Cant Skirt Pakistan

Indian Express , August 29, 2007

Within days of celebrating the 60th anniversary of Pakistan’s emergence as an independent country, Pakistanis have been repeatedly reminded of the limitations of their independence.

The pursuit of grandiose strategy by politicised generals at the expense of internal strength has so compromised Pakistan that many key decisions are taken only after the intervention of foreign actors.

And under General Musharraf’s rule, the tendency to look towards outsiders for settling essentially domestic political issues has expanded to a point where nothing seems to be a purely internal affair of Pakistan any more.

Musharraf allowed former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to go into exile only after a vague agreement guaranteed by an unnamed international personality. It didn’t matter to the general that barring a citizen of Pakistan from returning home under an agreement with a foreign national lacked any legal basis, a fact attested to by Pakistan’s Supreme Court.

There is something clearly wrong with the thinking of Pakistan’s military-intelligence complex that finds it easier to negotiate domestic policy through rich foreign potentates instead of adopting a policy of reconciliation with Pakistanis for the sake of Pakistan.

In the aftermath of 9/11, after an admonition from the United States — ‘Are you with us or against us?’ — Musharraf turned around Pakistan’s mistaken policy of supporting Afghanistan’s Taliban. For several years before the fateful 2001 terrorist attack on New York’s World Trade Centre, quite a few patriotic Pakistanis who had warned about the dangers of Talibanisation had been condemned as alarmists or traitors by Pakistan’s establishment.

Musharraf woke up to the peril of religious extremism only when US officials threatened his regime with dire consequences, in addition to promising billions of dollars in aid.

And again, Pakistan was recently saved from the imposition of a state of emergency after a midnight phone call from US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Although opposition to emergency has been widespread within Pakistan, clearly it does not carry the same weight as the same advice coming from senior American officials.

General Musharraf’s off and on negotiations with Benazir Bhutto, leader of Pakistan’s largest national political party, are also said to have materialised only after encouragement from Britain and the US. Bhutto has in exile for about a decade. Although many liberal Pakistanis have criticised Bhutto for negotiating with a military dictator, she continues to refuse to accept Musharraf’s right to rule in uniform and appears willing only to work out a settlement that reverts Pakistan to democracy.

Transition to democracy in an orderly manner requires some personal concessions from Musharraf. But even at this stage of widespread unpopularity and lack of domestic legitimacy, Musharraf does not seem to be negotiating with the opposition in good faith.

The regime’s negotiating position with Bhutto has changed several times, and settled issues have been regularly reopened and promises not kept. Once again, the general seems to be trying to buy time and to confuse and divide his opponents. Instead of treating his critics as enemies, Musharraf should look upon them as Pakistanis deserving of respect in view of popular support.

Their claims to monopoly over patriotism notwithstanding, each one of Pakistan’s military dictators has shown greater willingness to listen to foreign voices of influence than to heed the opinions of Pakistan’s own thinkers or politicians.

Pakistan’s internal issues can best be resolved through national discourse that takes into account international opinion but does not let external players lead the way. The Pakistani establishment’s willingness to negotiate with foreigners while refusing to compromise with the country’s own leaders diminishes Pakistan’s sovereignty. Pakistan’s establishment needs to rethink its inability to maintain dialogue with the country’s key political actors while allowing foreigners to negotiate domestic political issues.

How to Serve Pakistan Better

Gulf News, August 29, 2007

Within days of celebrating the 60th anniversary of Pakistan’s emergence as an independent country, Pakistanis have been repeatedly reminded of the limitations of their independence.

The pursuit of grandiose strategy by politicised generals at the expense of internal strength has so compromised Pakistan that many of its key decisions are taken only after the intervention of foreign actors.

Every now and then Pakistan’s foreign office warns foreign powers to desist from interfering in Pakistan’s internal affairs.
But under General Pervez Musharraf’s rule, the tendency to look towards outsiders in settling essentially domestic political issues has expanded to a point where nothing seems to be a purely internal affair of Pakistan any more.

Musharraf allowed former prime minister Nawaz Sharif to go into exile only after a vague agreement guaranteed by an unnamed international personality.

