WITHIN weeks of taking over as governor of the NWFP, Owais Ghani has discovered that the ‘weak, demoralised and despondent’ administration of the province is headed for collapse.

Though his comment was in the context of the troubled tribal areas, surely he knows that the situation is no different in the province of Balochistan that he governed for four and a half years recently.

Having made a bold discovery, the remedy Mr Ghani has proposed is timid. Three regional coordination officers appointed to serve as a bridge between the settled and tribal areas of the province, he thinks, would avert the impending collapse. It is hardly an extraordinary decision to deal with an extraordinary situation, as he was quoted as saying by a report in this paper.

Yet, we may trust Mr Ghani when he says that more and bigger steps will follow, for he is not a politician in the conventional mould whom we have learned not to trust. Though an engineer and owner of a small foundry, according to his friend Ejaz Rahim (a former cabinet secretary and now health minister) he is an erudite historian. After a short, unrewarding stint in Imran Khan’s party, he must have felt amply rewarded by President Musharraf for making him first a minister and later governor of two provinces, bypassing many aspiring generals and politicians of longer standing.

Since Governor Ghani belongs to no party and should not be entertaining political ambitions beyond the present regime, Musharraf, too, should listen to him and encourage him to act swiftly and decisively to undo the enormous harm that his (Musharraf’s) policies — designed primarily to punish those politicians whom he dislodged for their corruption and civil servants whose hauteur he loathed — had done, not just to the administrative system of the tribal area but to that of the whole country.

Greater urgency, however, lies in the tribal regions where guerilla warfare and kidnappings (as in the two Waziristans), militant Sharia campaigns (as in Swat and Kohistan) and the sabotaging of rail, gas and power lines (as in Balochistan) have all but paralysed the administration.

Now, while the army fights infiltrating foreign terrorists and local saboteurs, Mr Ghani and his successor in Balochistan should urgently initiate measures to restore the lost authority and declining prestige of the political agent as well as that of the tribal elders.

Working together in an alternating atmosphere of mutual trust or hostility, the PA and the maliks have historically kept peace and order in the tribal areas relying on tradition and goodwill without invoking the penal codes or the Sharia.

To regain that lost direction, two radical but inescapable decisions must be made. One, the tribal areas of the NWFP should be administered by the provincial government as they are in Balochistan; and, secondly, the central and provincial civil services with their political wings should be restored.

At present, under Article 246 of the Constitution, it is the executive authority of the federation and not of the province that extends to all the seven Fata agencies (Bajaur, Orakzai, Mohmand, Kurram, Khyber, South and North Waziristan) and also to the tribal areas adjoining the districts of Peshawar; Kohat, Bannu and Dera Ismail Khan which were previously administered by the deputy commissioners of these districts.

When the DCs were reduced to mere coordinating officers the tribal pockets detached from the districts were left to be looked after by junior political assistants.

In the old, pre-devolution times, the political agents and deputy commissioners both came under the commissioner of the division. The coordination between the settled districts and tribal agencies thus posed no problem. Now it does, and seriously. Governor Ghani’s effort to achieve coordination by appointing three regional coordination officers without roots in the tribal history and tradition and powers to enforce their orders surely will not succeed.

Coordination is easier said than done. Here it would be even more difficult to achieve if the tribal areas were to remain under the executive authority of the federation. The enduring solution to this problem lies in transferring the administrative control of the tribal areas to the province of which they are an integral part.

This arrangement, however, would require an amendment to the Constitution which can be considered only by parliament after it comes into being. Even then, the legislators may decide not to approve it.

What the governor with the approval of the president can straightaway do is to group the contiguous districts, agencies and tribal pockets into regions (better called divisions) and appoint an administrator (not coordinator) for each region exercising full authority on behalf of the federal and provincial governments. The paramilitary force would, thus, obey the political agent and the elders, too, would trust him.

The National Commission for Government Reforms, after two years of investigations, according to a press report, has come to the conclusion that while the devolution plan had helped to settle the priorities for local development, it created a void in the administration of law and order and the management of natural or man-made disasters. This void in the tribal areas is more serious than elsewhere.

