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| November 05, 2006 | Sunday | Shawwal 12, 1427 |
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Ascertaining the truth
Another vani victim
The downside of our India policy
THE ultimate test of a policy lies in the results it produces. Judged by this standard, it is difficult to visualise a greater failure than that of our India policy practised for more than half a century in utter disregard of the rules of a sound foreign policy.
THE way the accountability process has been carried out drew the Supreme Court’s ire on Thursday when it asked: “What is the use of accountability if influential people are not to be put behind bars?” The apex court’s observations came when a petitioner asked why the authorities had not released his brother on parole while the same facility had been extended to four of Balochistan’s former ministers. The four former ministers named in the petition are Mr Behram Achakzai, Mr Faiq Jamali, Hafiz Loni and Mr Nisar Ali Hazara. According to the petitioner, they had been awarded sentences ranging from four to 19 years, and fined Rs 34 million, Rs 63m, Rs 10m and Rs 56m respectively. The additional advocate-general of Balochistan confirmed to the court that the four had been released on parole but they had not bothered to pay the fine. Nab authorities, he said, had issued reminders to them, and the provincial chief secretary, too, had been informed, “but no action has been taken”. Avoiding a comment on the petition itself, since the matter is sub judice, we can clearly see that the observations by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry highlights the lack of transparency and objectivity that has often characterised NAB proceedings.
Like all previous regimes, this government, too, launched the accountability process with great fanfare, the avowed aim being to prosecute those politicians and retired civil and military bureaucrats who had indulged in massive corruption while in power, besides businessmen who had amassed wealth by illegal means. Indeed, in the beginning, NAB proceeded in earnest and arrested, prosecuted and convicted many a big fish. NAB laws also provided for plea bargaining through which the defendant could get his freedom if he surrendered to the government part of his ill-gotten money. Many people were tried and benefited from the plea bargaining clause of the NAB law. The most well known case was that of retired Admiral Mansurul Haq, who was extradited from the US, made to stand trial and was let off after he surrendered $7.5 million to Nab to win immunity. Now he lives in freedom in America.
The accountability process lost much of its credibility when the authorities became selective about whom to try, for instead of the law being applied objectively, it became clear that accountability had turned into a shibboleth and was being used for persecuting the regime’s adversaries and ignoring the misdeeds of those who were on its right side. Also, after the general election of 2002, it became necessary to secure a parliamentary majority for the king’s party. So, some MNAs against whom NAB had cases were virtually pardoned if they ditched the party on whose tickets they had been elected and switched sides. That is how the PPP Patriots came into being. In sharp contrast, there has been a relentless persecution of those among the corrupt who belonged to the PPP and the PML-N.
The basic assumption behind “special” accountability campaigns each time there is a regime change is absurd. Accountability must be an on-going process independent of politics. Special laws promulgated through decrees and not enacted by parliament are an exercise in expediency, because the laws already on the statute books are enough for the corrupt to be tried and punished. The cumulative experience with the accountability process since the time of Ziaul Haq to this day reflects a gross violation of the basic concepts of equity and justice.
THE dust raised by the missile attack on a seminary in Bajaur on Monday has still to settle. The strong backlash it has touched off is understandable in view of the fact that the government has failed to give credible answers to the numerous questions that are being asked about the military action, its motive and the identity of the victims. Since the people do not feel assured that what was done was unavoidable, they feel outraged. Worse still, the authorities feel touchy about public criticism and are conveying the impression that they want to hush up the matter. Hence their move to keep the media out of Bajaur and not allow the Sindh Assembly to debate the issue. Given the doubts that have risen about the attack and the government’s lack of credibility, it is important that an impartial inquiry by a high-level judicial commission be held to ascertain the truth. The commission should be assigned the task of determining the identity of the attackers, whether the madressah was training ‘terrorists’ and, if so, was massacring them all the only option available to the government? The impression gaining ground is that the government is toeing the American line too faithfully in dealing with the problem of terrorism.
Since the Nato forces have assumed charge of the ISAF in Afghanistan this summer and the tripartite commission (comprising Pakistan, Afghanistan and ISAF) in its meeting in Kabul in August is said to have recognised Nato’s right of hot pursuit, the possibility of the American forces having launched the Bajaur attack cannot be ruled out. These are significant strategic decisions which will have far-reaching implications for Pakistan’s security. They could lead to more Bajaurs in the future. The vital nature of these decisions notwithstanding, we have not been told about what the government has conceded to the Americans in Afghanistan. It is time President Musharraf let it be known what his own strategy is in the war on terror. As the latest International Crisis Group report states, there can be no quick fixes in Afghanistan. It also links a solution to the problem of terrorism to Pakistan’s willingness to reverse policies that feed extremism.
