According the militants space, time and, worst of all, legitimacy!
The never-exhausting eagerness of the government to appease the militants and their countless criminal corollaries has driven the country up the blind alley with no hope in hell to come out. It is pitch-dark, and getting darker as we continue to take steps to ultimately espouse militancy in a tight embrace that may explode any time leaving behind pitiable shreds of what once used to be the ethos of a state known as Pakistan.
Even the dreaded assault in the heart of Islamabad has not dented the government’s predilection to re-start negotiations with an outfit that is not known for keeping its word even in the best of times. Instead, it is irretrievably linked with indescribable brutality in masterminding massacres right across the expanse of the country, leaving behind thousands killed and maimed. Skulls severed from human bodies have been used as playing balls uploaded in sickening videos. No shame, no remorse, just proclamations of continuing the mayhem to the bitter end when their brand of Sharia is imposed in the country.
Even the dreaded assault in the heart of Islamabad has not dented the government’s predilection to restart negotiations with an outfit that is not known for keeping its word even in the best of times. Instead, it is irretrievably linked with indescribable brutality in masterminding massacres right across the expanse of the country, leaving behind thousands killed and maimed. Skulls severed from human bodies have been used as playing balls uploaded in sickening videos. No shame, no remorse, just proclamations of continuing the mayhem to the bitter end when their brand of Sharia is imposed in the country.
The attack in the district courts of Islamabad that killed eleven people including a judge has proved one point beyond a shade of doubt: that a deal with the Tehrik e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) is no guarantee to peace in the country. Already there are statements emanating from a number of known and unknown militant outfits expressing their resolve to continue their terrorist activities independent of the TTP till the imposition of their degenerate writ in the country. There are reports of splinter groups within the TTP engaged in a leadership battle that is expected to get more brutal with the passage of time. There are also outfits that were never ever associated with the TTP which have maintained their independent posture throughout the tenure of this killing spree now spread over more than ten years. Consequently, why this deep-set urge to engage the TTP in a dialogue that would give them space, time and, worst of all, legitimacy? Time they would use to regroup and get some more recruits into the organisation after the precision strikes knocked out some of their hideouts. Space they would use to rethink their strategies and plans and further expand the repertoire of their contagious message. Legitimacy they would use to telling effect in getting back at the government once their immediate purpose has been served. And what does the government stand to gain from this gruesome fixation that the dialogue is the way to peace in the country? It stands to gain nothing except a loss of legitimacy, if there is still any left, and a further erosion of focus to combat the scourge of militancy.
Is this expression of painful helplessness in the face of daunting militancy challenges owed to the countless skeletons dangling in the personal closets of the PML-N leadership – this in exchange for a bargain to maintain peace in the Punjab? Remember the Chief Minister stating so in plain words, the lethal effect of which his government and cohorts so painstakingly tried to erase from people’s memories for days, weeks and months, when he exhorted the militants to spare Punjab from their activities? Or, is this because of a lack of understanding of the venomous poison that would penetrate the entire state edifice once the deal is struck? Or, is this a bit of both?
The battle zone is the entire Pakistan stretching from the Waziristan region in the north to the urban Karachi in the south. The TTP and their collaborators’ targets include the military and the security forces, the legal fraternity, the students, the teachers, the schools, hospitals and nursing homes, the worshipping places including the mosques, churches and temples, people of all hues and colours, hailing from all backgrounds, faiths and beliefs, the old and the young, the healthy and the ailing, men, women and children – just about everyone who refuses to espouse the sickening and degenerate writ of the militants.
The closet Taliban that the government nominated on its committee to negotiate a peace deal with the militants are proving to be more Taliban than the real-time Taliban. The TTP does not have to look for support from outside. The support from within the government committee would be enough to strike a deal that would be beyond even their own reckoning. Just go through their writings of the last few years and their statements and one would easily gather enough material to understand their urge for the Talibanisation (nay criminalisation) of the country. This coterie of closet Taliban has presented the opportunity of imposing its regressive writ on a platter to the TTP and they would not let it slip by any means.
The battle zone is the entire Pakistan stretching from the Waziristan region in the north to the urban Karachi in the south. The TTP and their collaborators’ targets include the military and the security forces, the legal fraternity, the students, the teachers, the schools, hospitals and nursing homes, the worshipping places including the mosques, churches and temples, people of all hues and colours, hailing from all backgrounds, faiths and beliefs, the old and the young, the healthy and the ailing, men, women and children – just about everyone who refuses to espouse the sickening and degenerate writ of the militants. The only people spared are those who can purchase the wherewithal to escape the attacks – the rich and the mighty, going around in bullet- and bomb-proof vehicles with a mile-long entourage in the front and a longer one following. Everyone else is doomed. It is the same corrupt privileged lot that is negotiating the fate of those who are the target of the militant savagery – and it is being done at the terms and conditions of the TTP and their criminal cohorts.
