A reminder to the president

THE letter to President Pervez Musharraf by some intellectuals, retired generals and serving and former parliamentarians breaks no new ground and states the obvious. But what lends importance to it is that those who have come out with what looks like a desperate plea include men who till yesterday were part of the establishment and helped craft the kind of civilian-military mix we have as our political dispensation. The focus of the letter is on ending the military’s role in politics, and it appeals to the heads of all institutions, especially the political parties, to desist from adopting extremist positions and instead pursue “a sustained dialogue” so as to break the polarisation that at present has the country in its grip. While this is no place to go into history and dwell on the causes that have brought us to the present sorry pass, suffice it to say that the blame for the crisis cannot be heaped on one individual or party: it is a collective failure, the responsibility for which must be shared by the political parties, the generals, the civil bureaucracy and the judiciary. Of the first two — the political parties and the generals — it is a matter of opinion as to who bears the greater part of the blame and what is the cause-and- effect relationship. Do we have bad politicians because the military repeatedly dislodged civilian governments and did not let the political institutions grow, or was the military persuaded to intervene because we have had bad politicians? The debate can go on endlessly, but one statement that no one will disagree with is that collectively we Pakistanis seem to have sworn not to learn from history.

The polarisation to which the letter in question refers basically centres round two issues: one is the army’s role in politics, the other is the two different visions for Pakistan — one based on obscurantism, the other on the sayings and precepts of Jinnah and Iqbal. The first is less problematic, because there are no two opinions about what the armed forces’ role in any country is — it is to safeguard its frontiers. Gen Ziaul Haq sowed the seeds for the institutionalisation of the army’s political role by declaring that the army was also the defender of Pakistan’s “ideological frontiers”. The tragedy was that some political parties agreed with him and lent him their full support for the army’s persecution of its political opponents by raising the ideology bogey. Today some of those political parties are crying themselves hoarse for an end to the army’s role in politics. This illustrates the lack of scruples and principles that characterises our approach to issues of vital importance to the evolution of democracy.

The army’s role in politics is indefensible. It has disfigured the Constitution, deprived it of its parliamentary character, resurrected the ghost of Article 58-2b, which subordinates the elected civilian prime minister to the generals, and has created a National Security Council headed by the general-president. The worst part of it is that the army chief happens to be an “elected” head of state. Like the religious parties which supported Ziaul Haq yesterday, today the “secular” PML-Q has lent its full support to this joke of democracy. The letter thus aptly demands a separation of powers and pleads for the army’s disengagement from politics. This point has been stressed by men who were not only closely involved with the imposition of the kind of constitutional non-system we now have but who also played a major part in doing away with the time-honoured, Mughal-gifted district management system which even the British had maintained with some modifications. The writers of the letter also include those who are the president’s personal friends — besides some generals who served more than one military ruler. One wonders why their conscience did not prick when they were in uniform. However, the old adage holds good here: do not go by who is saying it but what is being said. From this point of view, the letter by some born-again democrats provides us with an opportunity to restate our position on some of the observations contained in it.

The letter asks all sides to avoid taking extremist and inflexible positions. This is the fundamental principle of democracy, for democracy cannot survive, nor can healthy democratic institutions develop without a spirit of accommodation and tolerance among the major actors. One can recall the rigid positions that the two sides took during the PNA movement in 1977 following the controversial elections. The protracted negotiations and the failure of the opposition parties and the government to agree on the terms and conditions for a re-election enabled General Zia to usurp power and perpetuate his rule for 11 long years. The opposition celebrated the overthrow of the Bhutto government as a victory, but the consequences of the army’s take-over on July 5, 1977, are still with us. The loser ultimately was the nation.

A point which the letter misses is the growing trend towards violence. Any observer of the Pakistani scene today would be astonished by the absence of responsible and mature public behaviour, the ever-present threat of mob violence, and the failure of politicians and religious leaders to control their supporters. The tendency to call for “wheel jam” strikes on the slightest pretext does no harm to the government but creates immense hardships for the people, besides causing economic losses which for a single day run into billions of rupees. The country’s image also suffers, for Pakistan is getting increasingly identified with frenzied mobs on the rampage, torching vehicles, gas stations and restaurants with foreign franchise — as seen during the strikes over the Danish cartoons.

Where is humanitarian law?

