On the run
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
As militants from South Waziristan remain on the run, the military is now reported to be moving in after them into the Kurram Agency and more parts of Bajaur. There has also been movement by troops in the Bara tehsil of the Khyber Agency, which lies adjacent to Peshawar, after militants blew up a girls' school. Meanwhile the COAS, on his latest visit to Mingora, has stressed that troops will not pull out of the area until the security situation is back to normal. It appears that as a result of the Pakistan army's more determined initiative the ring around the militants is closing. Soon, we hope, they will have fewer and fewer places to run to, although cooperation with Kabul is also required to impede flight across the border.
The 'stop and start' aspect of military operations we have seen in the past has been missing this time round. For this we must all say a quick prayer of gratitude. It seems that the military has finally realized that there is no option but to go after the militants with all the resolve and force that can be mustered up. It has persisted in this tactic despite the inevitable loss of many soldiers. The hope that we could see an end to the bombings and other acts of terrorism that have in recent days devastated Peshawar rises with every news item about military action and the expansion of the ongoing operation. But amidst optimism, we should also remember that the time will come when we will also need to hunt down militants further afield. Much has been written about bases in southern Punjab. We hear too of leaders who may be based in Quetta, or Karachi or elsewhere. Once the fighting finally ends in the tribal areas, there will be an urgent need for the government, the civil administration and the military to sit down together and plan how best to go after them, so that the full dividends of defeating militancy can come our way.
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Ordinances and parliament
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
As we approach the November 28 deadline set by the Supreme Court, after which 37 ordinances promulgated by former president Pervez Musharraf may lapse, the federal law minister has said some of them will be re-promulgated. This comes from a government that has spoken on more than one occasion about the supremacy of parliament. The SC had sought parliamentary sanction for the ordinances that representatives believed should be made into law, rather than further use of presidential ordinances. At least 31 of the 37 ordinances had been placed before the National Assembly. None was approved – or rejected. Most failed to move beyond the committee stage. Parliament, an institution on which large sums of public money are spent annually, needs to be effective. If it is not, questions will inevitably arise as to why it exists in the first place. Our representatives have a special duty to strengthen democracy by demonstrating that they are capable of performing their function with responsibility and interest.
The government has set aside some controversial measures of the Musharraf era, including ordinances limiting media freedoms. But there are others that need to be retained, such as those that set up the Earthquake Relief and Rehabilitation Authority (ERRA), the NADRA ordinance and that putting in place the Competition Commission of Pakistan (CCP). Despite alleged irregularities, ERRA remains involved with various projects in the quake-hit areas. The projects need to be completed without disruption. The same holds true for NADRA. The suspicions that powerful cartels are lobbying for the demise of the CCP so that they can push up prices without hindrance makes it all the more imperative that the government act in the interests of ordinary people by protecting this body. Other ordinances and their impact require discussion and debate. It is unfortunate that this has not happened. The failure to generate such debate in the National Assembly and bring a vote on these issues only adds to the perceptions of the government's ineffectiveness and inability to keep the wheels of state running smoothly along.
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Listen India!
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is currently about to experience American hospitality of the type associated with a full-blown state visit. Wearily true to form he is using the occasion to deliver unhelpful and negative statements about Pakistan that drip oil on the fires that burn between us. 'We are not fully committed to Afghanistan' and 'Pakistan has nothing to fear from India'. With the greatest of brotherly respect Mr Singh, we have a considerable amount to fear from India. You are the bear growling at our backdoor, the fox that eyes our chickens and the Very Big Brother with a military stick that we know we would have difficulty countering were push to come to shove. You have regional superpower aspirations that we cannot match and the ear of the only other established superpower that cultivates you for its own interests. But wait… do you not also have the same problems of poverty as we do? The same threats to natural resources posed by global warming? No shortage of armed uprisings within your own borders? Are there not religious and sectarian atrocities reported on a daily basis and is there not an outbreak of witch-killing in your rural hinterlands that sees widowed women regularly hacked to death?
You are no less flawed than we are and yet it is we who are always seemingly 'not doing enough' and we who are the exporters of terrorism. Are you innocent, India? Free of stain and guilt? Have you never sent agents across our borders, sought to foment discontent and division where you saw opportunity or profit? Have you never done that to us, India? Have you not moved in on Afghanistan yourself as a significant donor, created diplomatic missions and sought to influence the Afghan government? And do we really use terror as an instrument of state policy – or is it that in geopolitical terms it is currently flavour-of-the-month to present Pakistan as a bubbling pot of wickedness? We have our faults and we are often poor at acknowledging them, but we are not the only baddies in this game, India. Yes, we would prefer peace if only because wars are expensive and often fail to solve problems. But peace is ill-served by a ritualised thrashing of a favourite scapegoat. So if it's peace you seek, Manmohan Singh, find a different way of saying so. Believe us – we'll listen if you do.