A commendable initiative

THE launch of a new industrial estate near Multan as part of the Punjab government’s initiative for backward rural areas is a welcome step towards sustainable development. Spread over an area of 670 acres, the estate is estimated to generate some 100,000 jobs on completion. It is good that the Punjab government has decided to make loans available to potential investors at half the regular mark-up offered by banks to help set up small industrial units. Southern Punjab is the traditional stronghold of big landlords presiding over an impoverished people who out of desperation have perforce been migrating to big cities in search of a livelihood. Many can ill afford even a meal a day back in the hinterland; others head for Karachi, for instance, where they live under subhuman conditions in shantytowns, taking up odd jobs — without security or prospects — to eke out a living. Conditions prevailing in the underdeveloped western Punjab districts are no less depressing. The need now is to see the new industrialisation policy implemented without hindrance to bring the impoverished southern and western Punjab districts on a par with the relatively developed central Punjab.

If continued as promised, the new initiative will also help accelerate the pace of social change. It is in this feudal belt that a plethora of primitive tribal practices and customs hold sway; among these are parallel and twisted justice systems run through illegal panchayats headed by tyrants posing as self-proclaimed tribal elders. Reports in recent years have brought to light the cruel and inhuman punishments such panchayats have inflicted on those suspected of challenging the prevailing, unjust social order. ‘Errant’ women have been sentenced to be raped — Mukhtaran Mai’s is but one such case — and paraded naked down the streets; minor girls are married off to settle blood feuds; bonded labour and honour killings are common evils; private jails and torture cells run by area influentials are a fact of life. Landlords routinely block efforts to build roads and schools in their isolated but vast ‘territories’ dotted with forsaken hamlets. The prevalence of all such vices and the law of the jungle reigning supreme are arguably linked to the insulation of the feudal/tribal communities from the norms of a society based on the rule of law and civilised behaviour.

These conditions are not confined to the feudal/tribal belt of Punjab alone. Neighbouring districts in Sindh and Balochistan and the tribal areas bordering the Frontier province suffer from similar primitive practices. The other three provinces should emulate the example set by Punjab by formulating and implementing a policy aimed at opening up their underdeveloped rural hinterland to industrialisation. This should form the basis of a national poverty alleviation programme, with the federal government financially assisting the provinces that cannot pursue a similar policy because of their limited resources. But for any meaningful social change to come about, besides promoting industrialisation in the rural areas, the government must also provide for setting up the necessary infrastructure to give access to health, education and justice to a people who have suffered feudal tyranny and exploitation for long. This is the only way to stop the massive migration of the rural poor to the big cities, which in turn creates many civic, social as well as law and order problems in the overcrowded urban centres.

Kargil: need for a probe

MORE than seven years after the Kargil crisis rocked South Asia, it remains a mystery on this side of the border. Normally, there should have been two versions — the Pakistani and the Indian. The Indian version is known to us: many Indians, civilians and retired generals, have written about it from both political and military points of view and in the process have sought to establish the truth behind what for the Indians was initially a shock. Later, the Indian government appointed a four-member committee to determine what caused the debacle from their point of view, especially the failure of the Indian intelligence to get wind of Pakistan’s plans to move into the Kargil heights. Establishing the truth on the Indian side was easy, because there was only one party that was in overall command and that was the civilian government; the military merely carried the orders. On this side of the border, however, the task of ascertaining the truth is difficult because there were two centres of power. President Pervez Musharraf has all along insisted that all parties, including the civilian authority, were on board. However, Mr Nawaz Sharif, who was then prime minister, insists that he was kept in the dark, and that the army planned the operations on its own. The publication of two books — Mr Sharif’s Ghaddar Kaun and the general’s In the Line of Fire — have only made the confusion worse confounded, with the truth being a major casualty. This only strengthens the need for an impartial inquiry into the misadventure that Kargil was.

The people should know whose brainchild it was, what exactly was the broad strategic aim behind what in isolation appeared to be an astute tactical operation and, finally, what led to the retreat. The military blames the withdrawal from the heights on a prime minister who had succumbed to American pressure; Mr Sharif insists that the army pleaded with him to seek American intercession to ensure a Kargil ceasefire. Let the government appoint a retired judge of the Supreme Court to hold a thorough investigation and let the nation know the truth about Kargil.

