is no excuse for not holding local body elections.
The Peshawar incident could become a turning point of in history only if the state institutions demonstrate their commitment to change of narrative. Anything less than that would mean moving in circles and waiting for next tragedy.
The government has launched a national plan of action with tall promises and fresh commitment to confront the menace of terrorism. More than a month past, the plan has yielded a number of meetings, press conferences and mounting figures of rounded up suspects. Meanwhile hangings of previously convicted criminals have become more conspicuous, encounters are on rise and it is being repeatedly asserted that the government will not discriminate between good and bad Taliban. This would be a major shift from the past if happens at all.
Newspaper reports, however, suggest that the purpose-built good Taliban still enjoy safe havens and not much has changed on ground. Some of the recently reported incidents indicate that a complete dissociation with good Taliban is not imminent even if there is a serious will to do so.
Sources in the Interior Ministry revealed that the ministry is contemplating a ban on Haqqani group and Jamaat-ud-Dawa. It is customary in Pakistan that the banned outfits continue their operations unhindered by just adjusting to a new innocuous title.
With a simple change of brand name, leaders of such outfits stand absolved of all the previous baggage. As long as they fall under the category of good warriors of security establishment, they can operate with a new license. Some two dozen such outfits enjoy complete impunity in Pakistan. Most of them have their sanctuaries in Punjab where state apparatus lacks both courage and will to lay hands on them.
The same attitude explains inaction against the Lal Mosque cleric Mullah Aziz, who openly challenged the jealously guarded writ of the state. A court has issued his non-bail-able warrants that he brazenly defied by saying he will neither seek bail nor will he surrender before the law.
The state apparatus that recklessly dumps mutilated bodies in Balochistan and Sindh to secure writ of the law, becomes spineless when it comes to religious fanatics. Few days back an incident was reported in newspapers that narrate the degree of patronisation enjoyed by sectarian elements.
The PML-N represents a wider sentiment among Punjabi middle class that enjoys a negotiated peace on its land at the expense of bloodshed in other parts of the country.
On the evening of December 31, a leader of Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (AWSJ), was arrested by a joint patrolling team of police and Rangers. The cleric who is a proclaimed offender was heavily guarded. His guard also included a properly armed policeman. According to the newspaper reports, the cleric received a VIP treatment at the SHO’s office. He was ceremoniously released even before the magistrate of the area came to grant him bail.
As the news story appeared in leading newspapers, the Interior Ministry found a scapegoat and a competent police officer, SSP Asmatullah Junejo was suspended. Internal inquiry conducted by senior police officers revealed that the release orders of the cleric came from IGP office yet an honest police officer had to bear the brunt of departmental action, enough to demoralise a handful of honest and committed officers in the police department. The police inquiry is silent on who deployed a police guard to protect a proclaimed offender and who actually ordered his release. This single incident reported in Islamabad is enough testimony that the narrative of good Taliban is immune to the current wave of action.
In September 2014, Maulana Asmatullah Muawiya, head of TTP Punjab announced that his faction would no more carry out attacks in Pakistan. Muawiya however unequivocally mentioned that his group will continue his activities in Afghanistan. He subsequently surrendered before military officials in Miramshah. The episode was trumpeted as a great success of the military operation without narrating details of the heinous incidents of terrorism that he perpetrated. A long list of barbaric acts is attached to his credit. No action has been heard against him and his aides so far. The newspaper reports confirm that he has been allowed to return to his hometown in Punjab. No one knows about the deal that erased all the blood stains from his hands.
According to findings of the interior minister, Islamabad is infested with religious seminaries, mostly illegal. The small town with a population of about two million, houses some 401 seminaries compared to only 422 government schools and colleges. It includes illegally functioning 160 madarassas and 72 Quranic institutions that are not registered with any government authority. Number of seminaries’ students in the capital territory is 31,769 that include 14,377 non local students. Most of these seminaries are located in Sihala, Bhara Kahu, Shahzad Town and Margalla Town, located barely few miles away from the Interior Ministry offices.
Intelligence agencies have been reporting about their involvement in dubious activities.
Other cities and towns of Pakistan have much higher number of seminaries and students. Many of them operate illegally and possess tentacles to mobilise financial resources without much effort.
While the Interior ministry finds it hard to track their financing, channels funneling money into these seminaries are not too veiled. Both charitable and illegal sources of their income are well known to those who matter. However, most of these resources are not availed through formal methods and hence cannot be regulated through banking channels and tax authorities.
