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The Rediff Interview/Benazir Bhutto
 

July 2005

Another Face of Terror
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

The Ambivalent Ally
We need Pakistan in the war on terror. But does it fuel Islamist passions?
BY ALYSSA AYRES

Thursday, July 28, 2005 12:01 a.m. EDT: Soon after London's July 7 subway and bus bombings, investigators discovered that three of the suicide terrorists were children of Pakistani immigrants and had traveled recently to Pakistan. Two may have attended a militant training camp there.

The problem isn't only Britain's. In the U.S. last month, a father and his son--both U.S. citizens of Pakistani descent--were arrested in California, technically on charges of having lied to the FBI. The indictment declares that the son, contrary to his claims, received jihad training at an al Qaeda camp in Pakistan in 2003 and 2004. The camp's training methods apparently involved target practice with photographs of President Bush, and the U.S. featured prominently in a menu of countries from which the trainees could select a jihad of their choice.

In the U.S., no less than in Britain, the pressing question is whether such Islamist extremists belong to a larger network of citizen sleeper-cells. But behind that question lies another: What is Pakistan's part in this dystopian tale? That a major non-NATO ally seemed to harbor an al Qaeda training camp as recently as 2004 should be cause for alarm.

Formally speaking, of course, Pakistan is a frontline partner in the terror war. President Bush has even characterized Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, as the last bulwark against a radical Islamist takeover, praising the general for his commitment to "banning the groups that practice terror." Thus the U.S., otherwise pledged to promoting democracy around the world, finds itself in an awkward embrace with a military ruler.

Against this backdrop, Husain Haqqani's "Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military" should give Washington policymakers sleepless nights--and everyone else too. Mr. Haqqani knows whereof he speaks: He enjoyed an illustrious career in Pakistan as a journalist, diplomat and adviser to three prime ministers before coming to the U.S. in 2002. The analysis in his book benefits from his deep knowledge of Pakistan's political history and, no less important, from his insider access to top political and military figures.

Mr. Haqqani hopes to defy the conventional wisdom that sees Pakistan as perpetually balancing two forces, with a strong military holding in check the radical excesses of the country's mosques. Mr. Haqqani does not believe that the generals and the mullahs are adversaries at all. Rather, they exist in a kind of symbiosis--an alliance by which each helps the other "in their exercise of political power." What is more, the alliance has been in place since the country's founding.

After each of Pakistan's many coups, Mr. Haqqani shows, the Pakistani military has "adopted Islamic ideology" to fashion itself as the guardian of the nation and its core beliefs. In doing so it has repeatedly co-opted Islamist organizations--notably the Jamaat-e-Islami--for cover and support. The military has also followed a policy of divide and rule, patronizing existing Islamist groups while seeding new ones that might rival them.

Mr. Haqqani marshals a wealth of evidence to document such claims. He describes in detail the mosque-military alliance during Pakistan's first two military regimes--that of Field Marshall Ayub Khan (1958-69) and Gen. Yahya Khan (1969-71), both generally regarded as secular, whiskey-swilling good old boys. He thus shows that Pakistan's creeping Islamization predates the rule of Gen. Zia ul-Haq (1977-88), the man widely held responsible for giving Islam a major role in all aspects of Pakistani life. Gen. Zia, it turns out, only tightened an alliance that already existed.

Mr. Haqqani argues that, over the past two decades, Pakistan's army has fueled the passions of some of the country's most extreme radicals. Bankrolling these groups has served the strategic purpose of rendering the military desirable by contrast. International observers--not least the U.S. State Department--thus conclude that the military is necessary for Pakistan's stability. The shadowy Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) has played an especially critical role in this game.

As a 1990 ISI report on the future of U.S.-Pakistan relations concluded: "It was important to maintain the impression of widespread anti-U.S. sentiment in Pakistani society, which could be assured by periodic demonstrations by Islamists. This would create sympathy for Pakistani military and intelligence officials among their US counterparts." Flash forward to 2005: Gen Musharraf's regime bans the protest rallies of journalists, feminists and members of the Pakistan People's Party, headed by former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. Meanwhile, Islamists manage to hold anti-American "million man marches" throughout the country. How little times have changed.

Mr. Haqqani's book is not an easy read for the nonspecialist. His detailed narrative at times assumes a familiarity with Pakistan's political history that many people will not possess. This quibble aside, though, his analysis will reward anyone who seeks to understand one of the most perplexing foreign-policy challenges facing the U.S. today.

After all, America does need Pakistan's cooperation in the war against al Qaeda. What Mr. Haqqani shows is that a Manichean dichotomy--army good, Islamists bad--obscures the partnership between the two. A better way of combating Islamic radicalism, Mr. Haqqani argues, is to strengthen the very democratic forces that the military abhors.

Ms. Ayres, who is writing a book about nationalism in Pakistan, is deputy director of the Center for the Advanced Study of India at the University of Pennsylvania.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto issues instructions to Party office bearers regarding Local Bodies Election

Islamabad, 30 July 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party has issued instructions to the district, tehsil and city presidents and other office bearers to file official complaints regarding the acts of rigging and victimisation of party workers and Awam Doct candidates to the returning officers, session judges and additional session judges.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto also asked these party officials to send immediately a copy of the complaint to the Central Secretariat Islamabad, Media Office Islamabad, Bilawal House Karachi and the provincial presidents. In case of any kidnapping of Awam Dost candidate or PPP worker the party officials have been instructed to file an FIR immediately and if the police and administration refuses to register FIR then they should file a complaint with the Returning Officer, Session Judge or Additional Session Judge.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has also instructed the Peoples Lawyers’ Forum to extend every possible legal help to party workers and Awam Dost candidates

PPP issues fact Sheets regarding Violation of Election laws and victimisation of opposition candidates

Islamabad, 30 July 2005: Pakistan Peoples Party has very strongly condemned General Musharraf, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, Chairman Senate, Governors and Chief Minister of Punjab and Sindh, federal and state ministers and other government official for running campaign of King’s party and its allies and demanded of the Election Commission to take notice of these violations of election laws and victimisation of Awam Dost candidates and their supporters.

The media coordinator of the Central Monitoring Committee PPP for the local elections, Nazir Dhoki issuing fact sheet regarding cases of rigging in the elections and the victimisation of Awam Dost candidates said that General Musharraf is running the campaign of King’s party supported candidates in Sindh and Punjab. He summoned DPOs of the four provinces to Islamabad and gave them the task to ensure the victory of government supported candidates. Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz attended MQM’s political gathering in Hyderabad and announced a package of one billion rupees after which the MQM ministers hoisted MQM flags on the government buildings and vehicles.

He said that the governor and the chief minister Punjab are distributing Nazimship of different districts. Chief Minister Sindh Arbab Ghulam Rahim, federal ministers Liaqat Jatoi and Ghous Bux Mehar are using the administration and police for getting their candidates elected. The chairman Senate Mohammad Mian Soomro visited Jacobabad to campaign for his mother Saeeda Begum and after his visit police raided hundreds of houses of PPP supporters and Awam Dost candidates.

The fact sheet says that hundreds of PPP workers and supporters have been kidnapped in Thar, Diplo and Mithi in the Chief Minister’s constituency. False cases have been registered against Khan Mohammad Lund, former member national assembly Dr. Khattoo Mal Jiwan. The police and administration stopped Awam Dost candidates from filing their nomination papers. On the behest of Liaqat Jatoi, property of PPP supporters were destroyed in Dadu and the candidates of Nazim and Naib Nazim were arrested. Chief Minister Sindh pressurised the medical superintendent of Chandka Medical College to support government candidates. Police raided houses of Awam Dost candidates and their supporters in Larkana, Qamber and Shahdadkot. When the former tehsil Nazim Mohammad Chandio refused to change his loyalty, he was put behind bars. Police is carrying out raid to arrest Awam Dost candidates Nazir Hussain Gopang, Sikandar Ali Gopang, Liaqat Ali Gopang, Iqbal Ahmed Brohi and Ghulam Haider.

In Jacobabad, police raided the house of Mai Gul Khatoon to arrest her because she is contesting against the mother of Chairman Senate Mohammad Mian Soomro. DPO Jacobabad threatened her son Manzoor Brohi of serious consequences if Mai Gul Khatoon keeps insisting to contest election against Saeeda Soomro. The houses of Awam Dost candidate Ayub Ghunjo and his supporters were raided in Jacobabad.

Nazir Dhoki said that the PPP workers are also being harassed in Thatha, Badin, Mirpurkhas, and Gothki. The Awam Dost candidate for Naib Nazim in New Saeedabad, Abdul Rauf Kaka has been arrested and Amin Bhaio, the candidate of Naib Nazim in Shikarpur has been kidnapped on the behest of the federal Minister Ghous Bux Mehar. Supporter of Amin Bhaio Maulana Abdullah Noori has also been kidnapped and the police has refused to register FIR.

The fact sheet says that all these complaints have been sent to the Election Commission but so far the Commission has taken no action. Nazir Dhoki said that these cases of victimisation have exposed the hollow claims of holding free and fair elections. He urged the Human Rights Organisation and the Bar Councils to take notice of these cases and raise their voice against the victimisation of Awam Dost candidates and supporters and violation of election laws by the government officials

Pakistan's Problem

Decades ago, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, onetime U.S. ambassador to India, asked sarcastically if New Delhi exported anything but poverty. Today, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf needs to ensure that Pakistan is known for exports other than terrorism.

Three of the four men involved in the London subway and bus bombings this month traveled to Pakistan last year; police are investigating if they received training or planned the attacks there. In Egypt, police are looking for five Pakistanis they say are connected to last week's Sharm el Sheik bombings. In India, army officials said Monday that they had killed five armed infiltrators crossing from Pakistan into Indian-controlled Kashmir. Closer to home, the FBI last month arrested five men in Lodi, Calif., who have links to Pakistan; while all of them deny involvement in terrorism, two have agreed to be deported, and the others await a deportation hearing and a trial on charges of lying to federal agents.

Yes, there's a pattern here. To be clear, it is not that Pakistanis are more inclined toward terrorism than are citizens of any other country. It is that Musharraf is unable, or unwilling, to confront the terrorists in his midst. Musharraf has even had the gall to say that while, yes, Pakistan has a problem with Islamic extremism, so does Britain and the government there needs to address it.

Pakistan is no stranger to radical Islam. The government used U.S. funds and support to train anti-Soviet warriors after Moscow's 1979 invasion of neighboring Afghanistan. After the communists were defeated, the Pakistanis sponsored the Taliban fundamentalists who seized control and gave shelter to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. But after 9/11, Musharraf threw in his lot with Washington and pledged to root out terrorism; President Bush praises Pakistan as a close ally in the battle.

Pakistan has arrested hundreds of suspected terrorists, including top Al Qaeda operatives. For his efforts, Musharraf has twice been the target of assassins. But terrorist training camps can still be found in Pakistan, and the army cracks down on infiltration into India only under foreign pressure.

Pakistani Cabinet minister Faisal Saleh Hayat told The Times editorial board Monday that most of the much-criticized Islamic schools known as madrasas - where boys are educated, fed and clothed - are moderate, like most Pakistanis. He contended that "no country in the world has done so much in combating terrorism" as Pakistan.

But Musharraf could direct his underlings to crack down harder. When outside pressure reaches a boil, he reacts. When the pressure eases, so does he. That's not good enough.

The U.S. mistakenly turned away from Islamabad when the Cold War ended. But after 9/11, Washington's interest rekindled, and the U.S. agreed to provide the impoverished nation with $3 billion, much of it to be spent on secular schools that teach reading and math, not just the Koran. Musharraf should use the money to educate a generation adhering to the moderate form of Islam that most of the country has long practiced.

Complain Filed by MNA

July 29, 2005
The Chief Election Commissioner,
Election Commission of Pakistan,
Islamabad.

Dear Sir,

On 28-7-2005 three police mobiles came to the houses of the following candidates and were taken away by Kamber police. First to PS Kamber and then to some unknown place

1- Nazir Hussain Gopang Candidate for General Councilor Union Council 2, Kamber City.
2- Sikander Ali Gopang For General Councilor, Union Council 2, Kamber City.

On 28-7-2005 Kamber police raided the houses of the following candidates in Kamber Town. They were not present in their houses.

1- Liaqat Ali Gopang for Nazim Union Council 1
2- Abdul Hameed Brohi Nazim Union Council 1
3- Ghulam Hyder Gopang Councilor Union Council 1
4- Noor Hussain Gopang Councilor Union Council 1

About 12 days back, Mohammad Chandio sitting Nazim UC Mirpur, Tehsil Warrah was taken away by police. He was chained and defained at different police stations of Larkana, Kamber and Shahdadkot Police Stations. While he was detained at PS CIA Larkana, he was forced by SHO Khan Tunio to change loyalties. He refused to accept it. After about 7 days he was released. Again during the dates of filing of nominations, police raided his house. Some how he managed to file papers.

You are requested to kindly take notice of this.

Sincerely,

Khalid Iqbal Memon, MNA
0741-446666, 0300-3400494

Two Militants Place Suspect at a Camp in Pakistan
By ARIF JAMAL and SOMINI SENGUPTA

Two experienced militants told an independent Pakistani journalist here last week that they had met one of the July 7 London bombing suspects.

LAHORE, Pakistan, July 25 - Two experienced militants, both veterans of the war in Afghanistan, told an independent Pakistani journalist here last week that they had met one of the July 7 London bombing suspects, Shehzad Tanweer, on a trip to a known militant training camp north of the capital, Islamabad.

One of the militants interviewed said Mr. Tanweer struck him as "a good Muslim" who was eager to assassinate the Pakistani president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. "I wish I could do that," he recalled Mr. Tanweer as saying.

The militants, both members of Jaish-e-Muhammad, an organization officially banned by the government and implicated in two assassination attempts against General Musharraf, spoke on condition that their names not be used because they do not want to be apprehended by the government. They said they met Mr. Tanweer, 22, a Briton of Pakistani descent, last winter, but they would not be more specific on dates for fear of revealing their own identities.

Their statements could not be independently confirmed, and a senior government official who is following the investigation said he had "no knowledge" of such a visit. The militants were not interviewed by a correspondent for The New York Times, but spoke extensively on two occasions to a journalist working on contract for this newspaper.

The two men said they had all traveled together from Rawalpindi, a garrison town adjacent to the capital, to the Shah Ismail Shaheed Madrasa in Mansehra, a heavily forested mountainous district where guerrilla training camps continue to operate, said diplomats and militants interviewed by The New York Times.

Mr. Tanweer, the two militants said, was at the madrasa, which doubles as a training camp, on a short "study tour," which is akin to an orientation session for potential guerrilla recruits. He was accompanied by two other men: a Pakistani and another Briton of Pakistani descent, they said. None of them were there to receive arms training, they said. Mr. Tanweer and his companions left after four or five days; the two men would not say where the three went.

Its remoteness and landscape have made Mansehra, situated on the ancient Silk Route, an ideal address for jihad training. For at least 15 years, it has housed a number of rotating makeshift camps for fighters eventually dispatched to Kashmir and Afghanistan.

Mr. Tanweer, along with another bombing suspect, Mohammad Sidique Khan, also a Briton born to Pakistani parents, visited Pakistan between November 2004 and February of this year, according to Pakistani immigration records. They arrived in Karachi, a sprawling Arabian Sea coast city, but it is unclear where they went from there and whom they saw.

Mr. Tanweer's maternal uncle, Tahir Pervez, said Mr. Tanweer had visited the family home in a dusty village, Kota Chotiya, near the central Pakistani city of Faisalabad. Mr. Pervez had recounted his nephew's admiration for Osama bin Laden, a Pakistani newspaper reported.

But in an interview with The New York Times last week, he denied that report and characterized Mr. Tanweer as a deeply religious young man who spent over a month in the village, doing little other than praying and playing cricket.

A third bombing suspect, Hasib Mir Hussain, had also been reported to have visited Pakistan last July, according to Pakistani immigration records. It later turned out that the immigration records actually referred to another young man by the same name, not the bombing suspect.

Pakistani officials have maintained that no arrests have been made in connection with the July 7 attacks, but that hundreds have been picked up in an intensified campaign against banned militant organizations.

Mohtarma Bhutto condemns continued harassment of opposition candidates in local polls Asks Party leaders to provide legal assistance to victims

Islamabad July 27, 2005: Former Prime Minster and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has expressed grave concern over the continued harassment and intimidation of awam dost candidates in the local bodies polls and urged the Chief election Commissioner and the judiciary to take note of these incidents which were increasing with the passing of every day.

She said this in a statement to day after receiving further complaints of harassment and intimidation of awam dost candidates contesting local polls in the home district of Sindh chief minister.

One complainant Mir Mohammad Khan Lund of Kaloi, Tehsil Diplo in Tharparker district said that police in civil clothes attacked him and the Awam Dost candidates as they were returning from Kaloi resulting in injury to several members of the party including women. He said that the awam dost candidates attacked are candidates for Nazim and Naib Nazim positions against Arbab Abdul Khaliq, elder brother of Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim from his home UC Kaloi.

The complainant said that the Diplo police refused to register his complaint and instead filed FIR against all the male members of his family, who had proposed and seconded these Awam Dost candidates. The FIR No. 21/2005 has been registered against 20 people, including the complainant and all the male members of his family, the complainant said.

The former Prime Minister said that such disgraceful incidents had exposed the claims of the regime to hold free and fair elections. She said that the playing filed had been dislevelled for the opposition candidates to pave ground for rigging the next general elections.

The former Prime Minister also urged the human rights groups and the international community to take note of these incidents and stop the rulers from rigging the polls. She also paid tributes to the courage and steadfastness of the awam dost candidates for standing up to the tyrannical rulers.

She also directed the Party leaders to assist the complainant in filing FIR against the attackers and also to provide him legal assistance in the false and fabricated cases registered against him.

Mohtarma Bhutto condoles with Mohammad Hussain Azad

Islamabad, 27 July 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and her spouse Senator Asif Ali Zardari have condoled with Mohammad Hussain Azad on his mother’s death.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto in a condolence message addressed to Mohammad Hussain Azad wrote, "Senator Asif Ali Zardari and I are writing to condole the sad demise of your mother. The loss of a parent is a great tragedy. Our sympathies are with you at this difficult time".

She also prayed to Almighty Allah for eternal peace to the departed soul and courage to the family members to bear this irreparable loss with equanimity.

PPP to apprise foreign diplomats regarding Election Rigging by the government

Islamabad, 28 July 2005: Central Monitoring Committee of the Pakistan Peoples Party, for the Local Bodies Elections has very strongly condemned the government officials including General Pervez Musharraf for using state resources in the elections. The committee also denounced continued victimisation of opposition by the government party, its supporters and officials.

The meeting of the Monitoring committee was held today at the Central Secretariat Islamabad, chaired by Coordinator of the Committee, Senator Sardar Latif Khosa and attended by Syed Nayyar Hussain Bokhari MNA, Kamran Zafar, Masood Sharif, Nazir Dhoki and Palvasha Behram.

Media Coordinator of the Committee Nazir Dhoki in a statement said that cases of rigging in the elections in Sindh and Punjab provinces are increasing by the day. The administration of Chief Minister Sindh is continuously harassing and victimising the Awam Dost candidates and state resources are being spent on the election campaigns of pro-government candidates. He said that the Coordinator Foreign Liaison Committee PPP, Senator Enver Beg would brief the foreign diplomats regarding rigging in the elections and government victimisation of the opposing candidates on 8 August in Islamabad and these diplomats would be provided all the material and applications, which have been submitted to Election Commission.

Nazir Dhoki said that the police on the orders of Chief Minister is forcing the Awam Dost candidates and their supporters to change their loyalties. He said that party would raise the issue of rigging in the election by the military government at every forum.

PPP Files Application against Information Minister

demands Chairman NAB to try Sheikh Rashid in competent court

Islamabad, 28 July 2005: Pakistan Peoples Party has filed an application with the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) against the Minister for Information and Media Development, Sheikh Rashid Ahmad for being guilty of corruption and corrupt practices.

Shah Khawar Advocate on behalf of Pakistan Peoples Party filed the application under section 5 and 18 (B) sub-section-II of the NAB ordinance 1999, which is punishable offence under section 10 of the NAB ordinance.

The application has referred to a news item published in Daily Times dated 14 June 2005, which asserts that the respondent has been training Kashmiri fighters and in a clarification thereof, the respondent did admit that he has been looking after the Kashmiri refugees at his place. It was later revealed that in 1989 during the government of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), the ISI without clearance from the government had given the respondent, the then a Member of Opposition, hundreds of acres of prime land in the Islamabad / Rawalpindi areas. The spokesperson of PPP also clarified that when the then PPP government took up this matter with the ISI, it was informed that the land was given for support to the Kashmiri groups.

According to the policy adopted by the present government, training of Kashmiris has now been stopped. The question arises as under what circumstances, huge piece of land was given to the respondent by ISI and after the change in the policy regarding Kashmiris, under which authority the respondent still retains the said land worth billions of rupees and why the same has not been taken back.

By giving land worth billion of rupees to the respondent, a great financial loss to the government exchequer has been caused and the respondent has been benefited. The then ISI authorities and the respondent are jointly and severely responsible for causing great financial loss to the Nation.

The application prays that respondent has shown wilful indulgence in corrupt practices under Section 9 of the NAB Ordinance 1999. Such person is subject to punishment under Section 10 of the NAB Ordinance. So the Chairman of the National Accountability Bureau is called upon to initiate investigation in connection with matters set out herein above and further proceed to file a Reference against respondent for violating the provisions of Section 9 of the NAB Ordinance 1999 punishable under Section 10 of the NAB Ordinance 1999 in competent court of law.

Islamabad, 25 July 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto on behalf of Pakistan Peoples Party condemning the acts of terrorism in London has condoled the families of the victims of London blasts and conveyed sympathy for the injured.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto in a letter addressed to the British Prime Minister Tony Blair wrote "The vast majority of the world's Muslims abhors terrorism and rejects the claim of certain terrorist groups to speak in the name of the Muslim Community. Moderate and democratic Muslims all over the world will continue to support the struggle against obscurantism, authoritarianism and terrorism, all of which feed each other".

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto wrote, "The PPP pays tribute to the people of the United Kingdom who, under your leadership, faced the terrorist assault with courage and calmness".

PPP women’s wing rejects Talibanisation of Pakistan

Islamabad, 25 July 2005: "Depriving women of their basic right of expression is un-Islamic, un-democratic, un-constitutional, immoral and illegal and the military regime has the responsibility to take measure to assure women participation in the elections". This was said by the president Pakistan Peoples Party Women Wing Islamabad, Nargis Faiz Malik while addressing a large gathering of women at Aabpara Chowk Islamabad on Monday.

Hundreds of women from every walk of life demonstrated against the decision by some religious and political elements in Dir and Batagram in NWFP of disenfranchising women from their right of participation in the forthcoming local bodies elections. Protestors displayed placards condemning the decision and raised slogans in favour of women rights. The demonstration was led by Nargis Faiz Malik and attended by Asmat Jabeen, Mansha Bokhari, Mrs. Anwer, Gulzari Begum, Qasida Murtaza, Shamim Aijaz, Farza Begum, Akhtar Bibi, Khairunisa, Rashida Bibi, Mah Jabeen Naqvi, Shumaila Akhtar and others.

Addressing the demonstrators, Nargis Faiz Malik said that Pakistani women would not allow anyone to Talibanise Pakistan and usurp women’s rights. She said that the PPP under the leadership of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto would continue to fight for women’s rights. She said that a women leader who during her tenures as Prime Minister had taken several measures to emancipate women and enable them to contribute in the country’s development leads the PPP. Nargis Faiz Malik criticised the double standards of the religious parties who have made their daughters and daughter in-laws senators, MNAs and MPAs but want to keep women of their constituencies backward and in dark ages in the name of traditions.

She announced that the PPP Women’s Wing Islamabad will hold demonstration in front of the Parliament House if the military government fails to establish writ of the government in the areas where women are deprived of the electoral rights.

Mohtarma Bhutto denounces Hisba bill as reminder of taliban

Persecution of moderates by Musharraf had pushed country into dark ages

Islamabad July 16, 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson f the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto expressed concern over the Hisba Bill of the Frontier Government and said that the bill was violative of the fundamental human rights of citizens.

In a statement today she said that the bill was a bid to copy the policies of the Taliban in our country, which did not bode well for the strength, and stability of the nation.

The former Prime Minister deplored the intrusion in the private lives of citizens whereby official were now empowered to snoop around private individuals to push people back into the dark ages.

She said that all this was being done by exploiting the name of Islam while Islam categorically prohibited its followers from spying on each other. The bill aims at setting up a Moral Brigade to deny freedom of choice through a chain of priest judges at the provincial, district and tehsil levels to enforce what the politically appointed Mohtasib regards as 'virtue' and whip out what he considers as 'evil' in the name of religion.

The enforcement of virtue and vice brigade would remind many of the darkest days of the Taliban in Afghanistan, she said and added, ‘the establishment of the Hisba brigade was one more step towards unenlightenment, immoderation and tyranny which had flourished since the PPP government was overthrown in 1996".

The draconian Hisba force, which can interfere with the media, Provincial Assembly and private lives of individuals but not the armed forces, has no provision of appeal.

Ironically, Mohtarma said, that while the bill claims to protect women, minorities and disadvantaged groups, its sponsors reject legislation aimed at eliminating honour killings, bar women from participation in polls and hound women NGOs in the province. They refuse to protect the minorities by amending the blasphemy law and exploit the poor by increasing poverty to force the youth to join madrassahs to become cannon fodder in their fights for political power.

She said that General Musharraf's regime had taken Pakistan backwards by persecuting moderate parties and allowing full freedoms to religious parties. She said this was being done to frighten the world that the choice in nuclear Pakistan is only between military dictatorship and religious fascism.

Karachi July 13, 2005: Mr. Shuja Kamal elder brother of Peoples Party activist Mrs. Iffat Farrukh wife of Mr. Ijaz Farrukh Sr. Vice President PPP, USA passed away.

Shuja Kamal had a heart attack at the age of 59; he passed away peacefully at his residence in Karachi.

PPP workers, sympathizers and family friends all over the world are deeply grieved over the tragedy. Many people visited the residence of Mrs. Iffat Farrukh in New York to pay respect and offer condolence on untimely demise of her brother.

Extremism still thrives in Pakistan

By Husain Haqqani International Herald Tribune
 

WASHINGTON JULY 20, 2005: Just as the 9/11 terrorist attacks highlighted Saudi Arabia's responsibility in encouraging Islamist extremism, the July 7 bombings in London must lead to scrutiny of Pakistan's role in fomenting global jihad. Three of the four London bombers were Britons of Pakistani origin and had visited Pakistan recently. The Pakistan connection to the bombings is as significant as the nationality of the 9/11 attackers, fourteen of whom were Saudi nationals.

Pakistan's pro-Western ruler, General Pervez Musharraf, has responded to the London attacks by ordering a crackdown on extremist groups. Pakistan's suave diplomats, Western-educated technocrats and articulate generals will be busy over the next few days highlighting their government's cooperation in the war against terrorism since Musharraf abandoned support for Afghanistan's Taliban regime in 2001.

There is no doubt that Musharraf has selectively cooperated with Western governments since 9/11, and Pakistan has made some high-profile Al Qaeda arrests. But Pakistan has yet to acknowledge, let alone deal with, the ideology of hatred and militancy that has been cultivated as state policy for over four decades.

Some of Pakistan's religious schools, the madrassas, are no longer just bastions of medieval theology. They have evolved into training centers for radical anti-Western militancy. Pakistan's school curriculum cultivates the sentiment of Muslim victimhood and inculcates in young minds the hatred of non-Muslims in general and Jews and Hindus in particular.

When it emerged as an independent state in 1947, Pakistan was considered a moderate Muslim nation that could serve as a model for other emerging independent Muslim states. Pakistan's founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, was a Shia Muslim. Its first law minister was a Hindu. Its foreign minister belonged to the Ahmadiyya sect, which opposes jihad. Although Pakistan's birth was accompanied by religious riots and communal violence, the country's founders clearly intended to create a nonsectarian state that would protect religious freedoms and provide the Muslims of South Asia an opportunity to live in a country where they constituted a majority.

Over the years, however, Pakistan became a major center of Islamist extremism. The Ahmadis were declared non-Muslims through an amendment to Pakistan's constitution during the 1970s. Shia-Sunni sectarian violence has plagued the country since the 1980s. Religious minorities, like Hindus and Christians, complain of discrimination and have periodically been subjected to violent attacks by extremists. The disproportionate influence wielded by fundamentalist groups in Pakistan is the result of state sponsorship of such groups.

Pakistan's rulers have played upon religious sentiment as an instrument of strengthening Pakistan's identity since soon after the country's inception. Fears of Indian domination were addressed by embracing an Islamist ideology. Islamist militants were cultivated, armed and trained during the 1980s and 1990s in the Pakistani military's efforts to seek strategic depth in Afghanistan and to put pressure on India for negotiations over the future of the Himalayan territory of Jammu and Kashmir.

In an effort to justify the ascendancy of the military in the country's affairs, a national ethos of militarism was created. An environment dominated by Islamist and militarist ideologies is an ideal breeding ground for radicals and exportable radicalism: In their search for identity, British-born Pakistanis, like the July 7 bombers, have been drawn into the whirlpool of their parents' homeland.

The United States and other Western nations have put their faith in the promises of Musharraf's military to move Pakistan away from its Islamist radical past and toward "enlightened moderation." But the London attacks point out the deep-rooted problems there.

The major Kashmiri jihadist groups retain their infrastructure because the Pakistani military has not decided to give up the option of battling India at a future date. The Taliban have also continued to find safe haven in parts of Pakistan. Afghan and American officials complain periodically of their still training and organizing in Pakistan's border areas. But American officials also continue to express the belief that Pakistan has turned the corner and that Musharraf must be trusted as an American ally.

Western policy makers would rather see Pakistan's glass as half full rather than half empty. This approach distracts Pakistan's rulers, and their Western supporters, from recognizing the depth of Pakistan's problem with Islamist extremism.

(Husain Haqqani is author of "Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military." He was Pakistan's ambassador to Sri Lanka from 1992 to 1993 and teaches International Relations at Boston University.)

Editor South Asia Tribune placed on Exit Control List

ECL Removed from NAB Web Site
 

Musharraf Asks US to Silence His US-based Critics

I

ISLAMABAD, July 22: The Editor of the South Asia Tribune, Shaheen Sehbai, the Washington-based journalist and critic of Pakistani General Pervez Musharraf, has been placed by the Government of Pakistan on the infamous Exit Control List (ECL), which bans its citizens to leave the country.
 

The move comes as Pakistan’s intelligence agencies have made an informal request to the US authorities to “contain” some of the US-based Pakistani writers and journalists who criticize the Musharraf Government “because they are harming Pakistani efforts to fight the US war on terror."

The ECL was up-dated on the web site of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on July 14, 2005 and interestingly mentioned the names of several sitting ministers of the Musharraf cabinet, including the Interior Minister, Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao himself, who is basically incharge of maintaining and updating the ECL.

When newspapers broke the story of latest ECL nominees, Aftab Sherpao was so angry he ordered the NAB to remove the entire list from its web site and that was quickly done. By the evening of July 20, the ECL was no longer available to the public, as in the past.

In the developments on the other track, some of those critics Musharraf wants contained in the US include Washington-based scholar-diplomat Husain Haqqani (left), a former police officer and author of a recent book Boston-based Hassan Abbas (right), and a Wisconsin University Professor Dr. Tarique Niazi, who writes scathing articles in the South Asia Tribune.
 

A California-based businessman and intellectual Khawaja Ashraf (left), some American scholars including well-known Asia expert Steve Cohen (right) and probably Marvin Weinbaum of the Middle East Institute are also on the hit list.
 

The name of Shaheen Sehbai (left) was put on the ECL sometime in the recent past but it appeared in the ECL on the web site of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) when it was up-dated on July 14, 2005. Click to view ECL, saved before it was removed by NAB

It provides the name and Pakistan and US addresses of the SAT Editor as well as his passport number and places him in the company of some important politicians including even some current ministers of the Musharraf cabinet.

Among those on the ECL available on the web site of NAB are Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao, Kashmir Affairs Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat, PPPP Leader Makhdoom Amin Faheem, Government PML-Q leader Nasrullah Dareshak and many others in and out of the Government.

Of course the most prominent on the ECL are Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz Sharif, Asif Ali Zardari, Shahbaz Sharif, MQM leader Dr Farooq Sattar, Rape Victim Mukhtaran Mai and even Public Accounts Committee Chairman Malik Allahyar of PML-Q and former NWFP Chief Minister Sardar Mehtab Ahmed Khan Abbasi who recently traveled to a number of European countries as a member of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee.

Interestingly some of those who have left this world are still not allowed to leave Pakistan, according to the NAB list. These unfortunate ones include Mian Mohammed Sharif, father of Nawaz Sharif, former minister Abdus Sattar Lalika and top terrorist Riaz Basra. A sick Begum Nusrat Bhutto and Asif Zardari’s father Hakim Ali Zardari also remain on the list.

Political observers, however, say the ECL has been turned into a joke by the military Government as it is being used totally and exclusively for persecution and harassment of political opponents of the regime while those who support the army are allowed to travel even though their names stay on the ECL.

The entire Sharif family was on ECL but was forced out of the country, these observers point out. Asif Zardari was permitted to leave without his name being struck off, at least from the NAB list on the web site. Mukhtaran Mai was permitted to leave the country under US and Western pressure but her name is still there.

Newspaper Dawn contacted Aftab Khan Sherpao, the Interior Minister under whose jurisdiction the ECL is compiled and updated, to seek an explanation as to how he himself and a fellow Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat were on the list. The interior minister responded: “Our names are not on the ECL.” Asked if he would direct the authorities to make corrections in the list, the minister replied in affirmative.

But Dawn quoted a NAB official saying that the Interior Minister’s name was put on the web site as cases were pending against him in courts. The official, requesting anonymity, said the interior minister’s name would be taken off only on the directives of a court of law.

Asked why the Kashmir affairs minister’s name was on ECL, the official said perhaps the concerned officials had not updated the list as court cases against the minister had been withdrawn.

About Mukhtaran Mai still featuring on the NAB web site, the official said the list was maintained by the interior ministry and the government might have put her name on ECL. The official said NAB got the names of only those people on ECL who had any corruption cases pending against them.

Asked if the NAB had the legal power to place a person’s name on ECL or publish it on its web site, NAB spokesperson Nasir Jamal said there must be some provision but he would have to check the exact position with the legal department on Wednesday.

As this ECL joke continues, a more sinister move by the Musharraf Government is getting more attention in Washington. According to sources the ISI and Military Intelligence (MI) have given several names to the US intelligence agencies and other authorities to “contain” some of the critics of the Musharraf Government who are based on US as they are “harming Pakistani efforts to fight the war on terror by attacking General Musharraf.”

The name of South Asia Tribune Editor Shaheen Sehbai also figures prominently on this list of US-based trouble-makers.

Sources in Islamabad said by asking the US authorities to “contain” these writers and intellectuals, the Pakistan Army wishes that some of these Pakistanis should be handed over to Islamabad while the US citizens be asked by the Washington Establishment to tone down their attacks on General Musharraf in the name of serving US National Security interests.

The US reaction to this request is not yet known but experts say it would be wishful thinking on the part of the Pakistani Generals to believe that any US Government would link “political dissent” and “criticism of General Musharraf” to the war on terror and forcibly silence or expatriate these critics.

Mohtarma Bhutto criticises Congressman for offensive remarks about Makkah Sahrif Asks congressman to tender apology

Islamabad July 21, 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto termed "offensive, provocative and irresponsible" the suggestive remarks by a U.S. congressman that the United States could "take out" Islamic holy sites if Muslim attackers targeted America in a nuclear strike.

In a statement today she said that the Congressman’s remarks could fuel extremism. "When a crime was committed, the criminal was punished and not the whole community".

She said it would be wise for the Congressman to tender an apology for his comments with a view to cool the inflamed passions.

The former Prime Minister said that religious tolerance was the need of the hour. When religious sites were targeted, as Pakistanis have unfortunately experienced in their own homeland, hatred and intolerance grew, she said.

She said that the Congressman’s statement that the Washington could retaliate to an extremist attack by bombing Makkah Sharif, the House of God for Muslims, would anger and provoke Muslims and was most unfortunate.

She said that the PPP deplored it and warned that such statements could play into the hands of terrorists who could claim that Islam, and Makkah Sharif, was in danger to make fresh recruitments.

The former Prime Minister noted that the U.S. State Department called the congressman's statement "insulting and offensive" and said Americans "respect the dignity and sanctity of other religions."

One of the five pillars of Islam calls upon Muslims to pay a holy pilgrimage to Makkah Sharif once in their lives.

NAB is a Jihadi Organisation -Naheed Khan

Islamabad, 21 July 2005: Naheed Khan, member national assembly and the political secretary to the chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has asked the chief justice of Pakistan to take suo moto notice of NAB's interference with the judicial process and demanded of the regime to restrain its political arm, the NAB, from meddling with the judiciary.

Naheed Khan in a statement today said that NAB's intrusive actions in the matters of judicial nature prove that this organisation is functioning with ulterior motives. The way NAB demonstrated interests in the Mir Murtaza murder case reminds Gestapo of Nazi Germany. She said that NAB is a hideout of the Jihadi elements where the extremists conspire against the democratic forces of the country.

Naheed Khan warned the regime and the NAB that the days of terror and victimisation are numbered and now the international situation demands transparency in governance. In changing environment the Jihadi cannot hide their true identity whether in the government or in its political arm. She urged the Human Right Bodies, the legal fraternity and the civil society to take notice of NAB's illegal actions and raise their voice against this Jihadi organisation.

Musharraf’s address betrays two faces of Pakistan's military ruler

Islamabad July 21, 2005: The address of General Musharraf tonight demonstrated once again the two faces of Pakistan’s military ruler.

In a statement today spokesman of the Pakistan Peoples Party Senator Farhatullah Babar said that General Musharraf’s rhetoric of enlightened moderation was a façade to conceal how he was chasing the democratic political opposition with their back to the wall and thereby actually spawning forces of extremism.

The General spoke of provincial harmony but in the same breath struck at the root of provincial harmony by insisting that he will build the controversial Kalabagh dam, he said.

The PPP spokesman said that the General appeared to sound tough against the extremists but this is not the first time that he has sought to present this side of his face.

On January 12, 2002 after the tragic events of 9/11 he sounded as tough against extremists when he warned them against becoming an Army of God. As later events showed the tough talk of January 12, 2002 was rhetoric and sound and fury signifying nothing.

The tough talk tonight against the extremists is déjà vu and fails to arouse any credibility, he said. General Musharraf has yet to demonstrate that the tough talk against extremists is a shift in strategic thinking and not a mere tactical manoeuvre, the PPP said.

General Musharraf appeared to stake claim of a better Muslim than others by flaunting credentials that the doors of the House of God were opened for him.

This will not impress those who know from history that many tyrants and dictators before him also had the doors of House of God opened for them, the spokesman said.

General Musharraf failed to admit that the interference by a previous military dictator in Afghanistan in early 80’s was a mistake. His defence of the role Pakistan played in 80s in Afghanistan betrayed that no lessons had been learnt form treating Afghanistan as providing strategic depth as the country’s fifth province.

Mohtarma Bhutto Supports Registration of Maddrassas

Says the approach that London bombings were London's problems unacceptable

Stresses modern education along with religious teachings in madrassa

Islamabad July 22, 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto said that following the London bombings by bombers who had visited Pakistan prior to the events of 7/7 it was essential for Islamabad to take action to demonstrate its commitment to fighting terrorism.

In this context, she said in a statement today that the PPP welcomed the military regime's announcement that it would register all madrassas and schools by December this year and establish a special cell to carry out the task.

She noted that many Maddrassas were carrying out solely religious functions. However, some had been set up to fight the occupation of Afghanistan in the eighties. She said that these political maddrassas were brainwashing young men into becoming robots in a deadly move of terror.

In an address to the nation General Pervez Musharraf vowed to reform the madrassah education so as to fight against extremism and terrorism. He also asked the people for support in this task.

The former Prime Minister said that such a move if implemented in letter and spirit it would be welcomed by all those who are concerned about Pakistan's image abroad as well as the stability and well being of the country itself.

She said that the PPP had noted General Musharraf's pledge not to allow banned organizations from operating under a new name.

She said that in the wake on London bombings and the revelations that some suicide bombers had visited Pakistani madrassas before carrying out the attacks it was important that the madrassa education was closely watched and also reformed.

The former Prime Minister cautioned that the line taken by some elements of the regime that the London Bombings were London's problems was unacceptable. Too many terrorists had ended up with some link to Pakistan, which meant that Islamabad must be seen to be taking the issue with seriousness to allay international concerns.