THE latest victim of the ugly tradition of vani — where young women are traded between families to resolve a dispute — is a 12-year-old girl in southern Punjab. The dispute in question centres round the girl’s brother who married of his own free will against his wife’s family’s wishes. A panchayat ordered the boy to divorce the girl and his family pay a compensation of Rs60,000 as well as marry their 12-year-old daughter off to a boy from the other family when she attains puberty. That this deal was allegedly reached at the house of a former nazim is even more disturbing. It is also illegal under the country’s laws which do not permit vani or swara or any such crimes that are committed against women in the name of honour. But despite strict laws that disallow such antiquated customs, the practice continues. Earlier this year, a panchayat ordered the marriage of a three-year-old girl to a 14-year-old boy to settle a dispute in which the girl’s father is alleged to have raped the boy’s sister. Mercifully the Supreme Court stepped in and prevented that aberration. But for every case that attracts the courts’ intervention, there are countless others that go unremedied. The situation will not change until the law is strictly enforced and violators duly punished.
Unfortunately, social activism has been lacking in mobilising public opinion against such crimes. If galvanised, the intelligentsia, along with NGOs, can play a major role in changing peoples’ attitudes towards evil customs like vani. Women who choose not to be victimised — like two sisters in Mianwali earlier this year who refused to marry two drug addict brothers they’d been married to when they were children — should be admired and inspire others in similar situations. Women like Mukhtaran Mai are a symbol of courage and need society’s support.
In the process, the country was dismembered in 1971. Besides, the nation had to go through other painful experiences including the 1965 Pakistan-India war, which caused incalculable damage to Pakistan’s economy and sowed the seeds of the 1971 crisis, the loss of Siachen and the debacle of Kargil.
Most of our policy initiatives concerning India were taken in the name of Kashmir. The net result after half a century of a confused policy, however, is that we are farther away from a satisfactory settlement of the Kashmir dispute than we were in 1948. Taking advantage of our current internal instability, the Indian government is going for a settlement on its terms by maintaining sustained diplomatic and political pressure on Islamabad.
The tone and the content of the pronouncements by the Indian leaders on relations with Pakistan lead one to no other conclusion. In an interview given to a Finnish magazine recently, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh once again ruled out any change of borders for a settlement of the Kashmir dispute.
After the much trumpeted Havana meeting between Musharraf and Manmohan Singh on the resumption of the composite dialogue and a day after the announcement of the dates for the next foreign secretaries’ meeting, the Indian prime minister stressed on October 18 that New Delhi had “put Pakistan on notice that any democratic government of India would find it difficult to continue on the present path of addressing all outstanding issues unless the government of Pakistan clearly deals with the issue of terrorism.” The statement needs to be seen against the background of the oft-repeated Indian accusations that Pakistan is abetting and supporting terrorism in Indian-held Kashmir and in parts of India.
The comments by the Indian defence minister (now foreign minister) on the same occasion went even further and were tantamount to gross interference in Pakistan’s internal affairs. Mr Mukherjee expressed concern at the “marked deterioration in the internal situation of Pakistan, which has serious implications on overall stability and peace in the region”. What has gone wrong and why has our India policy produced such disappointing results? The answers to these questions lie not only in the substance of the policy pursued by us but also in the way the policy is formulated and implemented as well as the manner of internal governance of the country. After all, the foreign policy is closely linked with the internal policies and conditions of a country.
The most fundamental flaw of our India policy has been that it has never been part of a grand strategy incorporating in a coherent fashion the aspirations and objectives of the people of Pakistan and a well-coordinated employment of the nation’s resources towards the attainment of those objectives. Our India policy during most of our history has been a hostage to our military establishment which has controlled it directly or indirectly.
The net result was that the military dimension of the India policy dominated in operational terms at the expense of the political, economic and diplomatic dimensions. The 1965 Pakistan-India war and the Kargil misadventure are prime examples of the neglect of the principle of optimum integration of the political, economic, military and diplomatic dimensions into a creative policy to achieve the country’s short-term and long-term objectives. In modern times, this function of integration must be performed ideally by a democratic government which is responsive to the will of the people and to which the armed forces are subordinate. Needless to say, the present situation in Pakistan is far from that ideal.