Religious parties that openly coddle madrassas are not too naïve about the streams of resources flowing into these seminaries and the education being imparted in these institutions. Madarassa reform is an anachronistic prescription that has never worked in the past. Just tweaking their curriculum and introducing modern subjects would not suffice anymore. Their number has swollen beyond the regulatory capacity of government bodies. Proselytization of unimaginable proportions is being practiced in these seminaries and the narrative has been intelligently aligned with the ideology of state.
According to one study conducted by noted scholar Dr Tariq Rehman, when seminary students were asked priorities for Pakistan, 99.2 per cent answered conquering Kashmir whereas 97.7 per cent students wanted enforcement of Sharia law. This is only tip of the iceberg. Extremist jihadi literature is widely taught in many seminaries and young minds are openly indoctrinated. Much before conceiving any action, the government is apologetic on madarassas issue.
The interior minister dutifully keeps issuing clean bill of health to more than 90 per cent seminaries without revealing details about the remaining ones. Media reports indicate that the government is completely confounded and bereft of clarity on how to tackle madarassas issue.
The PML-N’s soft corner and ideological tilt towards extremist groups is no more a secret. The PML-N in fact represents a wider sentiment among Punjabi middle class that enjoys a negotiated peace on its land at the expense of bloodshed in other parts of the country. However as these terrorist groups are spinning out of their centre of gravity, this aperture of peace is shrinking at a faster pace. It is practically not possible to regulate militancy beyond a certain limit.
Once for all, civilian and security establishment has to take an unambiguous position against terrorism in all its forms. A three-sixty degree policy shift is inevitably required to retrieve peace from the knife-edge.
Gen Raheel Sharif in London (Credit: tribune.com.pk)
General Raheel Sharif is a very busy man. In particular, he is seen as advancing parts of the National Action Plan (NAP) that sit in his bailiwick. Currently, he is in London for three days and he is meeting people who make things happen. On his first day in the UK, he met British Prime Minister David Cameron and had talks with Secretary of Defence Michael Fallon as well as “other senior officials”, according to reports. The UK is home to a large population of people of Pakistani origin, not all of whom seem to have the best interests of their motherland in their hearts. Of particular concern is an organisation that is banned in Pakistan — the Hizbut Tahrir (HuT) — which is said to have strong support in parts of the UK’s Pakistani population. The army has a particular concern about the HuT as in 2012, four military officers which included a brigadier, were convicted of their links to the HuT. Also present in the UK are several prominent members of the Baloch separatist movement, who give the government another headache.
The purpose of raising these matters with the UK government is to seek its support and assistance in preventing funds being channelled to the HuT and Baloch separatists, as well as exploring the possibility of the UK similarly banning HuT, which is a proscribed organisation in a number of countries other than Pakistan — which may strengthen the argument that General Raheel presents. Given that the HuT has the goal of establishing a global caliphate and considering events in Paris in the last 10 days, any move to limit expansionism by extremist groups must be welcomed.
Baloch separatists have been in the UK for many years, and at least since 2004. The head of the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) lives in London from where he often speaks on the Balochistan insurgency, and is reportedly a funding magnet. The BLA is prominent among the several groups active in Balochistan and has claimed responsibility for a number of attacks, including on those people who have settled in Balochistan from other parts of the country. Whether the argument that fighting terrorism is a global responsibility is going to sway the British remains to be seen, but it is the first time Pakistan has reached out and sought help from the British in this way.
On the same day that General Raheel was busy in London, there was a move in Islamabad that may be an indicator of just how far paradigms have shifted since the tabling of the NAP. Many of the terrorist organisations operating in Pakistan get their money from overseas, and some of it comes from Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is a close friend and ally of Pakistan and has been for many years. A fresh facet of that relationship is now being explored and the interior ministry has approached the Saudi embassy in Islamabad to urgently discuss matters relating to the funding by Saudi philanthropists of madrassas and mosques in Pakistan. This is a sensitive matter and will require deft handling, but it comes on the back of a recommendation from a NAP committee that Tehran, Riyadh and the United Arab Emirates all be asked to help stop the funding of groups that are banned in Pakistan and which fan religious and sectarian fires. The interior ministry is to share intelligence reports on foreign funding in support of its request.