It did not matter to the general that barring a citizen of Pakistan from returning home under an agreement with a foreign national lacked any legal basis, a fact now attested to by Pakistan’s Supreme Court.

There is something clearly wrong with the thinking of Pakistan’s military-intelligence complex that finds it easier to negotiate about domestic policy through rich foreign potentates without being willing to adopt a policy of reconciliation with Pakistanis for the sake of Pakistan.

In the aftermath of 9/11, Musharraf turned around Pakistan’s mistaken policy of supporting Afghanistan’s Taliban after a “Are you with us or against us?” admonition from the United States.

Billions in aid

For several years before the fateful 2001 terrorist attack on New York’s World Trade Center, quite a few patriotic Pakistanis had warned about the dangers of Talibanisation only to be condemned as alarmists or traitors by Pakistan’s establishment.

Musharraf woke up to the peril of religious extremism only when US officials threatened his regime with dire consequences in addition to promising billions of dollars in aid.

Pakistan was recently saved from the imposition of a state of emergency after a midnight phone call from US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Although opposition to imposition of emergency has been widespread within Pakistan, the opinion at home quite clearly does not carry the same weight as the same advice coming from senior American officials.

Musharraf’s off and on negotiations with Benazir Bhutto, the leader of Pakistan’s largest national political party, are also said to have materialised only after encouragement from Britain and the United States.

Bhutto has been out of power for a decade and in exile for most of those years. Her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, spent eight and a half years in prison without a conviction on charges several of which do not even qualify for such long imprisonment under law.

One cannot fault Bhutto for mobilising international support to seek a way out of an impasse that has forced her to live in exile with the sword of legal proceedings dangling without end.

Although many liberal Pakistanis have criticised Bhutto for negotiating with a military dictator, and some have accused her of doing so only in self interest, her stance makes sense.
Bhutto continues to refuse to accept Musharraf’s right to rule in uniform and appears willing only to work out a settlement that reverts Pakistan to democracy.

Transition

Transition to democracy in an orderly manner requires some personal concessions to Musharraf, who would lead Pakistan into a deeper political quagmire if he sees the immediate future as the end of the road for himself.

But even at this stage of widespread unpopularity and lack of domestic legitimacy, Musharraf does not seem to be negotiating with the opposition in good faith.

Not only has the regime’s negotiating position with Bhutto changed several times, settled issues have been regularly reopened and promises not kept.

Once again, the general seems to be trying to buy time and to confuse and divide his opponents. Instead of treating his critics as enemies, Musharraf should look upon them as Pakistanis deserving of respect in view of their popular support.

Their claims to monopoly over patriotism notwithstanding, each one of Pakistan’s military dictators has shown greater willingness to listen to foreign voices of influence than to heed the opinions of Pakistan’s own thinkers or politicians.

Pakistan’s internal issues can be best be resolved through national discourse that takes into account international opinion but does not let external players lead the way.

The Pakistani establishment’s willingness to negotiate with foreigners while refusing to compromise with the country’s own leaders diminishes Pakistan’s sovereignty.

Pakistan’s establishment needs to rethink its inability to maintain dialogue with the country’s key political actors while allowing foreigners to negotiate domestic political issues.

Tolerance and Tradition in Turkey

Turkey, the first secular republic with a majority Muslim population, is expected to soon have a president who prays in public and whose wife wears a headscarf as a manifestation of her religious convictions. Anti-religious secularists in the Muslim world see this development as a threat to Turkey’s laicism. But it could also be an opportunity to define secularism in the Muslim world as a political system ensuring separation of theology and state rather than as an anti-religious ideology.

For almost a century, secular elites in Muslim countries have equated secularization with renunciation of Islamic symbols and practices. This rejection of traditional religion was initially a reaction to the efforts of Muslim clerics to enforce Islam by law. But the radical secularism of authoritarian regimes, such as that of the shah of Iran, has contributed to the rise and expansion of Islamist radicalism. Islamists portray their religion as being in danger; the exclusion of practicing Muslims from the power structure in majority Muslim states helps the Islamists build that argument.

