Dated: March 12, 2015

Nine Zero raid

RELATIONS between the Rangers and the MQM had been strained even before yesterday`s raid by the paramilitary force on Nine Zero, the Muttahida headquarters in Karachi.
The MQM had been complaining that it was being victimised by the Rangers during the course of the ongoing law-enforcement and counterterrorism operation in the city; the party said its workers were being picked up by security forces and would later turn up dead. Then last month, the stinging allegation came from the Rangers that the Baldia factory was deliberately set on fire by elements linked to the MQM in 2012. In such a tense atmosphere came the Nine Zero raid; the Rangers claimed they had recovered heavy weapons from the party`s complex, while convicted criminals were also reportedly picked up. A member of the Rabita Committee was also taken into custody, and the MQM claimed a worker was killed in the raid.
This is not for the first time that the MQM has faced the wrath of the security apparatus. The `operations` of the 1990s are still fresh in the memory, when the state unleashed its force against the party.
Rightly or wrongly, the Muttahida has attracted a reputation for using strong-arm tactics when the need arises, while its street power in Karachi is widely considered second to none. It needs to explain about the weapons the Rangers say were recovered from Nine Zero, and give its point of view regarding the recovery of `hardened criminals` from within the complex. As its reputation unfortunately precedes it, the MQM will need to work hard to clear its name, while refraining from shutting down the city each time it feels it has been wronged.
Having said that, it must not appear as if the Muttahida is being singled out for persecution by the state, specifically the security establishment. If there is credible evidence that party members have been involved in illegal activities, this must be presented by the Rangers in court where the MQM can defend itself. While the law-enforcement agencies claim the Karachi operation is nondiscriminatory and that suspects linked to other political parties and extremist groups have also been picked up, the optics of the current situation say a lot. For example, it was on the same day as the raid that the black warrant for Saulat Mirza, a convicted murderer said to be an MQM activist, was issued. To be effective and above board, counterterrorism and law-enforcement actions in Karachi must be seen as being impartial. For while politically linked suspects are being rounded up, are the LEAs going after religious and sectarian militants with equal zeal? The fact that jihadi militants have firmly ensconced themselves in pockets of the city would suggest otherwise.
Hence action has to be across the board and most importantly, within the ambit of the law and fundamental rights.

Reviving executions

THE federal government`s decision to reactivate the death penalty in all cases where it is applicable, going beyond the terrorism exception invoked two months ago, is a grave setback to the cause of justice and rights in the country. In practice and in theory, the death penalty is a punishment that does not belong in modern times the state`s right to take the life of an individual who is already behind bars and no threat to society in the name of the collective good is one that no state ought to have. Consider first the practical implications. In a criminal justice system that is broken for all intents and purposes, the death penalty disproportionately applies to individuals who are unable to have adequate counsel and who, in some instances, simply do not have the resources or clout to purchase their freedom. Far too often human rights advocates have pointed out to both procedural and evidential flaws in the trial and appeals process where the state has sought the death penalty. Surely, it is not enough to say, as the federal government is claiming, that the penalty will only be applied after exhaustively failing the letter of the law when both the very spirit and letter of the law are routinely flouted here.
There is also the reality that the death penalty does not act as a deterrent to crime in any meaningful manner. If it did there would not be more than 8,000 individuals on death row in Pakistan, the vast majority convicted before the moratorium was put in place by the previous government. In terrorism cases, where the individual seeks to embrace death whether by suicide bombing or a fedayeen attack, the death penalty can never be a deterrent. Even beyond that, given the wide range of crimes in which the death penalty is applicable in Pakistan, it is impossible to claim that violent and major crimes would be curbed by its presence. Global experience shows that crime is curbed by addressing its social, economic and political roots rather than simply seeking to apply the maximum punishment. Consider just the experience of two ideologically very different countries the US and Saudi Arabia where the death penalty is enthusiastically implemented. In both places, there appears to be a steady supply of individuals willing to commit offences attracting capital punishment. Pakistan does not need more blood on its hands.

Investment climate

THE Pakistan-United States Business Opportunities Conference that just concluded in the capital may not create much business between the two countries, but at least it has furnished an opportunity to revisit some long-standing concerns of investors in Pakistan. The head of the US delegation at the conference, Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker, described some of the challenges that foreign investors face when it comes to this country, and the list turned out to be a bit long. Some of the items that were mentioned are fairly standard concerns that foreign investors have when doing business in developing countries but then there are others that merit serious attention. The delays in processing sales tax refunds, for instance, have long been an irritant for businesses, whether foreign or domestic, and strengthening the fiscal machinery to do away with this practice of withholding refunds to help jack up the revenue numbers deserves to be addressed on a priority basis.
For its part, the government is likely to be disappointed if it expects large American investment in the areas that have been identified by the commerce minister as a priority. Those areas include energy, infrastructure and the agriculture sector. Energy investments are hampered by the circular debt and the poor state of governance in the area whereas infrastructure investments are highly politicised. Meanwhile, agriculture is mostly informal in our country, and, subject to the policy framework, is designed largely to benefit large landowners who have links to political parties.

The government would be well advised to devote its energies to addressing the challenges and creating a more stable and predictable environment for investors before it asks for preferential trade treatment, or large-scale investment in areas with long gestation periods. Nevertheless, it has been encouraging to see such a large delegation from the US at the conference. Perhaps a few investment opportunities can be fruitfully discovered in similar sessions, although two such conferences in the past have not yielded anything to brag about.

Dated: March 13, 2015

Senate challenge

AVOIDING the unseemly bargaining and bartering that characterised the Senate polls in some provincial assemblies, the election of the chairman and deputy chairman of the Senate was a relatively smooth affair. Given the events of the previous week, it was only right that the Senate`s image not be further tarnished. Happily, the country`s political leadership also saw the need to avoid controversy and elect a stalwart of the house, Raza Rabbani of the PPP, to the chairmanship unopposed. That the deputy Senate chairman, the JUI-F`s Ghafoor Haideri, is from Balochistan and the PTI also decided to throw its hat into that electoral ring is a further boost for the democratic process. As ever in politics, the big question is, what next? After the political and, later, security turmoil of the last year and a sense that the PML-N government did not from the very outset have a legislative agenda nor is it particularly interested in developing the parliamentary process, the new Senate has taken its place in an arena fraught with challenges and few obvious opportunities.

The Senate remains, however, an assembly with a great deal of legislative and political experience, so perhaps it can nudge the government into taking parliament more seriously. Early in its tenure, the PML-N government occasionally pointed to the fact that it had a small presence in the upper house (owing to its being elected by the previous assemblies) as a reason why it had to go slow on the legislative front. The reality though was otherwise as the PPP, then with a near-majority in the upper house, did not try to obstruct the government in a significant way and it was clear that the party was willing to cooperate on legislative matters at least with the government. Where the Senate was a disruptive force as with the PPP-led boycott of the house it was only to emphasise the government`s neglect of it and to demand the prime minister and his cabinet participate more often and meaningfully. Nearly two years on from the general election and af ter December`s National Action Plan, there are now new and immediate things the Senate can lead on not least a thorough review and overhaul of the decrepit criminal justice system. Will it though? The other aspect of the Senate`s neglected core duties is oversight: how effective have the various committees and individual senators been in holding governmental actions to account? The opportunities here are plenty. Consider just the electricity sector, with the government`s oft-tweaked promises never really coming close to reflecting the realities in this area. Would not the country benefit from a thorough, open and non-partisan study of why the electricity sector is confounding successive governments and proposals of how to move ahead? Surely, if the Senate leads in a constructive, helpful manner on many issues, the government would have to try and follow.