Taken together, events in London and Islamabad in pursuit of the goals set out in the NAP are beginning to look like the government is starting to put its money where its mouth is. There have been arrests for the misuse of loudspeakers, hate material has been confiscated in a number of places and now the diplomatic machine is beginning to turn. We welcome these developments, and hope for more of the same.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 16th, 2015.
Pakistan has outlawed the Taliban-linked Haqqani network, officials said on Friday, days after US Secretary of State John Kerry urged Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s government to fight groups that threaten Afghan, Indian and US interests.
American officials blame high-profile attacks in Afghanistan on the powerful Haqqani network, which mainly operates out of Pakistan’s border areas.
Senior Pakistani government officials told Reuters a formal announcement of the ban would be made “within weeks”.
“We have decided to ban the Haqqani network as a step in implementing the National Action Plan devised after the (Peshawar) school attack,” said a cabinet member, referring to a massacre of 134 children by Taliban gunmen last month.
“The military and the government are on the same page on how to tackle militancy. There is no more ‘good’ or ‘bad’ Taliban.
“Kerry specifically pressed for action against the Haqqanis, including banning the group,” the official added.
A second official, a minister who spoke on condition of anonymity, confirmed the decision to outlaw the Haqqani group.
The United States accuses the Pakistani intelligence agency of supporting the Haqqani militants and using them as a proxy in Afghanistan to gain leverage there against the growing influence of its arch-rival India. Pakistan denies this allegation.
A formal announcement of the ban would show the government is keen to convince the United States it will no longer differentiate between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ militants.
But it remains to be seen if the ban will translate into significant action.
There has been intense debate within the government on whether to brand the group a terrorist organisation.
Some officials have argued the move would have little battlefield impact but risks setting back Afghan reconciliation efforts and unleashing more attacks against Pakistan.
In June last year the Pakistan army launched a long-expected military operation in the troubled North Waziristan region, said to be the base of the Haqqani group.
“Pakistan has done a lot already to disrupt the activities of the Haqqanis…within Pakistan,” said a Western diplomat.
“But they must also take follow up steps … to ensure the Haqqanis and other groups are not allowed to regroup or return to sanctuaries, their assets are frozen, their funding is blocked and their networks dismantled.”
Brig Javed Cheema (Credit: ibnlive.in.com)ISLAMABAD, Jan 16: Retired Brigadier Javed Iqbal Cheema, former director general of the National Crisis Management Cell (NCMC), told a Rawalpindi Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) on Friday that he had addressed a press conference following the assassination of Benazir Bhutto after discussing it with the spymasters and then secretary interior.
This statement differs from the one the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) produced before the ATC on February 7, 2011, where the prosecution included Brig Cheema as a prime witness against former president retired General Pervez Musharraf, in connection with the Benazir murder case.
As per Brig Cheema’s previous statement, submitted by the FIA along with case challan, the former DG NCMC was quoted as saying that a day after Ms Bhutto’s assassination, on December 28, 2007, he held a press conference on the advice of Gen Musharraf. In the FIA’s version of Brig Cheema’ statement, he maintains that he held the press conference, in compliance with Gen Musharraf’s orders, to dispel the negativity against the regime, that prevailed in the aftermath of the assassination.
Brig Javed Iqbal Cheema says he was told by spymasters to present Baitullah’s video claiming responsibility for assassination
A reporter who attended the press conference in question told Dawn that during the presser, Brig Cheema had said that the cause of Ms Bhutto’s death was an injury to the head, sustained when her head hit the sunroof lever of her own vehicle. The second thing he disclosed during the press conference was that Baitullah Mehsud, who was the leader of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan at the time, had claimed the responsibility for the attack in a video message.
Brig Cheema had also shared the video — where Mehsud had indirectly claimed responsibility for the assassination of Benazir Bhutto — with members of the press corps.
But on Friday, when the prosecution produced Brig Cheema as a witness before the ATC, he told the court that the decision to hold the press conference was taken by then-interior secretary Kamal Shah.
He said that before the press conference, he was summoned to the headquarters of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), where he met the interior secretary and the heads of the ISI, Military Intelligence and Intelligence Bureau.
He told the court that the spymasters briefed them about their meeting with Gen Musharraf and handed him the video and instructed him to hold a press conference to this effect. He also told the court that he also consulted then-interior minister retired Lt-Gen Hamid Nawaz before holding the press conference.