RESTRAINED perhaps by the mandate of his office, the UN’s emergency relief coordinator was non-committal when asked on Sunday if Israel was guilty of war crimes in its on-going assault on Lebanon. He was, however, unequivocal in his condemnation of the Israeli offensive, pointing out that the targeting of civilians and non-military infrastructure stood in clear “violation of humanitarian law”. Issues of legality and culpability aside, there can be no looking away from the attack’s horrifying human toll, destruction and mass displacement that no one could have foreseen a few weeks ago. Collective punishment is being meted out to an entire nation for the actions of a guerrilla outfit that is clearly not under the control of the Lebanese government or people. Israel, however, remains unfazed even as world opinion begins to mount against these brazen atrocities, with European and UN diplomats finally echoing Lebanon’s call for a ceasefire.

Tel Aviv’s confidence stems from the limited carte blanche given by Washington. In this meeting of minds and mutual interest, the US has reportedly given Israel another week in which to inflict maximum damage on Hezbollah. Washington seems to have no intention of playing the role of peacemaker until Israel’s — and its own — immediate objectives have been achieved. Israel has made it clear that it will accept an international force in southern Lebanon only when Hezbollah has been significantly weakened. In an apparent endorsement of the Israeli stance, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said before her departure for the Middle East that the need for a ceasefire may be “urgent” but the “conditions” must be such that it is “sustainable”. With Syria growing increasingly restless on the sidelines and vowing to intervene in the event of a full-scale invasion by Israel, the time for a ceasefire is now. At stake is not just regional but global security. Wilfully or not, Israel and the US may be creating yet another ‘cause’ for militants and terrorists worldwide.

Sensexocrats: the new ruling caste

THE anguish of terrorism breeds a thousand questions, each troubling, one more difficult than the other. Anger is inevitable, but insufficient. Judgment is necessary, and retribution essential, for a state cannot be impotent against those who seek to destroy its peace.

But it is equally vital to understand the problem, if only to better understand the enemy. Solutions are eventually found not by the judge but by the scholar. The hunt for villains is incomplete without the hunt for answers.

The answers do not belong to easy questions. A parade of the usual suspects is necessary to police work. Pakistan has topped just about every list of suspects that I can recall. Let us agree that some intelligence agency in Pakistan is clever enough to be guilty each time. We then also have to agree that we have been able to do nothing about it.

There is a pattern. Delhi accuses, Islamabad responds with denial and a request for hard evidence. Threats follow from Delhi; cease, or else. Sometimes the “or else” is accompanied by the rattle of sabres. In 2001, after the attack on the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly building on October 1 and the parliament building on December 13, the rattle of sabres was heard across the world. Then? Then nothing happened. On August 25, 2003, bombs left 40 dead in south Mumbai. On October 29, 2005, 59 died in Delhi’s markets which till that moment had been humming with Diwali joy. Each time the prime minister dressed wounds with rhetoric about Pakistan. What happened?

A lot of nothing.

Why do the usual suspects remain usual? Who are the fifth columnists of our country? “Suspect” is a word as wide as the horizon since hard evidence is rarely offered to back up the suspicion. Is suspicion a device to appease media frenzy, to buy time, to ensure that the people are diverted from asking hard questions from their own government?

Why are the usual suspects not penetrated, exposed and uprooted during the fallow months between terrorist outrages? The latest on the list of regular suspects is SIMI, the Students’ Islamic Movement of India. The mention of SIMI certainly encourages some television channels to fill their screens with caps and beards. SIMI is a public organisation with office-bearers.

If they are guilty why cannot the police destroy them while the conspiracy is being hatched instead of waiting for the violence to blast our lives? Their name has been fed to the media before. What did the police do after that? “The usual suspects” is a phrase from the film ‘Casablanca’ and is used by a cynical police chief who knows that suspects are obligingly expendable during a crisis.

Of the thousand questions that trouble me, two leave me helpless. Who and where are tomorrow’s terrorists? Why did terrorists in Mumbai target first class railway compartment? The answer to the second will offer clues to the first. Terrorists succeed because they keep ahead of those on their tail. Mumbai’s terrorists are now mining the many layers of anger in a complex metropolis vulnerable to innumerable forms of misery. Examine the events that preceded the train terrorism in July and you can see the seismic tremors building, whether connected or separate, in advance of the earthquake. Even nature intervenes to rev up the Misery Index.

