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The Nation, Pakistan
Friday, January 21, 2005
Whither Pakistan?
By WAJID SHAMSUL HASAN
Our Generals have not only been responsible for the break-up of Quaid's
Pakistan, they have also played their role in fracturing Pakistani
nationhood, fostering violent religious sectarianism, unleashing
ethnicity, nurturing local Jihadis and extending patronage to foreign
religious extremists. They have done all this either through
extra-constitutional interventions or by their overt and covert
machinations.
Perhaps they are justified in doing so because neither they had any
role in the creation of Pakistan nor have they contributed any feat
that should have made it stronger.
In war with the external adversaries they always lost. In peace, they
kept conquering their own unarmed people time and again.
Pakistan today under General Musharraf has reached a point of fatal
implosion. He claims that Pakistan has no external threats and its
future is endangered because of its grave internal conditions. Nothing
could be true. Pakistan's military establishment has pushed the civil
society to the edge of precipice, rendering life short, brutish and
nasty.
All this has come about under the cover of khaki democracy in the name
of good governance and enlightened moderation. The Gilgit incident that
continues to take its toll despite heavy presence of the Pakistani
military, and the eruption of armed insurrection in Balochistan are
nothing but fatal signs of a socio-economic and political tsunami-like
disaster threatening the very existence of the country.
And on top of everything, one should not ignore the oft-repeated
declarations of those who felt no qualms in saying that Pakistan's
creation was a blunder, that two-nation theory was a hogwash and that
there is no need for this "failed" state to continue to exist. What
lends credence to their views is the fact that these elements seeking
undoing of Quaid's Pakistan are part of the present ruling coalition.
Pakistan's power elite is blind to the writing on the wall and it seem
to be hell-bent on repeating history. General Musharraf is treating
explosive Balochistan problem as one of law and order and as of a
situation created by a handful of armed miscreants. He fails to
understand that it has a long history and that what we see today is the
ugly manifestation of a deep-seated sense of deprivation, arising out
of socio-economic and political step-motherly treatment inflicted upon
a proud people.
I have often heard army officers dismissing Balochistan as a non-issue.
A senior army chap discussing about the insurgency once said:
"Remember, Balochistan is heterogeneous to rest of the country. East
Pakistan was not separated by hostile enemy. When we were in a state of
war everything had to be detoured via Sri Lanka and flying over
international waters to be in Dhaka-a very expensive affair. Besides
the Bengalis were more in number than us in West Pakistan and all the
'bingos'were hostile to us. They were aided, trained and armed by the
Indians in guerrilla warfare. Balochistan with much less population can
be overwhelmed with force in no time-if Islamabad has a will to enforce
its writ.".....
Some Muslims live under the misconception that a Muslim cannot kill
another Muslim. It is time to face the reality. Sectarian dissensions
have been part of Muslim religious polity and I think more Muslims have
killed their religious compatriots than those who do not believe in
Islam.
In this context one has to state with a heavy heart that Pakistan's
military establishment and its intelligence apparatus have been using
sectarian and ethnic forces to keep the masses divided.
While attempts to reinvent Mr Jinnah's Pakistan's as a theocratic state
had been initiated since after its creation, they blossomed into a
serious threat following Zia's coup in July 1977. Zia used Islam,
Mullahs, sectarian and ethnic politics to counter ZAB's awami politics
and his power base in the masses by dividing them.
Zia's legacy of three AAAs-(America, Army and Allah)remain an albatross
around Pakistan's neck and recurring sectarian violence in which
Muslims kill Muslims with impunity keep reminding of the curse that he
was. General Musharraf continued his policies until 9-11. It was
President Bush's ultimatum to him: "it is they or us" that forced him
to change his spots. No doubt much after 9-11 he continued to play
ducks and drakes and even manipulated MMA's electoral triumph in
October 2002 to keep it as his trump card to blackmail Washington that
after he is gone it is Mullahs who would hold the key to Pakistan's
nuclear arsenal.
Now General Musharraf is paddling his doctrine of enlightened
moderation and making sounds on the issue of national reconciliation to
seek consensus politics sans Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif. In other
words he wants to have the cake and eat it too in the name of
reconciliation and national consensus. .....
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