And the provincial government’s short memory span
The government has an unenviable record in protecting the minorities, be these Christians, Hindus, Shias or Ahmadis. Despite Ch Nisar’s claims of having made historic improvements in the Interior Ministry, the agencies at his disposal either fail to predict terrorist attacks on time or are unable to do the needful to stop them. This explains why TTP (Jamaat-ul-Ahrar) suicide bombers managed to sneak into Youhanabad where they killed 17 worshipers and two policemen in two Churches. The killings have led to countrywide protests marked at many places by violence. The Punjab Police present inside the Christian locality failed to stop the mob from lynching two innocent persons and burning their bodies. Failure on the part of the administration to manage the mobs led to more violent protests and the killing of another person the next day. Large contingents of police duly protected by the Rangers were deployed on the third day to secure the city.
The Punjab government continues to deal with terror incidents in an ad hoc manner. It has no long term programme to eradicate extremism and terrorism. Its knee-jerk reaction to these attacks is to announce compensation for the victims’ families and to deploy police to control the protesters. The party leadership plays no role in pacifying the charged crowds. Once peace returns, the government forgets about the incident. There is no attempt to devise ways and means to deal better with situations of the type in future. The government did pretty little to implement the Supreme Court’s order for protection of churches. It has yet to undertake the initial moves in the fight against extremism and to inculcate tolerance in society.
Youhanabad killings have brought bad name to Pakistan and elicited worldwide condemnations from prominent figures and friendly governments. The damage has been done. Will the government draw the right lessons from the Youhanabad incident or forget it within a few days as it did the Joseph Colony incident?
