The Umpire (Punjabi establishment ) Strikes Back, Drama of Taliban Khan PTI + Qadri Against its own created Mian Taliban Sharif PMLN.

The Umpire Strikes Back
By Saroop Ijaz
Published: August 31, 2014



The writer is a lawyer and partner at Ijaz and Ijaz Co in Lahore saroop.ijaz@tribune.com.pk

Was this really about any demands (at least those made before the marches and the sit-ins), except, maybe, the very confusingly phrased singular demand, “Go Nawaz Go”? Mr Imran Khan just has the same anecdotal ‘evidence’ about rigging, which is also featuring less and less as days go on; the rest is ad hominem attacks and false bravado. Vanity is a dangerous sin. To hear Mr Khan talk about his prison days (yes, all eight of them, maybe he should just do a Gramsci and write his Prison Notebooks already) without any visible embarrassment is not that amusing anymore. The primary reason (apart from the obvious, blatant power lust) given by Mr Khan that he has tried legal avenues for fourteen months and now his ‘patience’ has run out. Really? One can only speculate on whatever subjective conception of the legal system he has in his head. What sell-out courts are these who have failed to factor in that he is a “fast bowler” and thus has a little patience, right? Never mind the institutional problems with the legal system that millions face every day. This exceptionalism is not surprising from a man, whose speeches constitute exclusively of “I, me and myself”.

Yet, there were finally some signs of humility, of ordinary human emotions from the Mighty Khan. It was moving to see him suppress giggles as he rushed to meet the ‘Chief’, almost like a child meeting his idol; an emotion countless have felt about seeing and meeting Imran Khan. Mr Khan wants to be something like General Raheel Sharif when he grows up. The Umpire has not lifted his finger yet, however, you have got his attention.

His holiness has one absolutely legitimate and non-negotiable point, the registration of theModel Town FIR. There is no grounds explaining the delay from the government; none. However, rest is hubris, at least in form, if not completely in substance. Yet, it was interesting to see his grace making the exception, letting “martyrdom”, “revolution” and other such elevated things wait, as he made his way to the “Sipahsalar”, and Dr Qadri’s speech post-meeting suggested that he had just met the perfect living specimen of humanity. It is time to dust off the old slogan from the days of infamy of the lawyers’ movement, “Chief teray jannisar, beshumaar, beshumaar” or of course the new “Raheel, teray phone say inqalaab aaye ga”.



One cannot be certain if the ‘Chief’ wanted it to be this way; however, one can be fairly certain, that the Chief is not complaining. What about the man that this country elected to govern this country? Mian Nawaz Sharif has not surrendered completely, yet he surrendered significantly on Thursday evening, when he asked the Army chief to ‘facilitate’. That was the prime minister, throwing his hands up, shrugging his shoulders, and in essence saying “I am just not up to it”. One can debate the semantics till Kingdom comes (might be sooner than Mian Sahib thinks), yet the point remains, that the prime minister buckled under pressure in the Parliament on Friday, and did not state the whole truth. Of course, Mr Imran Khan and Allama Qadri wanted the Army chief to ‘mediate’/ ‘facilitate’/ ‘arbitrate’ (no meaningful difference in this context, let go off the Oxford Dictionary) right from the get go. It was you Mian Sahib, who was supposed to resist and repose the trust in the Parliament which the Parliament reposed in you.

The Leader of the Opposition, Mr Khursheed Shah, made the best speech of the last 14 months on the floor of the House. Excellent and with moral clarity; no coups will go unresisted. Yet, that speech had to be made by Mian Sahib. Nawaz Sharif has never been a man of crisis, starting as a prodigy of General Jillani and General Ziaul Haq. The patriotic business tycoon from Punjab against the treasonous folks from the deep dark feudal fiefdoms of Sindh, he is used to having at least two out of the three power centres — the Army, Media or the Judiciary — with him. For the past five years, he had the media and judiciary who were vehemently anti-government. Now, Mian Nawaz Sharif has a government and a state with fragmented power centres, whereas one deal is good enough. It is a test of his nerves, the past is not confidence-inspiring on that account. Mian Nawaz Sharif lost his nerve and asked the Army Chief to intervene (even if demanded by Mr Imran Khan and Allama Qadri). The only honourable course of action was him apologising to the Parliament and assuring it that he is a man worthy of their trust and support. Instead he simply told a half-truth. Mian Nawaz Sharif cannot take stand like Syed Khursheed Shah, simply because he has never had the need. It has always been detached arrogance until tragedy strikes. Well, he has to learn now.

