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| April 01, 2007 | Sunday | Rabi-ul-Awwal 12, 1428 |
Clashes in Waziristan
The PCB charade
Prophet, a model of moral code
THE Quran declared: “You (the Prophet) stand on a sublime pedestal of morality.” Prophet Muhammad himself informed that the purpose underlying his mission was perfection of the ethical and moral code. When Ayesha was asked about the morals of the Prophet (pbuh), and who could have known him better, she replied, “haven’t you studied the Quran! His morals are the Quran in practice.” And she did not exaggerate. The Prophet mirrors the Quranic morality.
DEMOCRACY is under threat — such as the one we have. As a columnist recently wrote, “Pakistan is neither a dictatorship nor democracy”. This paradox is not all disaster and holds out hope for the future, for we have in this situation a chance to build on the existing opportunities. Regrettably, this does not seem to be in evidence. The pressures on democracy and the threat to civil society stem from several quarters, and it is often forgotten that the pursuit of legitimate political interests in an undemocratic manner proves counterproductive. Restraint and tolerance are vital in Pakistan’s case where democracy has yet to strike root. Established democracies absorb aberrations and contradictions without harming themselves. The Watergate episode involved President Richard Nixon and several cabinet members, including the vice-president and the attorney-general. But such was the strength of American democracy that the scandal did not fatally harm its political system. The same pattern was in evidence two decades later when President Clinton survived impeachment by a narrow margin. In sharp contrast, one saw what the 1977 PNA movement did to Pakistan.
With the benefit of hindsight, one can perhaps appraise the grave harm the PNA movement did to the country’s polity. While the PPP government partly rigged the 1977 election, the opposition focussed less on undoing the effects of the rigging and more on Mr Bhutto’s personality. The intensity of the PNA’s hate campaign and the “wheel jam” strikes that paralysed the country were matched only by the government’s ruthless response. The end-result was the overthrow of the PPP government and the assumption of power by a general who promised to hold elections within 90 days but went on to rule for 11 years. What is more, some PNA parties joined Ziaul Haq’s cabinet and endorsed the repressive policies, including flogging, pursued by the military government to crush dissent. Today, the threat to democracy comes from several quarters. The army does not seem to be in a mood to give up power, for the army chief, who is also the president, appears inclined to get himself re-elected by the existing assemblies. The way the “non-functional” Chief Justice was treated, the baton charge on lawyers, and the police attacks on media offices showed very clearly that when threatened, the government is ready to abandon all restraint and moderation.
Non-state actors too have often behaved in a way that does not cast them in a good light. In many cases, the religious right has either condoned violence or criticised it for form’s sake, and once again the opposition on the whole seems fixated on the personality of President Pervez Musharraf instead of focussing on issues that are vital to remove the distortions and anomalies that today stand between Pakistan and democracy. The opposition’s reaction to events surrounding the Lal Masjid in Islamabad and a family’s abduction shows that it does not see the threat that these events pose to democracy. Combating and containing the fascist trends seen in the sordid events in Islamabad are the nation’s collective responsibility, and the opposition will be making a grave mistake if it looks the other way and derives pleasure from the government’s predicament. The government’s options are limited: using force thoughtlessly will be counterproductive, but letting those women act the way they want will encourage anarchy and even worse. The opposition must behave as a government-in-waiting, and for that reason it must set targets higher than a mere change of faces at the top.
THE latest bloody clashes in South Waziristan between pro-government tribals and foreign militants and their local allies come after an understanding was reached between the government and local tribal elders to end violence in the area. The death toll in Friday’s gun battles between the militias in which pro-government tribal fighters were aided by the Frontier Corps artillery and surveillance apparatus was 54, of which 45 were foreign militants. The security forces also suffered two casualties. Friday’s fighting reportedly made the surviving militants flee for their lives. The action is expected to continue until the area is cleansed of foreign militants and their local collaborators, now a shrinking minority, lay down arms. The accord reached between the government and the local tribesmen is holding for now; in Tank, the kidnapped school principal and his brother were released on Friday. These are good developments. For the accord to endure, sustained efforts will have to be made by both sides so as not to renege on the promises made.
While the tribesmen are expected to abide by their side of the deal, requiring them to ensure that their area does not become a battleground for Taliban militants and that normality returns to the restive tribal belt, the government must also bring them the promised development. There are few lawful means available in the remote region for the people to make a decent living. Lack of employment opportunities and basic infrastructure have forced the local communities to smuggle goods, including contrabands, to and from neighbouring Afghanistan. Health and education facilities, too, are virtually non-existent. These need to be provided, and guarantees sought from the tribesmen that they will not allow the ultra-conservative among them to obstruct the course of such basic socio-economic development. Meanwhile, it becomes all the more important for the government to ensure that the state’s writ runs unobstructed by the local Taliban in the contiguous settled areas of the Frontier province. Those defying it anywhere by shutting down music and barber shops or forcing women teachers not to report for duty must be brought to book and punished for taking the law into their own hands.
NO disaster is big enough to derail the PCB gravy train and its cargo of cronies and assorted freeloaders. People who are wholly unqualified for the important jobs assigned to them through diktat are not known to resign, at least not in official quarters where moral bankruptcy rules and where there is no tradition of doing the honourable thing. As such, it came as a surprise when Dr Nasim Ashraf, the physician-turned-PCB chairman, tendered his resignation shortly after Pakistan’s exit from the World Cup. But the joy was short-lived, with President Musharraf refusing to accept the chairman’s resignation and Dr Ashraf dutifully declaring his intention to improve the national side’s performance and image. Spin may have been missing in the match against Ireland but there is clearly no shortage of it in Lahore. The PCB chief subsequently cancelled the central contracts of all Pakistani players and insisted that the new coach would be a local man – a decision that has its own load of imponderables. A fielding coach, however, will be brought in from America, the country that Dr Ashraf until recently called his home.
If Nasim Ashraf hadn’t offered to step down, he should have been removed and replaced by someone with a good cricketing background. Instead, his resignation has been returned by the board’s patron, suggesting that the whole exercise was a charade. What the PCB needs is a non-controversial interim chairman who can dispense with the system of ad hoc administration and revert to running the board on a constitutional basis. To end cronyism in the highest echelons of Pakistan cricket, it is important that the president avoids appointing the PCB chief. The regional associations must also be brought on board to make the PCB a truly representative organisation.
The Quran exhorts: “Be quick in the race for forgiveness from your Lord and for a Garden whose width encompasses the heavens and the earth, prepared for the righteous, the God-fearing – those who spend freely in the way of Allah, both in prosperity and adversity, who suppress and control their anger, and those who forgive the people. And Allah loves those who are good to others.” (Q:3:133-4). And how did the Prophet translate into practice the magnanimity and generosity, so enjoined by the Quran. He never took revenge for his own self, for his own sake, and instead forgave even his bitterest enemies.
The Prophet is ordered by Allah to come out, to preach openly and loudly that which has been revealed to him (Q:15:94). He does so in the valley of Makkah. The message is rejected even by his nearest kith and kin. He is tormented, ridiculed, tortured and humiliated and so are the few ones who accept his message and who come mostly from the low cadre of society. Hoping that some people may lend their ears to his message in the twin city of Ta’if, he travels to that place. The nobility there proves to be more stony-hearted. They not only turn a deaf ear to the Message, instead they instigate and appoint ruffians, gangsters and hoodlums of the town to inflict on him maximum possible pain, injury and insult.
Continuous volley of stones, abuses, and calumnies is hurled at him in the streets of the town. He is so grievously wounded that blood flowing all over his body fills his shoes. Whenever he falls down he is lifted up to be freshly targeted with stones. Once the onslaught was so brutal that he fell unconscious and Zaid, his companion, had to lift him on his back to take him out of the town. Not even a single person did oblige him with believing in the Divine message.
It was under these circumstances that he was given the option of the annihilation of the population of Ta’if, if he pleased to curse them. The Prophet’s approach was, “How could I choose to pray to Allah for their destruction. What if they rejected and didn’t believe. I have every hope that their future generations are sure to believe in Allah.”
During the eleven years when the Prophet, (pbuh), was in Makkah, the unbelievers spared no means to persecute, victimise, terrorise, intimidate, and harass him and his followers. A really nightmarish period it was for the believers. Twice, some of them had to leave their homeland for other countries. The climax was reached when they conspired to imprison, exile or better to kill him and thus make short work of the new faith. The Prophet (pbuh) had to migrate to Yathrib, which afterwards came to be known as Madinatal-Nabi, the City of the Prophet.
While leaving Makkah he addressed it, “Oh! How I love thee. Hadn’t I been compelled to leave thee I would have never done so.” Many of the believers followed him. The warmth with which these Mohajirs were received by the Ansars and the brotherly affection and love which was showered upon them, moreover the fast-spreading faith and ever-increasing power of the Prophet only to incite the Makkan unbelievers to adopt a course of action to destroy the nascent Muslim society and a long era of armed conflicts and wars of attrition spread over ten years ensued.
It was about 23 turbulent years after the declaration of prophethood that the day dawned with the conquest of Makkah at the hands of the Prophet. His sworn enemies, his blood-thirsty tormenters who had hounded him throughout were at his feet awaiting the final verdict. It is not rare that at such occasions and under such circumstances entire population is put to sword, towns are plundered, looted, burnt, pillaged and even razed to ground (the ‘civilised’ nations of today’s world are doing it quite efficiently). What the Prophet did was quite unusual, rather unprecedented.
