AS the summer light begins to change and the northern regions wear an autumnal look in preparation for another winter, the nation marked the first anniversary of the October 8 earthquake. On the eve of the occasion, the deputy head of Erra, an army general, was the guest on a talk-in show on the BBC’s Urdu Service. He outlined Erra’s efforts made in the past year and answered a number of questions from listeners.

One caller Aamir from Batal who complained that Erra people had sold cheques of Rs75,000 for Rs25,000 was given the right royal brush off. The general, according to an English transcript of the programme, said “If Aamir’s complaint proved to be genuine after a thorough probe, action will be taken against the culprits. And if the complaint proved to be wrong, I shall arrange for his (Aamir’s) arrest and imprisonment”. Even the BBC compere was a little appalled and muttered something about “that is not right, general sahib ..”.

This is not just an instance of plain boorishness when it may have been excused as a failing common in some army types. It reflects an entire attitude on the part of the officialdom and militarydom of refusing to accept that there may be something wrong somewhere in the good and great enterprise of governance now underway or being capable of saying ‘thank you’ for pointing this out and if it turns out to be true, ‘we will look into it and try to put it right’.

No, Sir, that would be accepting that we are not supermen and are liable to go wrong. This state of denial has now become almost an article of faith with us and is reflected in everything that we do — in politics, in administrative affairs, in disaster management, in running our railways, in repeatedly creating belligerent conditions at home and in the neighbourhood.

For God’s sake, the October earthquake was a disaster of mind-boggling proportions. Nearly 74,000 people were killed, including many children, and 2.8 million were rendered shelterless. It would have posed a challenge for any government, and there have been areas where the response was swift and adequate. But in an operation of that magnitude, lapses were bound to occur. Even the Hurricane Katrina story in the US continues to produce information on corruption in relief operations, besides constantly underlining the callousness that continues to colour government efforts in a tragedy where the victims were mostly coloured people. But US officials do not always deny what is being said: they seek to clarify and promise to investigate.

We refuse to accept that anything could have gone wrong in such a huge operation or that relief workers and nazims, as well as residents of the affected areas who survived intact and now see some quick money to be made, could be involved in misappropriation of aid money or getting false claims approved. Erra’s head, a gentleman from the private sector, has had allegations made of dubious dealings by a concern he was once associated with although there is no evidence that he was personally incriminated in anything. But the public is ready to believe that someone with a past like this may not be too willing to inquire into allegations of corruption by his staff.

President Pervez Musharraf also, far from saying he would investigate all genuine complaints, bristles at suggestions of slow progress of work or financial irregularities. Oxfam had said that, based on government figures, only 17 per cent of the earthquake affected households had started rebuilding permanent shelters. This made the general angry and he talked in those newly acquired tones of irascibility with which he dismisses all criticism of ISI vis-a-vis the Taliban or any other perceived policy lapses. Erra, in association with NGOs and aid-giving institutions, has produced many figures about the pace of the rehabilitation effort and these have had a good impact.

Why blow all this by refusing to accept that things have also not proceeded as well as they should have in some sectors? The general made matters considerably worse when at a rally in Muzaffarabad to reassure the earthquake victims, he also put in a line too asking for votes for the PML-Q in the next elections so that uplift work could continue. This is not only partisan politics on the part of the president, but exploitation of a sombre occasion for political purposes when the president should have been instilling confidence and hope in the shattered residents of the disaster area.

Such attitudes reflect both arrogance and self-righteousness and are not always signs of confidence, but indications of people losing their cool when they have no satisfactory or rational answers to the allegations made. The general had flared up in a similar fashion during his previous visit to the US when someone raised questions about Shazia Khalid and Mukhtaran Mai. Such attitudes become ingrained when there is lack of institutionalised accountability in a system. Military rule and unresponsive civilian governments have made sure that is the case in Pakistan.

No one feels obliged to admit, or answer for, anything. The remedy resorted to is to malign critics and undertake the great whitewash job. In the process, we get away with daylight murder. Take, for example, the recent shenanigans in the world of cricket, whose affairs move the nation far more than lack of democracy or corruption in high places.

Everyone agrees that Pakistan were right to protest at umpire Hair’s ball-tampering decision. But at least two cricketing greats, Imran Khan and Javed Miandad, questioned Inzamamul Haq’s refusal to come out to play that resulted in forfeiting the match, having Inzamam accused of defaming the game of cricket and ultimately getting a damages suit slapped on the PCB that has yet to be settled. Zaheer Abbas, who was team manager, said in a recent interview that he and board officials had advised Inzamam to go back into the field when the umpires had asked the team to do so for the second time. The skipper had replied that personally he wouldn’t go back, but his colleagues were free to resume play. Could any team member go out to play in such circumstances?

