Dividing up Punjab

Written by: Ayesha Siddiqa ·

Suddenly there seems to be greater conversation about creating a Seraiki or, alternatively, a Bahawalpur province. These are two independent movements with independent dimensions. But why is there sudden talk of new province/s in Punjab? What makes it even more interesting is that there is no real popular movement that could make it look like a public demand.

Recently, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani talked of his party including the demand for a Seraiki province in the PPP manifesto. His critics would immediately see this as his bid to stay politically relevant. But he is not the only one endorsing the new province project. The demand for a Seraiki province was endorsed by Pervaiz Elahi as well, who is a hardcore central Punjabi and should, technically speaking, have not supported such a move. However, who says leaders have to be wise all the time? For Pervaiz Elahi or Yousaf Raza Gilani, the main objective is to push the Sharif brothers. Once threatened with a division of the larger province that they rule, they might agree to shake hands with the establishment. An indicator of whether there is appeasement between the establishment and the Sharif brothers will be if Nawaz Sharif, who is not liked by the establishment, will take a back-seat in his own party.

Ideologically, there are many forces, including the MQM, that would like to see Punjab divided, as that would reduce the power of the larger province and the Sharif brothers as well. Such a division will also set the principle of more divisions elsewhere which, in turn, supports the MQM’s plan to carve out something for itself in urban Sindh. The establishment itself may not be totally averse to the idea, as it will deflect attention from the issue of Punjabi dominance of the state and the security establishment.

Needless to say, the Bahawalpur and Seraiki province indicate two different approaches. In many ways, the establishment in Pakistan is far more comfortable with the idea of a Bahawalpur province than a Seraiki one, mainly because the former is ethnic-neutral. Notwithstanding the legal claim regarding Bahawalpur’s status as a province, the fact is that in the past 60 years and more, the former state of Bahawalpur has become a melting pot for all ethnic groups. The main powerhouse is no longer the Nawab family but Punjabis like Tariq Basheer Cheema — a turncoat who defected from the PPP to the PML-Q. The very people who vociferously opposed the movement for the restoration of Bahawalpur province (1969-71) and were party to the killing of hundreds of innocent people, are now supporting the idea. The very fact that the movement is spearheaded by a person like Mehmood Durrani, who has the reputation of being close to the establishment, indicates the way the winds are blowing.

The Seraiki province, on the other hand, is an ethnicly-potent concept which the establishment does not like. It recognises the concept of Pakistan woven around its multiple identities. Sadly though, the country’s establishment is extremely nervous of a national narrative based on multiple identities.

In any case, both movements deserve attention because they protest the highly skewed distribution of resources, especially in the largest province. For instance, a glance at the development budget for the financial year shows that the highest share goes to Lahore. The district’s development budget is about Rs75 billion. This is in stark comparison to DG Khan’s Rs20.6 billion, Bahawalpur’s Rs17.7 billion, Bahawalnagar’s Rs8.7 billion, and Bhakkar’s Rs4.8 billion. Interestingly, it’s not just a matter of south Punjab. Even north Punjab seems to be suffering vis-à-vis central Punjab. For instance, Attock’s development budget is Rs5.7 billion and Chakwal’s Rs6.5 billion. In fact, Multan, DG Khan, Faisalabad, Gujranwala and Kasur are comparatively better.

Surely the development budget is skewed in favour of the big cities of central Punjab, especially Lahore. But a glance at official figures shows that some cities of south Punjab have done equally well. For instance, the prime minister has put in an effort in recent years to develop Multan due to which the city’s development budget seems to have gone up. Such examples may not absolve the Sharifs of their skewed distribution policy, but it also says something about the lack of capacity of local leaders who were unable to vie for resources. Hence, it is necessary for intellectuals from these areas to look at the errors of their own leadership before they propose the creation of a new entity.

Malodorous reporting, Sir!

Written by:  Fasi Zaka ·

My High Priest Hermit of the Presidency, it is your trusted sage Rehman Malodorous reporting. Dark Lord, as per your instructions I have been learning yoga to dislodge my foot from my mouth. It shall be free from my oral cavities soon, so I can walk with dignity again.

And now Sir, highlights of the main issues you wanted clarity on, whether the match was fixed and if the balti chicken on Burns Road is hygienic. Allow me to prioritise, yes, the chicken is good to eat. And the cook, from what our intelligence gathering has told us, is not a blasphemer. So he is alive. For now.

I will be the first to admit Sir, that I know very little about cricket. But you shall be pleased to know that has not stopped me from giving you my expert opinion. It has, however, stopped me from reciting the Holy Quran. I stopped not because of the press criticism, because I have never cared for what they say, but because when your foot is always in your mouth it is hard to maintain the wuzu.

Yes, about the cricket. It was fixed. It seems they are not afraid of my warnings. Inshallah, once I develop a spine after careful surgical grafting this will not be the case next time. No Sir, I am not being rhondi about Dhoni.

You will be happy to know that I have furthered our diplomacy in India. If you remember, your attempt at flirting with Sarah Palin was as successful as the Kargil Operation. I firmly told the Prime Minister that he should keep his banter family friendly, and to ask about the health of her (Sonia Gandhi’s) children instead of complimenting her beauty. But you know these Indians, she did not take it well.

Sir, I have received your new shopping list from Harrods. Please sanction Zulfiqar Mirza to shoot his mouth off again so I can make the trip to the United Kingdom. They have very good sales these days. Altaf Bhai will lend us his discount card for the mall on High Street.

Also, I need to report that terrorists are targeting shrines once again. No Sir, shrines are not a form of bitter wine. They are places of worship. And no Sir, Poonam Pandey has not taken any action yet. I am monitoring the situation on a war footing and will let you know of any development if and when it happens.

Sir, this is just in, apparently she has changed her offer now by saying she will only go nude in private in front of the Indian team. This is similar to our changed stance on to the restoration of the judiciary.

Sir, to avoid misunderstandings with the public I am now directly talking to them through Twitter. Please Sir, do not say I need a babysitter for Twitter. Terrorism is under control which is why I am now looking at other important matters. I opened the free pollen allergy camp in Aabpara, last week. Inshallah, your nosy-posy will be all better soon.

Sir, I have also told Interpol to cancel Terry Jones’ priesthood. They have said they don’t have the mandate. I have written to the Pope to cancel the priesthood of Terry Jones. He says that he doesn’t have the mandate because Terry Jones is not a Roman Catholic but a Protestant. The Catholic Church says Terry Jones is actually a pastor, as if I would believe he is a macaroni.

The situation internationally is not good. There is civil war in Libya, problems in Syria and my own blunderbussphilia. In addition, Bipasha is not happy with the performance of Deepika in Duma Maro Dum.

Banned books

Written by: Hajra Mumtaz ·

Not only have they had to add electronic media such as Facebook and Twitter, with their worrying potential to stir up trouble and perhaps even bring about revolutions, now there’s WikiLeaks as well. And meanwhile, it’s not like they can cross the good old-fashioned book off the list either.

The latest book giving some people a headache is Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle With India, written by Pulitzer prize-winner Joseph Lelyveld. On Wednesday Gujarat’s state assembly voted unanimously on a ban — even though the members had not read the book, which has not yet been released in India. (Gujarat also temporarily banned Jaswant Singh’s Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence.)

Their decision seems to be based on reports about early reviews of the book in the US and the UK, some of which suggest that Lelyveld writes of Gandhi being in a homosexual relationship.

Tridip Suhrud, a noted Gandhian scholar who interacted with Lelyveld while he was researching the book — and, crucially, has read it — stands with the author’s claim that he does not refer to Gandhi as bisexual. In interviews to the Indian press, he has called it the first political biography of Gandhi by an expert on apartheid.

In terms of the furore over passages relating to the nature of Gandhi’s relationship with a German man named Hermann Kallenbach, Suhrud points out an important aspect of the matter — how crucial context is. He has been quoted by the press as explaining how in earlier decades men often addressed each other in a manner that would now be construed differently.

Giving the example of the letters exchanged by Rabindranath Tagore and C.F. Andrews, he said, “Andrews wrote to Tagore in a manner that might raise eyebrows today. But the context was different then as also the usage of words.”

Context is everything and what is considered unacceptable at one time or place may become acceptable later, or elsewhere. Books have through the ages suffered from being too ‘advanced’ for a particular time and place. Consider D.H. Lawrence’s 1928 book Lady Chatterley’s Lover, which was banned in the US and UK for violating obscenity laws.

A great number of books, many of them recognised later or elsewhere as being fine pieces of work, have been banned for political reasons. Dr Zhivago, for example, was banned by Russia until 1988 for its criticism of the Bolshevik party. George Orwell’s political satire Animal Farm, which is today part of the English literature curriculum in many countries, was found by the Allied forces of the Second World War to be critical of the USSR. The book was considered too controversial to print during wartime, including by publishers, and copies of it were withdrawn from bookstores and libraries.

Aleksander Solzhenitsyn’s 1982 book, The Gulag Archipelago, was banned in the Soviet Union because it ran contrary to the image the government was trying to project of itself.

The logic behind banning these books is simple to understand, whether one agrees with it or not. Yet lists of books that various countries have banned, and the reasons, make for interesting and sometimes surprising reading.

The Da Vinci Code was, for instance, banned in Lebanon because Catholic leaders found it offensive to their religion. Lebanon also banned The Diary of Anne Frank for portraying Jews, Israel and Zionism favourably. In 1966, Yugoslavia banned by court order the Dictionary of Modern Serbo-Croatian Language because, apparently, “some definitions can cause disturbance among citizens”.

The Chinese province of Hunan banned, in 1931, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland for what seems, on the face of it, to be a bizarre reason: that it portrayed anthropomorphised animals as acting to the same degree of complexity as human beings.

Sometimes, despite bans, the books are available regardless. But occasionally, bans are so severely enforced that even the author’s existence is in danger of being wiped out.

That was nearly the case with Chinese writer Shen Congwen (1902-1988). A writer and research scholar of historical cultural relics, his work was denounced by both the communists and the nationalists. The books were banned in Taiwan and on mainland China publishing houses burned his books and even destroyed their printing plates. In effect, his name was to a large extent simply erased from the modern Chinese literary record. It was only in 1978 that the Chinese government reissued selections of his writing, and then only in limited editions.

Pakistan too is no stranger to banned books, though one often feels that some of the literature that really ought to be banned — the pamphlets inciting sectarian and communal hatred, militancy and anarchy — remain freely available. The most notable example is, of course, The Satanic Verses that led to deadly protests and riots. The incendiary book was also banned in Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Kenya, Kuwait, Liberia, Malaysia and a number of other countries.

Some documents on the web say that Stanley Wolpert’s 1982 book, Jinnah of Pakistan, was also banned (while India banned the same author’s 1962 book Nine Hours to Rama, apparently because it exposes security lapses that led to Gandhi’s assassination.).

Books are dangerous because they can contain ideas that can change the world. But are bans necessary or effective? Governments around the world clearly think so. Yet it might be worth pondering how far the state ought to dictate its citizenry’s thoughts.

We must exorcise our devils

Written by: Kamran Shafi ·

I WRITE this one day before Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, elected prime minister of this luckless country, was murdered 32 years ago by an army usurper and his handmaiden judiciary, and two days before he, the beloved leader of millions of Pakistanis, was buried in the presence of seven or eight people, the rude charpoy on which his body lay for the funeral prayers so short that his feet were protruding a foot off it.

His wife and daughter were not allowed within hundreds of miles of the funeral, jailed as they were in the headquarters of the establishment, Rawalpindi; not a sparrow flew that day in Larkana. The military establishment under Zia had had its revenge: killing the very man who put salve on the deep wounds inflicted on the hapless nation, and upon the army rank and file, by unthinking and cruel and stupid generals led by a drunken sot.

And then some say his murder should not be revisited, yes that is the word I want, by our newly emboldened and muscular (the Almighty be praised) superior judiciary; trotting out mealy-mouthed reasons and technicalities and more mealy-mouthed reasons and technicalities. There are very many reasons to look at the disgraceful way in which ZAB was tried and then done to death.

The first, of course, is the shameful way in which his so-called ‘trial’ was held, first by denying him a court of first appeal by trying him in the Lahore High Court instead of in a sessions court. Secondly, by bringing him before a judge who was an avowed enemy: Maulvi Mushtaq, whose appalling behaviour towards ZAB during the trial is a horror story in itself. And thirdly, by the army usurper putting pressure on pliant (all of them from Punjab, please note) judges through the servile chief justice, Anwarul Haq as admitted by Nasim Hasan Shah, one of the hanging judges, and later the chief justice(!) of Pakistan. I ask you.

Indeed, by the dictator and his collaborators in the judiciary using every trick to get rid of those judges who were considered ‘unreliable’ (all non-Punjabis, please note again), and changing the make-up of the bench to facilitate their plan to hang Bhutto come what may, forced retirement of judges included.

Nor is this all. Noted lawyer Raza Kazim disclosed just the other day that Anwarul Haq, who headed the hanging bench, tricked Bhutto into stating that (unlike the Lahore High Court) he had faith in the Supreme Court which was hearing his appeal. The quid pro quo was that the death sentence imposed by the Lahore High Court would be commuted to life imprisonment by the Supreme Court. This trick was played on Bhutto through Mr Hamid Mehmood a great gentleman, who had grown up with Anwarul Haq, and who also knew and liked ZAB.

When Mr Mehmood visited Bhutto in Rawalpindi jail and made the proposition to him, ZAB asked him if he was sure this was not a trap being set by Anwarul Haq. Mehmood replied that he had known the chief justice since childhood and that he would not go back on his word. We all know what happened subsequently. Hamid Mehmood was a broken man after that and could never forgive himself for trusting Anwarul Haq. He died of a broken heart not long after. No, gentlemen, no, ZAB’s case must be revisited and if it opens other Pandora’s boxes so be it. We simply must exorcise our devils.

Maulana Fazlur Rehman is an unfathomable personality if he is anything: requesting the American ambassador (thank you, WikiLeaks) to push his candidacy for the premiership of this luckless country one day; the very next saying the Americans are the worst thing that ever happened to Pakistan, and the Taliban the very best; the very next offering to mediate between the Americans and the Taliban, but not in Pakistan (thank you again, WikiLeaks).

Let’s say it straight: why will their apologists not understand that the Taliban and their friends and associates whether they be called Al Qaeda or Hizbut Tahrir or Al-Muhajiroun or Afghan Taliban or Pakistani Taliban, and all other such, are all linked to one another, and are in the business of taking over the state of Pakistan, a first step to global jihad? And that they will kill and maim all who come in their way: innocent men and women and children; our army soldiers; our police, even their own apologists such as Maulana Fazlur Rehman simply because he too is a part of the organised state.

Why will the maulana, deft son of the greatly deft, and shall we say most innovative, politician Mufti Mahmood, not understand that he was targeted twice in as many days last week precisely because he is a part of the democratic system, by the very same terrorists he supports? Plainly said, anarchy is the aim of these murderers.

Nor is it only people like the maulana who refuse to smell the coffee, so does my friend Imran Khan. Nor do my friends in the afwaj-i-Pakistan, hung up as they are on being India-centric whatever the devil that means. Really, one despairs at the shallowness of the thinking that goes into their ‘strategic’ policies. Consider: the so-called and short-lived Kurram peace deal seemingly done, and now allowed to be undone to further the self-same agenda, taking with it many innocent lives so cruelly cut short by the terrorist murderers.

The denouement is at hand, however, and no matter what lies are told to the common people and more harebrained schemes thought out, this country is in for a very high jump indeed. Remember that the US presidential elections are to be held in 2012 with campaigning starting this autumn. Remember too that the Republicans, more hard-line than the democrats, will up the ante re: Afghanistan many notches. Think about it, gentlemen, and for God’s sake come to your senses.

The daily tutorial on arrogance management

Written by: Ayesha Tammay Haq 

Two years ago Pakistan threw up a unique movement, it was liberal, secular, democratic and plural, it engaged the nation and unlike other battles being fought in Pakistan this one’s weapons were concepts. The lawyer’s movement, as it came to be known, has been criticised on many fronts, for being used, no hijacked, by political parties for their own gain, first by the PPP to negotiate political space with a military director and then by the PML-N who lacked an election slogan. Once the PPP moved on and the movement’s goals clashed with the party’s leaderships personal goals, the accusation was that it had been taken over by rightist forces. If truth be told the politicians have much to thank the lawyers for, but it is not in their nature to do so. The movement set the tone for our political forces to do the right thing and our parliamentarians to exert themselves and do something that will bring real change. There was no need for them to hide behind fear now, the undoable had been done!

Through all this we saw the growth, development and contribution of the media and what became known as civil society. The media was the darling of those opposing the government of the day. I have heard those who today veil threats of censorship in calls for self-regulation wax lyrical about how the media’s contribution to democracy was invaluable. As the media began to play a more assertive and investigative role, the once much derided civil society moved out of their comfort zones to be recognised as a force where “people power defeated state power”.

So here we are two years later, the movement saw the second reinstatement of the chief justice, and while everyone claimed his restoration as his own nobody stopped to think for a minute as to who the real victor was. Sadly our politicians do not take time out from their personal agendas to pause and think which in turn may lead them to the realisation that it was Right that won. Principle won over compromise, expediency, wrong, un-constitutionalism, brute force and more. There was a need to do the right thing and once it was done the nation let out a collective sigh. The stock market soared; suggesting political stability and consequently confidence in the market. Even the cynics were smiling. If ever hope had been rekindled it was now. And it was something to build on. But before you could say chief justice the squabbling had started again.

The PPP spent a year in office before it bowed to public pressure and did what it said was not possible, and then unleashed a wave of unconvincing propaganda as to its intent. Showing no embarrassment, they did not stand on any point of principle. This old-style politics will not wash today. Politicians may have selective memory but we certainly do not and if there is a case of amnesia we can always relay on media archives. The judges were not the Musharraf government’s only legacy; there is an empty treasury, an untenable security situation, internal political strife and a very unpopular war that must be dealt with.

A year in government and nothing to show for it other than bickering, fighting and jostling for power. In all this education, health, security, the rule of law, poverty, unemployment and more have been ignored. Suicide bombings increased, and so did drone attacks. And it became glaringly apparent that we lacked any kind of credible and effective leadership. Everyone was running around doing their own thing, policy was missing in action and no one took ownership of what passed for policy. The buck having been continually passed around really needed to stop somewhere.

Where are the so-called secular liberal forces? They seem to be missing in action. And this is brought home by the story of a young foreign correspondent who fell victim to a teargas shell near the Lahore High Court on March 15 and found, when he regained consciousness, that he had been rescued and revived not by his friend Zammurad Khan of the secular liberal PPP but by Mr Liaquat Baloch of the right wing Jamat-i-Islami. Yet, a few hours later when the announcement was made by the prime minister to restore the judges, Mr Zammurad Khan, hitherto on the wrong side of the tear gassing, was seen taking a posse of PPP workers to the chief justice’s house. This is not leadership. This is fraud, a fraud on the people.

Government spokespersons sound so angry all the time. Who are they angry with? Topping the list it appears is the media. But the media is only holding them to the same account that it held the previous government to. At that time it was hailed as a champion of democracy by the same angry lot. If they weren’t so busy accusing others they might actually see that are vacating the political space their party should be occupying. They are allowing right wing and extremist forces to occupy it in their stead. Swat has been surrendered, what next?

A lawyer friend, Nadeem Ahmed, sent me the following email: “I have always believed that if, God forbid, this nation were to fail one day, then, contrary to what is generally believed, it would not be because of people’s intolerance but purely because of excessive tolerance, tolerance bordering on pathetic cowardice, tolerance that is a product of just a whimpering, shameless attempt to persist in biological survival, regardless of the fact that this survival takes place amid a dark and ghostly multitude of ugly injustices, abuse and exploitation that have been haunting this nation for the last sixty years. It is this kind of crouching keenness to survive at the biological level of the animal kingdom that makes it impossible for men and nations and their leaders to stand tall with honour and confidence against injustice in all forms and shapes.”

Fortunately amongst those seeking to survive at the biological level, there are those too who stand tall. We need them to come forward now and lead the way in this very difficult time and let the likes of Maulana Fazalur Rahman be a reminder of a bygone era.

Politics anyone?

Written by: Ayesha Tammay Haq

Politics is a strange thing. It affects every aspect of our lives, yet we view it with suspicion, shun it, refuse to engage — it’s dirty, it’s untouchable. We claim distance, yet it touches everything we are. Imran Khan is bemoaned for having committed that ‘fatal mistake’— joining the political process. The general consensus amongst those we call the chattering classes is that he should stick to doing social work, help people and leave politics to the pariahs. Which then leads one to the conclusion that politics is this thing that is not for the general weal. How such an illogical conclusion can be drawn is mind-boggling.

Pakistanis seem to be afraid of doing anything substantive about Pakistan’s problems. We are big on philanthropy, build schools and hospitals, run soup kitchens, plant trees and clean beaches but we don’t work on making policy and getting it implemented. The sense of doing ‘something meaningful’ is restricted to sticky tape and iodine solutions without realising that these actions in themselves are political. They give the government of the day more breathing space, space that allows them to get away with thousands of ghost schools, hospitals without facilities and environmental degradation of our beaches and mountains. They are not required to provide solutions for job creation or poverty alleviation. They leave the welfare of millions of young Pakistanis, who roam the streets eking out an existence with extended hands, at our benefaction.

Having rabbited on ad nauseam for years about engaging, I have decided its time, once again, to walk the talk. So I am in the market for a political party. Everyone I know thinks I have lost the plot. Are you crazy they scream, you can’t join that lot, they are evil, the others are corrupt, the third lot is fundo and the fourth are evil, corrupt and fundo. No party will let you do anything and if you want to get anywhere you will have to become one of those hideous sycophants who are required to shout louder than anyone else. It sounds like it’s over even before I begin. Undaunted, I have decided to soldier on and boldly go where no one I talk to wants to go.

In pursuit of this new career, I set about investigating options. Of course, every political party wants new recruits, so they all put their best foot forward, extolling their virtues, real and imagined. It reminded me of law firms in the US whose summer internship programmes are designed to lure fresh graduates — having enjoyed a few weeks of the best restaurants, theatre and a very gentle work schedule, they are thrown in the deep end and put in 20-hour days. Here, the best foot forward also tends to be an obstacle in itself. Most politicians stray far from the party manifesto and are themselves the very reason one wants to jump into the fray. By the end, what should have been a civilised discussion has disintegrated in to a shouting match. It gets worse if you have two politicians from rival parties, they forget all about the manifesto, about being charming and user-friendly and start slanging each other. Not good if you are trying to reach out to people and convince them of the need for engagement with the political process.

My first discussions were with the PPP and the PML-N. It started well, we talked of things that mattered — democracy, the need for all citizens to have a stake in the country and become a part of the political process. All was good for about five minutes, then the attacks began. They forgot all about me, I may as well have not been there, and attacked each other. The attacks were personal and unrelenting. It was unproductive, alienating and, in a quandary, I thought of options. Should one join a major party as that would be the only way of being in a position to influence decision-making, or should one join a smaller party with no real prospects, or should one reject all options and start a new party? Or perhaps the best thing to do is to continue the search and close out on a party of choice by January 2011. So watch this space.

A stitch in time saves nine ……

Written by: Ardeshir Cowasjee

THIS 18th-century adage finds particular application in the rampant maladministration obtaining all over Pakistan.

Rather than tackling problems under established procedures and rules, as and when they occur, our government functionaries procrastinate, seeking magical solutions that will satisfy everyone, until the heavy hand of the law descends on all.

They allow unlawful situations to deteriorate to the extent that addressing them becomes difficult or virtually impossible.

In March 2010, former Karachi Nazim, Naimatullah Khan, petitioned the Supreme Court against the shameless brazen conversion of amenity spaces all over his “sinking city” into private residential and commercial estate. He told the court that political, ethnic, sectarian and religious groups, in collusion with the City District Government Karachi (CDGK) and functionaries of the provincial government, had been and were in the process of occupying and usurping public land for pelf.Naimatullah submitted satellite images of encroached parks/playgrounds, impotent complaint letters addressed to the prime minister, the Sindh governor, chief minister, chief secretary and a string of politicians and administrators of the city and province.

Also submitted was comprehensive supporting documentation (news clippings, opinion columns, photographs).

He acknowledged the courageous role of the apex court in recent years in arresting such anti-public interest practices all over Pakistan — including Islamabad, Lahore and Murree — and prayed that Karachi’s amenity spaces be restored to designated master-plan use.