The threat to secularism in the Muslim world comes from religious intolerance, not from individual acts of piety. Turkey’s election of a conservative Muslim president need not be seen as a deviation from its secular ideals. It is a much-needed embrace of a path different from that of radical Islam as well as radical secularism.

The Justice and Development Party (known by its Turkish initials, AK), led by Prime Minister Recip Tayyip Erdogan, won parliamentary polls in July with 47 percent of the popular vote and a clear majority of seats in the Grand National Assembly. This was a significant improvement over the 34 percent share of the vote it won in 2002 – an election that first brought the conservative party with Islamist roots to power.

The elections last month were called earlier than scheduled because of an inconclusive presidential vote in April, when, the AK Party’s nominee for president, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, faced severe opposition from Turkey’s secular establishment led by the military. Gul’s election was blocked by technical maneuvers backed by the outgoing president and top army generals, notwithstanding the AK Party’s majority in Parliament.

This time around, the party has again nominated Gul for president and, given the recent resounding popular mandate for AK Party, the army might not be able to block his election short of an improbable military coup.

Although the AK Party grew out of a succession of Islamist parties banned by Turkish courts, it describes itself as a moderate conservative party rather than an Islamist one. It does not seek the enforcement of Shariah law, and its performance in office during its first term confirms its claims.

Although both Erdogan and Gul are practicing Muslims who were once active in the Islamist movement, their first stint in office reflected an effort to distance themselves from Islamist politics. Under Erdogan, Turkey pursued European Union membership, maintained close ties with the United States and Israel, and attained new levels of economic prosperity.

The AK Party government has not curtailed civil liberties and continues to observe the basic tenets of secularism by keeping religion out of its political decisions. In the post-9/11 world, Islamist parties and leaders in several countries have become instant converts to moderation. The AK Party’s critics insist that it has changed only strategically and that it would revert to demanding Shariah rule if and when it gets a chance.

Such fears must be weighed only in light of available evidence, and so far the evidence favors AK Party’s credentials as a religiously conservative party willing to operate within the broad principles of secularism.

For too long, the Muslim world has been polarized between secularists who want all public manifestations of Islamic religion banished from their countries and Islamists who insist on reverting to obscurantist theocracy.

This polarization cannot come to an end without secularists tolerating the practice of religion and Islamists moving away from radical Islam to a middle where individuals can be Islamic even though the state is secular.

As in the West, Muslims need to be able to fuse faith and enlightenment while also accepting the rights of unbelievers.

Under a Gul presidency, Turkey will hopefully continue to combine tolerance with tradition. This would open the way for secularism in the Islamic world that concerns itself with protecting individual freedom and pluralism instead of being preoccupied with debates over issues such as headscarves.

 This op-ed originally appeared in the International Herald Tribune.

Why the World Must Look at Turkey

Indian Express , August 22, 2007

Turkey’s forthcoming presidential election offers an opportunity to define secularism in the Muslim world as a political system ensuring separation of theology and state rather than as an anti-religious ideology.

For almost a century, secular elites in Muslim countries have equated progress and modernity with renunciation of Islamic symbols and practices. Now Turkey, the first secular republic with a majority Muslim population, is expected to elect a president who prays in public and whose wife wears a headscarf as a manifestation of her religious convictions.

Anti-religious secularists see this development as a threat to Turkey’s laicite. Those who realise that separating religion from matters of state does not necessarily mean taking religion out of people’s lives, see Turkey as choosing a path away from radical Islam as well as radical secularism.

The Adalat va Kalkinma Partisi (AKP) or Justice and Development Party, led by Prime Minister Recip Tayyip Erdogan, won July’s parliamentary polls with 47 per cent of the popular vote and a clear majority of seats in the Grand National Assembly. This was a significant improvement on AKP’s 34 per cent vote share in 2002 that first brought the conservative party with Islamist roots to power.

The polls were called earlier than scheduled because of an inconclusive presidential election in April. Then, AKP’s nominee for president, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, faced severe opposition from Turkey’s secular establishment led by the country’s army. Gul’s election was blocked by technical maneouvres backed by the outgoing president and top army generals, notwithstanding AKP’s majority in Parliament.

This time around, AKP has again nominated Gul for president and, given the recent resounding popular mandate for AKP, the army might not be able to block his election short of an improbable military coup.

Although AKP grew out of a succession of Islamist parties banned by Turkish courts, it describes itself as a moderate conservative party rather than an Islamist one. It does not seek the enforcement of Islamic law, and its performance in office during its first term confirms its claims.

Although both Erdogan and Gul are practicing Muslims who were once active in the Islamist movement, their first stint in office reflected an effort to distance themselves from Islamist politics. Under Erdogan, Turkey pursued European Union membership, kept close ties with the US and Israel, and attained new levels of economic prosperity.

The AKP government did not curtail civil liberties and observed secularism by keeping religion out of its political decisions. But in the post-9/11 world, Islamist parties and leaders in several countries have become instant converts to pluralism, tolerance and moderation.

AKP’s critics insist that the Turkish party, too, has changed its direction only strategically and that it would revert to demanding Sharia rule if and when it gets a chance. Such fears must be weighed only in light of available evidence and so far the evidence favours AKP’s credentials as a religiously conservative party willing to operate within the broad principles of secularism. Gul’s personal observance of Islam and his wife’s wearing a headscarf as a symbol of piety does not necessarily threaten the ideal of separation between faith and state.

For too long the Muslim world has been polarised between secularists who want all public manifestations of Islamic religion banished from their countries and Islamists who insist on reverting to obscurantist theocracy.

This polarisation cannot come to an end without at least some secularists becoming more tolerant of religious practices and some Islamists moving away from radical Islam to a middle where the individual remains Islamic but the state is secular.

If the conversion of every former Islamist to believing in separation between religion and state is looked upon with suspicion, even in the absence of evidence of dissimulation, there would be no hope of finding a middle ground for the world’s 1.4 billion Muslims. The election of a born-again or Church-going Christian as president of the US or prime minister of Britain does not raise the kind of spectre that the prospect of Gul’s election as president has done in the case of Muslim-majority Turkey.

Unlike the US, where secularism evolved from a commitment to religious tolerance, secularists in the Muslim world were interested in westernising their nations in a hurry and were not particularly bothered by niceties of individual freedom. In Muslim states — from Morocco to Indonesia — westernised elites have denied democratic change, arguing that it would compromise secularism. These fears are based on the history of attempts by religious groups to impose their narrow version of Islam by force.

But in reality, religious intolerance, and not individual piety, is the enemy of secularism. If governments in the Muslim world open themselves to democratic change, there might be other political movements like AKP, which combine tolerance with tradition. Otherwise, the Islamic world will remain embroiled in the power struggle between authoritarian westernisers and retrogressive Islamists.

Turkey Shows the Way

Gulf News, August 22, 2007

Turkey’s forthcoming presidential election offers an opportunity to define secularism in the Muslim world as a political system ensuring separation of theology and state rather than as an anti-religious ideology.

For almost a century, secular elites in Muslim countries have equated progress and modernity with renunciation of Islamic symbols and practices.

Now Turkey, the first secular republic with a majority Muslim population, is expected to elect a president who prays in public and whose wife wears a headscarf as a manifestation of her religious convictions.

Anti-religious secularists see this development as a threat to Turkey’s Laicite. Those who realise that separating religion from matters of state does not necessarily mean taking religion out of people’s lives see Turkey as choosing a path away from radical Islam as well as radical secularism.

The Adalat va Kalkinma Partisi (AKP) or Justice and Development Party, led by Prime Minister Recip Tayyip Erdogan, won July’s parliamentary polls with 47 per cent of the popular vote and a clear majority of seats in the Grand National Assembly.

The polls were called earlier than scheduled because of an inconclusive presidential election in April. Then, AKP’s nominee for president, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, faced severe opposition from Turkey’s secular establishment led by the country’s army.

This time around, AKP has again nominated Gul for president and, given the recent resounding popular mandate for AKP, the army might not be able to block his election short of an improbable military coup.

Although AKP grew out of a succession of Islamist parties banned by Turkish courts, it describes itself as a moderate conservative party rather than an Islamist one.

It does not seek the enforcement of Islamic law or Sharia and its performance in office during its first term confirms its claims.