Army Public School Parents Protest PTI chief’s visit (Credit: siasat.com)After the terrorists executed their barbarous action, the government mercifully woke up to develop a plan for its action. A committee of political wizards, including Sheikh Rashid who had been publicly inciting violence, has been constituted to contemplate measures to curb terrorism in the country.
Heart-wrenching incidents like the one in Peshawar normally prompt such reaction from government quarters. Committees are constituted, thundering statements are issued, a wish list of punitive measures against the perpetrators is suggested and then all fizzles out without a measurable outcome. Depending on gravity of the incident, sometimes a flurry of ephemeral actions is also witnessed. However, root causes are barely touched. In the spirit of fairness, one may eschew criticising an unborn plan of action, yet the track record is undeniably dismal.
After a decade-long battle against terrorism, the country does not merely need a set of cosmetic actions to mollify enraged masses but it requires a fundamental shift in the thought, approach and policies on terrorism. A major policy retrofit is unavoidably needed to put the course on right track. The State ought to adopt an unambiguous position on all forms of terrorism without any classification of its degree, location and suitability.
Analysing and responding to Peshawar incident as an isolated act and perpetrators as just a rouge group of militants would be a blunder. An appalling naivety, insincerity or political bankruptcy of leadership was evident from a news report published on December 19 in a leading national daily. The news report of the prime minister’s meeting with the president carried a paragraph leaving every reader’s head spinning. It reads “A spokesperson for the president said Mamnoon Hussain had asked PM Sharif to involve non-political religious scholars to contact militants and convince them to give up their ‘un-Islamic’ and ‘inhuman’ agenda.” This conversation took place only two days after the gruesome and barbaric incident in Peshawar.
What is bewildering is that the head of the State still believes that militants should be communicated with and convinced to abandon their barbaric tactics! The statement was not much different from the one issued by the cleric of Lal Masjid Maulana Aziz. Misusing Friday sermon to discuss his personal matters he suggested to the military and political leadership to negotiate peace with the Taliban, ostensibly for a more worthy cause. He further suggested that a united force of Pak army and Taliban should be established to fight the infidels.
An even more glaring affection for good Taliban was expressed by Sartaj Aziz, Adviser to the Prime Minister on National Security and Foreign Affairs. In his interview to BBC exactly a month before the incident he was sloppy enough to say “Pakistan should not target militants who do not threaten the country’s security. Why should America’s enemies unnecessarily become our enemies? When the United States attacked Afghanistan, all those that were trained and armed were pushed towards us. Some of them were dangerous for us and some are not. Why must we make enemies out of them all?
The ill-advice of the president to the prime minister and the wisdom showered by the foreign minister were not merely their piteous personal utterances. These manifest the policy paradigm prevailing in the highest policy corridors of the country. It does not remain confined in the policy avenues but also trickles down sapping the administrative web that runs day-to-day affairs of the country.
This characteristic confusion was echoed on December 19 when Islamabad police registered an FIR against civil society activists who were holding a peaceful demonstration outside Laal Masjid demanding an unconditional condemnation of the perpetrators of the Peshawar incident from the mullah. The cleric of the mosque flatly refused to condemn the incident in a talk show that infuriated the whole country. The efficient Islamabad police that did not waste a minute to register FIR against peaceful civil society activists had been too indolent to act against law breaking clerics. The same police did not have courage to book the cleric when he openly instigated violence during Friday sermon. According to a news report, the custodian of law, Islamabad police were able to arrest only three of the 193 clerics booked for amplifier act violations during the whole year.
The present government’s lenient tilt to religious extremists is not much obscure. The incumbent chief minister Punjab while speaking at a seminar held in Lahore to commemorate the services of late Mufti Muhammad Hussain Naeemi in March 2010 beseeched Taliban to spare Punjab. In his cavalier choice of words he said that the Taliban and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz both opposed former military dictator Pervez Musharraf and, therefore, he is surprised that this common stance has failed to stop the Taliban from carrying out terror attacks in Punjab. He went on saying “Gen Musharraf planned a bloodbath of innocent Muslims at the behest of others only to prolong his rule, but we in the PML-N opposed his policies and rejected dictation from abroad and if the Taliban are also fighting for the same cause then they should not carry out acts of terror in Punjab.”
Not just that but the ruling party leadership also outlandishly used proscribed outfits to muster support during recent anti-government movement. A newspaper reported on August 23, 2014 that Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (AWSJ), formerly banned as Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan, marched from Lal Masjid to Islamabad Press Club registering their support for the Nawaz government. The PML-N’s members were present on the stage and thanked AWSJ for supporting their government.