On Feb 2, 2011, a full bench comprising Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, Justice Khalil-ur-Rahman Ramday and Justice Ghulam Rabbani, directed the CDGK to demolish, within 30 days, all encroachments and illegal buildings (including government and political party offices) in Karachi’s public parks and amenity spaces. When informed that religious structures also existed on these plots, the honourable judges observed that illegally built mosques could not be considered legitimate constructions.

The special force (supported by area police) and criminal courts established last September under the Sindh Public Property (Removal of Encroachment) Act 2010 could be well utilised to assist in this gigantic operation against amenity-space usurpers. Encroachers (and their partners in government and police) are liable to onerous fines and heavy prison sentences, aside from underwriting demolition expenses.

The Karachi scenario is worse than as described by Naimatullah. For instance, Webb Ground in Lines Area is still being utilised by the Makro-Habib mega-store 12 months after the Supreme Court handed down a decision that the amenity plot was not the defence ministry’s to lease, and that, in any case, government land could not be leased to NGOs at throwaway prices. The plot had been master-planned as a playground in 1983 and could not be used for commercial purposes.

When I talked to young Mustafa Kamal in 2008, the then city nazim frankly admitted that his party had settled and housed political workers on the parks of North Nazimabad. He asked why we were not tackling the increasing mosque encroachments on amenity spaces in the city, and stated that he would remove his party’s encroachments when the mosques were dismantled — and this from a mayor sworn under law to protect the takeover of public land.

Karachi’s Cantonment areas are not free from this menace. Some 20 per cent of a park adjacent to The Forum in Clifton is being used for parking cars from nearby illegal commercial structures: but for determined citizen action, the entire park would today be a multi-storeyed parking-plaza (we fail to understand the difference between ‘park’ and ‘parking’). Usmani Park on the seafront in Defence Housing Authority in 2005 was leased for a huge shopping-cum-entertainment-cum-residential complex before the high court stopped it under the ‘public trust doctrine’.

A 2009 series of columns entitled ‘I own Karachi — and can sell it!’, dealt with the escalating rape of amenity spaces in the city : the land-grab of over 50 park/playground plots including Gutter Baghicha, unlawful conversion by the City Council of numerous amenity spaces (2.5 acres at Clifton beach-promenade, 40 acres at Mahmoodabad sewage-treatment plant, etc), setting up of MQM party offices on 175 public plots, and auction of amenity land including public-building, dispensary, community-centre/garden, post-office, and car-shelter plots.

In September 2009, my friend and former chief secretary of Sindh, Kunwar Idris, wrote in this newspaper: “The nazim [Mustafa Kamal] of Karachi was heard complaining on television the other day that he could not prevent encroachments in Gutter Baghicha because the police wouldn’t come to his help. Surely he knows that both under the local government and police laws he is responsible for law and order and the chief of the district police is also answerable to him.

“Deputy commissioners had no better control over the police under the colonial laws than the nazim now has in Musharraf’s system. No deputy commissioner however could ever disown responsibility for encroachments. This writer was deputy commissioner of Karachi 40 years ago for four years. Those were not the best of times for the administration and Gutter Baghicha even then was a favourite target of professional encroachers. But they were able to nibble at the edges and no more. Losing 400 acres to them in four years signifies total lawlessness or connivance — neither should be tolerated.”

Enrique Penalosa, the outstanding former mayor of Bogota, Colombia, visited Pakistan in early-2009. He rightly brought up the future generations residing in congested cities bereft of parks, playgrounds and open spaces. What will they think of us, their forebears? That we were uncaring, selfish and rapacious, that our greed for money was never slaked?

He pointed out the obvious fact that in the future wealth and other assets can be created, but hoggishly devoured open spaces and parks once meant for the beneficial use of citizens can never be restored.

We must wish more power to the elbow of the Supreme Court!

The ‘regularisation’ syndrome

Written by: Ardeshir Cowasjee

WHILST morality lies moribund in this Republic, and its legislators slowly whittle away at whatever `assets` are left to it, the environment of our cities — Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi and others — is slowly and steadily being eaten up by the various mafias (official and otherwise) who feel their time is running out. Attack is the order of the legislative day.
Karachi, proud city of Sindh, where much of the country`s wealth lies, is a particular sufferer when it comes to the callous condonation given to build substandard constructions, to the loss of open spaces, greenery and what are known as amenity plots. The `regularisation` syndrome has for too long persisted.
In 2002, the then governor of Sindh, Mohammadmian Soomro promulgated an ordinance that converted wrong into right. He `regularised` thousands of hazardously-constructed buildings which would crumble and kill in the event of an upper-moderate level earthquake (in which seismic zone the city of Karachi lies). His excuse: “widows and orphans” who had “invested their life-savings” in the to-be-demolished-under-court-orders buildings needed to be protected.
He falsely promised to prosecute criminal builders and corrupt Karachi Building Control Authority officials who had colluded in the dangerous construction. As projected by the Association of Builders and Developers, the city stood to make billions in `regularisation` penalties. It was all an eyewash.
Now, a second Soomro `regulariser`, Sindh Law Minister Ayaz Soomro, (in the words of his party spokesman) wants to help “remove the sword of illegality” from over the heads of “poor and ignorant” people who have been deprived of their “hard-earned monies” by unscrupulous encroachers. He proposes, via the `Protection and Prohibition ( sic ) of Amenity Plots Bill 2009` to `regularise` all amenity plots in Sindh which have been encroached upon or `grabbed` during the past 17 years.
Such `compassion` is the hallmark of our politicians in and out of uniform. They protest that they do nothing for their own benefit, they serve the `poor and ignorant`, the `widows and orphans`. But they legislate in the name of progress and equity which merely affects their own pockets and power bases.
It is a statistical fact, undeniable by our `compassionate` legislators, past and present, that during the passage of 64 years under the guidance of generals, governors, ministers and their ilk, the levels of poverty, illiteracy and misery have alarmingly risen in our country.
Right now, with law and order dead to us, citizens of Pakistan are lining up to escape to other lands where strict implementation of the law is the norm. They have realised something that our transient leaderships fling to the dry winds, that an unemotional implementation of law leads to progress: electricity does not fail, water is available, sewage is treated, traffic moves, pollution is controlled, commerce/industry prospers, health standards rise, public order is maintained and life improves.
Pakistan has a long history of `regularisations`. Black money is whitened, smuggled cars are regularised, illegal appointments are regularised, tax evasions are condoned, unauthorised buildings are regularised, land-grabbing is regularised, illegal weapons are regularised, refugees are brought into the mainstream and military takeovers are clothed with the `doctrine of necessity`. This establishes a culture where what is illegal today will be legal tomorrow. It assures the lawbreaker that even if caught, he will not be punished. It proves that crime pays.
On March 1 this newspaper printed a most pertinent editorial: `Threat to public land`. Dissecting the `compassionate` Amenity Plots Bill 2009, it was aptly termed pro-land-grabber, contradictory, contemptuous of town-planning, unconstitutional, and in contravention of the Supreme Court`s recent directive to clear encroachments from parks in Karachi.
It stated: “If the government is sincere about the plight of underprivileged citizens who have been sold plots on encroached amenity lands by criminals, it should provide the affected people with alternative land. Amenity plots should remain amenity plots and the state should protect what little public space is left in Karachi, not aid criminals` efforts to occupy and make money out of it.”
Tomorrow, Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry`s bench in Islamabad will learn what the City District Government Karachi has done to implement its Feb 4, 2011 order to clear, within 30 days, the 1,000-plus parks of Karachi from non-conforming encroachments.
The press reported that the drive started on March 2 (a few days before the deadline expired), and apparently the only structures being demolished were libraries, union council offices and gardeners`/sweepers` sheds, all built by the KMC/CDGK with taxpayer money.
In deference to their political and criminal masters, the CDGK demolition squad is not bulldozing the numerous land mafia`s buildings or private houses and commercial edifices on park land. Could the Supreme Court kindly look into this noora-kushti ?
Urban-planning laws forbid amendments to notified development layout plans without an elaborate procedure involving justification of changes, and invitation and consideration of public objections. Corrupt sleazy bureaucrats and politicians have observed these laws in the breach, with the result that the great majority of sub-divisions or changes in land-use have been carried out illegally over the past decades.
The Amenity Plots Cell of the CDGK`s Master Plan department has complete detailed lists and layout plans of all the illegal sub-divisions and allotments for non-conforming purposes in amenity plots in the city. The parks department has extensive information on the misuse of green spaces under its jurisdiction. All this must be properly placed at the disposal of the court so that the land grabbers` extensive efforts to defeat the directives of the judges are foiled.
This `regularisation` syndrome must be nipped in the bud, before it spreads all over the country. As our PPP government maintains, democracy is the best revenge. Under military rule in Pakistan, man exploited man. Under democracy today, the opposite applies.