The militarisation of the India policy has also been largely responsible for the high levels of our military budgets and the resultant low allocation of resources to the critically important task of accelerating the economic development of the country. Consequently, India has pulled much ahead of us in the economic field. According to the latest issue of the weekly Economist, India has recorded a GDP growth rate of 8.9 per cent while ours remains at the level of 6.6 per cent. A better mix of the political, economic, diplomatic and military dimensions of our India policy could have safeguarded our national security while attaining higher economic growth rates.
Another failing of our India policy, specially since 1990, has been its preoccupation with short-term considerations leading to the neglect of a long-term strategy. Our leaders have generally failed to provide a long-term vision of the place of our country in the regional and international context and to lay down policies for its realisation. The chronic political instability because of the ineptitude of the politicians and frequent military takeovers did not allow the leadership to focus on the long-term direction of policies. Our India policy could not but be a victim of this tendency. The negative consequences of the short-term approach have been three-fold. The inability of our rulers to look beyond what is current has robbed the India policy of the qualities of stability and steadiness of purpose. The short-term approach has also led to desperate attempts by our rulers to achieve an immediate settlement of the Kashmir dispute. The Indian side has naturally taken advantage of this desperation to extract unilateral concessions from Pakistan.
These negative consequences have been specially prominent under the Musharraf government. It would suffice to refer to Kargil, the Agra summit and then the climbdown of the January 2004 Pakistan-India joint statement to highlight the somersaults in our India policy. The series of proposals made by General Musharraf for the settlement of the Kashmir dispute from time to time give the impression of desperation which has been duly exploited by the Indians resulting in a number of unilateral concessions by Pakistan, starting with the January 2004 joint statement.
Our India policy also suffers from a lack of balance and moderation in its formulation and implementation. There have been times when we consider India as our main enemy posing a serious threat to our national security. This position is specially projected when the military establishment wants to justify its high level of military expenditure.
Then there are times when we go overboard in our enthusiasm to improve relations with India and start advocating such proposals as the establishment of a South Asia Economic Union on the lines of the EU, which would ultimately lead to the economic domination of Pakistan by India and the loss of our economic independence. Some of our leaders have even tried to prove that culturally Pakistan and India are the same, thus forgetting the very rationale for the establishment of Pakistan.
What we need is a more rational and balanced policy in handling our relations with India. Such a policy should be based on the recognition of a number of important considerations. The first and foremost consideration, of course, is the realisation that while there may be some similarities between the peoples of Pakistan and India, what divides them culturally, socially and historically is more important than these superficial similarities. That is why the Muslims of South Asia struggled for and established a separate homeland for themselves. Thus, Pakistan and India are destined to remain two separate nations and countries.
Secondly, the two countries can and must have good neighbourly and even friendly relations on the basis of sovereign equality, non-interference in each other’s internal affairs and mutual respect for each other’s independence and territorial integrity. Such a relationship would be in the mutual interest of the two countries. It would include normal trade and economic relations on a level playing field but would exclude such quixotic schemes as an economic union between the two countries.
Thirdly, the desired good neighbourly relations between Pakistan and India cannot come about unless a serious attempt is made by both parties to resolve outstanding disputes peacefully. This would require a two-track approach: reduction of tensions and establishment of a climate of mutual trust on the one hand, and progress towards the resolution of outstanding disputes, on the other. (The former would include CBMs and a strategic restraint regime) There will have to be forward movement on both the tracks to make the process of improvement of bilateral relations sustainable.
Fourthly, a beginning may be made by resolving the relatively simpler disputes/issues since it would be easier to settle them. However, that does not mean we should ignore the Kashmir dispute. But instead of rushing into a settlement now when ground realities favour India, it would be advisable for Pakistan to adopt a two-stage approach in dealing with this issue.
In the short term, we should work for an interim solution which would improve the human rights situation in Indian-held Kashmir, result in the demilitarisation of the territory or at least the withdrawal of the bulk of the Indian forces as the militancy goes down, autonomy for Indian-held Kashmir and increased contacts between the Kashmiris on either side of the Line of Control.
Fifthly, Pakistan should redefine its security doctrine. Instead of defining our security almost exclusively in military terms as we have done in the past, we should aim at a new mix of political, economic, diplomatic and military dimensions of security so as to refrain from adventurism and allocate a much higher level of our GDP to economic development to accelerate our economic growth.
The writer is a former ambassador