Unequal taxation

FOR decades now our tax system has been riddled with holes opened up arbitrarily through the use of discretionary powers given to the tax bureaucracy to grant exemptions to select parties. Over time, the number of exemptions granted and the amount of tax revenue lost as a result has grown to such enormous proportions that it rivals some of the largest expenditure heads in the budget. It stands to reason that only those with the right connections can avail themselves of the benefits of selective exemption, meaning that the poor, who pay their share of taxes through the GST levied on all items of daily consumption, are left at a disadvantage.

The chairman of the Federal Board of Revenue recently found an occasion to dilate upon the government`s efforts to roll back these exemptions in a meeting with officials from the office of the Auditor General of Pakistan. He reminded the AGP officers that his government has rolled back close to Rs100bn worth of exemptions, and intends to roll back another Rs250bn worth in the coming years.

This is not a new issue. It has been the subject of donor advice since at least the early 1980s. Most recently, the commerce minister touched on it again when talking at the launch of a new report that shows very high levels of inequality in the country, where the top 10pc has a 31pc share in total spending, while the bottom 40pc spend only 20pc. In response to the state of inequality in the country, the minister reminded his audience that vast sectors of the economy remain undocumented, notably in retail and wholesale trade, and therefore inaccessible for tax purposes. The fiscal machinery has a role to play in helping close the growing inequalities in the country, most importantly by helping to document large sectors, but also by making revenue available for directed social welfare programmes, areas highlighted by the report as important dimensions of inequality. But documentation measures are far more long term than tackling exemptions, and whereas the government`s efforts to roll back exemptions should be acknowledged, it should also be emphasised that far more ground needs to be covered. Eliminating exemptions and rolling back the whole culture of discretionary powers in the FBR can play a central role in redressing some of the problems raised by the authors of the report on inequality, and that step begins with mustering political will.

More war powers?

WITH less than two years left for President Barack Obama to complete his second term, it is unclear whether Congress would be willing to give him special powers to prosecute the war against the self-styled Islamic State. On Wednesday, US Secretary of State John Kerry asked the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to give a unanimous vote for a new authorisation of military force (AUMF) to strike the IS at what he called `a pivotal hour`. Aware that the war against the IS is likely to outlive the Obama administration, the White House has asked for a three-year authorisation so that the change of government should not impede the prosecution of the war. Defence Secretary Ashton Carter also told the Senate committee that an `unmistakable message` should be given to the IS leaders that they could not divide and defeat `us`.

This `us` obviously includes America`s regional allies which have been fighting the IS hordes without having made any gains that could be called very significant.

Having begun their offensive from Iraq`s Anbar province, the IS militia has made stunning gains, capturing Mosul, Iraq`s second largest city, and then going over to the offensive in Syria to reach Kobane on the Turkish border. Since then there has been a sort of stalemate in spite of the benefit of American airpower the antiIS coalition has yet to break the militant organisation`s image of invincibility. While the region`s strongest military power, Turkey, has decided to keep itself neutral, the members of the coalition seem to lack both firepower and the will to take on the IS. America`s greater involvement militarily runs the risk of proving counterproductive and perhaps could help the IS propaganda war. Without the AUMF the US already has a massive military presence in the region; what the situation demands is not more war powers for the president but greater diplomatic efforts on America`s part to goad its regional allies into taking decisive military action, breaking the IS`s image of invincibility and reversing the tide of the battle.

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A still tongue keeps a wise head.

Dated: March 14, 2015

Release of Mumbai suspect?

ZAKIUR Rehman Lakhvi`s crawl towards judicially permitted freedom appears to be near an end. The federal government may yet try to impede the release of the Lashkar-e-Taiba leader and alleged architect of the November 2008 Mumbai attacks, but it is unlikely to be anything more than a shoddy ad hoc measure to cover up gross failure over the past six years. Lakhvi should not be a free man. That he may soon be free is entirely the fault of the state, and especially the security establishment, whose only real intention appears to have been to take the LeT leader out of the global spotlight when the international pressure on Pakistan was intense and then do little of note. Be it an energetic pursuit of evidence against Lakhvi and his co-accused, appointing prosecutors with vigorous intent, providing the necessary protection to the court or ensuring that the defence team`s manoeuvring is swiftly and adequately countered, the state has failed in nearly every area. How, for example, as long rumoured and recently confirmed by media reports, has it been possible for Lakhvi to spend his time in prison in relative luxury and with access to his network of supporters unless the state itself is complicit? Surely though the judiciary must shoulder some responsibility for this unhappy state of affairs. While the judiciary cannot be expected to simply allow the state to indefinitely hold an individual, there do appear to be strong reasons not to allow Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi to walk free. There are several examples where the courts themselves have urged the prosecution, the police and the government to do more than they are at the moment. Were it not for judicial intervention there would be little movement on local government elections. Were it not for judicial intervention several high-profile crimes, like the lynching of a Christian couple in Kot Radha Kishan, would probably have been quietly dropped by the authorities. There are other instances as well, such as the case of the missing persons where the judiciary`s interest and activism have been positive and welcomed. A similar approach is needed in the case of Lakhvi. The Islamabad High Court`s decision to nullify the conviction of Mumtaz Qadri on terrorism charges has already resulted in uncertainty. And further controversy could follow its latest orders. In such cases, surely the Supreme Court ought to take notice, seek answers and suggest the necessary changes.

There is a further problem: if Lakhvi is set free, will he be allowed a hero`s welcome and made available for LeT/Jamaatud Dawa/ Falah-i-Insaniyat Foundation propaganda events? It is well known that the state has many tools available to it to keep militant groups from emerging from the shadows and taking centre stage. Already there appear to be attempts to hijack March 23 as it was last year by radical groups. A repeat should not be allowed.

Mystery of weapons

THE US State Department has categorically said that lethal supplies, including weapons and ammunition meant for Isaf, the Nato-led force in Afghanistan, are not transported from the Karachi port, indicating that the facility is used only to bring in non-lethal supplies. The same clarification had been issued in September 2013 by the US embassy, when the case regarding stolen containers carrying lethal supplies meant for Nato forces was being heard by the Supreme Court and there was much comment in the media. Given two clear statements to the effect that lethal supplies like guns and ammunition are not transported from the port, what do we make of the Rangers` claims, following Wednesday`s raid on the MQM headquarters in Karachi, that a large cache of weaponry and ammunition was discovered on the premises, and must have come from stolen containers carrying Nato supplies? Footage of the weapons and the ammunition was released to the media. Some of the arms appeared to have been stored in cardboard boxes sealed with masking tape. The footage seems to confirm that these weapons and ammunition were indeed present, but questions still linger as to how they got there in the first place.

