THE country’s top civilian and military authorities on Thursday pledged to crush extremism and militancy while addressing an Ulema and Mashaikh Conference. This is the latest salvo on this topic from the top brass in the wake of the Azm-i-Istehkam programme announced in June. While some of the comments at the event appeared to be aimed at political parties that have fallen foul of the powers that be, other remarks were squarely aimed at terrorist groups that have begun to reassert themselves. The prime minister called for efforts to wipe out the banned TTP, referred to as ‘Fitna al Khawarij’. The army chief, meanwhile, said social media was being used to spread “anarchy”, and cautioned against “corruption on earth”, a theological term. He also asked the assembled preachers to shun extremism and help “bring back moderation” in society.

Considering the existential threat terrorism and extremism pose to Pakistan, there can be no disagreement with the crux of the message enunciated by the civilian and military leadership. Yet we must also remember that the state has been making such efforts, in one shape or another, for the past two decades and counting, with very modest success. In the post-9/11 era, Gen Musharraf pushed his ideology of ‘enlightened moderation’ to discourage extremist trends within the nation and the broader Muslim world. These efforts encountered a rude awakening when terrorism exploded nationally in the aftermath of 2007’s Lal Masjid fiasco. In 2018, a state-backed fatwa was issued in the form of Paigham-i-Pakistan, which was reportedly endorsed by hundreds of clerics as it sought to formulate a theological response to the monster of terrorism. Yet today, our leaders are still stressing the need to wage the good fight against terrorism and extremism. An honest appraisal by the state, therefore, is in order to determine where we have gone wrong. Some obvious weaknesses in our counterterrorism approach appear to be lack of follow-up, and the state losing interest after the launch of CT campaigns. For example, the National Action Plan is a considerably thorough CT document; yet its enforcement has left much to be desired. Moreover, while violence by any party cannot be condoned, the state should not fuse the political opposition with hard-core militants and extremists that seek to overthrow the constitutional order. This misplaced conflation will only harm national CT efforts.

Published in Dawn, August 10th, 2024