The only people spared are those who can purchase the wherewithal to escape the attacks – the rich and the mighty, going around in bullet- and bomb-proof vehicles with a mile-long entourage in the front and a longer one following. Everyone else is doomed. It is the same corrupt privileged lot that is negotiating the fate of those who are the target of the militant savagery – and it is being done at the terms and conditions of the TTP and their criminal cohorts.
The battle does not involve the use of lethal weapons alone. More importantly, the battle would be fought on the intellectual front: what narrative the state of Pakistan is to espouse to move into the future? Whether it would follow the path outlined so eloquently by the Quaid in his August 11 speech – a speech that the adherents of the militant obscurantism even deny the existence of – or it would chose a path that the militant criminals are advocating and which finds ardent support among the government committee members? On the face of it, and judging by an obdurate insistence of the political leadership to continue engaging the militants in a dialogue, the scale appears decisively tipped in favour of the latter, a task made that much easier through the presence of the closet Taliban representing the government’s side.
In the meanwhile, the upsurge of violence continues. After the carnage at the Islamabad District Court, Ansarul Mujahideen (AM) claimed responsibility for attacking a Frontier Corps convoy in Hangu that killed six soldiers. The AM faction is part of the TTP conglomerate and these two criminal militant organisations have coordinated their terrorist activities in the past. In the wake of the ceasefire announced by the TTP and the government having decided to suspend military strikes against terrorist hideouts in response, a decision that escapes logic, how would the political leadership respond to this latest provocation?
The battle does not involve the use of lethal weapons alone. More importantly, the battle would be fought on the intellectual front: what narrative the state of Pakistan is to espouse to move into the future? Whether it would follow the path outlined so eloquently by the Quaid in his August 11 speech – a speech that the adherents of the militant obscurantism even deny the existence of – or it would chose a path that the militant criminals are advocating and which finds ardent support among the government committee members?
There are also indications that the government may move to expand its negotiating committee by including politicians and representatives of the military and intelligence agencies. Ostensibly, this comes in response to the TTP demand that they would like to interact and seek guarantees directly from them. So, things continue to become more grotesque. Conceding to this demand would be tantamount to agreeing to one of the TTP pre-conditions for the dialogue to proceed any further. This would also be an attempt on the part of the political hierarchy to shirk its constitutional responsibility of providing leadership to the country. They want the military to slug it out with the militants as they continue to enjoy the benefits of their corrupt sojourn in power.
It may do another trick for the government. Exposing the military to the dialogue through their direct involvement may remove the perception of the two leaderships not being on the same page when it comes to combating the scourge of militancy. This divide has been evident for a long time now and the gulf separating the civil and the military thinking has only widened with the passage of time. The military’s patience seems to have been exhausted as has been the patience of the ordinary people of Pakistan. They want an end to this mayhem which the political leadership, led by the ever so indecisive (nay complicit) prime minister, is not willing to undertake. Like a person shorn of any vision and a complete disdain for the killing spree that goes on unabated, the prime minister continues to put his faith in a process that should not have been initiated in the first place, and that is not likely to deliver any results with regard to ending the scourge of militancy that grips the nation every minute of their living. It is only that, like his other cohorts, he is so insulated that he cannot see the perpetual pain and suffering in the country.
On the face of it, and judging by an obdurate insistence of the political leadership to continue engaging the militants in a dialogue, the scale appears decisively tipped in favour of the latter, a task made that much easier through the presence of the closet Taliban representing the government’s side.
The policy, if there is any, which is being followed to address the cancer of militancy in the country, is gravely flawed. Solutions only come when states establish their writ in advance of undertaking any negotiations with the adversaries. And before any such process is initiated, those opposed to the state and what it stands for vide its constitution and all laws that emanate from there, have to renounce violence and lay down their arms. It is starting with this premise that there can be some hope of reaching a broad understanding with the adversaries that may ultimately lead to a deal paving the way to secure peace. Negotiations are not conducted in the midst of continued violence, as is happening around us, while the charade of talks with the militants continues. Such an engagement will only dent the state’s legitimacy further and degrade it to a level where the militants and their multifarious cohorts would stamp their regression for it to bear. It is unmitigated shame that the government, unable or unwilling to understand the grave ramifications that would emerge from such a catastrophe, appears hell bent on carrying forward the drama of negotiating with a band of defunct organisations, thus imperilling the future of the state and its people.