If Nato supplies that arrive in Karachi port do not contain weapons, as the US government has indicated, then where did this cache come from? The MQM claims that it was planted, although as yet there is not much to suggest that this was the case. Meanwhile, the Rangers` version too appears debatable in light of the State Department`s consistent claim. What we are left with is a mystery that has persisted for a long time now. Both the Rangers and the MQM need to provide answers to the natural questions that arise about the presence of these weapons in the party`s headquarters. The Rangers must back up their allegation with facts and figures and make clear how they arrived at this conclusion, while the MQM, that is often accused of employing strong-arm tactics in urban Sindh, also has a lot of explaining to do. The case should be thoroughly investigated to get to the root of the matter and to prosecute those suspected of having committed crimes. But attempts to sensationalise the issue and make allegations without evidence will only create confusion and detract from the effort to nab suspected militants, whether they belong to a religiously motivated, political or ethnic group.

Vaccines` wastage

THE difficulties faced by the country in vaccinating every single child against polio are widely known and place a formidable question mark over the health of new generations.

Less talked about, though, is the fact that the deficiencies of the health sector in terms of protecting children against preventable diseases are myriad, and so deeply entrenched as to make a change of course appear difficult. If at one end of the spectrum there is the problem of the slowdown in the rates of routine immunisation, at the other are the glaring gaps in supply, storage and oversight, which may cumulatively negate what little success the country does manage to achieve in this area. The latter point was underscored by the news that came to light a few days ago that a large consignment of the pentavalent vaccine, worth some $1.3m, that was being stored on the premises of the National Health Services Ministry had spoiled because the required temperature had not been maintained. To put this into perspective, the vaccine, which protects against five potentially deadly diseases in a single shot, was of a quantity that could have been administered to 400,000 infants.

The story has only come to light because of the actions of a whistleblower, and the health authorities have on their part instituted an inquiry and promised suspensions when those responsible for this lapse are identified. That is all very well, but hardly goes far enough. That such an eventuality occurred at all provides further evidence of what a survey undertaken by WHO and Unicef last year concluded: urgent improvements are needed in most areas of vaccine and supply management systems, while the country is meeting the required standards only in the area of vaccine and commodity arrival procedures. As it is, Pakistan`s vaccination efforts are aided in no small part by international organisations; it is shameful that even so, the country cannot get things right at its own end, even when its own future is at stake.

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A still tongue keeps a wise head.

Boost to Sisi?

IT’S a massive dole-out whose aim looks more political than economic. On Friday, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Kuwait pledged a total of $12bn to Egypt to revive an economy that has been steadily declining since the Arab Spring rocked the country in 2011. The stir at Tahrir against the decades-old Hosni Mubarak regime, and widespread disturbances and killings after the overthrow of Mohammed Morsi’s elected government have hit the economy badly, with the rate of growth falling from 7pc to 2pc.

Foreign investment has declined from $13bn in 2007-08 to slightly over $2bn, and unemployment is high, while 55 million people i.e. 75pc of the population, subsist on government ration cards. President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi now has ambitious plans to kick-start the economy with massive investments in a new capital city, desert reclamation, 22 new industrial cities and 26 tourist resorts, the cumulative cost coming to a fantastic $140bn. Observers doubt whether the country with its bureaucracy known for sloth will be able to cope with the task.

Besides the concern for the economy, a major aim behind the generous pledges at the Sharm el-Sheikh summit seemed to be to give political support to President Sisi’s government, which has so far been unable to give stability to his country. Mr Sisi came to power after overthrowing the Muslim Brotherhood’s elected government and has since then faced serious challenges to his regime, including guerilla war in the Sinai. While Mr Morsi made many mistakes, his was nevertheless a democratically elected set-up. By destroying Egypt’s nascent democracy, Mr Sisi has done enormous harm to his country. He may be able to turn around the economy, but what foreign aid cannot give is legitimacy to his regime. He grabbed power through a coup and become president through an utterly bogus election. What has endeared him to some Gulf states is his persecution of the Brotherhood. This convergence on a negative idea can hardly give his country political stability and his people a share in governance.

Attack on churches

THE suicide attacks against two churches in Lahore yesterday could have been just another gruesome incident in the long list of horrors that has been inflicted on this country in recent years. The reaction by sections of the Christian community in Lahore and other cities of the country — with protesters taking to the streets and some turning to violence that resulted in two deaths — though suggests that the state’s halting response to the terrorism threat is leading to dangerous ruptures in society.

When non-Muslim and sectarian communities take to the streets in protest and turn to mob violence, it surely reflects the acute stress and intolerable strain that they are under. While all mob violence is deplorable, perhaps the lesson for the state here is that endless violence and horrors visited on a population lead to fear taking over and ugliness manifesting itself.

The state and the security establishment in particular will likely point to the fact that the group which has claimed responsibility, the Jamaatul Ahrar, is under renewed pressure both inside Pakistan and in Afghanistan, at the urging of the state here. The next phase of Operation Khyber-I does appear to place the militant group in the military’s crosshairs and the announcement of a re-merger between the TTP and the Jamaatul Ahrar over the weekend suggests that the groups are under significant pressure. As in the past, when hard security targets become more difficult to attack and a militant group is in the throes of being significantly diminished, strikes on soft targets such as places of worship or markets have spikes. Perhaps, then, that is what the latest attack in Lahore indicates: a desperate effort by the militants to try and stoke a societal backlash and in doing so put pressure on the state to curb its anti-militant operations.

Even if that were the case, however, there are still some serious questions to be asked. Why, for example, has the production of suicide bombers reached the level where they can be dispatched seemingly to any part of the country on any given day by any one of several militant groups? Given the young age of many of the bombers used in recent attacks, they have clearly not been indoctrinated in the distant past. So, how, why and where is this almost industrial-scale indoctrination programme continuing without the state being able to find and dismantle it? Beyond that there is the question of the failure to deal with the more complicated, and even vexing, aspects of the National Action Plan. Even the military appears to acknowledge that a militarised strategy cannot end militancy and terrorism, but there seems to be no real effort to try and think beyond military operations in Fata and counterterrorism operations in the cities. Will — can — that change?

Shifting of prisoners

IN Pakistan, ensuring that dangerous suspects and convicts are kept in detention is a major task, especially considering the several high-profile jailbreaks that have occurred in this country in the recent past.

The last such incident was the jailbreak in Gilgit-Baltistan, in which some inmates suspected of involvement in 2013’s Nanga Parbat massacre managed to escape. With this bitter experience in mind, the GB authorities have sought to transfer 20 high-profile inmates to detention facilities in Punjab. What is troubling is that officials told this paper they feared a fresh jailbreak was possible.

Considering the remoteness of the region and its limited resources and infrastructure, it appears to be a good idea to shift dangerous prisoners to Punjab, which has relatively better facilities. Some officials have raised concerns about how trials will be conducted, considering GB’s physical distance from the rest of Pakistan; this problem can be largely overcome through the use of technology, for example by conducting the trials through video link.

The move by the administration highlights the need for better prison facilities in Gilgit-Baltistan. While shifting dangerous inmates to Punjab or elsewhere in the country may be one solution, it is only a temporary fix; in the long run, improvements need to be made to GB’s criminal justice infrastructure to minimise the chance of future jailbreaks. Also, while Punjab may indeed have better facilities, these are by no means foolproof. For example, even some key prisons in the province, such as Adiala in Rawalpindi, are said to be vulnerable to terrorist attacks. What is needed countrywide is a series of maximum-security prison facilities to detain terrorism convicts and suspects.

Punjab is due to bring such a facility online in Sahiwal shortly, and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the past has talked of building a similar high-security jail. But such facilities are needed in all provinces and regions considering the enormity of the threat militancy poses to the country. Along with more secure detention facilities, what is required is a thorough exercise to conduct background checks of jail staff members whose duties demand interaction with terrorism convicts or suspects. In the GB jailbreak case, the inmates were said to have ‘brainwashed’ jail officials while prison staffers are believed to have been complicit in their escape. Measures need to be taken so that extremist inmates don’t mingle with ordinary prisoners, and jail staffers guarding them don’t turn out to be sympathetic to the militants’ cause.

Published in Dawn March 16th , 2015

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"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!

Where is the CCI?

THE attempt by several PPP MNAs to bring to parliamentary attention the federal government’s extended delay in convening the Council of Common Interests is a welcome move that may just cause the government to take at least one of its constitutional responsibilities more seriously. Despite a constitutional provision stipulating that the CCI must meet at least once every 90 days, the group has not met since last May. The CCI is an arcane platform, but its powers and potential impact are anything but. As set out in Article 154(1) of the Constitution, “The Council shall formulate and regulate policies in relation to matters in Part II of the Federal Legislative List and shall exercise supervision and control over related institutions.” Part II of the Federal Legislative List covers everything from the census to supervision and management of public debt and from the railways, ports and electricity to national planning and national economic coordination.

The government itself appears to be aware of the practical need to convene the CCI, with meetings scheduled at least twice in recent months but then not held for reasons not explained by either the Ministry for Inter Provincial Coordination or the Prime Minister’s Office, the prime minister being the chairman of the CCI. Now, there is a fresh meeting reportedly scheduled for this week and perhaps, with the matter being taken up in parliament, it will finally be held. Just a sample of the more than one dozen items on this week’s agenda further underlines the CCI’s relevance and importance. The population and housing census is to be discussed, as is the permanent absorption by the provincial governments of federal government employees transferred under the 18th Amendment. In addition, amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code; the Indus River System Act, 1992 (which deals with water distribution between the provinces); and the federal petroleum policy are to be discussed. Each one of those agenda items could consume an entire meeting by itself. Now, owing to the tardiness and neglect of the federal government, they are all on the agenda of the same meeting. The neglect of the CCI also underlines a wider problem: the PML-N government’s almost total lack of interest in institution building and preference for ad hoc, extra-parliamentary and extra-institutional decision-making.

Contrast the number of committees (under NAP to discuss constitutional amendments, or to consider talks with the Taliban once upon a time) the government has either created or kept active with the institutional mechanisms it has relied on. The lack of interest in the proceedings of the National Assembly, the virtual shunning of the Senate, the sidelining of parliamentary committees — it is all of a piece in a system where the federal government prefers to take decisions in small, informal forums and then gets the formal institutions to rubber-stamp those decisions.

Intelligence cooperation

IT is widely believed that intelligence agencies in Pakistan, both of the civilian and military variety, guard their ‘turf’ jealously. Yet considering the challenges militancy and violent crime pose to the country, such territorial attitudes must be abandoned in favour of greater intelligence convergence. Fortunately, attitudes do seem to be changing as a few recent incidents have illustrated. As reported, security officials say information from the civilian-led Intelligence Bureau was instrumental in the recent raid on Nine Zero, the MQM’s Karachi headquarters. Sophisticated arms and suspects wanted in major crimes were recovered in the Rangers-led action. The IB had been maintaining a database on suspected criminals within religious and political parties in Karachi. Meanwhile last month, the interior minister told the National Assembly that a network planning to target Balochistan’s Hazara community had been busted thanks to collaboration between the IB and Inter-Services Intelligence. While these are indeed intelligence successes, gaps still remain, as the bombing of two churches in Lahore on Sunday shows. As per the Punjab home minister, there was no previous information about the possibility of such attacks.

It would be correct to say that the Army Public School tragedy was what motivated the country’s various intelligence agencies to drop their territorial attitudes and combine forces for the sake of national security. However, this collaboration must be a continuous exercise and not a temporary arrangement. The intelligence landscape in Pakistan has long been dominated by the military’s agencies, with the civilian outfits not given as much attention. Whenever military regimes were in power the IB was neglected while during democratic set-ups the bureau was politicised. Now, even though the military’s agencies may be leading the effort, perhaps the IB’s value in intelligence gathering is beginning to dawn on the security establishment. But more work is needed in the area of intelligence sharing; it needs to be a formalised affair instead of working on a case-to-case basis. Cooperation among agencies must be the norm, not the exception. For this the National Counter-Terrorism Authority can play a major role. Unfortunately, Nacta is still largely inactive, thanks to reported manpower and financial problems, coupled with the state’s apparent lack of interest in making it an active concern.

For effective counterterrorism measures and long-lasting efforts against violent crime, the civilian and military agencies must continue their cooperation under Nacta, which should work as an independent and empowered entity focused on actionable intelligence gathering and sharing.

Pakistan in quarter-finals

PAKISTAN’S comprehensive seven-wicket victory over Ireland in a do-or-die game on Sunday has assured them of a quarter-final berth in the ICC World Cup. The qualification, which saw the country jubilant, has been astounding to say the least, keeping in view the team’s dismal start to the Cup last month. It was barely three weeks ago when back-to-back defeats against India and the West Indies had all but derailed Pakistan’s chances of making the grade. The insipid manner in which the Greenshirts were subdued by the rival teams had the critics predicting an early ouster for them. But hats off to skipper Misbah-ul-Haq and his men for regrouping in style and bouncing back strongly to make the quarter-finals against all odds. To their credit, they have successfully managed to put behind them the ignominy of the early losses, the selection snags, the scores of injuries as well as poor form to win four games on the trot, including a famous one over favourites South Africa, which is no mean feat.

Here, one must point out that more than the diligent workouts on the field, some clear thinking and rational decision-making on the part of skipper Misbah and the team management in the latter phase of the Cup has paid off for Pakistan that was regretfully missing earlier on. The imbalances in the playing eleven have thankfully been dispensed with and the results are there for everyone to see. The belligerence of Sarfraz Ahmed, who was inexplicably ignored in the earlier games, as well as the bold step to go in with five specialist bowlers have been key factors in the recent turnaround. With the inception of the knockout round, however, there’s hardly any room for error now. Misbah and his team will be up against the formidable Aussies this week in what is seen as the toughest quarter-final of all. But with Pakistan playing to their strengths at the moment, there is nothing that should be seen as beyond them in this World Cup.