Mumbai now has three major religions: Hinduism, Islam and Wealth. These broad categories may have soft edges, allowing much seepage but the contours are valid. The rich were always a separate culture. Now they have their own gods, their own demons, their own rituals, their own prayers and, naturally, their own sacrificial goats. In this respect, as in so much else, Mumbai is only the advance face of India.

India is dividing into two worlds: a political democracy, where the poor live, and an economic sensexocracy in which the rich and the rising middle class bow to consumerism, salaries and a stock exchange. The Sensexocrats are the new Brahmins, the new ruling caste. It is not an accident that the finance minister of India, Palaniappan Chidambaram, declared, after the train terrorism, that the Mumbai Sensex had survived. The Sensex was safe and therefore his India was safe.

The democrats of our serfocracy are permitted the privilege of voting once every five years. That is their only relationship to power. Very suitably, they are given a holiday to celebrate such a festive occasion, which of course also serves to reinforce our image abroad as a free nation. But the freedom of the poor ends with that vote. Other freedoms are the privilege of the Sensexocrats, a prominent sub-caste of the group, equivalent possibly to the Kayasthas, being the media. (I am a Sensexocrat of the media sub-caste.)

Sensexocrats periodically offer democrats economic crumbs from a Barmecide’s Feast (a feast in which food is an illusion). When democrats get angry, the prime minister, whoever he may be, gives a speech with a carefully depressed face. When democrats get desperate, and resort to violence — as the Naxalites are doing — Delhi, lost in dream world delirium, selects a response from Alice in Wonderland. Off with his head, said the Queen! The terrorists of Mumbai are expanding their theological base. Marx thought religion was the opium of the masses. He never paused to consider what religion might one day think of Marx. The mixture of communal venom with Marxist anger is just the kind of acid that the desperate need to set off a deadly conflagration. Some politicians will of course never resist encouraging such fires.

Is this where the next terrorist is coming from — from the despair of the underclass of Mumbai? Is the Naxalite a terrorist? Is the Naxalite a fundamentalist? These questions are urgent and relevant. Terrorism is born in the mind, and that is where any battle for prevention has to take place. The police and the Army can take charge of the cure.

But if prevention is better than cure, then it becomes the responsibility of the political class and its surrogates, including the media. It is they who must engage in the tough task of reducing despair, and spreading social justice along with prosperity. Why do I feel helpless? Because the answers lie in nuances and the Sensexocrats are blinded by headlines.

The writer is editor-in-chief of Asian Age, New Delhi.

Warsaw worries

POLAND and Poles are not used to attracting the sort of attention they are getting at the moment, for a mixture of reasons. Two years since the country finally joined the European Union the conservative and nationalist drift of its domestic politics is causing alarm at home and abroad.

Until recently most Britons remembered Poland as a plucky wartime ally that disappeared behind the iron curtain and produced a memorable pope. Now it is the source of the largest influx of foreigners to arrive in the UK in modern times, several hundred thousands since 2004.

As many Londoners already know, Poles have become indispensable to whole sections of the British economy. The freedom, mobility and mutual benefit that represents is a tribute to the EU expansion of which successive governments have been enthusiastic advocates. Unlike the French, we mostly welcome and value our Polish plumbers, builders and nannies.

Poles working here and elsewhere in Europe are fleeing unemployment of over 16% (the EU’s worst), though that is shrinking as the remittances they send back helps create wealth.

Opportunity knocking in richer EU countries and the triumph of English as the language of globalisation (overtaking the German, Russian and French that Poles once spoke) are both factors. Ironically this has brought worries about a skills shortage at home which is being filled by poorer Ukrainians and Belarussians.

The nervousness arises from the shortcomings of the centre-right Law and Justice party and replacement of the popular prime minister, Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, twin brother of the president, Lech Kaczynski — raising concerns about constitutional checks and balances as well as too many punning headlines and bad jokes.

The new premier’s most striking traits are assertiveness towards the EU and strong hostility to gay rights and abortion, a focus for the rightwing League of Polish Families, one of two small coalition partners. Relations with Germany, historically sensitive, have deteriorated sharply in spats over a Russo-German gas pipeline and the president’s overreaction to a hostile article in a Berlin newspaper, suggesting an illiberal attitude towards press freedoms.

Pledges to curb corruption and speed public sector reforms are welcome but hard to achieve without singling out former communists. Like every people, Poles, (twins or otherwise) are distinctive and idiosyncratic: one of their top exports is Catholic priests, making up for the shortfall in less devout lands.

—The Guardian, London