| April 6, 2003 | Sunday | Safar 3, 1424 |
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Pindi building collapse
PRESIDENT Saddam Hussein’s dramatic appearance in public on Friday evening may not have a bearing on the ultimate outcome of the war; but in an electronically-waged war where the enemy can make a surgical strike within minutes of being tipped off, the Iraqi president’s gesture was as electrifying for his people as it was symbolic for the invaders. His public appearance in Baghdad demonstrated a remarkable spirit of defiance in the face of the heavy odds the Iraqis face in a wholly unequal fight with a hugely superior invader. It also showed that the Iraqi regime was still alive even though a large part of the country had been overrun by a coalition of invading forces which had ruthlessly used their total mastery of the skies to rain death and destruction on the civilian population of Baghdad and several other cities in order to cripple the economy and destroy the people’s will to resist.
Nevertheless, there is no stopping the coalition juggernaut. The Saddam International Airport has already fallen, and the forces of the sole superpower and its allies have almost succeeded in encircling the city and cutting it off from the rest of the country. The push for the city of five million seems to have already begun, though the final assault should take some more time before it gets under way with full fury. Yet in spite of the overwhelming military superiority of the invaders, Baghdad may not fall like a ripe apple. If the defenders’ morale is still high, they can give a good account of themselves in resisting the occupation of their homes and their heritage by the imperial invaders. Once the invaders face the defenders inside the city, the airforce will be more or less neutralized and the encounter will become less unequal. Yet it remains to be seen if one will re-visit the epic battle of Stalingrad. An equal possibility in that the invaders may soon occupy a part of the city, tighten their siege of the capital and cut off the Iraqi garrison’s supplies, thus forcing it to surrender. But one thing is patent: Baghdad’s citizens are not going to greet the attackers as liberators.
So far, most if not all, assumptions on which the US had based its Iraq operations have gone wrong. The Saddam regime has not collapsed like a house of cards, and the Shia population in the south has not risen in revolt against Baghdad. It is thus a fair guess that, even after the Saddam regime comes to an end, the allies will not find the going easy in post-war Iraq. Already, the US has made it clear that the UN will have virtually no role in managing post-war Iraq. In fact, it would like it to be an exclusively American zone of occupation and exploitation, with Gen. Tommy Franks playing Douglas MacArthur. It is highly unlikely, however, that the Iraqi population which has been the victim of such relentless aerial strikes by the coalition forces would consider Gen. Franks as their saviour. Nor will the rest of the world accept the US occupation regime as legitimate, since the war has been launched without the UN’s approval.
While there is no doubt that America will manage to find some quislings, the vast majority of the Iraqi and Arab masses will have nothing but contempt for the regime that the victors will put in place in Baghdad. Peace and tranquillity will be the last thing that such a set-up can give to the Iraqi people. The situation in the Kurdish north will be even more thorny, with American, Kurdish and Turkish interests not necessarily being in harmony. It remains to be seen whether the US will then still vigorously pursue its programme of what Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz called “ending” some states in the Middle East.
In the short run, Washington may have the satisfaction of achieving all these aims, with Iraq fragmented into statelets and cantons. But the first casualty of the post-war mayhem could be the Middle East’s “moderate” regimes, some of which have collaborated with the US in this war. The likely beneficiaries of the geopolitical chaos and the crisis of sovereignty in Iraq will be the forces of religious militancy, for whom the Middle East will become one big recruiting ground and the principal operational centre and launching pad. This makes it highly unlikely that the war’s end will bring order and peace to the Arab-Islamic world and ensure the success of Israel’s “final solution” of the Palestinian question and America’s geopolitical and economic interests — which are what the war is all about. America will then be the unwelcome occupier and not the liberator such as the warmongers in the Bush administration would have the world believe. In such a scenario, the Arab and Muslim people will be justified in looking for allies for help in a new war of resistance against the US and its proconsul, Israel.
THE collapse of a five-storey under-construction commercial complex — Bano Arcade — in Satellite Town, Rawalpindi, on Friday killed at least two and injured over 30, some seriously. As many as 50 others are believed to be trapped beneath the heavy concrete debris. The tragedy occurred when some 40 labourers were laying the roof for the fifth floor of the complex. The immediate priority for the concerned authorities should naturally be to do everything possible to rescue those still trapped in the rubble. The incident raises many questions about the role of the civic authorities which are concerned with construction in the city. In the first place, how is it that a fourth and then a fifth floor to be used as a marriage hall were being constructed so openly when, according to a municipal official, this was clearly illegal as approval had only been given for three floors? Secondly, why were shops in the lower floors allowed to open first when the upper storeys were still under construction? Any new commercial building should first be fully completed and a certificate to that effect obtained from the concerned civic agency before the building can be occupied and opened to the public. Even if additional floors were to be legally added later on, the concerned authorities should have ensured that the lower floors were evacuated while construction was going on above. Finally, the fact that the building collapsed is clearly indicative of a poorly laid foundation and/or use of poor construction material. How is it that these serious lapses and shortcomings went unnoticed by the building control authorities which are supposed to keep a watch on the construction and state of buildings from the safety point of view? Besides, had the building collapsed at a later stage — say during a marriage function, the casualty toll would have been much higher.
The provincial government has announced compensation for the families of those who have died and for the injured. A six-member committee under the district nazim has also been constituted to investigate the incident and the Punjab chief minister has promised that the culprits would be held accountable. One hopes that the government will ensure that the real culprits are caught and punished rather than finding some scapegoats. This must include not only the owner but also all those in the civic agencies who may have connived at flouting of the relevant rules and regulations or otherwise neglected to enforce these in this and other cases.