Confronting political opponents with the support of religious extremists amply indicate the bankruptcy of a supplicant ruling party. Legitimising religiosity to prop up political vested interests is a clear lack of political acumen and stewardship. Similarly, the PTI’s avoidance of condemning Taliban in unequivocal terms is another example of apologetic approach. It was five days after the Peshawar incident when the PTI’s core committee named the perpetrators and condemned them. If leading political parties adopt a policy of pandering terrorist outfits, the country will remain trapped in the quagmire of terrorism.
This approach encourages violent mobs to lynch putative blasphemers without any evidence. It lets clerics to freely abuse pulpits to incite hate and violence in society. The very approach glorifies heinous murderers and elevates their stature from a condemned criminal to an adorable hero and epitome of piety. On the other hand, it muzzles every voice of sanity that demands to demarcate the limits of lunacy. Thus demand for separating faith from the State business becomes an unpardonable sin likened to infidelity. Infusing society with this scale of bigotry breeds intolerance and lunacy of unfathomable proportions. A precipitous descent of the society into chaos and anarchy is a logical corollary of the course. Practicing this prescription for decades, Pakistan has become a nursery of pathological obscurantists.
While it is customary to blame foreign hand behind every act of terrorism, reciprocally we are also blamed for offering cozy sanctuaries to the elements involved in the acts of naked terrorism in other parts of the world. Some of them not only roam freely but also convene public rallies, persuade people and forces to take up arms for jihad, brazenly promote violence and exhort pogroms of sectarian and religious minorities.
They are at liberty to use every public space from mosques to media shows to spew verbal venom with complete impunity. They do not need licenses from poor PEMRA to operate radio or tv channels to air any uncensored content. They can publish literature full of distorted interpretations of religious scriptures. Patted by the powerful patrons, these clerics can conveniently demonize anyone with the charge of apostasy, issue decrees of capital punishment and even publically decapitate the accused yet stay unscathed.
They hardly tolerate existence of womenfolk on earth. From legislation to moon sighting, almost every State and public affair has been made subservient to the clergy. Some of these self-proclaimed guardians of religion were instrumental in instigating gruesome acts of arson against Christian, Hindu, Qadyani and Shia Pakistanis. They do not hesitate to burn them alive, mercilessly kill their innocent children, defile their sacred places and vandalise their deities. All this would not have been possible without tacit support or nonchalance of the highest power centers in the country.
Peshawar incident is nothing but the continuum of this insanity that has plagued the country for decades now. This is high time to decide if this Frankenstein is a strategic asset or an eternal enemy of this country and the humanity. Rather than exterminating the monster of extremism, exploring possibilities of an armistice, as suggested by the president to the prime minister, would be tantamount to paving way for more Peshawar-like macabre scenes.
Parliament meets on special courts (Credit: expresstribune.pk.com)
ISLAMABAD, Jan 2: The All Parties Conference (APC) at the PM House on Friday reached consensus on providing constitutional cover to special courts through an act of Parliament, while a roadmap regarding the 20-point National Action Plan was presented.
Speaking to the media after the meeting on Friday evening, PTI Vice-Chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi said that members of the APC agreed on the proposition that amendments be made to the Army Act to enable “speedy” trials against “hardened criminals”.
He added that the meeting was prolonged because of the discussion on whether what they were doing was enough.
“Legal experts were of the opinion that challenges are expected to any possible amendment to the Army Act or the Constitution in superior courts,” Qureshi said. “Legal experts believe that if amendments are made with constitutional cover it will be easier to defend them [in superior courts].”
Earlier, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said legislation regarding the the National Action Plan, which would possibly amend the Constitution to establish military courts, should be tabled in the National Assembly today.
“The time has come for a final decision to be made today. I am hopeful that this bill should be presented before Parliament today. There is no room for further debate on NAP,” Nawaz said, urging political leaders to finalise the draft for the amendment in the Constitution.
“The nation wants to see the National Action Plan in action,” the prime minister said while addressing an All Parties Conference at the PM House in Islamabad.
Further, the premier reiterated that the military courts would only be set up for two years.
Nawaz lauded the efforts made by the leadership of all political parties for being on the same page following the aftermath of the tragic attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar in which 150 people were killed.
“I am happy to announce that the day after the incident, on December 17, all political parties’ leaders were in Peshawar and on the same page,” he said.