Polio cases in the NWFP

THAT a sixth case of polio has been detected in the NWFP this year does not bode well for the country’s commitment to eradicate polio. As it is, Pakistan has fallen behind the 2005 deadline it had committed itself to. While the country made substantial progress in reducing cases of polio in the last few years, lapses in the NWFP are a cause for concern and require a more aggressive campaign against the disease. What is especially worrisome is that some of the children said to have contracted polio were vaccinated against the crippling disease. This could perhaps mean that the vaccines were not kept in proper conditions, thus affecting their efficacy. Another frustrating problem in the NWFP is parents’ suspicions about the vaccination programme itself. Local clerics have compounded the problem by warning parents against the vaccination, terming it a western conspiracy against Islam. That health officials haven’t been able to remove such misapprehensions shows how much more needs to be done in spreading awareness about the dangers of polio. This is especially true of Bannu where the newest case of polio, said to have originated in neighbouring Afghanistan, has been found.

The World Health Organization has identified families’ refusal to administer polio vaccines to their children as a hurdle in the way of eradicating polio. The health authorities should work with WHO to tackle such problems by removing any misgivings and should consider enlisting female health workers to lead the anti-polio drive in this largely conservative province. An intensive immunisation campaign specific to areas like Bannu and Dir, which have had a number of polio cases, needs to be carried out in right earnest. Of equal importance is the need to ensure the potency of the vaccination so that its effectiveness is not impaired or neutralised.

The dictates of Uncle Sam

RICHARD Armitage says he did not, in the immediate aftermath of the events of September 11, 2001, threaten that the US would bomb Pakistan “back to the Stone Age” if Islamabad made the slightest fuss about bowing to Washington’s dictates.

He does not, however, deny that he “had a very strong conversation with the intelligence chief”, during which he told ISI director General Mahmoud Ahmed that “Pakistan was either with us or against us”.

It is, of course, immaterial whether or not he threw in the Stone Age reference. It may well have been invented by Mahmoud Ahmed or Musharraf to convey the gist of America’s uncompromising attitude at the time. The minor controversy stirred by Musharraf’s decision to bring up the matter during his US visit has provoked greater interest in his autobiography, which suggests the stunt has served its purpose.

But while the timing of the “revelation” may have been unexpected, it is difficult to fathom the expressions of surprise and/or alarm it has elicited from various quarters.

George W. Bush claims he had no idea that any such warning was issued, and it isn’t hard to believe him. He is not, by a long stretch, the best-informed US president, but even if he was, it would still have been unrealistic to expect him to be familiar with the wording of every threat issued by his underlings, particularly in the wake of 9/11.

Armitage, the former US Navy Seal who was deputy secretary of state at the time, is certainly capable of expressing himself in robust terms: his appearance complements his take-no-prisoners approach to diplomacy. He may indeed have used different words, but he must have made sure their meaning was painfully clear to Mahmoud Ahmed, whose Taliban sympathies were well known. Armitage’s boss was Colin Powell, who recalls: “We gave them a list of things we wanted Pakistan to do, which essentially required Pakistan to completely reverse its policy with respect to the Taliban.”

Required is right. It has long been accepted wisdom that Pakistan had little choice at the time other than to comply with American wishes. Apart, perhaps, from a handful of senior US officials, no one can say with certainty what the consequences would have been of Pakistan refusing to play ball, but they would not have been pleasant and may well have been disastrous. The MMA’s Qazi Hussain Ahmed is therefore being either disingenuous or naive when he says that instead of buckling, Musharraf should have “taken the nation into confidence” and resisted the pressure, a la Iran. Likewise, the PML-N’s Iqbal Zafar Jhagra appears to be addressing matters beyond his level of competence when he suggests that Pakistan’s military supremo should have talked to the US “like the leader of a nuclear power”.

What exactly is that supposed to mean? Should Musharraf, when his nation was threatened with possible obliteration, have responded: “Don’t you dare, Uncle Sam, because if you try anything stupid, we’ll despatch a couple of our crude devices your way”? The merest mention of Pakistan’s nuclear capability in a hostile context would have invited an immediate attack on Kahuta.

Had Nawaz Sharif or Benazir Bhutto been at the helm in September 2001, chances are they would have responded to US demands in exactly the same manner as Musharraf did: without hesitation, and without too many quibbles. Their promise of cooperation could, however, have run into complications in the absence of an ability to control or countermand pro-Taliban elements in the army, and particularly in the ISI.

This is not intended as an advertisement for military rule, which over the decades has contributed generously to Pakistan’s woes; it’s also worth remembering that although the Sharif and Bhutto administrations were embarrassingly prone to ineptitude and corruption, they were at the same time undermined by the army’s refusal to completely relinquish power after Ziaul Haq’s dictatorship literally went up in smoke. Nonetheless, the fact remains that when the FBI purportedly came up with evidence that, shortly before 9/11, $100,000 had been wired to leading suicide pilot Mohammed Atta at the behest of Mahmoud Ahmed (who was also rumoured, on a mission to Kabul, to have advised the Taliban to remain unmoved in the face of US pressure), Musharraf was able to replace the ISI chief without provoking a putsch.

