President General Pervez Musharraf’s press briefing (20th November) was one with a difference. It was more of an animated interaction than a monologue a conventional press conference generally is. Short on the number of invitees, it had been fairly long on substance touching upon practically all the burning issues facing the nation without an early and easy answer in sight.

In an almost three-hour pre- and post-Iftar session rounded off by a dinner, the President fielded questions with as much clarity of verbiage as transparency of intent. However, every question answered spawned yet another question and this would go on. For the volatile and unpredictable state Pakistan has been in, almost defies clear-cut, clinical answers.

Pakistan, the President said, was “at the crossroads”. Depending on how one tackled the various challenges and tasks ahead, the country could go up or down over time. There were ‘immense’ possibilities and opportunities as well as an immense threat of ‘marginalization.’

It would be hard to find a better word than ‘marginalization’ to sum up the daunting fate that might well be ours in the world community should we fail to put our house in order. Short of being driven out of the community of important countries, we would be reduced to the status of a non-entity with little or no role to play in world affairs.

A sorry state of affairs in spite of our natural locus as a geopolitical hub. Pakistan, the president said, was recognized as the ‘hub’ vis-a-vis Afghanistan and Central Asia, the future Middle East in possession of gas and oil reserves as yet largely untapped. For a full and fruitful exploitation of our importance as a geopolitical hub, however, internal stability, harmony and security mattered more than anything else.

He went on to stress that Pakistan faced no ‘external threat.’ This was obviously not so much to deny the existence of the ‘external threat’ as to emphasize the gravity of the insidious internal threat. Once internal stability was ensured, external challenges could be met and overcome with full confidence and force.

Inter-provincial disharmony and frictions posed the greatest threat to the very fabric of the state and national unity. Such mundane and technical issues as the building (or not building) of dams are ‘politicized’ to delay vital decision-making. The development of the Gwadar port and the contribution of the coastal highway, two of the ambitious projects in hand, are viewed with unwarranted suspicion and mistrust as assets potentially to benefit the Punjabis. A wholly absurd perception.

The government also had in hand projects like the construction of the national and the Indus highways and the motorway. He sounded very upbeat about the ‘economic indicators’ supporting his ‘vision’ of future economic prosperity. He exuded optimism regarding the future of the country as a model of economic development.

What seemed to provoke and disturb the President most was the spectre of religious extremism and sectarianism. Talibanization of Pakistan would not be tolerated in any shape or form. Sectarian killings on the pretext of serving the cause of Islam made for the worst kind of lawlessness. Using mosques to preach sectarian hatred was the worst kind of disservice one could do to Islam.

The on-going army action in the tribal areas of the NWFP is only against trouble-makers especially the Arabs and the Chechens out to destabilize Pakistan. Army and Frontier Corps units are deployed in strength along 2000-km of Pakistan-Afghan border to root out the Taliban and Al-Qaeda remnants in tribal areas.

The President denounced press reports about Taliban roaming around in Quetta and Chaman and challenged reporters to prove it. His government had been in effective control of the border areas and kept a close vigil on the activities of the trouble-makers, be they Taliban or the Al-Qaeda elements. The consequences of the loss of effective control over those elements and check on their activities could be horrendous for Pakistan. It could lead to the imposition of sanctions on Pakistan by the European Union and the US. The loss of textile exports to the EU alone could cost well over a billion dollars. Uncontrolled cross-border escapades of Afghan malcontents fleeing for life or regrouping in Pakistan might even lead to aerial bombardment of Pakistani territory by the US (as in Tora-Borah, Kandhar etc).

Though well handled by the President, questions relating to the incidence of religious extremism/sectarianism and absence of ‘external threat’, still kept staring one in the face. If sectarianism is as great a threat as the President rightly thinks it is, what is being done to curb and eradicate it at its source remains open to question. Apart from the panoply of religion-oriented programmes in the electronic and print media — Na’at khwani, sermonizing etc. — their loud echoes are heard even at the arrival/departure lounges of major airports. These would be enough to give a wrong message to newly arriving foreign passengers. Shouldn’t something be done to dispense with the practice without undue delay? I don’t remember having heard or seen such programmes at the Dubai, Abu Dhabi airports. Unless the problem is attacked at the source, it would stay.

As for his observation about Pakistan not being under external threat, it would seem to call for a clearer definition of national security and defence whether as a wholly military or an essentially national concern. It’s one thing to give people good news but quite another to administer them a placebo.

The writer is a retired brigadier of the Pakistan army