There can be no two opinions about Prime Minister Gilani’s plea that the state institutions need to be strengthened. Those who criticise the intelligence agencies for their failure to find OBL or the army for being found napping during the May 2nd American operation want in fact to strengthen the two institutions by helping them find their vulnerabilities, which is possible only through a credible probe. The investigation under the Adjutant General would satisfy none. The military has in the past been resentful of enquiries conducted into its failures and has blocked their publication or failed to take action when recommended. The Hamoodur Rehman Commission Report was kept under wraps for twenty six years and no action taken on its recommendations. The Ojhri Camp Report prepared by the army never saw the light of the day. No enquiry was held, despite demands by public and former air force and navy chiefs into the Kargil misadventure. Two years back, the army chief promised an enquiry into a video tape showing men in uniform killing civilians in captivity. Another probe was promised into a big financial scam by three generals. The outcome of the enquiries remains still unknown. Keeping in view the gravity of the intelligence-cum-security failure, a competent, neutral and reliable body needs to be constituted to satisfy the critics at home and abroad. This is also in the benefit of the state institutions.
When developed democracies encounter grievous failures of the sort, parliaments either appoint bipartisan committees comprising legislators or commissions comprising parliamentarians, members of civil society and individuals widely respected for their competence. In a nascent democracy like Pakistan, bodies of the sort might fail to create confidence in their competence or impartiality at this stage.
The only institution which is widely considered impartial and competent at home and abroad is the higher judiciary. Mian Nawaz Sharif has suggested a six member commission comprising five CJs of the High Courts presided over by Chief Justice of Pakistan. While one may not fully agree with the timeframe given by the former PM to the commission, an investigation by the judicial body would be widely respected.
i have been following ur editorials and articles by Arif Nizami for quite some time and appreciating the arguments and balanced opinions since then. But, for once, i would demur here. The army's hegemony over political and cultural narrative is no doubt deplorable. but this is the army of a nation-state. No doubt the lower to mid level tiers subscribe to transnational islamism but top echelons are pragmatic and know the diference between being national and transnational. The only bulwark against creeping extremism will be army. And army must know that frankenstein monsters are ready to engulf the army itself. The probe if it amounts to realizing and checking the wrong policy of rhetoric and narrative subscribing to global jihad is welcome but if it is going to conclude that this war is not our war and disassociate ourselves from this war will be a death knell for us. We have seen in the past that only 'Nixon could go to China.'
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