It took the government a good 14 hours to react to the news of the prime minister asking the army chief to intervene, like it took Mian Sahib the younger half a day to finally wake up to the Model Town massacre. The prime minister might survive still. Yet, Mian Nawaz Sharif has to publicly on the floor of the House apologise; he should not have asked the army chief to play a role, any role, in a political dispute, and of course if he survives start leading the house from INSIDE the house. He should now stake his job on ensuring that this is dealt with only by the Parliament and the political class.

The illusion of civilian, democratic supremacy has been the primary casualty of the fiasco thus far; the velvet coup is upon us already. The real possibility is that it will reduce the business of all governance to politics of survival; one long day at a time. The non-existent debate on social and economic rights will remain non-existent. There will be no time or energy for institutional reforms. In due course, the saturation point with the political drama, with the shenanigans of Imran and Qadri, on the one hand, and the indifference of Nawaz Sharif, will be reached on the other. The recently politicised urban middle class will go back to normal life, shrugging their shoulders and with the customary, “they are all the same”. The democratic project undermined now, will diminish further, perhaps worse, it will create a vacuum yet again for a demagogue egoist, another Imran Khan with hollow rhetoric to come in another few years. We do not need that.

Postscript: Mr Khan and Allama Qadri have brought the culture of viciousness and personal attacks in vogue. It is disturbing to hear of threats to excellent and courageous friends Mr Omar Quraishi and Mr Kamran Shafi. This government, it seems, can do little else at the moment, but it can at least track down and prosecute those who threaten dissenting voices.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 31st, 2014.

source;  http://ht.ly/ELb2b

Taliban as "Anti Imperialists and "AntI Colonialists"

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Written by Mona Naseer

If we choose to believe our media, the shock which Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) initially delivered to the state of Pakistan and its people since it first struck in 2007, targeting the urban cities, has evaporated. The narrative moved swiftly from rage and anger to the point of calling the Taliban an ‘anti-imperialist’ power and issuing a call for ‘decolonization’.  This discourse is blended with and explained by tribal people’s nature, norms and propensity.

An example of this being PUKHTUNWALI, a code practiced in the Pashtun area supporting violence along with their AZAD QABAIL Status (the area was never under occupation and the people are free to follow their own traditions and customs).

One such article appeared March 2, 2014, in The News on Sunday (TNS). This article entitled, ‘Pakhtun ethos for Ghamidi’ suggests that ‘Taliban, too, ostensibly are fighting for decolonization not only from America but more so from the Pakistani state, which they deem un-Islamic, therefore condemnable’. The writer follows by saying, ‘Taliban in contra-distinction to Foucault, to some extent, fit in well with Franz Fanon’s ideas in which he considers violence as a necessary and inevitable tool for decolonization’.

Now let’s look at the terms anti-imperialism and decolonization in light of the TTP intellectual framework, its goals and objectives. What sort of anti-imperialist and decolonization agenda are they pursuing?

Anti-imperialism can be roughly defined as a movement in which all efforts are made to destroy imperialism as a system where the oppressor subjugates the indigenous population, their resources, labour, capital and uses instruments of domination like arms and a well-equipped army to keep the people oppressed and obedient. Decolonization was a movement based in calls and demands for independence on the part of the colonies of the imperialist powers.

The TTP ostensibly was formed in 2007 in reaction to the American occupation of Afghanistan and the Pakistan army operation against the Taliban in FATA.  FATA, as a special status of political, social and economic isolation, provided the perfect sanctuary to Taliban who, along with remnants of Pakistani jihadist organizations present in the area, were fleeing Afghanistan after the American occupation. From the start the Taliban agenda, if they had an agenda, has been to provide support to the Afghan Taliban against NATO forces, jihad against the Pakistan army’s ‘occupation’, demand a withdrawal of the Pakistan army from tribal areas, abolish all army check posts in FATA and ultimately to implement Sharia Law not only in FATA but throughout  Pakistan.

