Formulation of national security policy cannot be allowed to drag on
The deadly attack on the President’s personal security officer Bilal Ahmed Sheikh appears to remind us that the security threat to Pakistan does not come from just once source. Multiple actors are now outside the control of the State and targeting State officials has now become the order of the day. The suspected suicide bombing near New Town on Sheikh’s vehicle reminded most of the attack by the Taliban on Justice Maqbool Baqar two weeks ago, but the television talk shows continued to suggest that the late Sheikh had been facing threats from the People’s Amn Committee (PAC) and its head, Uzair Baloch, who had control over the Lyari area. Bilal Sheikh had been with Benazir Bhutto when she was attacked in Karachi on Oct 18, 2007, and President Zardari’s words revealed how close he was to the Bhutto family: “He was not just a bodyguard but more like a son.”
While the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) has lost a trusted lieutenant, the opposition head Khurshid Shah spoke out against the federal government for delaying the moot on National Security earlier scheduled for July 12, but delayed because Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan had to go to London “for a medical checkup”. Khan, often accused of being sympathetic to the Taliban, gave his critics more ammunition as he was photographed attending a ball organised by Prince Charles, instead of finding time to give his party’s take on the serious security situation developing in the country. While Shah is right in saying that the All-Parties Conference on National Security should have gone ahead – with or without the PTI chief – the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government understands the need for a unified position on the issue of terrorism.
This is indeed why Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif convened a moot with parliamentarians from FATA on Wednesday and said that “inaction cannot be afforded” and that “curbing terrorism is my government’s top most priority”. Consensus itself is a meaningless word if it means inaction in the present and the fact that thousands of people have now left Lyari to move to Badin and Thatta, acquiring the status of IDPs, means that the State is increasingly losing its ability to offer its citizens protection from gangs, mafias and terrorists. The PML-N chief also told the FATA parliamentarians that “the window of dialogue should be kept open all the time”, but does that not mean that the government is weakening its position with respect to the Taliban and other militant groups? Bilal Sheikh is the third security chief to be targeted – and frankly it is high time that the urgency of drafting and implementing a national security policy should be quite obvious. While the process of ending differences between Imran Khan, the JUI-F and PML-Q shall take time, Mr Sharif must realise that the issue cannot drag on.