Further high jinks were to come. Since Inzamam has had a four-one-day match ban imposed on him, PBC chairman Shaharyar Khan announced that Younis Khan would captain Pakistan in the Champions Trophy in India. Younis Khan appeared at a press conference saying he wouldn’t be a dummy captain, meaning that he should be made permanent, displacing Inzamam, and rudely walked out of the press conference.

It was said that vice-captain Mohammad Yusuf would be the captain, and the player must have considered this a great honour despite the rather unsettled circumstances that had propelled him into the position.

Younis Khan had displayed gross indiscipline, and he should have been put on the mat of the PBC. But, wait. It was Shaharyar Khan, who should have resigned much earlier when he failed to produce his promised draft constitution, who resigned. He was replaced by Dr Nasim Ashraf, who was doing useful community welfare work in the Washington area before he become an active and fawning supporter of General Musharraf and came to Islamabad to become an adviser to the presidency. He was a member of the PBC executive and was seen prominently in the Oval dressing room with the Pakistan team while the Hair row was going on.

He was thus fully involved, like Mr Shaharyar Khan, in what happened, and should be considered as a party to it all. Mr Abbas Zaidi, who was Mr Shaharyar Khan’s right-hand man and would fire off a letter to the editor whenever something against his boss appeared in Dawn, has also resigned. All those resigning or being appointed are unelected officials, chosen whimsically, and hence unaccountable, often even to their own consciences.

This mess in cricket is but a reflection of what is happening everywhere — in earthquake relief, in some not very senior railway officials being sacked for the Rann Pathani bridge disaster that cut off Karachi from the north for weeks and no minister bothering to accept responsibility for it, in the cold silence that has greeted pleas for information from families of missing persons, in an environment of general arrogance that permeates governance.

This will continue if we don’t stop experimenting with democracy and “sustainable” democracy and moderation that is “enlightened” and remain trapped in self-delusion and continue to believe that we can do no wrong and that we’re the most virtuous and religious people in the world and can bypass whatever institutions that are still functioning. Shouldn’t parliament, for instance, be given an accounting of the moneys received in aid and loans from donors and how they have been spent?

We fill senior posts with favoured appointees selected on the basis of “merit” but have “search committees” to select vice-chancellors, and they unerringly pick on military officers. Allah be praised.

THE only issue of deep concern in New York and Washington at the moment appears to be the Darfur crisis. Full page advertisements in major national dailies are regularly appearing, urging the US and its allies to take decisive action and rescue Darfur. NGOs and noted newspaper columnists are campaigning with unprecedented zeal.

Public meetings are being held to create awareness of the issue. Student organisations on campuses are being co-opted. Some time ago, a rally attended by 50,000 people was held to observe the “Global Day for Darfur” in New York’s Central Park. Former Secretary of State Madeline Albright was one of the speakers.

Sudan is Africa’s largest country and one of its poorest in terms of development and spending power, but with infinite natural resources including vast oil reserves. It has a population of 36 million consisting largely of Muslims. Darfur is the western province with only six million people. Sudan produces 350,000 barrels oil per day, earning a million dollars a day in oil revenues. By next year, the figure is expected to increase substantially thanks to rising oil prices. The oil factor has changed the dimensions of the conflict, inviting rivalry between China and the US, China being the largest investor in Sudan’s oil industry.

Newly discovered energy resources have made Sudan of enormous interest to US corporations. In addition to having oil and gas reserves, it has one of the three largest deposits of high purity uranium in the world, along with the fourth largest deposits of copper.

The Darfur crisis erupted in February 2003. The conflict began as an uprising of African tribes against Arab tribes known as the Janjaweed and supported by Khartoum. It is alleged that 250,000 people have been killed by violence, hunger and disease and about 1.9 million displaced. Nearly three million depend on international aid for food, health and medical treatment.

The Darfur issue came under the international spotlight in 2004, with the then US Secretary of State Colin Powell endorsing a US Congress resolution that genocide had been committed in Darfur. It must be borne in mind that both warring factions are Muslims and the conflict is considered by many (including the government) not to about ethnic or racial animosities but pastures and water. The expression “genocide” has since been used deliberately to mobilise global attention and concern and pave the way for US intervention. The efforts of the Sudanese government for peace between Khartoum and west Sudan resulted in an agreement in May 2006 between the government and the Sudanese Liberation Movement. The peace agreement, inter alia, provided for a referendum, but it did not consider the SLM demand for giving the post of vice-president to Darfur, or to resolve power-sharing and wealth distribution issues.