“In that APC, we unanimously decided that a parliamentary committee will be made to take action after the horrific incident,” said the premier.
Further, the prime minister said another meeting was held on December 24, which lasted 11 hours, in which the 20-point National Action Plan was also agreed upon collectively.
“I am happy that the political leadership of Pakistan is standing together to work towards eliminating terrorism,” he said.
Human Rights lawyer, Asma Jehangir (Credit: dawn.com)
LAHORE, Jan. 1: The parliament mustn’t give legal cover to military courts, the Lahore High Court Bar Association said at its general house meeting on Thursday. The LHCBA passed a resolution condemning the plan to set up military courts to hear terrorism cases.
A general house meeting was called to deliberate on the issue. The LHCBA announced that it would call an All Pakistan Lawyers’ Convention to devise a strategy to resist the move.
Former Supreme Court Bar Association president Asma Jahangir said there was a need to cooperate with the armed forces in fighting the menace of terrorism. The people of the country gave a massive portion of the national budget to the armed forces each year to help them fight terrorism. “But they couldn’t even protect a school in their own cantonment.”
Jehangir said the judiciary and the democratic setup had its faults but they were still better than martial law or military courts. “These courts cannot resolve conflict.” Under the military, there could be no separation of powers, she said. “The whole system would collapse.”
Jehangir said that the parliament should not wait for the judiciary to declare the amendment illegal. It shouldn’t pass the bill at all.
The first step the government needs to take is to take note of all sympathisers of terrorists from among politicians and within the armed forces. “Everyone knows that the FC is protecting Lashkar-i-Jhangvi in Balochistan. The only solution to the problem of terrorism is the supremacy of civil rule.”
There is no doubt that Pakistan is faced with a severe terrorism problem, but setting up military courts will not change a thing, former SCBA president Advocate Hamid Khan said.
Pakistan had tried and tested military courts since 1958 and nothing good had come of it, he said. “Setting up military courts gives the impression that the attack in Peshawar was the judiciary’s fault.” It was clear that the military and intelligence agencies had failed in gathering intelligence about the attack and pre-empting it, said Khan. The armed forces hadn’t been able to kill any terrorists involved in the attack, the culprits blew themselves up.
Khan said the prosecution was to blame for not collecting enough evidence to bring the culprits to book. Whatever reforms the country needed in light of the war on terror must be taken within the Constitution, he said. “The security and protection the government plans to provide military courts should be extended to judges.” The state has created the impression that protection and security extends to the armed forces and not the civilians. “This is a failure of the state,” he said.
Small militia groups under the banners of Lashkar and Sippah needed to be disbanded immediately, said Khan. “Regardless of their reputation, every organisation that preached a version of militant Islam needs to be disarmed,” he said.
Advocate Tanveer Chaudhry was critical of judges. Today courts act like dictators, he said. “One of the judges took a traffic warden into custody after he asked him to queue up to get a driving licence; another judge ordered four robbers to be shot dead for robbing the house of a civil court judge in Sheikhupura,” Chaudhry said. “An MS was put in handcuffs for not treating an LHC judge’s daughter on priority… Is this a civilian judiciary?” He said the country’s judiciary were acting like core commanders. Advocate Raja Zulqarnain said lawyers would not accept a move to set up military courts. He said politicians and military men provided weapons to the Jamatud Dawa and the Sippah-i-Sahaba. “Why are they protecting hardliners?”
LHCBA’s acting president Amir Jalil Siddiqi said the bar should have announced its view point right after political parties made an announcement in this regard. He said Nawaz Sharif became prime minister because of the Lawyers’ Movement. “We will not let him commit an illegal act.”
Published in The Express Tribune, January 2nd, 2015.
While we all got used to missing persons and tortured bodies in Balochistan, it’s odd to find Sindh becoming part of the same tragic cycle.
Death and dead bodies are not new to Sindh. Every decade since the 1980s, the province has bled for one reason or the other. But this current spate of killings seems to be a new pattern. It is almost as if Sindhi nationalism is being woken up. Interestingly, the six dead bodies found recently did not belong to violent nationalists. In fact, five out of the six were men who had moved on in life. Notwithstanding old associations with the JSMM, these people were not actively involved in any ‘anti-state’ activity or even in party politics.
