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Sunday, July 08, 2007
EDITORIAL: Moment of reckoning for Musharraf, army and media
The Islamabad establishment has decided to go into denial over two incidents that were clearly linked to the operation against Lal Masjid: an abortive attempt to bring down the presidential aircraft in Rawalpindi, and the killing of a major and a lieutenant of the Pakistan army in Malakand.
On Friday, President General Pervez Musharrafs plane escaped getting hit when it flew over Rawalpindi after take-off from Chaklala airport. Three bearded men had fired at the plane with a sub-machine gun and an anti-aircraft gun from a house in Rawalpindi before fleeing, shouting Allah Akbar. Security personnel quickly located the house from where the shots had been fired and recovered a submachine gun, two anti-aircraft guns with tripods, and two satellite antennas.
The same day, four Pakistan Army troops, including a major and a lieutenant, were killed in an improvised explosive device (IED) attack on a military convoy in Malakand a stronghold of the banned Tehreek Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNFJ). The ISPR, however, denied that the attack was a reaction to the standoff with the Lal Masjid militants in Islamabad.
About the Rawalpindi attempt, the DG ISPR sounded quite certain. He said: The president was not in the aircraft which was targeted. However a message received from John D Negroponte, the second-senior most official of the US State Department, was less reticent about how narrowly the president had come to being brought down by terrorists.
The people around Malakand who saw the attack on the army convoy, were also less uncertain about who had done the deed. They told local journalists that the attack was a second challenge from the TNSM chief, Mullah Fazlullah, in Swat who had given a call to his supporters for jihad on his illegal FM radio channel following the action against two Lal Masjid mullahs and their supporters.
After the Lal Masjid siege, an attack was launched by the warlord of Khyber Agency on a military camp on Thursday. Six soldiers were killed in a suicide attack in Bannu, NWFP, near North Waziristan on Wednesday. Also on Wednesday, a police constable and four civilians were killed in a remote-controlled explosion in Mingora in the tribal areas.
It is quite clear that the breakaway satrapies of religious extremism fear action against them after Lal Masjid and are launching pre-emptive strikes. Why is the government scared of admitting this?
The operation against the recalcitrant mullahs of Lal Masjid was opposed by the establishment because it feared the seminarys links with the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Waziristan. It is quite possible that the analyses of the situation presented to the government warned of retaliation from the two outfits in various parts of the country if not a wholesale invasion of Islamabad with popular acclaim. The Lal Masjid duo of Aziz-Rashid had old Banuri Masjid links inherited from their father, which indicated their outreach into Waziristan.
Maulana Abdur Rashid Ghazi, who remains entrenched inside the Jamia Hafsa part of the Lal Masjid complex, too has been hinting at his contacts. For instance, two hours before the aircraft incident at Rawalpindi he had asked for a two-hour delay in decision-making over the siege. Later, the banned Jaish Muhammad was quoted in the press saying that their trained terrorists were inside the seminary with Rashid Ghazi but that Jaish had disowned them. TV channels also reported on the basis of intelligence sources that some Arabic-speaking terrorists may also be inside the madrassa, meaning that Al Qaeda too had a footprint there.
Islamabad is still unwilling to take on the forces of extremism. Is it afraid of a militant reaction elsewhere in the country on the eve of the oppositions APC in London? Is it worried of the possibility of inside support to the extremists?
Intelligence agencies are especially vulnerable to this after an ex-ISI officer, Khalid Khawaja, was discovered aiding and abetting the Lal Masjid rebels. Are some influential ex-ISI officers also on the other side?
There has been a sudden spike in the popularity of President Musharraf after the Lal Masjid siege. A PTV survey done on the basis of 5,337 text messages says 82.15 percent of the people endorse the governments handling of the siege so far. Since the operation was the work of President Musharraf, this is clearly a yes-vote for him after a period of unpopularity. But the ruling PML is scared of taking on elements it has happily cohabitated with so far. Indeed, the cabinet is non-committal and is inclined to leave the president standing alone. No wonder so many people think that the Lal Masjid affair is more a big distraction engineered by the president than a manifestation of extremism.
Under the circumstances, it should therefore come as no surprise that the media, which has so far approved of the governments firm but patient handling of the crisis, may now inadvertently start to build public pressure on the government to accept Maulanas Ghazis demands and allow safe passage to the extremists so that the innocent women and children hostages are safe. What signal will that send to other would-be terrorists? That if they fail in their violent objectives, they can always get safe passage and live to fight another day?
Given the rapidly spreading extremism in the country, this is a moment of reckoning for President Musharraf, the Pakistan army and the Pakistan media in the short term and for the country in the longer term. *
SECOND EDITORIAL: Nawaz Sharifs lota problem
According to a report, the PMLN chief, Mr Nawaz Sharif, is seriously considering taking a novel public oath of allegiance from all candidates aspiring for PMLN tickets in the next elections. His new formula will oblige all candidates to hold public meetings in their areas and undergo a pro-forma oath taking. The oath is said to go like this: As God is my witness, I will not turn a lota. The ceremony will be filmed and kept as record.
Lota is the term used for politicians who abandon a party when they see it going down, either after a military takeover or an electoral defeat. Lota-ism also takes place inside parliament through what is called floor-crossing. Mr Sharifs party had a history of the lota syndrome but in the 1990s it reached new heights when the Punjab assembly majority turned lota twice in short order. Mr Sharif thinks that the PMLQ in power today is nothing but a lota version of his party. That is why it appears that this time he is not longer prepared to accept any repentant lotas back into the party. *
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