To bring about peace and enforce the provisions of the Abuja agreement, the African Union agreed to a peace-keeping operation. Accordingly, 7,000 troops were deployed to monitor the truce. The mission costs about $40 million a month, and the AU that is financially dependent on donor nations, is facing a serious financial crisis. The AU peace-keeping operation has also been severely limited by lack of vehicles and communication equipment, and is not expected to continue beyond the end of this year.

The neo-conservatives of Bush administration have been eyeing Sudanese oil covetously. For the last three years, they appear to be working towards isolating Sudan and intervening militarily to take over its oil reserves. The introduction of Shariah laws in Sudan is another reason for this agenda.

Sudan despite close cooperation with the US on terrorism in the wake of 9/11 still continues to be classified as a “terrorist state”. Horrific images of genocide in Rwanda and Burundi in the 1990s are being invoked to justify intervention in Sudan, on the grounds of humanitarian concern.

To many, the neo-cons are itching for military intervention as laid out by Anthony Lake, Clinton’s former national security advisor. In a recent article in The Washington Post, he, along with others, urged swift military action, since “History demonstrates there is one language Khartoum understands: the credible threat or use of force...The United States should press for a UN resolution that issues Sudan an ultimatum: accept unconditional deployment of the UN force within one week or face military consequences...The US, preferably with Nato involvement and African political support, would strike Sudanese airfields, aircrafts and other military assets. It could blockade Port Sudan, through which Sudan’s oil exports flow. Then UN troops would deploy — by force if necessary with US and Nato backing.”

Lake’s advice is ominously significant. He is the architect of the “Princeton Project” along with George Schultz, secretary of state under Reagan. It advocates a new national security strategy for the US, creating a “concert of democracies” that “could be a pressure group that would allow powerful nations to implement their decisions without consulting the UN and the Security Council.”

The oil factor as in other cases, particularly that of Iraq, is the main determinant of the increasing US pressure directly and through the Security Council to bring in peace keeping forces to supplant the AU forces, and thus get into a struggle to secure energy resources. The US through Ghana and Uganda is exacerbating the situation by driving a wedge in African ranks to make Sudan succumb to US pressure.

Sudan has rejected the stationing of UN troops, but pressure is being applied relentlessly. Meanwhile, the hardliners continue to say that the most compelling challenge of our times is to stop the genocide in Darfur. The Security Council has passed a couple of resolutions 1679 and 1706. The Darfur situation has been described as “the world’s worst humanitarian disaster”, and “the first genocide of the 21st century”.

The UN resolution 1706 has called for the deployment of up to 20,000 UN peace-keepers to replace AU troops over the rejection of Sudan, which President Omar al-Bashir regards as a US ploy to invade his country and plunder its resources. The resolution does not talk of any sanctions due to opposition by China and Russia, but refers to UN World Summit Declaration.

During the 2005 United Nations World Summit, the US had a wide-ranging document unanimously endorsed by world leaders. Paragraphs 138 and 139 of the document, under “Responsibility to protect” while recognising the sovereign rights of a state to regulate its own internal affairs, made this right conditional and not absolute.

The reference to paragraphs 138 and 139 is fraught with serious consequences for Sudan. The implication is that when peaceful means are exhausted and the government of a UN member state is “manifestly failing to protect their populations” then other states have the responsibility to take collective action through the Security Council.

Resolution 1706 was the first time that the Security Council referred to the responsibility to protect a specific country where armed UN peace-keepers are to be deployed under chapter VII of the UN Charter. Here, the Security Council has “invited” Sudan to consent to the deployment of UN troops which will replace AU forces. The message to Sudan is that while the international community seeks the cooperation of Khartoum, others will have to step in if Sudan does not fulfil its sovereign obligations.

The die seems to have been cast for Sudan as it is incapable of resisting the combined pressure of the US and the UN. Unless the Arab League intervenes effectively or the African Union insists on an African solution, Sudan will be headed for troubled waters and will find itself caught in a conspiracy that seeks to provide the US and the West with an assured source of energy and perpetuate their presence in the name of humanitarian assistance.

The Arab League can thwart the neo-con agenda of military intervention if its members collectively meet the estimated budget $40 million per month that is needed for the maintenance of AU peacekeepers and also assist Sudan in resolving the continuing crisis and avert another tragedy.

The writer is a former ambassador.