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From Cairo with a caveat

“Angry about the near total absence of public security, the desperate state of the economy and an increase in sectarian tensions…” Stop! Is this Pakistan? Every word in the sentence is true of our present state of crumble. Actually, it’s Egypt that the New York Times writes about.

Train your mind and eye for a virtual travel to Tahrir Square in Cairo. You will in a flash see the uprising that throws an ominous shadow on our own route to ruin. It’s a chilling reality. That our establishment has its finger firmly on its pulse is reassuring.

Obviously, the armipotent – powerful in arms; mighty in battle – know fully well that Islamabad can soon become a carbon copy of Cairo. Pakistan’s flaming fires fuelled by sectarianism, ethnicity, poverty and loadshedding close in from every direction.

Surely many in Islamabad and Pindi must have seen the millions of Egyptians march in a mad frenzy to oust Mohammad Morsi, their president. The Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist organisation that propped Morsi to power barely a year ago, is now the villain of the piece. Sunday’s protests were the largest since February 2011 when the crowds had occupied Tahrir Square for 18 days demanding dictator Hosni Mubarak’s removal.

The Egyptian army issued a 48-hour ultimatum to Morsi and his opponents to reach an agreement to “meet the people’s demands” or it would intervene. The ultimatum said it was a “last chance.”

Taking note of the protests that centred on Morsi’s ouster, the Egyptian military termed it “glorious”, adding that the protesters conducted themselves “in (a) peaceful and civilised manner,” and that “it is necessary that the people get a reply…to their calls.”

The Egyptian army chief refused to sit on the fence and made it known that the army had a responsibility to act because Egypt’s national security was facing “grave danger”. If things don’t improve the army would be obliged to “announce a road map for the future and the steps for overseeing its implementation, with participation of all patriotic and sincere parties and movements.”

Sadly, our leaders continue to sit in their gaudy golden chairs that they consider thrones ensconced in safe sanctuaries and well-fortified bunkers in Pindi. They are content to binge on state resources without a speck of sadness for the wretched country that they rule.

If they really cared enough for the daily dead, they would have done something by now – especially the military that has the wherewithal to stem the blood-soaked tide of death. We have lost 50,000 citizens since Pakistan joined the so-called war on terror.

The Egyptian ultimatum reminds me of the finger-wagging ultimatum by Tahirul Qadri, whose failed million march earlier this year in Islamabad brought people from all over Pakistan. His shifting deadlines to Zardari were laughed away by hobbits Kaira and Naek, caught mimicking Qadri on camera.

Chaudhry Shujaat and Mushahid Hussain also joined in the circus making him look like a clown. The final blow of course came from the honourable judges of the Supreme Court who questioned his loyalty to Pakistan when he went to court against the Election Commission of Pakistan.

Well, the scenario would have been different if Imran Khan, then riding a ‘tsunami’ of popularity, and the MQM whose leader discards his own statements (accompanied with thunder and lightning) as though they were a piece of tissue paper to be trashed and forgotten, had supported Qadri. Both men distanced themselves from him. A change in status quo may perhaps have paved the way for military action in North Waziristan with the ‘crusaders of democracy’, the chief obstructionists (PML-N) pushed to the wall.

The military held the trump card. It did not use it. Hence gigglers on the government side let out loud guffaws, secure in the knowledge that the military would never move. It was all over for Qadri and the thousands of men, women and children left standing in icy rain.

And herein lies the difference between Cairo and Islamabad. The military in Cairo has stepped in.

Author and journalist Zahid Hussain brings us the latest from ground zero that he visited. North Waziristan, he affirms is the headquarter housing top Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) commanders, including Hakeemullah Mehsud, Punjabi militant groups linked with TTP and Al-Qaeda, some Uzbek fighters and the Afghan Taliban.

So can this motley lot be done away with? If yes, who will cast the first stone?

The answer comes from a senior military man who spoke with Zahid Hussain: “A military operation is still doable at the moment, but further delay would be disastrous.” The Pakistan Army in the past blamed PML-N for foot-dragging. “The military wanted a clear mandate from the political leadership before launching the offensive”, writes Hussain.

“The effort by the PPP-led government to achieve a consensus among the main political parties failed. The main opposition came from the PML-N that was fearful of a possible backlash in Punjab. The opportunity was lost thus granting greater space to the militants and making Pakistan and the region more insecure.”

General Kayani is soon to become a lame-duck army chief with only four months in office. His lasting legacy to the nation that has given him full six years to run the military-industrial complex would be to stamp out the repositories of terrorists. Today these same ‘crusaders of democracy’ will gladly give the go-ahead to Kayani unless they want to take the country down a suicidal path.

“Everything that you have done in your past is a part of who you are, but everything that you do today will be who you are tomorrow”, said Kayani in his address at the GHQ a while ago. “We are critically looking at the mistakes made in the past and trying to set the course for a better future.”

So what is the good general waiting for? A nod from Sharif? Writes Imtiaz Ali in the prestigious magazine The Atlantic – voted as the “most insightful, thought-provoking magazine” by the readers of the American Journalism Review.

“If Sharif commits himself to some of the positive steps he has taken already and does not waiver, he might be able to generate some hope and fresh momentum in the country, especially in the economy. Beyond that, no matter how sincere and positive he is, it seems unlikely that he could move the country on a sustainable path to better economic and social conditions if the state does not come up with an effective counter-terrorism policy.”

If Nawaz Sharif is not a changed man, then the implications are grave. The country will plunge into political instability. The Taliban would further exploit and expand their writ. Pakistan’s suffering will continue and could get worse, warns the Atlantic.

Col Javed Zahoor, a former chief (sector commander) of the ISI in the Frontier during 1996-1998, blames the ISI for losing its grip as the chief spy agency.

“Instead of broadening and improving our intelligence network we started expanding our administrative base through ‘Aman’ (peace) Committees and looking to other intelligence networks that were not aligned to national interests.”

The army, Zahoor asserts was already “half cocked” towards these extremists for its own strategic reasons. As militancy raised its ugly head, “extreme religion-based ideology rooted in sectarian polarisation” took over with help of outside countries.

With improved intelligence and “Machiavellian manoeuvring”, the menace can still be wiped out, thinks the man who warned 17 years ago that to pamper the ragtag army of brigands posing as mujahideen would one day pose a serious threat to Pakistan.

Zahoor was ticked off and peremptorily told to “keep his hands off the activities as the ‘concerned side’ was perfectly capable of monitoring their movements.”

A decade and a half later, the same blunders continue to be made.

The writer is a freelance journalist. Email: anjumniaz@rocketmail.com

Anjum Niaz, "From Cairo with a caveat," The News. 2013-07-04.
Keywords: Political science , Political leaders , Armed forces , Election commission-Pakistan , Taliban-Afghanistan , Supreme court , Military operations , Terrorism policy , Al-Qaeda , Loadshedding , Democracy , Journalism , Terrorism , Journalist , Poverty , Judges , Zahid Hussain , Tahirul Qadri , Imran Khan , Gen Kayani , President Zardari , President Hosni , Chaudhry Shujaat , PM Nawaz Sharif , Islamabad , Pakistan , Afghanistan , Egypt , PMLN , TTP , ISI