The psychological moment is thus ripe for Governor Owais Ghani to implement a plan for an integrated tribal administration and not be content with the illusory ‘coordination’ which has worked at no level in our system — inter-provincial coordination for one.

He could then go back to his foundry and history books with the satisfaction that after all he had done some good for his home province to make up for the sin of leaving Balochistan worse than he had found it.

It hurts to recall that once, and not very long ago, the NWFP and Balochistan both were distinguished from the larger provinces for their relaxed yet effective administration marked by cordiality. The political agent felt more like a part of the tribe than the government. For old-timers, the nostalgia of service there can still be overpowering.

It is coming to half a century when this writer was political agent in the NWFP but the meanest of Mohmands still feel like long separated kindred kin. The same goes for the pauper princes of Chitral. Hear my friend Abdul Karim Lodhi go lyrical about the Marris and Bugtis among whom he once served, and see him wonder how the nawab of the Bugtis, howsoever defiant, deserved to die in a cave at the hands of the guardians of our lives, and why the recluse Marri nawab should now shun officials, howsoever high, like the plague.

For the tribal areas plunging into anarchy, the politicians and administrators are to be blamed no less than the terrorists and saboteurs.

A JOKE making the rounds in Cairo depicts Hosni Mubarak, who has just completed his 26th year as president of Egypt, on his death bed. A visitor asks him if he has a farewell message for the people. Mubarak responds with a question of his own: “Why? Where are the people going?”

Only two other persons have ruled Egypt longer than him: Ramses II (66 years) and Mohammad Ali (43 years). His authoritarian ruling style has prompted some observers to call him a modern pharaoh.

Born on May 4, 1928, to an inspector in the ministry of justice, Muhammad Hosni Said Mubarak completed high school and joined the National Military Academy, obtained a Bachelor’s degree in military science in 1949. He then went on to the Air Force Academy, graduated in aviation science, and became a pilot in a bombing squadron in the Egyptian air force. He received further training in the Soviet Union.

Having held several posts in an ascending order, he rose to be air chief marshal and head of the Egyptian air force after the war with Israel in October 1973. In April 1975 he was appointed vice-president of Egypt and vice-chairman of the National Democratic Party (NDP, the ruling party and the only one officially recognised). He became president of Egypt and chairman of the NDP on Oct 14, 1981, following the assassination of President Anwar Sadaat.

Egypt was expelled from the Arab League after President Sadaat made peace with Israel. Mubarak was able to get it readmitted, and the organisation returned to its former headquarters in Cairo. His government continues to receive over two billion dollars a year in US aid even when Washington is unhappy about its violations of democratic norms and human rights. Mubarak is said to be America’s most favourite dictator in the Arab world.

Hosni Mubarak sent 38,500 Egyptian troops to help American forces expel the Iraqis from Kuwait during the first Gulf war (1991). In return, the United States and the Gulf states wrote off $29bn Egyptian loans. He did not, however, favour President Bush’s invasion of Iraq in 2003; he cautioned that it would spawn a hundred Osama bin Ladens.

Gama’at al Islamiyya fomented waves of terrorist violence in Egypt during the 1990s, killing more than 100 government and NDP officials, including Major General Raouf Khayrati, head of the anti-terrorist police, a speaker of parliament, and many tourists and bystanders. Six attempts were made to kill Mubarak himself.

The last of them, a close call, was engineered by a combination of the Gama’at, the Islamic Jihad, a senior Al Qaeda representative in Cairo, and a Sudanese intelligence agency in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), where Mubarak had gone to address a meeting of the Organisation of African Unity in June 1995. The attempt failed partly because of the malfunctioning of a grenade launcher.

On his return home Mubarak launched a ruthless campaign to crush the Gama’at. Security agents all across the country broke into homes, pillaged, molested women and threatened to do worse unless they produced their sons and brothers for interrogation, seized suspects by the thousands and took them away to undisclosed places.

Until recently, the Egyptian constitution authorised parliament to nominate a candidate for the president’s office and the subsequent election served as a referendum to confirm its choice. This is how Hosni Mubarak was re-elected president for six-year terms, unopposed, in 1987, 1993, and 1999.

