For the moment
So Rangers will stay in Karachi – as was expected – even if it is just for a month, for now. But going by the last minute go-ahead from Zardari (from Dubai), the 30-day ceiling, and the chief minister’s outbursts a couple of days before, it is clear that tensions will remain high. Sending them packing right now – and the ensuing chaos – would have been in nobody’s interest. That much is understandable. So it is definitely the long-term impact of their cleaning-up that is ruffling some feathers these days.
The chronology is important. Things were more or less fine till the operation was confined to militancy. But temperatures began to rise once the interior ministry, apparently backed by the military, began looking into corruption and found how deep it ran in the official provincial machinery. The fallout of the Nine-Zero raid was instructive, but not nearly as much as the PPP co-chairman’s uncharacteristic chest-thumping. Subsequent frenzy, especially the party’s frantic firefighting, also spoke volumes. Therefore, when Zardari said from Dubai that civil-military relations were ‘in the larger interest of the country’ and there was a need to ‘strengthen them’, there was obvious and deliberate posturing also at play.
But the Sindh government will have to do more. So far it has just pushed the issue ahead by a month. Ultimately the matter of corruption – in addition to Karachi’s other problems – will be taken up again, and a purge will become inevitable. The only way of avoiding this axe is cleaning the party and the government, and help Rangers bring law-and-order normalcy to the city, especially since the police has proved incapable and incompetent again and again. Otherwise the noose will tighten around all political outfits who have had their hands dirty. Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA), though, also have to be careful. Granted, corruption simply cannot be sidestepped. But they must not take their eye off the ball. Militancy is still the prime target in this war against terrorism. Hopefully the provincial government will facilitate, not hinder, Rangers.