He asked his erstwhile blood-thirsty enemies, who had no choice but to accept defeat and were now dreadfully waiting for the verdict of the Prophet, “Do you have an inkling of what I am going to do with you?” asked the Prophet. The meek reply of those who had rejected him, tortured and humiliated him, attempted to kill him, made him leave his hometown, fought against him was, “You are the Righteous, the Trustworthy, al-Sadiq al-Ameen. You have been a benevolent brother, a magnanimous nephew. We have all along found you kind-hearted, merciful, generous and compassionate.”
And for once during their life time they spoke truth. The Prophet then declared, “Today I say to you the same what Yousuf once said to his brethren: You are absolved of all what you committed in the past. Amnesty is granted to you all. Everyone of you is free (Antum al-Tulaqa’ ).”
The Quran commands: “Fulfil the covenants, the commitments. Every commitment will be enquired into,” (Q:17:34). Never during his life-time did the Prophet, even for once, broke his promise. The Battle of Badr was a decisive moment in the history of Islam. The Quran gives it the name of Yaum al-Furqan, the Battle which clearly distinguished between Kufr and Islam and established that Islam is to survive.
Three hundred and thirteen ill-equipped believers were going to face a well-equipped army of seasoned and battle-hardened warriors determined to wipe out Islam. To make the matters worse a sizable chunk of able-bodied men, the hypocrites, instigated and led by the Munafiq Abdullah bin Obayy had already deserted the believers to weaken them physically and harass them psychologically.
From the point of view of numerical strength every single man counted. At such a critical juncture two of the Companions, named Huzaifah ibn al-Yaman and Abu Husail who till then had not been able to perform Hijrah, somehow escaped from Makkah to join the Prophet and fight on his side.
They met the Prophet, related their story and told him that on the way to Madinah they had been captured by the Quraishites and were only released when they had made a promise not to fight on the side of the Prophet. They expressed their determination to fight the infidels as it was under sheer duress that they had made such an insensible commitment. The Prophet vehemently opposed the idea. He ordered them to leave the battle field immediately as they had no choice but to fulfil their commitment, pointing out that a Muslim had after all to honour his words and fulfil his promise.
Another crucial moment came in the shape of the Treaty of Hudaibiah whose terms though seemed apparently humiliating and very much tilting in the favour of the Makkan heathens was described by the Quran as the Manifest Victory. One of the stipulations was that if a person from Makkah, which was still under the hegemony of Quraish, joined the Prophet, (pbuh), he would be sent back. On the contrary if a man from Madinah opted for Makkah, he could not be claimed back. The covenant had just been signed by the parties when a Makkan Muslim named Abu Jandal, who had managed to escape from Makkah, and who was still in chains and wounded arrived at the scene and requested the Muslims for refuge.
For Muslims who were already dejected and unhappy, the scenario became unbearable. On the other side the Quraish were insistent to get the recently concluded stipulation implemented and get the man back. The Prophet, while honouring the covenant, decided in the favour of the Quraish who under the sad and helpless gaze of the Muslim multitude dragged Abu Jandal back to Makkah.
The patience and forbearance of the Prophet was exemplary. There was in Madinah, a Rabbi, a learned Jew, named Zaid bin Sha’nah who has narrated this episode. He closely watched the Prophet to ascertain whether he possessed all the signs of the promised prophet as found in the Scriptures. He had come to the conclusion that he possessed all of them except the two which he had not the opportunity to verify. One was that the patience and the forbearance of the promised Messiah would always get the better of his anger. The other was that the more impudent, disrespectful and impertinent one would be with him the more his patience and forbearance would increase.
He remained in search of an opportune moment and visited him often. It happened that one morning a Bedouin came to him that his people had embraced Islam but had been afflicted with a severe drought and he was afraid if help didn’t reach them they may even abjure Islam. The Prophet asked Ali if some financial help could be made available to him. Nothing was at hand. Thereby Zaid, who was present at the moment, snatched the opportunity and made an offer that if the Prophet promised to deliver a specific quantity of dates on an appointed date he was prepared to pay the price in advance just now. The deal was struck and Zaid paid eighty misqals of gold which was then given to the Bedouin for disbursement.
Two days before the appointed date Zaid came to the Prophet when Abu Bakr, Omar and Usman were also with him. Zaid caught hold of the Prophet’s shirt and over-covering and angrily demanded repayment of the debt. He also implicated the entire clan of Abdul Muttalib in being guilty of never repaying their debts. Omar admonished the Jew saying that had it not been the fear of annoying the Prophet, he would have lost his life for insulting him.
The Prophet didn’t lose his composure and smilingly said to Omar, “It would have been better if you had advised me to repay the debt in a more proper manner and as well instructed him (Zaid) to be polite in demanding his right. Now go, pay him what is his rightful claim and give him twenty Sa’s more as a compensation for your scolding him.”
When paid twenty Sa’s over and above his claim the Jew asked Omar that why was he being paid in excess. Omar informed him that it was the Prophet’s order and that it was his mode of repayment. Zaid told Omar the whole story that he never meant any disrespect towards the Prophet, he only wanted to verify the two remaining signs which had come true and then embraced Islam.