Periodic purges notwithstanding, it’s not very clear to what extent the army and its intelligence wing have been stripped of the obscurantist influences that were eagerly facilitated during the Zia era. In some circles, Pakistan continues to be referred to as Terrorism Central, and rumours persist of a surreptitious military role in aiding the Taliban.

Earlier this month, Gen Musharraf was quoted as telling the European Parliament’s foreign affairs committee that Pakistan had “paid a big price for being part of the coalition that fought the Soviet Union” in Afghanistan. He said: “Whatever extremism or terrorism is in Pakistan is a direct fallout of the 26 years of warfare and militancy around us... We launched a jihad, brought in mujahideen from all over the Muslim world, the US and the West and us together. We armed the Taliban and sent them in, we did it together. In 1989 everyone left Pakistan with 30,000 armed mujahideen...”

That’s a fair enough overview as far as it goes, but it doesn’t go far enough. It is important to remember that unlike the post-9/11 state of affairs, back in 1979-80 Pakistan was under no obligation to fall in line with western designs. It is uncertain whether Zia was aware that clandestine American efforts had played a crucial role in encouraging the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan, but in the back of my head there is a cringe-worthy memory of that disgusting dictator literally begging Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, to use Pakistan as a conduit for counter-revolution. Zia was desperately seeking legitimacy, and the US didn’t need to be asked twice.

Without Pakistan’s eager assistance, it would have been considerably harder for the US to bolster and sustain the mujahideen in their crusade against enlightenment. A similar arrangement with Iran would have been almost inconceivable at the time: although the ayatollahs perceived the Soviet Union as devilish, it wasn’t quite on a par with the US because of the latter’s relationship with the Shah. Nor, back then, was India quite willing to switch allegiances.

We can never know, of course, how Pakistan would have reacted had the democratic experiment initiated in 1971 not been so rudely interrupted — and circumstantial evidence suggests the interruption wasn’t exactly a non-aligned affair: the US was perceptibly uncomfortable with Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s independent streak.

Hence, although Musharraf is by no means mistaken in implicating the West in the circumstances that led to the present situation, it would help if he were more forthcoming about his predecessor’s momentous contribution to the imbroglio. He has had no qualms about criticising all three of the Bhutto eras as well as the Nawaz phases, but he has avoided any direct attacks on the rot spawned by the Zia administration. Besides, a clear idea of that deleterious phase in Pakistan’s history would probably have prevented him from appointing Zia’s progeny as his minister for, of all things, religious affairs.

Musharraf’s current sojourn in the US is of a piece with the choice Pakistan made shortly after its inception: the nation’s first prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan, managed to wrangle a prolonged trip out of the US after turning down a Soviet invitation. The trajectory of Pakistan’s international stature could have been remarkably different had Liaquat exhibited the sense to visit Moscow as well as Washington.

One can only hope that positive consequences will flow from Musharraf’s engagement with the Indian prime minister on the sidelines of the non-aligned summit in Havana, although it is painfully obvious that Pakistan is no more neutral today than it was back in 1979, when it was represented by Zia at a similar gathering in the Cuban capital.

Back in April, Musharraf told The Guardian that he wasn’t fighting extremism for the sake of the US or Britain: “It’s not a question of being a poodle,” he pointed out. “I’m no one’s poodle.” Apparently no one told Bush about this, because he went out of his way to stroke the general’s back during his joint press conference with the Pakistani leader last week, and he must be somewhat disappointed that the general’s book bears the title In the Line of Fire, that may not be inapt, but Musharraf could, instead, have opted for total honesty by reversing Ayub Khan’s fatuous posturing and calling his book Masters, Not Friends.

Last week ended with rumours that Osama bin Laden had succumbed to typhoid, while US intelligence agencies confirmed that the war in Iraq had helped exacerbate the terrorist threat. This week began with large numbers of people with confusing two kinds of power failure and equating Wapda’s stumble with Musharraf’s overthrow. The celebrations in Quetta were hardly surprising in the wake of Akbar Bugti’s murder, even though another coup is the last thing Pakistan needs.

There is too much darkness in the land already, even when the wattage is undimmed. Neither In the Line of Fire nor Musharraf’s protracted US tour will reduce the gloom. In the meanwhile, one would love to know whether foreign ministry spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam’s quote in this newspaper last Saturday — that “any terrorist action to be taken inside Pakistani territory would be taken by Pakistan” — was an editorial faux pas or a Freudian slip of Bushesque dimensions.

Email: worldviewster@gmail.com