A recent constitutional amendment permitted multiple candidates to contest the presidential election. Accordingly, two persons opposed Mubarak in the election held on Sept 7, 2005. Thirty-two million, out of a population of some 75 million, were registered voters and 23 per cent of them actually voted. Hosni Mubarak got 88.5 per cent of the votes cast, Dr Ayman Nour, a liberal member of parliament, got 7.3 per cent and Noaman Gama’a of the Wafd Party got 2.8 per cent.

The election was said to have been rigged on a large scale. The usual practices connected with rigging — bribing and intimidation of voters, bogus votes, impersonation, use of government vehicles to bring public employees to polling stations, secret counting of votes and misreporting of results — took place.

The following day (Sept 8) Dr Ayman Nour joined a group of some 2,000 protesters who accused the government of having falsified the election results. He was arrested, convicted of disturbing the peace, and sent to jail. He went on a hunger strike, and his health began to fail in prison. At this point, Washington questioned Egypt’s professed commitment to democracy and the rule of law, deplored Nour’s detention and called for his release.One may ask if Mubarak and his political heirs will ever be ready and willing to contest a free and fair democratic election and take the risk of losing it. I think the answer has to be that, left to themselves, they won’t be.

Hosni Mubarak imposed emergency rule the day he took office in Oct 1981, and that has remained in force now for more than 26 years. His government may imprison an individual for any length of time without telling him or anyone else the reasons for his detention and without producing him in a court of law. Mubarak argues that emergency rule is necessary for fighting terrorism. It is said also that if the government could not confiscate the financial resources of those who might fund extremists, and if it did not rig parliamentary elections, militants might come to power. Egypt ranks 133rd in a survey of 168 countries for freedom of the press. In recent years, some independent newspapers and satellite TV and radio programmes, notably the one called Al Qahira al-Yawm, have come up and they do criticise Mubarak’s and his family’s doings.

Mubarak’s two sons, Alaa and Gamal, are prospering in industry and commerce. Both own substantial amount of stock in numerous large corporations. Alaa is said to have been favoured in the award of government contracts and privatisation of state-owned enterprises. Graft is rampant in the police establishments and the ministry of interior because their officials can deal with citizens arbitrarily. Invasions of privacy, extra-judicial killings, executions in fake encounters, and hidden prison cells are all there. The sight of a police officer is scary, not reassuring.

It is hard to say if the Egyptian people have accepted Mubarak’s stern ruling style as the normal way. Some observers believe that the last electoral contest has awakened them and they are not likely to go back to sleep. A protest movement surfaced as recently as the first week of Oct 2007. Workers in state-owned factories went on strike. Human rights activists, led by Sa’ad Eddin Ibrahim, demanded “Democracy Now”. Twenty-three independent newspapers ceased publication for a time to protest the curbs on journalists.

True, the regime has responded with a massive crackdown against dissidents, imprisoned a number of journalists, and arrested many others. But this protest movement may be followed by others and the demand for democracy may become irresistible in time.

The writer, professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts, is currently a visiting professor at the Lahore School of Economics.

anwars@lahoreschool.edu.pk

FORTY days after Benazir Bhutto’s brutal assassination, waves of shock, anger and grief continue to reverberate across Pakistan, uniting all but the most inveterate of her detractors. Mourners continue to throng her burial site in Garhi Khuda Bux transforming it into a sacred shrine; memorial ceremonies multiply all over the country and the terms shaheed and shahadat have become ubiquitous in references to her.

Reminiscing about this last fateful year of her life, many of her friends and associates recall how as she struggled to vindicate herself and restore Pakistan to a civilian, democratic path, she would momentarily become rapt in a faraway other-worldly look, while on other occasions, she would let slip premonitions of her untimely death. Such reminiscences serve to sharpen our sense of the tragic irony marking her fate.