Practising Muslims

Although both Erdogan and Gul are practising Muslims who were once active in the Islamist movement, their first stint in office reflected an effort to distance themselves from Islamist politics.

Under Erdogan, Turkey pursued European Union membership, maintained close ties with the United States and Israel, and attained new levels of economic prosperity.

Gul’s personal observance of Islam and his wife’s wearing a headscarf as a symbol of piety does not necessarily threaten the ideal of separation between faith and state.

For too long the Muslim world has been polarised between secularists who want all public manifestations of Islamic religion banished from their countries and Islamists who insist on reverting to obscurantist theocracy.

This polarisation cannot come to an end without at least some secularists becoming more tolerant of religious practices and some Islamists moving away from radical Islam to a middle where the individual remains Islamic but the state is secular.

If the conversion of every former Islamist to separation between religion and state is looked upon with suspicion, even in the absence of evidence of dissimulation, there would be no hope of finding a middle ground for the world’s 1.4 billion Muslims.

The election of a born-again or Church-going Christian as president of the US or prime minister of Britain does not raise the kind of spectre that the prospect of Gul’s election as president has done in case of Muslim-majority Turkey.

Unlike the US, where secularism evolved from a commitment to religious tolerance, secularists in the Muslim world were interested in westernising their nations in a hurry and were not particularly bothered by niceties of individual freedom.

In Muslim states from Morocco to Indonesia, Westernised elites have denied democratic change, arguing that it would compromise secularism.

These fears are based on the history of attempts by religious groups to impose their narrow version of Islam by force. But in reality, religious intolerance, and not individual piety, is the enemy of secularism.

If governments in the Muslim world open themselves to democratic change, there might be other political movements like AKP, which combine tolerance with tradition.

Otherwise, the Islamic world will remain embroiled in the power struggle between authoritarian Westernisers and retrogressive Islamists.

Poverty Fuels Extremism

Gulf News, August 2, 2007

Once again, extremist Islamist radicals in Pakistan have exposed the inadequacies of the Pakistani state.

Notwithstanding the state’s show of strength, just a few days ago at Islamabad’s Lal Masjid (Red Mosque), the radicals had the upper hand when the mosque reopened after repairs.

Supporters of the detained cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz took over the mosque again and rioted violently. The radical extremists showed such strength in Islamabad so soon after the much publicised and high casualty military operation of a few days ago. One can only imagine their capability in the remote mountainous parts of Balochistan and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), which everyone knows as extremist strongholds. If the events in Islamabad were not enough to highlight the dire straits that Pakistan finds itself, the latest US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) pointed out the absolute failure of Pakistan’s strategy in the war against terrorism. It noted that Al Qaida has reorganised itself from safe havens in Pakistan.

The NIE could well be wrong, as US intelligence has sometimes proven to be, but its release has created the spectre of direct military strikes against alleged Al Qaida safe havens on Pakistani soil.

The challenge of terrorists within the country and the threat of a superpower ally using military force on Pakistani soil because it distrusts Pakistan’s own capabilities should have served as a wake up call for Pakistan’s leadership. Instead, General Pervez Musharraf is still dragging his feet over sharing power and allowing civilians with a popular power base to help him (and Pakistan) out of its tough spot.

Inability

Several politicians and political commentators, too, are proving their inability to overcome their prejudice (for example the dislike some have for the Bhutto family) in favour of a constitutional-institutional arrangement that allows elected civilians to run the country again without confrontation with the country’s army.

As for the army, its leadership’s vision also remains limited to conventional balance of power concepts.

Pakistan’s elite appears oblivious to the country’s slow hemorrhaging.

Government economists cite increasing mobile phone use and expanding sales of motorcycles and cars as signs of progress and speak of the privatisation programme being a regional success.

Pakistan’s elite now drives around in Porsches, more of which have been sold in the city of Lahore alone than the car’s manufacturer had envisaged for the entire country. The pace of construction for new country clubs, golf clubs and luxury hotels also reflects growing prosperity of a select few.

Pakistan reveals multiple realities and the temptation to let optimism prevail is great. But, in essence, Pakistan has a high level of dysfunction and unpredictability.