A recap of Soviet-Pakistan relations

Written by: Ardeshir Cowasjee,

IN response to my column of January 9 there came an email message from a Russian friend resident in Pakistan. He stated that contrary to Pakistan’s fears, the Soviet government “never had any intentions to walk into Pakistan”.

He also pointed out that even when the Soviet Union had a “military presence in Afghanistan Pakistan remained beyond our strategic plans. The reason for such an approach is that historically we had partnership relations with India”.

The narrative taught in Pakistan starts with the assumption that the Soviet Union was anti-Pakistan right from Pakistan’s creation, just as our media is now busy trying to convince us that the United States is out to get us. Such was the Pakistani aversion to the Soviets that the process to set up diplomatic relations took over seven months even though Zafrullah Khan, Pakistan’s foreign minister, and Andrei Gromyko, Soviet deputy foreign minister, met on the subject of diplomatic relations in April 1948.

Pakistan saw relations with the Soviet Union from the prism of relations with India just as these days it sees ties with the US. In May 1949 Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru announced his plans to visit the US in October 1950. Pakistan’s leaders were keen to have the US on their side and actively sought an invitation from Washington. They were disappointed that Nehru was invited before their prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan.

Soon thereafter it was announced that Liaquat would visit Moscow, becoming the first Commonwealth head of government to visit the Soviet Union. The Moscow visit never materialised and instead in December 1949 it was announced that the prime minister would visit the US in May 1950.

The real reason why the US was chosen over Soviet Union became apparent in a background paper written by the Study Group of Pakistan Institute of International Affairs in 1956: “There are important divergences of outlook between Pakistan, with its Islamic background, and the Soviet Union with its background of Marxism which is atheistic … Pakistan had noticed the subservience which was forced upon the allies of the Soviet Union … Furthermore, there was the question whether Russia could supply the aid, both material and technical, which Pakistan so urgently needed.”

The main reason why Pakistan sought friendship with the US and joined the American camp during the Cold War was economic and technical assistance. That the Pakistani government and policymakers cloaked the rationale for this assistance in ideological terms is not surprising.

After decades of assumptions and speculation, we now have access to the Soviet archives to find definitive information on Soviet intentions towards Pakistan. But Pakistanis do not delve into these archives because rather than searching for the truth, they prefer to live in a make-believe world.

Out of all the declassified Soviet archives related to the military intervention in Afghanistan there are only a few which even mention Pakistan. Those that do, mainly talk about the need for talks between Afghanistan and Pakistan. None mention the “push towards warm waters” cited by Gen Ziaul Haq as the explanation of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and as justification for the US-backed jihad that haunts Pakistan to this day.

According to documents in the Soviet archives, the Soviet ambassador to Afghanistan Alexander Puzanov advised Afghan president Nur Muhammad Taraki in June 1979 of the need for meeting Zia to resolve problems. It was proposed that in exchange for Afghanistan’s support for Pakistan’s entry into the Non Aligned Movement (NAM), Pakistan would ban political activities of Afghan refugees and refrain from sending armed groups into Afghanistan.

In a meeting held the following month, July 1979, while Taraki insisted that Pakistan was not helping, Puzanov stressed the need for Afghanistan to do its best to initiate a dialogue and resolve pending issues with its neighbour.

Documentation from December 1979 highlights disagreement between Soviet military and civilian leaders on the decision to intervene militarily in Afghanistan. Soviet chief of general staff Nikolai Ogarkov is on record as arguing, “We will re-establish the entire eastern Islamic system against us and we will lose politically in the entire world.” He was overruled by the Communist Party ideologues.

In July 1980 Zia put forth a proposal for holding talks between Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran under the aegis of the Soviet Union. Soviet archives reveal that in correspondence with East German Chancellor Eric Honecker, the Soviets reveal their suspicion of the “seriousness” of Zia’s “intentions”. Yet they agreed to go ahead with the proposal and offered themselves as mediators. The talks never took place because of Soviet and Afghan refusal to accept Pakistan’s demands that president Babrak Kamal be replaced and also because Iran backed out from these talks as well.

Out of the entire declassified Soviet archives available these are the only ones which discuss Pakistan. While not pleased with Pakistan’s support for the Afghan resistance movement and while often labelling Pakistan an American or western stooge, at no time and in no correspondence is there evidence that the Soviet Union planned an invasion of Pakistan.

My Russian friend is, therefore, right in pointing out that contrary to Pakistani belief and narrative, an invasion of Pakistan was “beyond our strategic plans”. While militarily intervening in Afghanistan for various reasons, Soviet strategists never contemplated invading Pakistan. They had a strategic relationship with India and did not wish to threaten a close ally by extending their military presence to India’s borders.

Pakistanis need to examine the Soviet archives and we need to review our entire unreal narrative of history. We must know where we deceived ourselves to avoid being deceived again. Russia is one of our close neighbours and could be an important economic partner.

The watchmen watch

Written by: Ardeshir Cowasjee

WITHIN a couple of weeks two well-known commentators, both familiar with Pakistan for many a year, one American and one British, have come out with papers suggesting reasons why Pakistan may finally prove to be a failing state — or collapse.
Stephen Cohen of the Brookings Institution we all know well. In February, he prepared a policy brief for NOREF entitled Coping with a failing Pakistan . He propounded on the various and varied reasons why `failing` is an option. “States are glorified bureaucracies,” he writes, “nations are ideas that are more or less viable.”
To its credit, Pakistan, against all odds, has survived for over 64 years, albeit not in its original form (political machinations took care of that). It has hung on grimly by the skin of its wobbly teeth and since the decade of the 1970s there have been murmurings and mumblings about it being a `failed state` without failure ever materialising. A banana republic, yes, one can easily put it in that category as it has forever been in hock to the highest bidder.
To state the obvious, it is the mighty army — united, disciplined, rich beyond belief, an industrial giant in its own right (porridge being one of its products) — which has never failed to ensure its own survival and thus that of the country that keeps it on top of the national heap, living on in the manner to which it has become accustomed.
As for the economy, according to Cohen, Pakistan has “fantasised over its economic prospects”, blaming others for its shortcomings and it has been unable or unwilling — expediency dictating — to do what it should do which is to tax the fat milch cows that sit in parliament and in the many different power houses that run the country.
The civilians and the military have both refused to deal honestly with a continuously failing economy which has rendered the country ungovernable by either and unlivable for a large majority of its burgeoning population.
Demographically there is danger. As with the economy, where the feudal, landowning, industrial lot has protected themselves, population control has been held hostage by the religious right and population growth has been unchecked due to the policy of pandering to the mullah masters.
Since the 1960s, no government has acknowledged the problem of the galloping population growth with which the country cannot cope. This criminal negligence — and the same goes for education — has contributed towards the inability to govern and fix the economy.
Cohen talks of political instability, the use of the free media by the militant-minded to undermine governance, deteriorating international relations, separatism and sectarianism, and an inability to rebuild state institutions. His summation is that a failing Pakistan which is how we apparently are regarded is damaging to any prospect of restoring South Asia`s strategic unity. The interested world will therefore have to put its collective heads together and think in terms of policy changes.
Anatol Lieven, who has been commenting on Pakistan for decades, has written a lengthy piece for the March/April issue of The National Interest , a bi-monthly US-based journal. His opening focus is on the impossibility of complete cooperation between Islamabad and Washington in the Afghan campaign. Pakistan will not and cannot deliver to the US what the US wants. That is one firm thought. He also premises that the US interest in Afghanistan is but fleeting whereas the preservation of Pakistan as a viable state is its vital concern.
The title, `A Mutiny Grows in Punjab` reveals all. It is Punjab and the military, which largely hails from that province, that are at the moment gluing Pakistan together. It is in Punjab that Pakistan will collapse or ultimately pull itself into shape.
With 56 per cent of the population, it naturally dominates the bureaucratic and military establishment. It has the most productive industry and agriculture — no arguing with that. But what it also has is militancy of the religious type, with banned outfits such as the Lashkar-i-Taiba nurtured and supported by the provincial government and those shadowy things known as the `agencies`.
On this subject, Lieven quotes my old friend Chandi — now better known as Syeda Abida Hussain, a high-flying member of the PPP (changing horses presents no problems to her). She has most aptly and wittily dubbed Punjab the `Prussian Bible Belt` — well done and bravo.
In this `belt` live and increasingly thrive the militant groups of the religious right; they are far more organised and efficient than their counterparts up in the frontier areas. And they have ties and links of various and varied natures with the mighty army that is the child of Punjab.
Therein lies the threat, the grave threat. And therein lies the possibility of a mutiny should unexpectedly the unlikely happen — in this country it has so often been (and is at the moment) the unlikely that prevails. Should there be some spark that splits the army ranks, that brings about a mutiny, Pakistan is sunk. Any fissure in the mighty army would surely bring about the collapse of the state — finally and ultimately. It is here that the deadliest danger is posed to the US and its allies.
What preventative measures can be taken? Well, says Lieven, “Above all, however, the removal of the hated American presence, and the end of US attacks inside Pakistan, would greatly diminish impulses to radicalise in that country, especially if the United States can help develop that state economically (admittedly a horribly difficult process, especially under the present Pakistani government).”
Amazing it is, how others, sitting on the outside, manage to see us as we fail to see ourselves — as we persist in our state of denial.