In any case, one thought that from the state’s perspective, Sindh was not Balochistan. The province had been through this phase during the 1980s when people challenged the military regime and were killed for it. Like Balochistan, Sindh was politically vibrant. The Sindhi media and intelligentsia was politically active and educated people about issues in its own language. Fast-forward to the 2000s, things were manipulated and changed. Despite the media still being active, it has begun to behave and sound more like the media in the rest of the country. What the state couldn’t purchase or silence was bought over by influential dons.
One also thought that the state was using two other tools to repair relations with Sindh. First, approximately 80,000 men were inducted into the army during the Musharraf period that naturally increased effectiveness of old and new cantonments and cadet colleges in different places in the province. In fact, one came across Sindhi expatriates and intellectuals, who would argue in favour of their people joining the civil and military bureaucracy. Many scions of influential families joined the security establishment in different positions to enhance their power and influence. Second, the province was gradually but systematically infested with militant organisations, madrassas and other infrastructure. In any case, the JUI-F and the JUI-S were expanding their influence, which was obvious from the votes that the late Khalid Soomro got in Larkana contesting the 1990 elections against Benazir Bhutto. Given the absence of a forceful narrative to counter the gradually melting feudalism (that turned into neo-feudalism), the new middle class in Sindh was getting attracted to religious discourse. Certain religious organisations got lots of opportunities to bring back traditional support for them in Sindh back to life in a newer form.
So, one really wonders why it was felt that there was a need to light a fire in Sindh. Such killings can only provoke anger and resentment, especially amongst the youth who are abandoned both by the state and the political governments. The stories of poor governance, corruption and neglect of the people are far too gory for anyone to claim that the PPP and its leadership are not to blame. As a political party, the PPP is both a perpetrator and victim of the wave of violence. It is responsible for not crying out loud against what is happening in the province it claims to control. The collusion between its key leaders and the security apparatus denoted by joint exploitation of resources makes its behaviour questionable. Yet, it is a party that will find itself in a deeper mess if the violence doesn’t stop. It would be even more tragic if it has to become party to the greater intrusion of the security apparatus that will step in under the pretext of securing the place against ‘violent nationalism’.
Recently, the chairman of the Sindhi Taraqi Pasand Party, Qadir Magsi, rightly warned the JSMM against an armed struggle as it could result in greater losses and deaths of Sindhi youth. Moreover, violence will eventually open doors even wider for both the military and religious militants to expand their existing influence. Then, things will get so muddled that no one will seem to have a recipe other than perhaps, the Chinese. But in the process, the tranquility and serenity of the place will disappear forever. The Sufi tradition, multiculturalism and tolerance, which are already drifting away, will become things of the past. Even nationalists wouldn’t realise when they start seeking help of militants because there is no other help available. It is quite likely that, like in Balochistan where al Qaeda seems to have taken up the cause of Baloch nationalism, forces of extremism will determine Sindh’s politics.
While we try to solve the mystery of why Sindh is being sinned against, it is important to note that all moderate political forces are disappearing. This is also a reference to the recent killing of the JUI-F’s Dr Soomro. Although the partnership between the PPP and the JUI-F during the last six years played a critical role in strengthening the latter and bringing in militant elements into Sindh, which mostly came under the religious party’s umbrella, Dr Soomro was a political man who cared for Sindhi nationalism as well. Even if he hadn’t died, he would find himself less effective in the face of the evolving politics of Sindh. Some people even argue that his death may be linked with his nationalistic perspective rather than anything else. Not to forget that the JUI-F has an interesting legacy and historically had a leadership that opposed the official nationalist narrative. This was also a party where the politics of the left and right merged together. The death of leaders like Dr Soomro indicate a transition towards a different kind of leadership or the rising influence of new militant groups in Sindh, which are more aligned with Islamabad’s nationalist perspective. A new hybrid-theocratic society is in the process of being born.
Sindh has had a legacy of great history and traditions. While we can all think of demons that can be held responsible for the current mayhem, there is no time to waste if we want to stop the bleeding. The state must be held accountable and made to stop this bloodshed.
KARACHI, Dec 26 — Seven years have passed since Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan’s former prime minister, was assassinated in Rawalpindi, on Dec. 27, 2007. Her legacy and significance in world history continue to hold a special place in the hearts of the millions of Pakistanis who mourn her death as much as they mourn the death of the dream of what Pakistan might have been had she lived to rule the country just one more time.
