Does it take brilliance to conclude that if that happens the IDPs will be traumatised to such an extent that they may well acquiesce to the Yahoos suzerainty? –AP Photo

Before we go to our subject for today, let me remind readers of the attempted coup mounted by Hamid Nasir Chattha, Humayun Akhtar Abdul Rehman, and their motley crew, against the Chaudhries of Gujrat Sharif and their motley crew.

Now then, while the Chaudhries have a lot to answer for, such as wickedly wasting public funds amounting to nearly Rs500 crore on the questionable Punjab Entertainment Company, you may well ask why the establishment that so recently was playing footsie with the Chaudhries when they were the Commando’s satraps has suddenly got itself another set of handmaidens. For the simple reason that its own primacy over all of the country is its first endeavour, everything else be damned.

The Chattha-Akhtar attempted coup smacks as much of ‘agency’ meddling in politics, as does the move to introduce yet another irritant in Pakistan’s already fractured politics: Seraikistan, and in its wake the complete fragmentation of this already tortured country.

The ‘aim’ as our Guderians and Rommels would put it — not that they have achieved even one ‘aim’ in the last 62 years other than undermining democracy and the rule of law and breaking up the country once already — is quite obviously to divide Pakistan into small, powerless units, and then to ride roughshod over everything as they are so enamoured of doing.

Which is precisely why I have repeatedly beseeched the two large political forces, the PPP and the PML-N, to arm-in-arm defeat these Napoleonic dreams of the establishment before it strikes yet again to the detriment of the country, and all who sail in her. I write this from Islamabad where I have been just one night, but the vibes I get would frighten anyone who believes that democracy and only democracy will get us out of the bottomless pit into which we have been shoved by selfsame establishment.

There is open talk in the houses of the chattering classes of an impending coup of sorts starting, would you believe it, with the destabilisation of the superior judiciary yet again! They predicate this on the malicious rumour that is being spread about an impending challenge to the NRO, and therefore the unravelling of the set-up that emerged as a result of the 2008 election.

This will help no one who believes in elections and not force of arms, as a means of gaining power. So what is to be done? The immediate implementation of the Charter of Democracy, the defanging of the presidency by removing 58-2b and taking away its power to appoint the chief justice, the chief election commissioner, the chiefs of the services etcetera, so that seizing the presidency would become unattractive to any future usurper(s).

These powers should be transferred to parliament who will exercise them through the elected government of the day, with concerned parliamentary committees approving the appointments after public hearings. As I suggested only last week, President Asif Zardari could get himself elected MNA and become prime minister.
Indeed, the third-time ban on someone becoming prime or chief minister must also be removed immediately if not sooner so that the PML-N leadership stays in the political arena being the representative of the second-largest number of voters in the country. How fervently I pray the day will come when these two political parties will come together, the PML-N will rejoin the federal cabinet and both will jointly guide the country out of the mess it is in. United they stand a chance, divided they will both fall, the PPP leading.

A rather long aside, but a necessary one because dark clouds yet again loom over our poor country, made darker by the never-ending acts of omission and commission by people who ought to know better. Consider: some five weeks ago, three of us were asked by a TV anchor how many per centage points the army had succeeded in Swat/Buner. Twenty-five per cent I said, against 50 per cent and more according to the others.

I was right, wasn’t I? It was no more than 25 per cent then, because it is no more than 75 per cent (or less) today, 10 weeks after the operation began. For the very simple reason that not a single leader of the murderous thugs has been arrested/killed. Indeed, most recent reports suggest that the murdering thug, Mullah Radio, is back on the airwaves merrily broadcasting his poison on his FM station. There are reports too of armed Yahoos’ patrolling parts of northern Buner. Which leads me to say that the orchestrated, almost forced return of the IDPs is untimely, stupid and fraught with extreme danger. All it will take is a couple of beheadings and cruel murders to start the exodus all over again.

Does it take brilliance to conclude that if that happens the IDPs will be traumatised to such an extent that they may well acquiesce to the Yahoos suzerainty? That the Yahoos will have been emboldened to go on to further victories against a bumbling and riven-from-within state? And that the world at large will finally be convinced that Pakistan is, all ends up, a failed state?

To obviate that, the government must immediately beef up its police force in Malakand manifold in terms of equipment and weapons and salaries as has been recently announced, and the army must send in many more troops so that the Yahoos are prevented from carrying out their murderous deeds.

Last but not least: may I ask my friends of the District Management Group who so eloquently defended the appointment of a newly-promoted Grade-20 officer as ambassador to France how they would feel if a director general-level officer of the FO was posted as chief secretary, Punjab, even as home secretary? Also, why wasn’t there a peep out of them in the case of ACO Ali Annan’s thrashing by officers and men of the 32 Cavalry in Shiekh Yasin IDP camp?

kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk