Crisis conference
THERE is growing public weariness over the relentless bickering among our civilian leadership. Nearly every indicator of our social, political and economic health has been pointing firmly south for months.
To top it off, the resurgence of terrorist attacks now threatens a return of the darkest period of our long and bloody struggle against violent ideological extremism. Yet, nothing seems to give.
Acknowledging the severity of the challenges, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif recently called for a multiparty conference on Feb 7 to discuss the various crises facing Pakistan. Significantly, an invitation was also extended to PTI chairman Imran Khan to join the discussion.
Mr Sharif had also invited the PTI to send two representatives to a meeting of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa apex committee held in Peshawar on Friday. His goodwill gesture, however, seems to have been spurned.
The PTI later said the Gilgit-Baltistan chief minister and the Azad Kashmir prime minister had represented it in the Peshawar moot, instead of its usual representatives, as the invitation had been received late. Even later, the party made it clear that Mr Khan at least will not be showing up for the Feb 7 conference.
The PTI said it cannot engage with the PDM government while the latter cracks down against it in pursuit of a political vendetta. “It is the responsibility of the government to [first] create an environment [conducive to] national unity,” one leader said on Twitter. No doubt, the government’s recent excesses against PTI politicians must be roundly condemned.
Nevertheless, it is crucial to have the input of all parties and the PTI should rethink its stance on the Feb 7 sit-down, considering that it too has a responsibility with regard to the nation’s affairs whether or not it remains in government.
Meanwhile, the bickering continued. PM Sharif on Friday once again questioned why more funds were not spent by the governments in KP on countering terrorism over the last 13 years and took veiled shots at the PTI for wanting to resettle terrorists but refusing to work with other parties for the country’s future.
Mr Khan hit back, tweeting that he does not accept the PDM government as it was “imposed” on the country “through conspiracy and horse trading” and asked how PM Sharif could be “so shameless” as to “allow terrorism to spread under his nose”.
At a time when the enemy is seeking to capitalise on the chaos within our ranks, this was the worst possible that could be expected of our leadership. If Mr Khan himself does not wish to attend the Tuesday conference, so be it.
However, other PTI leaders must do so. Refusing to engage with the government in such testing times will only be taken as a sign of ideological bankruptcy.
Published in Dawn, February 4th, 2023
Revenge politics
A SENSE of déjà-vu prevails as cases pile up against PTI politicians, many of whom, along with their allies and other PDM critics, are being detained. The latest crackdown started with the arrest of Fawad Chaudhry for allegedly criticising the institutions. Then came the turn of AML chief Sheikh Rashid, who was arrested for accusing PPP leader Asif Zardari of plotting former PM Imran Khan’s murder. Meanwhile, a sedition case was registered against PTI’s Shandana Gulzar, for ‘spreading hatred’ against the institutions. The third arrest was of PDM critic Imran Riaz Khan — a court later ordered his release — also over hate speech accusations.
These arrests and cases against government critics follow the playbook of the PTI when it was in government. Arresting critics, opponents, journalists and dissenters over serious charges like sedition was the hallmark of the PTI regime, which this paper vociferously condemned. Unfortunately, little seems to have changed. The PDM parties protested the treatment meted out to them when in opposition, likening it to a political witch-hunt, but now have resorted to the same excessive force and underhanded tactics. Such tit-for-tat behaviour is expected only of the immature — it certainly has no justification in the world of national politics. The PDM government is perpetuating the same vicious, unjust cycle of treating opponents like common criminals, parading them in handcuffs and surprising them with night-time raids. This pettiness must come to an end. At a time when the government and opposition are required to sit together to address the grave threat posed by terrorists, such vindictiveness is counterproductive. PDM politicians may feel that PTI leaders and those associated with them are getting a taste of their own medicine, but the best revenge, as a wise man once said, is not to be like one’s enemy. Saner elements in the PML-N, such as Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, have publicly spoken against such arrests, and should urge their leaders to think twice before continuing with this viciousness. When in power, Imran Khan claimed that law enforcement was doing its job, and even ‘blamed’ some of the arrests and harassment of journalists on the intel agencies. The PDM cannot hide behind the agencies and get pliant LEAs to do its bidding, otherwise there will be no end to this politics of revenge and Pakistan will continue to cement its reputation as a banana republic.
Published in Dawn, February 4th, 2023
Inappropriate remarks
OFFICIALS of the state, especially when representing the country at international forums, need to choose their words carefully, and not make sweeping generalisations that are clearly offensive. It appears that Pakistan’s ambassador to the UN Munir Akram spoke without much forethought when he recently made regrettable remarks about the Pakhtun community during a session of the multilateral body in New York. While speaking on the situation in Afghanistan under Taliban rule, the veteran diplomat said that the restrictions placed by the hard-line group come “from a peculiar cultural perspective of the Pakhtun culture which requires women to be kept at home” while adding that this “reality … has not changed for hundreds of years”. A senior official with Mr Akram’s experience should have known better than to make such inappropriate remarks, even though he later backtracked and said he meant no disrespect to the Pakhtun culture.
Firstly, describing the Taliban — Afghan or Pakistani — as representatives of Pakhtun culture is incorrect. The Pakhtun community has a rich history, while the Taliban are largely the by-products of modern geopolitics mixed with extremist ideology. Moreover, in this part of the world, people belonging to all ethnolinguistic groups have been attracted to fundamentalist ideology, which was nurtured and weaponised during the Cold War, and extremism is certainly not limited to members of the Pakhtun community. If anything, many Afghan, including Pakhtun, women want to pursue education, which the obscurantists ruling Afghanistan are cruelly denying them. A senior diplomat such as Mr Akram should know that militancy and obscurantism were promoted in both Afghanistan and Pakistan during the Afghan jihad, and are not in any way linked to Pakhtun culture. In fact, if there is indeed a strong current of conservatism in parts of KP, our state has contributed to this situation as before the merger of the former tribal districts, the state did little to bring modern education and infrastructure to erstwhile Fata.
Published in Dawn, February 4th, 2023.