As with that of many political icons, Ms. Bhutto’s sudden death left a void in both leadership and inspiration; no politician in Pakistan has been able to fill it. She also left behind a checkered past, with allegations of corruption that still linger, unproved in court for lack of evidence. The two governments she led were dismissed on corruption charges, and she was accused of amassing a large personal fortune for her own family while doing far too little to alleviate the burdens of Pakistan’s poor.
In her own life, she carved out a brilliant academic career at Harvard and Oxford, and political achievements of undeniable import as the daughter of an assassinated prime minister battling to restore democracy in Pakistan; later, she became the first woman elected to lead a Muslim country. She inhabited a marriage that puzzled people as much as it fascinated them — to a controversial man who ruled Pakistan in her name for years after her death. She raised a son and two daughters, who now strive, with mixed results, to serve the Pakistani people she claimed to have lived for.
Yet Ms. Bhutto left behind more than success or scandal. In her wake are the millions of Pakistani girls and women who look at her life, her determination, her perseverance in the face of all odds. They appropriate even the smallest part of these elements of her life and add it to the blueprint they envision for their own. And they thrill to the idea, still radical in Pakistan 40 years after Ms. Bhutto began her political career, that gender doesn’t have to stop them from achieving their dreams.
One of the more literal examples of Ms. Bhutto’s legacy that helps Pakistani women is the Benazir Income Support Program, which distributes cash, without conditions, to low-income families throughout Pakistan. These poorest of the poor, 5.5 million families in 2013, receive 1,200 Pakistani rupees — about $12 — twice monthly, most of which is spent on food. Ms. Bhutto worked on the vision, concept and design of the program with a renowned Pakistani economist, Dr. Kaiser Bengali. After her death, the initiative was enacted by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, but named after Ms. Bhutto by her widower, President Asif Ali Zardari, as a tribute to her.
The program isn’t without flaws; critics have said that it is meant to influence voters at election time, that political influence skews which families are eligible to be recipients, and the fact that most of the assistance is nonconditional renders it ineffective (a subprogram gives families more cash if they enroll their children in primary school).
But there is also a revolutionary side to the scheme: The cash is transferred into the bank account of a woman in the family, not a man. Placing spending power directly into the hands of poor Pakistani women empowers them on many levels: They become decision makers within the family, and their respect and value increase in the community. To obtain the cash, they are required to get national identity cards and bank accounts; as a result, they achieve a level of citizenship and fiscal identity denied to previous generations, when the births and deaths of women were rarely registered in official records.
While mothers are being helped by the program, their daughters are going to school in even greater numbers than before, thanks to the many awareness campaigns and education drives underway in Pakistan. Many of these girls regard Benazir Bhutto as an inspiration for their own educational paths. Malala Yousafzai, Pakistan’s most famous schoolgirl, cites Ms. Bhutto as her personal idol, and wore Ms. Bhutto’s white shawl when she addressed the United Nations in 2013.
Young women attend classes at the Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology, which Ms. Bhutto established in her father’s name, in Karachi, Islamabad, Hyderabad and Larkana. There, they study law, media, computer engineering and more. Ms. Bhutto’s university-educated daughters, Asifa and Bakhtawar, today publicly encourage Pakistani girls to go to school so that they, too, may one day serve the nation as educated, empowered women.
The daughter of a privileged landowning family, Ms. Bhutto nevertheless fought against the conservative social mores of her environment, in which rich girls could go to school but grown women were expected to run a house and raise a family, no matter how educated they were. She herself returned to Pakistan after her studies, and entered politics, heading the Pakistan Peoples Party in its now-celebrated struggle in the 1980s against the dictator Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq.
She endured house arrest and exile throughout her political career, overcame the powerful mullahs’ objections to a woman’s ruling an Islamic nation, and won admirers all over the world for her political skills and compassion. Even after her death, she serves as the ultimate mentor to Pakistani girls and women who want to set the course of their lives for themselves, instead of having it dictated to them.
What might have happened in Pakistan had Ms. Bhutto been elected for a third term will remain an unanswerable question. Her personal and political legacy is full of contradictions and complexities that will continue to be examined by earnest historians, mined by rapacious politicians, venerated by her supporters and picked apart by her detractors.
Yet she emboldened the heart of every girl and woman in Pakistan who was ever told that being a woman precluded her from a lifetime of accomplishment, service and worth. This was her greatest legacy.
Bina Shah is the author of several books of fiction, including, most recently, “A Season for Martyrs.”