Published in Dawn March 17th , 2015

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"But screw your courage to the sticking place,
And we'll not fail." _Shakespeare, 'Macbeth')

Margallas in danger

EFFORTS to stop commercial stone-crushing and quarrying activities in the Margalla Hills in and around Islamabad are not new. Conscientious citizens and officials have for long tried to put an end to such activities in the Margalla Hills National Park, where quarrying and crushing were outlawed by a 1979 ordinance. But despite even the Supreme Court’s intervention, these activities have continued unabated in the hills. At a hearing on Monday, the apex court came down hard on the Capital Development Authority for failing to protect the national park; it described the Margallas as a “national asset” and a “public trust”. The CDA in the past had said — also under court pressure — that it would demolish stone-crushing units within the park area. Unfortunately, this has not happened. But the threat such operations pose to the ecological diversity of the Margallas, as well as to the health of the workers employed by the units, and of those living near the plants, calls for concerted action before the lush green hills are forever denuded.

Firstly, it must be asked why units have been allowed to operate in protected parkland, in clear violation of court orders and the law. Numerous animal and plant species are at risk due to the commercial activities. Environmental experts also point out that quarrying activities affect the health of the population by adding to air pollution. Particulate matter found in the air in areas where crushing takes place has been found to be much higher than acceptable standards. Labourers employed at the units, apart from working in a dangerous environment, often end up suffering from pulmonary and respiratory diseases. All these factors illustrate the seriousness of the matter. Efforts must be made to immediately stop commercial activities in the protected parkland and to shift these to areas located far from population centres. And wherever quarrying and crushing activities are taking place, dust-suppression methods must be employed to minimise workers’ exposure to particles and control the level of air pollution.

Way ahead for MQM

THE ripples from the raid last week on Nine Zero, the MQM’s headquarter in Karachi, continue to course through the city and wider afield. Considering it is the fourth largest political party in Pakistan and one that has reigned virtually unchallenged in the country’s financial jugular — some would say had a chokehold on the city of 20 million — this is scarcely surprising. Let alone the citizens of Karachi, the party itself appears to have been caught completely off guard by the no-holds-barred, Rangers-led raid on its formidable redoubt. The party’s response to the offensive, perhaps the harshest action against it since the army-backed operations of the 1990s, has ranged from plaintive claims of victimisation to belligerent denials of culpability. On Monday, party supremo Altaf Hussain refuted allegations of a militant wing within the party, maintaining that any misdeeds committed by its activists comprise “personal conduct” of individuals rather than actions sanctioned on an organisational level. That would, at the very least, mean that the MQM is shockingly poor at screening its cadres. The MQM is an anomaly, a party that has survived in the rough and tumble of Pakistani politics despite a central leadership remotely controlling it from thousands of miles away.

Usually, fear has been the not-so-secret weapon it has wielded to that end, both when it wanted to bring Karachi to a standstill at a moment’s notice — thereby demonstrating its relevance in the national political landscape — and also when it wanted to chastise its own leaders for perceived crimes of omission or commission. Those who could have comprised the second tier of the MQM leadership and taken politically sound decisions are instead perpetually engaged in a struggle to keep their heads above water. Some of them have mysteriously either met a nasty fate or voluntarily removed themselves from the political arena. As a result, there is a crisis of leadership in the party, with a yawning vacuum below the man in London. After the recent turn of events, there is only one possible way ahead for Mr Hussain. And that is to purge the MQM of the militant elements within — whether they have taken “shelter” within it, or been actively cultivated by it. For a party that has been sending its representatives to the assemblies since 1984, electoral politics is not a strange country. It is high time this is the only kind of politics it engages in.

Reading Lahore’s lynch mob

SPEAKING in the National Assembly on Tuesday, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan stated that the lynching of two men at the hands of an enraged mob in the aftermath of the church bombings in Lahore on Sunday was “the worst form of terrorism”. The tragedy does indeed compound the original horror, particularly since the assailants — even though they are yet to be identified — were in a sense victims themselves: their fury was kindled by the assault on their community. Does this take society’s behaviour in the aftermath of a terrorist attack in a twisted new direction? Could the future be one where members of various communities turn against each other, thus achieving the goal the terrorists have so far unsuccessfully been striving for? An answer of sorts can be found in the minister’s speech. Chaudhry Nisar invoked the example of earlier attacks on imambargahs and mosques, saying that a violent mob reaction such as that in Lahore had not been witnessed in those incidents. He went to the extent of citing the example of the Charlie Hebdo killings, pointing out that the minority Jewish community of Paris did not erupt in violence.

This is true. But there is a distinction to be made between the anger in Paris — or that experienced by terror-drenched Pakistanis in general — and what fuelled the lynching in Lahore: religious minorities in Pakistan have been targeted in a sustained fashion by militant and terrorist groups for at least a decade and a half. These communities have had their backs to the wall for a very long time and, further, have for generations borne the brunt of discriminatory practices and laws — the worst being the blasphemy law. While Pakistan has seen lynching incidents in the past, often over a blasphemy accusation, these have been premeditated murder in the sense that clerics and others have knowingly incited a mob to violence. In Lahore’s case, to delineate, the crowd’s actions — though horrific— appeared spontaneous. This provides a window into the pain and frustration of the country’s religious minorities, left unprotected by a callous state that simultaneously refuses to offer any meaningful redress.

Now that this eventuality has occurred, the state must realise the need to pursue this incident with much more seriousness than it has tended to show in the past. There are avenues of identifying the perpetrators of the lynching, and of ascertaining whether any incitement to violence occurred; those responsible must face the penalty of law. But in the larger picture, the state and government need to improve security across the board, improve police performance and urgently take ownership of religious minorities and vulnerable groupings. Without the reversal of the growing sense of victimhood at the level of the community, the future bodes dark.

Published in Dawn, March 18th, 2015

__________________
"But screw your courage to the sticking place,
And we'll not fail." _Shakespeare, 'Macbeth')

Obama’s realisation

FOREIGN interventions, regime change and implanting democracy from the outside have all been failed strategies that have only served to destabilise the global scenario. Yet it is rare — especially for superpowers — to admit to the failure of such follies. In this context, Barack Obama’s recent comments regarding the rise of the self-styled Islamic State are a welcome realisation. The US president said the IS phenomenon “grew out of our invasion” of Iraq in 2003, while adding that the so-called caliphate was an ‘outgrowth’ of Al Qaeda in Iraq. Indeed the US — and others — have often shown a propensity to play the role of global policeman. However, the results of interventionism have rarely led to any positive outcome. Whether it was Soviet forces marching into Afghanistan in 1979, the US invasion of Iraq, or the Nato-led air war in 2011 targeting Muammar Qadhafi’s regime in Libya, such interventions have left the targeted countries in worse shape than before. Indeed, problems in most of the world’s trouble spots existed before the interventions, and foreign interference has only exacerbated these to the point of virtually destroying once-functional states.

But Mr Obama’s realisation must go beyond words and be reflected in policy. Replacing ‘unfriendly’ regimes (as some in the West are still trying to do in Syria) through guile and aggression is and always will be a bad idea. Moreover, it has often been witnessed that those professing democratic values have either helped dictators quash popular aspirations, or looked the other way for strategic reasons. All major players in the international arena must realise that democratisation is an organic process and that people must be left to chart their own destiny. Coming back to IS, Mr Obama has talked of the “60-nation coalition” to counter the extremist movement. But if such efforts are to succeed in the long term, they must be coordinated with the governments in Baghdad and Damascus, while regional states (particularly Iran and Saudi Arabia) should play a central role in battling the extremists.

Unabated polio killings

IT is tragic that while polio workers continue to be cut down in the country, few outraged voices are heard condemning their murder or demanding justice. On Tuesday, two Lady Health Workers and their guard were shot dead in the Danna area of Mansehra district. And yesterday, one vaccinator died and another was injured in an attack for which responsibility was claimed by the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban in Bajaur Agency. Will the deaths of these brave individuals serve to shake up state and society and prod the country into finding the wherewithal to push back against the threat? This is unlikely, since the latest victims are far from the first polio vaccinators to have met a brutal end in a hail of bullets. In such cases, the response from the state, which has hardly gone beyond providing a guard or two to protect the vaccinators, has been demoralising to say the least. The killing of polio workers — and their protectors — is an issue which has now taken its place among the myriad other challenges that have faded into the background to become just another unfortunate reality in this country. At just about every level — from the administrative and health authorities to the families of the children potentially at risk — there appears to be little realisation that polio, which is easily transmissible, is fast proving to be a national calamity that has alarmed even the international community.

The warnings could not be clearer: rising incidence of the disease, growing violence against the teams administering the vaccination, the fear factor faced by parents who are intimidated into refusal by retrogressive elements. The presence of the virus is being confirmed at more and more locations across the country, with interior Sindh (Karachi has had a polio problem for a considerable period of time) being the latest to find the alarm being raised. It is difficult to predict how and when this situation can be reversed. Those against the polio vaccination effort appear focused and implacable in their intentions to deter health workers from vaccinating children. Perhaps a new strategy is needed to combat the threat. One solution could be to take the disease itself out of the domain of child health and repackage it as a national security emergency — for it is nothing short of that. But first the state has to show that it recognises the threat and is ready to take action against it.

An unequal justice

THE grisly sequence of death-row executions continues apace in the state of Pakistan. On Monday, 12 death-row inmates across the country were sent to the gallows, the highest number of executions in a single day since the government lifted the six-year moratorium on capital punishment last December, a day after the APS Peshawar attack. Yesterday, another nine condemned prisoners were hanged, bringing the total of such state-sanctioned killings to 39 in the intervening period. The government had initially maintained that the lifting of the moratorium would apply only to those sentenced to death under the Anti-Terrorism Act. Earlier this month however, that exception was revoked and the interior ministry directed provincial governments to reactivate capital punishment wherever applicable against all those prisoners who had exhausted every avenue of appeal and clemency. No one with a modicum of awareness can deny that the criminal justice system in Pakistan is deeply flawed and hence profoundly weighted against the poor and marginalised segments of society.

From the filing of an FIR, the investigation of a crime, the trial and appeals process, to the conditions of incarceration — the outcome of every step is often directly co-related to the financial and/or political clout of the parties involved. While one result of this broken justice machinery is that some crimes go unpunished, the other side of the coin is that many accused do not get a fair trial. Their defence is often in the hands of state-appointed counsel, who are overburdened, underpaid and usually not the brightest stars in the legal fraternity. Cases such as that of Shafqat Husain are instructive: although he was a minor at the time of committing the crime for which he was convicted, his state-appointed lawyer did not bring up the issue of his age during trial. One of those hanged on Monday also included Mohammed Afzal who, according to Amnesty International, was only 16 when convicted. It is scarcely surprising that the vast majority of those in prison, whether under sentence of death or not, are from disadvantaged backgrounds. However, as long as the state stays its hand against carrying out the one punishment that is irrevocable in its finality, there remains the chance of redressal.

By rescinding the moratorium in its entirety despite the realities outlined above, the state has implicitly set aside its commitment and its duty to uphold the cause of justice. Instead, in the interest of appearing to reassert its writ, it is pandering to populist demands based on emotion and fear. The exultation with which each batch of executions is greeted by a large chunk of the public is disturbing for its apparent willingness to dehumanise the individuals sent to their deaths. Finally, it seems, the bloodlust of the terrorist has met its match in the bloodlust of a wounded nation.

Published in Dawn March 19th , 2015
http://www.dawn.com/newspaper/editorial

__________________
"But screw your courage to the sticking place,
And we'll not fail." _Shakespeare, 'Macbeth')

Netanyahu’s victory

IN a Middle East already unstable due to multiple crises, the victory of Benjamin Netanyahu’s rightist Likud party in the Israeli elections bodes ill for chances of a just peace deal for the Palestinians. Due to the Likud triumph, Mr Netanyahu will most likely be asked to form a government in Tel Aviv. Yet if his past record is anything to go by peace for the Palestinians and stability in the wider region will remain elusive. In 2014, Mr Netanyahu presided over the Israeli rampage in Gaza, ostensibly carried out in reaction to rocket attacks from the impoverished strip. As per independent figures, over 2,000 people were killed due to Israeli aggression, the majority of them civilians. Also, under Mr Netanyahu’s watch the expansion of illegal settlements on Palestinian land has continued unabated; over 350,000 Israelis are said to be living in these controversial communities in the West Bank, while a similarly large number are to be found in occupied parts of Jerusalem.

The Israeli leader has also been clear in his opposition to the two-state solution: while the Palestinian leadership has stated it would work with any Israeli government that supported Palestinian statehood, Benjamin Netanyahu has said this is not a possibility. Hence the peace process — already in tatters — is likely to stay that way. Mr Netanyahu’s jarring words and actions have managed to alienate many of Israel’s usual supporters in the US and Europe, with the White House terming his election rhetoric as ‘divisive’. The Likud victory has indeed reflected the mood of the Israeli electorate. However, those world powers that have influence in Tel Aviv must counsel restraint to Benjamin Netanyahu. By no means should diplomatic efforts to resolve the Iranian nuclear question be torpedoed by Israel. It should also be assured that atrocities such as the Gaza episode are not repeated. Above all, the world must press Israel to honour the two-state solution that would allow the Palestinians to live in peace and with dignity in their own land.

FDI decrease

DIRECT foreign investment inflows into the country have slowed by a large amount in the latest State Bank report, raising concerns regarding the country’s balance of payments, as well as the larger investment environment at a time when declining oil prices were supposed to help in providing some support to a weak external position. This is a worrying development and the State Bank should address it in the monetary policy announcement scheduled for tomorrow. In the last announcement, the bank had specifically pointed out the low level of foreign investment (1.8pc of GDP at that time), and said that “lack of private inflows could pose risks in achieving a sustainable BoP position”. Since then, the situation regarding foreign inflows has deteriorated further, with FDI actually dropping by 3.8pc in the first eight months of the fiscal year. Foreign portfolio investment has, however, jumped in the same time period, but this is itself a source of concern given the volatile nature of the funds, especially in light of the steep declines in the stock market this week, reportedly on account of sharp withdrawals of foreign funds. The sustainability of balance of payments is of further concern because the steep declines in oil prices appear to be bottoming out, with some evidence that a renewed period of oil price increases is approaching.