Supremacy of SC?

Written by: Ardeshir Cowasjee

THE PPP government in Islamabad finds the lawful directives of the Supreme Court (SC) increasingly difficult to obey, and is putting bureaucrats and government servants into a quandary of non-compliance and dereliction of duty. Examples are: NICL, Pemra, NRO, NAB, ECP, HEC, FIA, etc.

A similar situation is emerging with the Sindh bureaucracy. Former Karachi nazim, Naimatullah Khan, petitioned the SC about the growing occupation of city amenity spaces for non-conforming use, highlighting political party offices, housing and commercial structures, and provided a sample list of around 164 ravaged amenity plots. On Feb 2, 2011, the court gave the city government (CDGK) one month to remove the offending structures.

Under pressure from the coalition government in Sindh, the CDGK put into play an elaborate bluff. While demolishing union council offices, libraries, utility store rooms and other similar structures built with taxpayer monies, the CDGK has ignored the hundreds of houses and commercial structures erected on amenity spaces by political land-grabbers.

Further, as a diversionary tactic it submitted lists of hundreds of mosques/madressahs that have occupied amenity spaces over the decades, and requested petitioner Naimatullah’s assistance in dealing with the removal of these ‘sensitive’ encroachments.

Simultaneously, the PPP tried to present a bill in the Sindh Assembly to ‘regularise’ all amenity plot conversions over the past 17 years. In a letter dated March 2, 2011 addressed to the law minister, Ayaz Soomro, MQM’s parliamentary leader, Syed Sardar Ahmad, stated: “…The Sindh Protection and Prohibition of Amenity Plots Bill 2009, which had been withdrawn on my intervention in the session of April 2010, was once again withdrawn on 21st February 2011, on drawing your attention to our last decision.

“It seems that efforts are still being made to reintroduce the bill as is evident from the enclosed clipping from Dawn of 28th February 2011. Since the matter stands closed as the bill had been withdrawn in April 2010 and the issue has been raised by the media, kindly ensure that it is not reintroduced in the House.

“It had been settled that amenity plots shall never be converted for any purpose other than the purpose for which these had been earmarked in the original layout plans of the schemes under the law as well as by the rulings of the hon’ble high court and the Supreme Court. Any move to reintroduce it in the House shall be opposed by our party.

“You would appreciate that in view of the Hon’ble Supreme Court’s recent order to remove all structures from the public parks, how could the assembly be authorised to convert amenity plots for residential or commercial purposes?

“I do hope that bill no 7 of 2009, and for that matter any bill that seeks to violate the sanctity of the amenity plots, shall not be brought back for the consideration of the assembly, as such attempt shall be resisted.”

Earlier, when bill no 7/2009 was introduced, Sardar Ahmad on April 18, 2010 wrote to the minister emphasising that: “The big towns with sprawling population that is swelling everyday needs ‘lungs’ for the teeming millions.

It is interesting that in the year 1866, when a chaplain applied for the grant of plot PR-2, survey no 4-6 admeasuring 13,723 square yards for the construction of St Andrew’s Church on Preedy Street, Karachi, it was granted on condition that one-third area be used for church building, while two-thirds would remain a park/garden for ventilation and sanitation of the surrounding areas.

“Many land-grabbers, including clergy, have tried to utilise the open land for commercial purposes, but all their machinations were thwarted by me as commissioner Karachi and chief secretary Sindh. You will appreciate how concerned the collector and the commissioner in Sindh 144 years ago were to maintain open spaces for neighbouring residents, and we now want to authorise the assembly to utilise the amenity plots for other purposes. Is it not unfair on our part? Hence it is proposed to kindly withdraw the bill….”

The officials who have been ‘overseeing’ the SC-ordered demolition operations, DCO Mohammad Hussain Syed and Additional EDO (Revenue) Matanat Ali Khan, under whom the CDGK machinery and land-record department operates, are entirely aware of the exact nature of each and every encroachment on the 4,000-plus amenity plots in the city.

It is this very machinery that has ignored constant complaints from area residents, and has colluded with land-grabbers for pecuniary benefit. They are fully aware that 70 per cent of the encroachments on amenity spaces (the figure given to the SC) have not been removed.

Historical Google-Earth satellite-imagery shows the situations existing on amenity spaces on September 2010, January 2010, February 2009, April 2008, February 2007, February 2006 and as far back as February 2000, thus defining pretty much when various land-grabs took place.

In a few months, the judges will see which amenity plots were being occupied even while the hearings were going on in Islamabad, and while the CDGK was trying convince the court that Naimatullah’s public-interest litigation was not ‘adversarial’.

The grabbing/allotment of parks, playgrounds and amenity spaces has been sporadically continuing for decades, but the plunder has accelerated recently, and is now escalating into a free-for-all, SC case notwithstanding.

In Korangi’s Mehran Town, some 80 per cent of amenity spaces have been encroached for residential housing. Other areas experiencing such trauma include Surjani Town, Gadap (where satellite-images reveal a largely undeveloped scheme with the housing only on amenity plots), Baldia Town and North Nazimabad.

The SC needs the support and involvement of concerned citizens and residents. What do law-abiding citizens do? ‘Never say die’ and soldier on? For how long, we ask?

