Will the reluctant fighters against terrorism implement it efficiently?
For a party taking a decision that marks a break with its past is not easy. Implementing it forcefully is even more difficult. This is one of the major reasons behind the delay in the PML-N’s formulation of a national security policy.
Religiosity has always been the hallmark of the PML-N. The party takes right of the centre position on issues like rights of the minorities and women and capital punishment. There is a consensus in the party that the laws promulgated by Zia in the name of Islam which militate against the minorities and women must not be removed from the statute book nor altered – being specially sacrosanct is the blasphemy law despite its having been widely misused.
Many in the party rank and file share the extremists’ worldview of the Jews, Christians and Hindus being the eternal enemies of Islam. Further, that no friendship is possible with them. Others share prejudices against a number of minority sects particularly the Shia community which is considered either a deviant sect, or one altogether out of the pale of Islam. Some have a soft corner for the militants. A category among them refuses to believe that the TTP or any of its affiliates is involved in suicide attacks, or assaults on military installations. These have been explained away as acts undertaken by forces opposed to Pakistan, like contracted operatives Blackwater or its successor Xe or the RAW agents. The Pakistani Taliban are seen to be conducting a jihad against the enemies of Islam.
While the top leadership of the party might not have fully agreed with the extremists, it could not afford to ignore the opinions of the rank and file. It had to construct narratives on issues like terrorism that were acceptable to its followers.
The TTP attacks in Pakistan were therefore described as a reaction to two factors, i.e. the US occupation of Afghanistan and the drone attacks. The Pushtuns living astride the Durand Line belong to the same tribes, it was argued. They were therefore justified to go to help their kinsmen on the other side of the border in their fight against American occupation. As Pakistan government supported the US war on terror, this led the TTP to launch attacks inside Pakistan. The drone attacks kill innocent people, and are conducted with the connivance of the government and the army. They provide the militants, it was claimed, another cause to launch attacks inside Pakistan
It is forgotten that violent attacks on the Shia community started soon after the creation of Anjuman Sipahe Sahaba, subsequently known as Sipahe Sahaba Pakistan in 1985. The organisation was to subsequently give birth to Lashkar-e-Jhangvi in1996. The anti-Shia terrorist outfits had killed hundreds of people by late 1980s and 90s.
Sufi Muhammad, the chief of Tehrike Nifaze Shariate Mohammadi initiated armed struggle in Malakand Division in 1994 during Benazir Bhutto’s second term with an aim to enforce Sharia.
Sufi Muhammad fomented an insurrection in Malakjand Division on the basis of his demand for Sharia law. The uprising was quashed by the Pakistan military but not before the TNSM had brought Dir and Swat under its control. This was much before the Americans were anywhere near Afghanistan and while they were yet to develop the technology that was to give birth to the drones.
The PML-N top leadership was not far from the corridor of power when Zia helped in the birth of the Anjuman Sipahe Sahaba. It knows how the gulf rivalries led to a proxy war inside Pakistan and who funded the sectarian killers.
The PML-N leadership’s relations with the Saudis who have traditionally financed not only hundreds of seminaries and mosques but also the Shia killing outfits have stood in the way of denouncing the LeJ or other terrorist networks targeting the Shia community. While the LeJ has publicly accepted responsibility for some of the most dastardly attacks, the interior minister has never condemned the network by name.
During successive elections the PML-N candidates have entered into an understanding with the LeJ in a number of constituencies. This too has hindered the party from opposing the terrorist network.
The narrative based on ‘this is not our war’ helped the PML-N maintain good relations both with the militants and their foreign sponsors. The narrative also provided the PML-N a stick to beat the PPP led government with. The party demanded that the government stop supporting the US war on terror and seek an end to the drone attacks. It was claimed that once this happened the terrorist attacks would come to an end automatically. This was the stand taken by several PML-N leaders on talk shows and in public statements before the elections.
Even Nawaz Sharif took the position in one of his pre-election speeches. Addressing a public meeting in Lahore on May 5, he urged the government to reconsider its support to the US war on militancy and instead start negotiations with the Taliban. The US-backed military campaign against the Taliban was not the best way to defeat the insurgency, he said. “I think guns and bullets are always not the answer to such problems,” he told Reuters in an interview in his black armoured car. “I think other options need to be explored at the same time and see what is workable. And I think we’re going to pursue all these other options.”
But once in power, the reality forces the leaders to remove their blinkers. Mian Shahbaz Sharif who had promised last year that he “would go for a long march against the drone attacks in FATA, if the strikes were not stopped,” remained unmoved despite several drone strikes that were conducted after the PMLN took over.
Ground realities have forced Ch Nisar to revisit the old narrative. Although the “war against terror” was imposed on the country after the attacks in the United States in Sept 2001, it had now turned into “a battle for survival of Pakistan”, the interior minister said in Quetta last week. “The entire nation should be on the same page in the `war against terror’ as it has now become a battle for survival of Pakistan even though it was imposed on us.”
Exigencies of power are forcing the PML-N to take note of the ground realities. While in power the party cannot ignore the attacks on law enforcement agencies, bank heists and jailbreaks and the use of Pakistani territory as a launching pad for attacks on other countries. A responsible government is supposed to come down hard on activities of the sort.
A sudden departure from the conventional position would however be embarrassing. It would lead the PTI and the JI to accuse the party of having sold itself to the US. It would even alienate the party workers. This explains why the formulation of a new security policy is taking time.
A new security policy might be a little late but will have to be crafted in the next weeks and months. What remains to be seen if the reluctant fighters against terrorism would implement it efficiently.
The writer is a political analyst and a former academic.