Coupled with the less than favourable outlook on privatisation and mounting external debt service obligations, the bank, in its announcement tomorrow, ought to tell us clearly how they see the external sector’s health. There is no reason for alarm since reserves remain high, but concerns are growing about the exchange rate and the balance of payments, and we are owed some clarity on these from the central bank. Clarity is also needed on the fiscal situation, especially since the government has been trying in vain to raise Rs150bn for payments connected to military operations and IDP repatriation, and this amount is not budgeted. The government has raised the matter with the IMF, to little avail, and most recently the finance minister was reported to have raised it with a visiting diplomatic delegation as well. With the revenue target already revised downward, and the deficit target untouched, the State Bank’s announcement should include a pointer or two on how they are seeing the fiscal situation shaping up as budget season looms before us again.

Saulat Mirza’s ‘confession’

TWO death-row prisoners got a last-minute reprieve in the early hours of Thursday. But whereas in Shafqat Husain’s case it was civil society’s vocal campaign that earned him a brief stay of execution, far more covert forces are clearly at work behind Saulat Mirza’s eleventh hour respite. Many individuals on the verge of being sent to the gallows – a punishment that Dawn does not support under any circumstances — would conceivably have the desire to unburden themselves. Not many, however, have been provided the opportunity to indulge in such a cathartic exercise on national television as did the MQM worker, convicted in 1999 for multiple murders, on late Wednesday night. Mirza’s sensational revelations, which have sent convulsions through Pakistan’s fourth largest political party, were followed by the announcement that his execution had been stayed for 72 hours. Saulat Mirza had already articulated the substance of his ‘confession’ in a statement before a Joint Investigation Team some years ago, the video of which is in the public domain.

This time around, there are explicit details that have brought not only Altaf Hussain but some of MQM’s most prominent names into the dragnet. It is the latest salvo in the concerted push to tighten the noose around the party that controls much of the country’s largest city and its financial hub. Last week’s raid on Nine Zero and recent allegations by the Rangers of MQM’s culpability in the deadly Baldia fire have unfolded against rising tensions between the law-enforcement agency and the party, which maintains it is being unfairly singled out in the ongoing counterterrorism operations in Karachi. However, the latest development raises several questions: how did a camera find its way into the death cell? Why this modus operandi, especially when there are other ways of going after militants taking refuge? Why now? What is the long-term objective?

There is no legal value in a ‘confession’ not made in a magistrate’s presence. Moreover, the situation — a condemned prisoner looking for any way to delay the inevitable — was conducive to manipulation. But in the eyes of the establishment, no stranger to Machiavellian tactics, there is perhaps considerable political mileage to be gained. What that is, is open to speculation, but the wholesale discrediting of the party is surely only part of it. However, while it is an open secret that the MQM employs heavy-handed tactics to maintain its grip on a city where politics and criminal networks often overlap, such an approach to bring it to account is in the long run likely to exacerbate the ethnic divide in Karachi, deepen the sense of persecution, and augur ill for peace in the metropolis. Meanwhile, even as the deep state orchestrates the MQM’s ‘remaking’ to its current requirements, both the central and the Sindh governments appear to be taking a back seat. By doing so, they do themselves and the democratic project no favours.

Published in Dawn, March 20th, 2015

http://www.dawn.com/newspaper/editorial

__________________
"But screw your courage to the sticking place,
And we'll not fail." _Shakespeare, 'Macbeth')

The madressah problem

IT was always going to be a difficult task — reforming the madressah sector and purging elements within who promote extremism, militancy and terrorism. But as a report in this newspaper yesterday indicates, the government appears to have all but given up already.

Three months on from the articulation of the National Action Plan, the federal government does not appear to have even decided which ministry should take the lead in dealing with the various madressah networks in the country.

Should it be the Ministry of Interior, with its basic responsibilities for law and order and hence identifying extremist- and militancy-supporting madressahs? Or should it be the Ministry of Religious Affairs, which coordinates with the madressah networks and in theory ought to have responsibility for determining the curricula taught?

Or should it be the Ministry of Finance, a unit of which is meant to supervise financial transactions in the country, that must be aware of the money flowing to the madressah networks?

Yet, unless all three are done, unless curricula reform, capturing militants and monitoring financial flows are pursued by the relevant ministries, a certain sub-section of the national madressah network will continue to pose a threat to the country’s security.

The problem, as ever, appears to be less about the difficulties in drafting a meaningful plan and implementing it with purpose, and more about the state — both the political and military arms — not really considering it a priority.

Perhaps the PML-N finds it easier to do nothing: taking on the religious right with its street power and other means to put pressure on the state is hardly something any elected government would relish doing.

Perhaps the army-led military establishment is preoccupied with fighting militants and extremists, or maybe it does not consider dealing with extremism its responsibility.

Whatever the reasons for the state sinking back into inaction against the nurseries of hate, intolerance and extremism in the country, the effect is predictable: the gains in the short term, via military operations, against militancy and terrorism will likely be squandered in the long term.

For there is little possibility of the state winning the fight against militancy if it does not also seek to address the root causes. Why are so many Pakistanis taught distorted religious ideas in centres funded by foreigners?

It must also not be forgotten that the madressahs are only one part of a much bigger mosque-madressah-social welfare network that is collectively used to spread distorted beliefs and, sometimes, preach violence and hate.

Just yesterday, the Jamaatud Dawa, perhaps the most well known of the so-called welfare networks, held a public event in Karachi to commemorate March 23 — this just a month after intense speculation about whether the group is to be banned or not. How serious, then, is the state in its promise to end militancy and terrorism of every stripe?

State Bank’s optimism

THE latest monetary policy announcement by the State Bank of Pakistan provides an optimistic assessment of the economy, bordering on the unrealistic.

It begins by telling us that every economic variable is moving in a “favourable” direction, and goes on to say that those which aren’t, such as growth in the large-scale manufacturing sector, will also be doing so soon.

Further on, most of the statement dwells on falling inflation and attributes movement in many other variables to it. At best, this analysis is too optimistic, and at worst, it is disingenuous.

It is true that inflation has fallen faster than anybody forecast in this fiscal year, but it is also possible to read too much into that development.

It strains the imagination a little, for instance, when the State Bank tells us that a decrease in private-sector credit offtake is due to falling inflation. If this is true, how do we explain rising government borrowing?

In fact, the bank has gone a little overboard in its optimism, a fact likely to be read by independent commentators as bowing before its political masters.

The drop in the current account deficit is attributable in some measure to higher CSF payments and other “multilateral inflows”, hardly a sustainable basis on which to build external sector health.

Fiscal affairs are only touched on in passing to say that the deficit appears to be “on track” despite major revisions in revenue targets and large expenditures looming in the third quarter.

The State Bank appears to be going to some lengths to avoid giving critical comments on the state of the economy, a trend that has been visible for some time now, but the latest monetary policy goes much more out of its way than most others have.

Given the powers vested in the bank to exercise autonomous decision-making, there is no reason for it to be so shy of pointing out the areas in the economy that need improvement. The assessments given by the bank are meant to provide the National Assembly with an objective and realistic view of the economy.

By giving out assessments of the sort contained in the monetary policy statement, the State Bank lets down the National Assembly, and those who look to it for a grounded, independent analysis of the economy.