Taseer’s real killers

Written by: Ahmed Quraishi Salmaan Taseer was a good Pakistani, a self-made businessman who did not use his politics to create illegal wealth or stash it abroad like most other politicians. He revolutionised telecommunications, introducing wireless telephony, Internet and cable television to Pakistan. In college in Britain, as Ambassador Zafar Hilaly recalled on this page, Mr Taseer read the Quran.
A week before his murder, he accused India of involvement in terrorism in Balochistan and defended Pakistan’s moral support to Kashmiris. The day he died, he was wearing a chain around his neck with Ayat-ul Kursi, one of the most inspirational verses from the Holy Quran. Despite being a liberal, he was not a ‘westernised extremist’ and never indulged in attacks against religious Pakistanis throughout his political career. He criticised a law written by legislators and lawyers, but did not question Islam’s death penalty for proven blasphemy. Showing support to a poor Pakistani Christian woman with young children who was not an intentional blasphemer was a humanitarian act, and very Islamic. He certainly was not a blasphemer.
Pakistan must prevent three different parties from hijacking the debate over the anti-blasphemy law and over Mr Taseer’s murder. One is our own religious extremists. Two is our own westernised liberal extremists. And the third party is foreign governments and media whose statements complicate the internal debate instead of resolving it.
Unfortunately, there is no credible face in the Pakistani government that could step forward and put the issue in perspective. The anti-blasphemy law is not directed at Pakistani Christians. The anti-blasphemy law traps more Muslims in its net than Christians, as the recent case of a conviction of a mosque imam and his son indicates. This does not mean the law should not be amended or repealed. It must be either amended or repealed because it is being abused. For example, the 45-year-old mosque imam and his 20-year-old son were convicted for life this month because they dared remove a poster on their shop window advertising a religious event that contained Quranic verses. It is ridiculous. What mosque imam would commit blasphemy?
The real problem over the law is between an extremist westernised minority of Pakistanis, who ridicule religion, and between another extremist religious minority, that takes religion to extreme. The extremist westernised minority wants no religion at all and keeps talking about European secularism, which is misplaced in Pakistan. This provokes the religious extremist minority into paranoia and pushes them to extremes, as in the case of the 26-year-old bodyguard who murdered Governor Taseer. Caught between the two extremes are the majority of moderate, peaceful Pakistanis.
The US and other western governments make matters worse by openly siding with the extremist westernised minority in Pakistan, provoking reaction. Also, some of the foreign support is self-interested. Some of the foreign governments are using Mr Taseer’s murder and the impassioned debate over the law to revive the falling legitimacy of the war in Afghanistan. Linking our internal debate with a disastrous foreign war is dangerous. Our debate over the law is similar to the US debate over abortion at one time that sharply divided the American public opinion and led to some violence. Outsiders must not be allowed to interfere in this debate.
The impression that foreign support is behind Sherry Rehman’s motion against the anti-blasphemy law provoked the other extreme. And her move to remove capital punishment for blasphemy is inconsistent with Islamic injunctions. It is an extremist position that does not appreciate and understand the religious sympathies of most Pakistanis which are legitimate and require no apologies.
On the other hand, Islam has blossomed for fifteen centuries without our made-in-Pakistan anti-blasphemy law, which contains procedures for trial, witnesses and conviction that are man-made and have nothing to do with religion. No one in Pakistan dares to commit blasphemy and this law creates the false impression of prevalence of blasphemy cases in our country. Most Arab and Muslim countries specify death penalty for proven blasphemy but do not have a law like ours. Leaders of religious political parties know these facts but chose to play politics and mislead gullible Pakistanis because they used this debate for popularity and recruitment.
Our overriding concern in this debate is to unite Pakistanis and stop a situation where Pakistanis go to war with each other because of two extremist minorities. We must stop anyone fanning this divide and try to bridge it with reason. Incitement to kill or to ridicule religion from either side must be sternly dealt with. We need to remind our people that a bigger travesty of our religion is to find a minister of Hajj, himself a clergyman, stealing pilgrims’ money. This debate can be redirected.

Military’s role

Scenes of ordinary people embracing soldiers and taking out their wrath on everything representing failed politicians happened for the second time in a few weeks. An uprising led by middle and lower-middle class citizens welcomed the Egyptian military’s deployment on the streets. Rioters obeyed orders given out by military officers. In sharp contrast, the same rioters pounded every symbol of the politicians, beginning with the police and its intelligence apparatus that protected an incompetent political system. Unlike Tunisia, Egypt has a robust and plural political culture controlled from the top. And yet not a single politician from any party dared join the protestors. Nor did the demonstrators demand the politicians to come out. In this context, how the Egyptians embraced the soldiers who came out to restore order is important.

Desolate Pakistanis flooded by water in far-flung parts of Balochistan and Sindh also embraced military rescuers while stoning the cars of visiting politicians. This does not mean people want military rule. The Egyptians want their military to ditch the corrupt elite and side with the creative, educated and honest people. Egyptians want their military to ally with them against a failed political system. This simply shows the military institution in countries with underdeveloped political systems have a role. The system cannot evolve on its own because we are not Sweden or England and conditions do not simultaneously exist for democracy to produce the same results here as it does in its European home turf. But democracy is a good system and we need it, albeit with local conditioning. In our case, a strong hand that inspires confidence and enforces discipline in the shape of a strong federal government is necessary for evolution. What is needed is military’s support for change and not a direct military rule. But the lead – both for change and governance – must come from the educated middle and lower middle class Pakistanis.

Tunisians and Egyptians begged their military to break its traditional ties to a political class that is tested, tried and failed. Similarly, Pakistan’s military establishment has grown too comfortable with a corrupt and incompetent political elite. Over five decades, our military establishment developed dependencies on elite politicians. This mutual dependency prolonged incompetence and corruption. The mutual ties became so strong that a former military chief who launched a coup in 1999 in the name of change ended up restoring to power the worst of the worst in Pakistani politics.

Look at what the Tunisian military has done. Key ministries of interior, defence, finance and foreign affairs were entrusted to technocrats and independent figures without any political affiliations. The new faces include an internationally acclaimed Tunisian filmmaker, a web designer and blogger, and political activists. The military, bowing to public pressure and possibly internal pressure as well from the rank and file, moved from the first hours to arrest corrupt relatives of the deposed president who were pulled out from airport departure lounges. The military did not hesitate in issuing arrest warrants for a president who looted public wealth. No deals were cut with foreign governments to house exiled corrupt Tunisian leaders. Even the tainted president of France found it difficult to grant asylum to close relatives of the former Tunisian president. This is not to say that the Tunisian military are walking angels. Some of its recent actions might turn out to be half-hearted. But whatever it managed to do in a few days is just a daydream in Pakistan.

Like the existing failed political system in Pakistan, many arguments can be made in favour of Hosni Mubarak. He stabilised Egypt and allowed its middle class to prosper and progress. But his government is incapable of unleashing the full potential of his nation. The common thread between Tunisia, Egypt and Pakistan is the middle class. The Pakistani middle class and the business class are responsible for most of the innovation in the country in the fields of culture, sports, music, film, education and science over the last two decades. The same is true for Tunisia and Egypt. Our existing political system is a roadblock in our progress. The required changes are nearly impossible to undertake from within the system. Our politics has degenerated into armed conflict. Political parties have become instruments for creating and sustaining linguistic divisions. They are unable to recognise that the fourth and fifth generation of Pakistanis is the most assimilated and integrated since independence. Technical issues like water-sharing and dams are politicised and foreign powers keep the ruling elite busy in ‘imported debates’ on religion vs secularism and whether the Afghan war is ours or not. It is not that Pakistanis are hopeless. It is a corrupt political system that pushes them toward these self-created divisions.

Pakistan’s military can play a major role in sustaining democracy in the country by ditching a failed political class. Tunisians have done it and the Egyptians are next.

Written by: Ahmad Qureshi

Egyptian independence

The most remarkable aspect of the Egyptian regime is that it has managed peace with Israel and relations with the United States for a quarter of a century without allowing either one of them to meddle in Egyptian internal affairs. Yes, the Egyptian intelligence cooperated with CIA-run torture programmes known as ‘rendition’ after 9/11. But despite being the second largest recipient of American aid after Israel, for three decades Egypt under Hosni Mubarak and its military foiled American efforts to reshape Egyptian politics and refused to oblige the Americans on plans to turn the Egyptian army into a glorified regional police force for the US military.

The only leverage the Egyptians had over the US was their knowledge that Washington needs Egypt to protect Israel’s western flank, and to meet Israel’s domestic energy needs from Sinai’s oil and gas reserves at preferential rates. Egypt delivered on this count, took the aid money but thwarted every American effort to establish itself inside Cairo’s power corridors. This is a remarkable achievement. For two decades, Pakistan has been unable to match this. American aid to Pakistan has been far below what the country has lost just in the past eight years – up to US$ 64 billion in revenue and opportunity losses, not to account for the price paid by Pakistan for America’s Afghan jihad. And yet Pakistan’s political and military ruling elites have felt they are obliged to allow Washington to shape Pakistan’s political governments and policy options. The biggest example of this is the 2007 deal that gave birth to the incumbent coalition government in Islamabad.

Mubarak is supposed to be a bigger foreign stooge than our own variety and yet, he never allowed foreign meddling in his country, not even in his defeat, declining all ideas and plans for him to move to Germany or Saudi Arabia. He moved to a house in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh. So far, he has stuck to his vow that he will die and be buried in Egypt and that he won’t escape for safety in some haven in Jeddah, Dubai, London or New York.

For Pakistan’s ruling elite, these cities have become alternate capitals of Pakistan.

Egypt was taking American aid but refused to accept American meddling. In 2008, then US Central Command Chief David Petraeus pressed the Egyptian army to transform itself into a counterterrorism force so the US could use it for firefighting in the region. The new Egyptian strongman Field Marshal Hussain Tantawi along with Mubarak and other generals refused to play ball. Despite massive corruption, the Egyptian ruling elite never produced proxies who serve Washington and then escape to greener pastures on the American lecture circuit.