In this ironic standpoint, a long-awaited homecoming ending eight years of self-imposed exile became the harbinger of death. This fatal emissary sent by some dark enemy assailed her as she rose in a triumphal moment to a forest of banners amid the glow of the setting sun and greeted the crowd who continued to cheer the boldest and most rousing speech of her campaign. With only 12 days remaining before the election, her People’s Party was now confident of securing a majority even though the prospect of massive poll rigging hung like the sword of Damocles over its head.

Her assailants’ lightning strike occurred eerily close to the spot where Pakistan’s first prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan, fell prey to an assassin and scarcely a mile from the jail where her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, met a tragic end. Her death marked the climactic moment of one of the most turbulent and blood-soaked years in Pakistan’s history.

The pall of gloom that has descended on the country after Benazir’s assassination falls into many contexts. For the millions who mourn, her death has become a sign of the times, a searing indictment of the present, setting off disquieting echoes from Pakistan’s troubled past as well as forebodings of an unsettled future. It has sparked a discourse in which diverse themes and several levels of analysis, namely the individual, the national and the global are intertwined.

There is the unspeakable horror of an unarmed woman, a mother of three being gunned down. There is renewed fear that without her elections would again be manipulated to perpetuate the status quo. There is worldwide speculation that the regime will lead the country to a point where it may face irresistible demands for denuclearisation and, worse still, undergo balkanisation. Above all, there are questions about who committed this great crime and why.

While this global discourse ranges extensively, one of its key assertions is that Benazir Bhutto made a fatal error of judgment in entertaining the possibility of a power-sharing arrangement with a regime that had no intention of doing so except for cosmetic effect. The general perception is easily spelt out. Musharraf had reportedly assured the leaders of PML-Q last autumn that the ‘deal’ was only a mechanism to destroy the emergent compact between Benazir and Nawaz Sharif as visualised in the Charter of Democracy in 2006.

With her razor-sharp political acumen, it is very likely that Benazir was aware of the pitfalls of dealing with dictators, and, therefore, attempted to offset the likelihood of betrayal by mobilising the people. This exposed her to great personal danger.

During the fleeting 10 weeks that she spent in Pakistan and despite the serious security risks confronting her, she campaigned tirelessly across the length and breadth of the country, addressing large crowds and making serious dents in the shrinking support base of the pro-regime political forces. Press reports suggested that she was contemplating steps to reduce the threat to her from Baitullah Mehsud, arrive at a better understanding with A.Q. Khan and retired General Hamid Gul.

Her final address at Liaquat Bagh signalled fresh thinking. Speaking forcefully about the need to defend Pakistan’s sovereignty, she paid tribute to her father’s role in developing Pakistan’s nuclear programme. She explicitly rejected calling foreign troops into Pakistan saying “Why should foreign troops come in? We can take care of this, I can take care of this, and you can take care of this.” She spoke of the removal of Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry with disapproval and lamented the Lal Masjid operation of the previous summer.

It seems Benazir Bhutto gradually underwent a process or radicalisation after her return to Pakistan as she aligned herself more closely with the national mood. Her growing confidence clearly unsettled her political opponents. While the developing situation called for great vigilance, there is almost universal consensus that the regime did not adequately protect her from the assassins it kept repeating were shadowing her perpetually. After her death, it has further constrained political forces demanding change with the result that the election campaign has become lifeless. In the West, the current discussion is whether there is any point sending observers to watch the election that is being emptied of real choice.

In the months and years ahead, the last 10 weeks of Benazir’s tumultuous life will feature keenly in biographical and political debates surrounding her legacy. The mystery of this murder will probably never be solved but the legend of a death foretold and a martyrdom that Benazir Bhutto herself anticipated would grow. Few would dispute that on the day of her death, she looked a winner and the halo of this personal victory will become brighter and brighter.

But there is danger that the fateful day of Dec 27, 2007, will also become a marker of Pakistan’s slide into instability. The only way to avert this danger is through a collective resolve on the part of the country’s democratic forces to uphold the cause for which she died. In life as in death, Benazir remains first and last a symbol of the federation, an extraordinarily courageous leader who stood for the sovereignty of the people.

The writer is completing a PhD dissertation at a British university.