A former Pakistani finance minister and World Bank economist recently told a roundtable on Pakistan in Washington DC that in most countries 6-8 per cent economic growth should translate into reduction in poverty by 10 per cent. He said that trickle down does not seem to be working in Pakistan as 6-8 per cent growth rates have not reduced poverty at the rate of the global average.

Pakistan’s growth is not creating jobs and is not helping alleviate poverty at a rapid pace. He estimated that 65 million Pakistanis live in absolute poverty while another 65 million live in poverty. Only 30 million Pakistanis are well-to-do.

The well-to-do often ignore the rage and anger brewing among the poor, who will be particularly vulnerable to extremist ideologies if political inclusion does not replace the current system of oligarchic rule.

Nothing short of a complete overhaul of the state structure under elected democratic leadership, based on rule of law and well-defined roles for all institutions, will bring Pakistan from the brink where it currently finds itself.

Missing The State

Indian Express , August 1, 2007

Once again, extremist Islamist radicals in Pakistan have exposed the inadequacies of the state. Notwithstanding the state’s show of strength just a few days ago at Islamabad’s Lal Masjid, the radicals had the upper hand when the mosque reopened.

Supporters of the detained cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz took over the mosque again and rioted violently. The policemen deputed to tear gas the mob were attacked by a suicide bomber right in the heart of Pakistan’s capital, resulting in many casualties. The radical extremists showed such strength in Islamabad so soon after the much publicised and high casualty military operation of a few days ago. One can only imagine their capability in the mountainous parts of Balochistan and Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

If events in Islamabad were not enough to highlight the dire straits Pakistan finds itself, the latest US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) pointed out the failure of Pakistan’s strategy in the war against terror. It noted that Al-Qaeda has reorganised itself from safe havens in Pakistan. The NIE could well be wrong, as US intelligence sometimes is, but its release has created the spectre of direct military strikes against alleged Al-Qaeda safe havens on Pakistani soil.

The challenge of terrorists within the country and the threat of a superpower ally using military force on Pakistani soil because it distrusts Pakistan’s own capabilities should have served as a wake-up call for the leadership. Instead, Musharraf is still dragging his feet over sharing power and allowing civilians with a popular base to help him, and Pakistan, out of its tough spot.

Several politicians and political commentators, too, are proving their inability to overcome their prejudice — for example, the dislike some have for the Bhutto family — in favour of a constitutional-institutional arrangement that allows elected civilians to run the country again without confrontation with the country’s army. The army leadership’s vision remains limited to balance of power concepts.

Pakistan test-fired the enhanced version of the nuclear-capable, low-flying Babur cruise missile, also known as the Hatf 7 last week — the second such test this year. The Babur, we were told by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), “has near-stealth capabilities, is a low-flying, terrain-hugging missile with high maneouvrability, pin-point accuracy and radar avoidance features.” The missile can hit targets at 700 km. “The latest test would consolidate Pakistan’s strategic capability and strengthen national security,” the ISPR said, without informing Pakistanis of its utility in dealing with rioting madrassa students, suicide bombers and restless citizens.

Pakistan may have the ability to project its power externally, but it lacks the strength of an effective state at home. And Pakistan’s elite appears oblivious to the country’s slow hemorrhaging.

Government economists cite increasing mobile phone use and sales of motorcycles and cars as signs of progress and speak of the privatisation programme being a regional success. Pakistan’s elite now drives around in Porsches, more of which have sold in the city of Lahore alone than the car’s manufacturer had envisaged for the entire country.

Pakistan reveals multiple realities. But, in essence, Pakistan has a high level of dysfunction and unpredictability. A former Pakistani Finance Minister and World Bank economist recently told a roundtable on Pakistan in Washington DC that in most countries 6-8 per cent economic growth should translate into reduction in poverty by 10 per cent. He said that trickle down does not seem to be working in Pakistan.

He estimated that 65 million Pakistanis live in absolute poverty while another 65 million live in poverty. The well-to-do often ignore the rage and anger brewing among the poor, who will be particularly vulnerable to extremist ideologies if political inclusion does not replace the current system of oligarchic rule.