With their strict Deobandi version of Islam and a ‘decolonization’ agenda, which some of our right-wing intellectual commentators attribute to them, the TTP themselves acknowledge the presence and influence of Arab funds and Arab fighters as well as a drawing of ideological strength from Islam as practiced by a monarchy like the house of Saud.

To date, there is no discussion of the cultural realm in the TTP debate on Sharia. Their demands for Sharia show no concern for the religious minorities, sects or social classes or what this might imply under their version of Sharia. Based on their actions it seems the only philosophy they believe in is that of violence and militancy. That may be because they are trained by the jihadi fighters of 1979 and no leaders at present have any substantial Islamic education or training. This is apparent in the Shia-killings in Kurram Agency, the targeting of Christians in the Peshawar church blast, as well as their recent statement regarding Kailash and Ismaili communities in Chitral and the rest of Pakistan. How does the targeting of religious minorities achieve ‘anti-imperialist’ or ‘anti-colonial’ objectives?

Another prerequisite which the TTP as a national decolonizing movement lacks is the crucial support of the ordinary people of the area. According to some estimates, since 2009, more than 2.3 million people have been forced to flee their homes in areas under their domination/occupation. These are mainly people from Bajaur, Mohmand, South Waziristan, Khyber and Kurram agencies in FATA and the Swat Valley. While many internally displaced people (IDPs) from Swat and areas rescued from the Taliban have returned, significant numbers still remain as IDPS. One internally displaced person spoke to Al Jazeera TV in these words ‘we fled our homes because of [the Taliban] - there is no point in sending us back to them’. This must be a very strange version of ‘anti-colonialism’ whereby ‘liberated’ people prefer escape the decolonized spaces. Ironically, the theoretician behind the theory of Taliban-as-anti-colonial-force himself works at Cambridge University.

The withdrawal of American forces in December 2014 should now see the end of TTP ‘anti-imperialist’ policy since it will be an all Afghan affair in the coming months. If opposition to the presence of the Pakistan army in the tribal area is one of their goals and if under this context people are attributing their rise as ‘anti-colonial’ power, then probably some fact checking is required in this regard. Tribal areas were always effectively under government control with Frontier Corps border forces operating in these areas since 1907 with more than 21 forts under their control. The interesting detail which most of us choose to ignore is that this border force ensuring the territorial integrity of Pakistani state is mostly manned and recruited from the tribal and Pashtun belt.

Furthermore, the TTP has made no demands of abolition of this set up under the Frontier Crime Regulation, 1901 - a crude instrument of historic British imperialist power. Perhaps they want the FCR and its oppression to continue because it suits their needs, and to get the requisite right-wing support without talking about poverty, deprivation in FATA or other unresolved issues since 1947.

Their philosophy seems to stem from slavery, forced recruitments in the tribal areas, violence and savagery. In fact they are the coloniser who has played havoc with the system operating in tribal areas, by targeting the Jirga, a local population, with throat slitting, occupying their land,  targeting the locals Aman Lashkar and  holding them hostage in a situation not of the majority’s doing.

No matter how much Frantz Fanon is quoted by the Cambridge professor, or others justifying TTP’s violence as having a therapeutic effect on the colonised. The fact remains that their wanton violence has terrorised the very people they wish to represent and made them hate these so-called ‘anti-imperialists’. I would rather put TTP in the bracket of colonisers by referring to Aimé Césaire here, ‘societies drained of their essence, cultures trampled underfoot, institutions undermined (Jirga system), lands confiscated, religions smashed (they pursue a violent ideology in the name of Islam), magnificent artistic creations destroyed (artist killed or banished), extraordinary possibilities wiped out (schools destroyed and girls education banned)’.

source : http://www.pashtunwomenvp.com/index.php/2013-01-28-03-21-27/political/433-taliban-as-anti-imperialists-and-anti-colonialists