It would be better if future pronouncements by the bank did not read like a press release from the finance ministry.

Gesture of defiance

WOMEN clad in black, their faces sombre and resolute, bear a rose-petal strewn coffin through a street. Men flank the periphery and bring up the rear in a protective cordon. It is an image that sears itself into the mind.

For such a break with tradition is all the more unusual, defiant even, because it happened in Kabul. Afghan society is more uncompromisingly patriarchal than most, where the rights of women and girls are routinely violated on the pretext of religion and culture. But there’s another significant element in this grim tableau.

The body, or what was left of it, that lay in that coffin was that of a woman who had been beaten to death and her corpse set on fire by a mob on an allegation of blasphemy.

Described by her family as “deeply religious”, the 27-year-old had also reportedly suffered from mental illness for much of her life.

From accounts that have emerged since then, it appears that her accusers’ pecuniary interests sparked the confrontation that led to the vicious murder.

In Pakistan, we are all too aware of how mobs can be incited to frenzy by accusations of blasphemy. The savage lynching of Shama and Shahzad and the attack on Ahmadis’ homes last year, and the ransacking of Joseph Colony in 2013, are only among the more recent examples.

Worldly considerations lie at the heart of many blasphemy accusations, and the arrow of the blasphemy law is a handy weapon to achieve the objective.

Perhaps even more unfortunate are those incidents in which the trigger is an individual’s mental illness and his concomitant lack of control over his actions.

In 2012, a mentally unstable man accused of desecrating religious text was lynched by a crowd in Bahawalpur.

An elderly man diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia was sentenced to death under the blasphemy law last year. In such cases — far too many for comfort in anything resembling civilised society — the confluence of ‘faith’ and ignorance can be deadly.

Published in Dawn March 24th , 2015

__________________
"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!

Blocking channels?

CENSORSHIP in the name of regulating the media is the oldest of political tricks and it appears that the present government is not about to give up on its quest for a docile, easy-to-manipulate media in the country.

As revealed in this newspaper yesterday, the federal government is considering an amendment to the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority Act, 2007, that would allow the electronic media regulator to interfere with or block the satellite signal of a particular TV news channel.

Effectively, that would mean no cable operator would be able to broadcast the particular news channel that Pemra wants to block at any given moment and that no direct-to-home customer (those with what are colloquially known as dish antennae) would be able to access the channel either.

If that were not disturbing enough, the government plans to enlist the help of Suparco to ensure the instantaneous blackout of a news channel.

All of that to what end? According to Pemra officials, the aim, in addition to the usual complaints about glorification of terrorists and TV channels showing terrorism-related scenes that the state believes are unfit for public consumption, is to keep other so-called objectionable and unwanted content off air.

This includes, rather astonishingly, blanking out the speeches of political leaders if necessary — presumably a thinly veiled reference to the MQM’s relationship with the media in Karachi, where a number of TV news channels are headquartered.

That is truly dangerous territory, whatever the need to ensure a healthier relationship between the media and the political party that dominates Karachi.

If regulating political speeches is deemed so necessary, then why doesn’t the government start with its own state-run news channels, which routinely broadcast lengthy speeches and everyday news conferences of the PML-N hierarchy?

But even if the government were to free state-run media from the yoke of state control that still would not make even a borderline case for making news channels unavailable to viewers on the basis of what the state determines they ought to hear and see.

Surely, in 2015, given all that the state has inflicted on society over the years, especially in the dark days of a state monopoly over the dissemination of news and information, there ought to be an immediate and total rejection of anything done in the name of censoring so-called unwanted and objectionable content.

Where there is a need for regulation — and the freewheeling nature of TV news in particular here does call for some sensible and principled regulation of the industry — it should be done in a manner that never gives the state the ability to pull the plug on the media and cause a TV news blackout nationally in seconds.

Consider what that power would mean during, say, demonstrations such as the anti-government protests last year in Islamabad or during another military intervention. Such power would be antithetical to the public interest.

China bank

THE Obama administration might have made a mistake in opposing China’s venture into multilateral lending, and is now standing more isolated than the country they sought to isolate.

One by one, countries have lined up to become part of the endeavour called the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, while the United States is alone in cautioning that the China-led initiative threatens to undermine the World Bank.

It is not clear why the US would want to believe that the World Bank ought to be the only multilateral lending agency dealing in infrastructure and social sector schemes, or that the Asian Development Bank is not being mentioned.

The world is a big place and there is plenty of room for other multilateral agencies to complement each others’ work. The head of the IMF and the government of Australia are the latest to add their voices of support to the venture. Clearly, they saw that there was little sense in opposing the AAIB.

There is even less sense in regarding the prospect of a Chinese move in multilateral infrastructure lending as some sort of a boon for Pakistan. It remains to be seen how the Chinese will deal with the problem of chronic users of their resources, and how they will approach the question of internal reform and conditionality-based lending.

Multilateral lending is a tricky game. Nobody wants to underwrite the economic dysfunctions of another forever, but urging the borrower to introduce reform brings the lender into the internal affairs of another country, something that the Chinese had been averse to until now.

As evidence of the deliberate and measured pace of movement, the Chinese have agreed to forego a veto in the bank, a move that was critical to win the support of the European countries.

The painstaking attention being given to governance issues these days is another indication that the bank is likely to be a more serious multilateral enterprise, and not an arm of Beijing’s foreign policy as the US has implied.

They are looking to not exercise the kind of power within the institution that the US has exercised at the IMF since its founding. It would be a mistake to underestimate the depth of the commitment that the Chinese are bringing to this enterprise.

It would also be a mistake to try and isolate them in the process. But equally it would be a mistake to regard the venture as some sort of big opportunity opening up for Pakistan.

Aug 11 speech in textbooks

THEY are among the most well-known words spoken by Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Uttered on Aug 11, 1947, they are often quoted by those seeking to reiterate that the founder of this nation envisaged it as a country where religion and state would be entirely separate from each other.

“You are free, you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or any other place of worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed — that has nothing to do with the business of the State….” he said in that address.

The decision by the Sindh government to include the speech in its entirety in the school curriculum is a laudable one, for the Pakistani state through the years has made religion very much its business — often with distressing results.

Official patronage of right-wing elements has led to a situation where religious extremism has become an ever-present spectre, fracturing society along the fault lines of faith. Its impact is even being felt in Sindh, the cradle of a benign and inclusive Sufi tradition.

While Sindh has taken the lead in reclaiming its pluralistic heritage through the classroom — much of its primary school curriculum has been purged of divisive, prejudiced material — the other provinces would do well to emulate its example.

However, political considerations and/or lack of courage in the face of regressive pressure groups have so far either stymied curriculum reforms or resulted in an ideological slant being reintroduced in certain textbooks.

Curriculum reform is vital to a long-term directional change in mindset and thereby to the promotion of a consolidated anti-extremism narrative in the country. Inculcating tolerance and appreciation of religious diversity is part and parcel of the latter.

To that end, school curricula should also consider including chapters on eminent personalities from minority communities. Broadening their minds will work to ensure that young Pakistanis of today will be the standard-bearers of a more moderate Pakistan tomorrow.


Published in Dawn, March 25th, 2015

__________________
"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!