When President George W. Bush rolled out his democracy agenda in the Middle East after 9/11, Mubarak was instrumental in failing it (along with the Saudis). He just won’t have it. Mubarak refused to allow the Americans to establish direct contact with Egyptian politicians or engineer any kind of internal change.

Egypt made peace with Israel but only because Egyptian nationalists were disappointed at what they saw as stabs in the back by Arabs and Muslims (for example, rich Arabs refused to bail out the Egyptian economy enough despite the fact that Egypt fought Israel in four wars on behalf of all Arabs. Egypt was also shocked to see Pakistan in 1956 supporting the British-French-Israeli invasion of Egypt, and harbored similar grievances against Turkey and Iran.) All of this shaped the psyche of the Egyptian ruling-elite and intelligentsia and helped push Egypt toward peace with Israel under American guarantees.

There were many occasions when there were frictions between Cairo and Washington over one thing or the other and the mainstream US media was unleashed – as usual – to ridicule, harass or intimidate Mubarak and Egypt. But Mubarak won’t have any of it. The point is not to glorify Mubarak. The point is to highlight the Egyptian elite’s sense of independence and pride even when they were corrupt and seen by their own people as pro-Israel touts.

Compare that to Pakistan. Every regime, from Benazir Bhutto to Nawaz Sharif to Pervez Musharraf to Asif Zardari, has handed over Pakistani citizens to foreign governments without an iota of national pride.

Some of them moved to Jeddah, Dubai, London and New York. Most of them have their wealth and properties abroad. Mr Musharraf introduced a new element to this shameful history when he launched Pakistan’s first political party on foreign soil, in London and Dubai. And now, most Pakistani politicians consider it kosher to conduct important political meetings outside Pakistan. Mr Zardari has introduced another first: high-level meetings with foreign governments that relevant Pakistani government departments, like the Foreign Office, know nothing about. We have ambassadors and national security advisers who are appointed to protect the interests of foreign governments.

Hosni Mubarak and the Egyptian regime made peace with Israel but never allowed any foreign power to come and abuse Egyptians or bomb them using CIA drones. This honour exclusively belongs to Pakistan’s ruling elite.

Written by: Ahmed Quraishi, 

Forget Davis

American military officials are telling their Pakistani counterparts they want to save the Pakistani-American relationship. The way to do this, they say, is to ‘forgive and forget’ the Raymond Davis debacle, one of the worst scandals to hit the Central Intelligence Agency in years. The notion of saving Pak-US ties is good. But the Pakistani government and military would do a disservice to the nation by sweeping a number of urgent issues under the carpet in the name of salvaging our ties with the United States. Instead of putting Pakistani military under pressure, our American friends need to help save these ties by correcting dangerous imbalances in the bilateral relationship. A fair and full trial for Mr Davis would be a good place to start.

It is also time for the Washington establishment to understand it can’t secure its interests in Pakistan by simply relying on proxies inside Pakistani government or by invoking the Pakistani military. Their actions and policies should also pass the test of Pakistani public opinion.

The Pakistani and American military leaderships met at a resort in Oman last week, which is a couple of hours by plane from Karachi. Credible sources in Islamabad confirm that US military commanders who met General Kayani tried to push him to come down hard on ISI and portray the Davis terror scandal as an ISI attempt to harm Pak-US ties. Some of the American commanders tried to portray the public outrage in Pakistan over Davis and other CIA assets in the country as ISI-engineered. Others are trying to allege that this outrage is limited to religious parties. All of this indicates a dangerous American disregard for Pakistani opinion.

It is also hilarious. If the American assessment is correct, the Pakistani popular outrage is all ISI’s fault. CIA’s advocates have the audacity to accuse ISI of exploiting the media. Someone should draw our American friends’ attention to five years of intense anti-Pakistan campaign in the US media, meant to destabilise Pakistan in every possible way.

A second mischaracterisation the Americans are peddling now is that Mr Davis was simply monitoring dangerous groups. The initial debriefings of the American prove he was not just a spy but a military intelligence operative whose assignment included mounting operations and not just collecting information. His contacts with anti-Pakistan terrorists strengthen earlier information about CIA elements helping terrorists targeting Chinese engineers and Pakistani interests in Balochistan. Information and piles of circumstantial evidence also show CIA elements abetting a range of anti-Pakistan insurgencies across western Pakistan, all of which emerged after our American friends firmly landed in Afghanistan in 2002.

CIA needs to be held accountable for all this. It must explain why its hired gun was in contact with the same terrorists who recently killed two retired ISI officers and who have mounted spectacular attacks in Lahore and Peshawar killing a maximum number of ordinary Pakistanis.

A third issue is the role of President Zardari, his interior minister and his Washington envoy in facilitating the entry of hundreds of US operatives into Pakistan over the past months. It is clear that the US government and CIA rely on proxies to further its agenda in Pakistan. This must come to an end. The personal interests of individuals in the Pakistani government must never trump national interest. The Oman meeting indicates the goal now is to sweep all these urgent issues under the carpet in the name of saving Pak-US relationship.

Contrary to the eloquent pronouncements of senior US officials, Washington is not interested in any long-term relations with Pakistan. The American focus is temporary and limited to its regional interests in Afghanistan, India and China. Only a few days ago the US mainstream media was awash with US official leaks threatening Pakistan of termination of relations. We should not kid ourselves about US intentions, the noise of the small pro-US lobby inside Pakistan notwithstanding.

Mr Davis must be tried and we must strike at the heart of the entire anti-Pakistan enterprise in the region which has been active for nine years. The opening provided by Mr Davis must not go to waste.

 By: Ahmed Quraishi

Democracy versus dictatorship – Javed Chaudhry

A woman called me and started crying over the phone. She said she had been collecting money for the last five years so that her mother could perform hajj but each time the government increased the cost; this year the increase was by Rs38,000. She said that this was her mother’s last wish but now it seems it would remain unrealised. “If my mother dies without performing hajj, I will send the money to the prime minister and ask him to spend it on his protocol instead.”
I trembled with fear because I know Allah is very close to the hearts of the poor and He listens to the plight of the oppressed.
Another call I received was from Mansehra. Khalid Mehmood said he was a poor carpenter. However, his business was booming and prosperity knocked at his door during Pervez Musharraf’s days. Good food to eat and his children admitted to good schools. “Then I was told Musharraf is a dictator, an American agent and against Islam and Pakistan so I also shouted: ‘Go Musharraf, go’ with other people”. The democratic government came followed by slump and poverty. No money to pay the school fee, or for petrol or the utility bills. “The worst dictatorship is better than the best democracy. Please keep your democracy and return me the dictatorship.” Again I shuddered — since I like democracy but I could see that it had not delivered.
The last call was from Karachi. It was different and more interesting.
The man on the other end of the line said that Pakistan has had four military dictators: Ayub Khan, Yahya Khan, Ziaul Haq and Pervez Musharraf. All four left the corridors of power with full protocol and their lives ended honourably. Ayub and Musharraf left the presidency with guards of honour. Musharraf is enjoying a relaxing time in London and Ayub had spent his last days on a rocking chair comfortably in his lawn. Yahya Khan’s coffin was wrapped in the Pakistan flag and was given a salute. As for Zia, when he died, the eyes of the entire nation were full of tears on his death.
Contrary to that the end of democratic leaders was not good. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was hanged and only a couple of prisoners participated in his funeral prayers. He was buried in the darkness of the night. Two of the Benazir’s governments were dismissed disgracefully and no one came out in her support. She met a tragic death. Nawaz Sharif was arrested along with his family and was exiled. Ninety per cent of his party men betrayed him. Chaudhry Shujaat and Pervaiz Elahi currently are in search of face-saving as well.
Why is it that in Pakistan dictators often do not meet unfortunate ends while democratically-elected leaders do?
“The answer is the state of poor common people” the man said. They lived better lives, filled with less pain, and they had food and medicine and this was during the time dictators were in power. As for democratic leaders instead of providing ‘roti, kapra aur makan’ for the people, they deprived them of these things and this only increased their troubles. That is why, the man said, ordinary people prayed for dictators.
“If the present rulers do not understand this point and do not wipe the tears of the poor people, the same thing will happen again.”
And then the call dropped.
Published in the Express Tribune, June 10th, 2010.