There has to be a method in this madness
Right now, it is a bad hair day moment for Shahbaz Sharif. The Punjab chief minister had to proclaim in a meeting chaired by his elder brother that he was ‘out of the loop’ about the operation at the Minahjul Quran Model Town secretariat in which more than 12 people died as a result of indiscriminate police firing.
As if this was not enough, Muttahida MNA Tahira Asif succumbed to her injuries, inflicted by yet to be traced assailants. The MQM claims that it was a targeted political assassination. To add insult to injury, a woman trying to get ration though a government scheme in Rawalpindi was crushed to death in a mad scramble for free food.
All of the above happened on Shahbaz Sharif’s watch. The chink in his ostensibly impenetrable armour is visible to all and sundry. In this backdrop there will be only few takers of the Punjab chief minister’s professed lack of prior knowledge about the incident.
If actually Shahbaz Sharif was not on board about the disastrous ModelTown operation — and we have no reason to doubt the veracity of his statement – some serious actions should follow. That Rana Sanaullah has been relieved of his law ministry portfolio, and made to fall on his own sword, is a good start, but more needs to be done.
Despite the fact that like a true gentleman Sharif has offered to resign if found guilty, no one is buying the judicial commission set up by him to inquire into the tragedy. The sense of outrage against the massacre can be judged from the fact that even those who have no truck with Tahirul Qadri or his firebrand demagogy have been forced to condemn it in unequivocal terms.
The sense of outrage against the massacre can be judged from the fact that even those who have no truck with Tahirul Qadri or his firebrand demagogy have been forced to condemn it in unequivocal terms.
The question being asked is how his subordinates could keep Shahbaz Sharif, who prides himself of his hands-on, 24/7 kind of governance in the province, in the dark. It is almost unbelievable that an operation virtually in the backyard of the chief minister’s residence in ModelTown, being spearheaded by Rana Sanaullah since the wee hours of the morning, was kept as a closely guarded secret from him. Sharif claims that he only learnt about it in the morning while watching a television news channel.
It was indeed ironic that the chief minister, after the media had exposed all the lies and half-truths, gave a press conference the same evening flanked by his law minister. More appropriately Rana Sanaullah should have been put on the spot for his gung ho approach.
It is yet a mystery that where did the orders to sort out Qadri come from? Was it someone in the bureaucracy or at the federal level? Certainly, the stated noble intention of removing “illegal barricades” in front of Qadri’s headquarters was not the actual reason behind storming it with an armada of trigger-happy policemen armed to the teeth.
It was also an odd time to remove barricades in the immediate aftermath of the start of the military operation in N Waziristan. Incidentally such barriers infest ModelTown. Especially around the PML-N secretariat and Sharifs’ residence, both housed in H-block.
The incident, ironically, highlights governance PML-N style — relying on a cabal of a few trusted elected and unelected advisors running the show. Barring a few family members and ministers, only some super bureaucrats at the federal level and in the Punjab wield real power. The rest of the cabinet members of the parliament and of the provincial assembly hardly matter.
In this kind of ethos, people exerting brute power can easily graduate being on autopilot. Nonetheless, this is no excuse for a hands-on chief minister to claim ignorance about such a grave matter.
It is somewhat similar to the explanation proffered by the ISI that it had no knowledge about Osama bin Laden’s abode a stone throw from Pakistan’s premier military academy in Abbottabad. Nor, it is claimed, was the military aware of the US Navy SEALS taking out bin Laden in a successful operation on May 2, 2011.
Of course the ISI was either complicit or negligent about Osama’s presence in Abbottabad and the successful US operation to get him. In either case, our premier intelligence agency was left with a lot of egg on its face.
Similarly, Shahbaz Sharif has a lot of explanation to do for the massacre that happened on his watch on that fateful Tuesday morning. Who is Gullu Butt and why was he facilitated by the large police contingent present at the scene? After all, there has to be a method in all this madness.
Perhaps the police force was too busy shooting defenseless demonstrators that included two women and looting close by shops. Good governance is not merely building motorways and metro trains or distributing laptops. It also means providing a sense of security to the citizen.
Whatever happened to the much-touted police reforms that the PM-N government had promised to introduce within a year of being in power?
Whatever happened to the much-touted police reforms that the PM-N government had promised to introduce within a year of being in power? The rulers should outgrow their sense of arrogance that they quintessentially exude.
The Sharifs should realise that the Pakistan they had governed in their second term has changed in many ways since then. There is a need to show restraint even in the face of negativity by the opposition and also to respect the right of the opposition to protest.
Of course the shoe being on the other foot hurts and sometimes hurts badly. It is not considered to be politically correct to praise predecessors of the present ruling lot for anything. But despite all its faults the Zardari led PPP government exercised a lot of restraint and in the process inculcated a democratic culture. The same kind of live and live ethos needs to be inculcated in our body politic.
This, however, should not mean an endorsement of those who are fishing in troubled waters, Qadri included. The Chaudhrys of Gujarat are much excited about a grand opposition alliance with the maverick Sheikh Rashid in tow.
There are reports that PTI chief Imran Khan, who till now has studiously avoided the politics of alliances, is now tempted to join in. He had rightly postponed his planned Bahawalpur rally. But now it is being held on Friday.
It will be a pity if the political opposition takes up arms against a beleaguered government that has just completed a little over a year of its five-year term. First things first, political forces should put their full weight behind the ongoing military operation in N Waziristan.
It is an existential struggle for Pakistan to survive as a pluralistic democratic country. However, the onus is on the ruling party to bring the opposition on board at all costs.
Unfortunately it has not lifted a finger to evolve a consensus amongst political stakeholders even in the parliament. Unfortunately a sanctimonious attitude bordering on apathy still prevails.