She said that Islam was a religion of peace and harmony and it was important that our madrassas were reformed so that the education imparted in these schools truly reflected the humane and peaceful traditions of Islam and Islamic teachings.

Mohtarma Bhutto said that modern education and skills along with religious teachings was important for striking a balance so essential for peace and stability.

"Balance is at the centre of a society's survival", she said and added that societies lost their moorings when the delicate balance was upset. Modern education is important so that instead of producing robots that mechanically followed the command the nation produced thinking individuals with critical faculties to observe, analyse and debate issues, she said.

She said that sermons from the pulpits of mosques that spread venom and hate had taken its toll on the people of Pakistan. She said that too many Pakistanis had fallen victim to terrorism, as had those outside Pakistan. She noted that the attack on Bari Imam earlier this year was one illustration of how terrorism was a domestic as well as international problem.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto felicitates World Punjabi Congress

on holding international Conference on Waris Shah

Islamabad, 23 July 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has wished the delegates from all over the world who have come to Lahore to attend three day International Conference on the great poet Waris Shah a warm welcome and hoped that this conference will be constructive

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto in a message to the Chairman World Punjabi Congress, Fakhar Zaman wrote, "I recall sending a message to the 1st World Punjabi Conference organised in Lahore in 1986. In that message I called for giving all languages of the soil a rightful place. In the case of Punjabi, this is all the more so since it has been neglected in Pakistan".

Regarding PPP policy towards culture and heritage she wrote, "Quaid e Awam Zulfkar Ali Bhutto Shaheed was the first Leader to encourage the establishment of a number of Cultural institutions. His government took positive steps for the development of languages rooted in with the land. The PPP Governments that I led followed Quaid-i-Awam's policies. We took great interest in the flourishing of institutions relating to Art, Culture and Literature. With the support of many intellectuals, the PPP Government I led promulgated the first Cultural Policy of Pakistan. Mr Fakhar Zaman was the architect of that policy and ensured its success as Chairman of National Commission on History and Culture and Pakistan Academy of Letters".

Emphasising the need of tolerance and brotherhood in Pakistani society and Sufi contribution to a peaceful civilization she wrote, "Sufi poets of Pakistan historically symbolise a culture of brotherhood, enlightenment and progress. They repudiated extremism, religious bigotry, obscurantism and mullahism. The poetry of Waris Shah, the social and cultural doyen of Punjab people, is extremely relevant today. We need to relate the teachings of our Awami poets to the present conditions where our society is marred by reactionaries and fanatics. Sufi poets Waris Shah, Baba Farid, Shah Hussain, Bullhe Shah, Sultan Bahu, Khwaja Farid, Mian Mohammad Baksh from Punjab or Sachal Sarmast and Shah Latif Bhatai from Sindh, Khushhal Khan Khatak and Rehman Baba from NWFP or Jam Durak and Mast Tawakkali from Balauchistan are beacon lights helping brighten the path for us to determine our directions. Their teachings aim at rendering a human dimension to society".

Felicitating the World Punjabi Congress on organising the Conference she wrote, "I Congratulate Mr. Fakhar Zaman, Chairman of World Punjabi Congress, for holding this Conference. He is a writer and Intellectual of high calibre, an asset to the country as well as to the Pakistan Peoples Party. I am proud if his determination to continue his admirable efforts to propagate the message of the mystic poets. He is much respected too for his Initiatives in the context of Indo-Pak friendship".

PPP asks CEC to take measures for free and fair elections

Islamabad, 23 July 2005: Secretary General Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians Raja Pervez Ashraf MNA and the media coordinator Local Bodies Election Central Monitoring Committee PPP, Nazir Dhoki in a joint statement have very strongly condemned the statement of Chief Minister Sindh, Arbab Rahim that his administration has made the entire Sindh a "No Go" area and warned him of restrain himself from such type of statement because people of Sindh and the entire country are no longer ready to live in an environment of fear of the dictators.

Raja Pervez Ashraf and Nazir Dhoki said that this statement of the Chief Minister displays the military regimes intentions of not holding free, fair and transparent elections. The regime is trying to usurp the peoples’ right to vote freely. They said that the government has two masks. One is the so-called enlightened mask for the West and other is the real face of the dictatorship, which is continuously victimising the liberal and progressive forces of the country.

PPP leaders said that all over Sindh province, the police and administration is harassing Awam Dost candidates and initiating false and concocted cases including murder cases against them to keep them out of the electoral process. Raja Pervez Ashraf and Nazir Dhoki said that Arbab Ghulam Rahim should not forget that such tall claims were also made by General Zia who is rotting in the dustbin of history but the PPP is still the largest political force in the country under the leadership of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto. They said that such claims by Arbab Rahim would not deter the party workers from carrying out a vigorous campaign to oust the dictatorship from the country. They demanded of the Chief Election Commissioner to take notice of Arbab Rahim’s statement and play its role in holding free, fair, impartial and transparent elections.

PPP asks CEC to take measures for free and fair elections

Islamabad, 23 July 2005: Secretary General Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians Raja Pervez Ashraf MNA and the media coordinator Local Bodies Election Central Monitoring Committee PPP, Nazir Dhoki in a joint statement have very strongly condemned the statement of Chief Minister Sindh, Arbab Rahim that his administration has made the entire Sindh a "No Go" area and warned him of restrain himself from such type of statement because people of Sindh and the entire country are no longer ready to live in an environment of fear of the dictators.

Raja Pervez Ashraf and Nazir Dhoki said that this statement of the Chief Minister displays the military regimes intentions of not holding free, fair and transparent elections. The regime is trying to usurp the peoples’ right to vote freely. They said that the government has two masks. One is the so-called enlightened mask for the West and other is the real face of the dictatorship, which is continuously victimising the liberal and progressive forces of the country.

PPP leaders said that all over Sindh province, the police and administration is harassing Awam Dost candidates and initiating false and concocted cases including murder cases against them to keep them out of the electoral process. Raja Pervez Ashraf and Nazir Dhoki said that Arbab Ghulam Rahim should not forget that such tall claims were also made by General Zia who is rotting in the dustbin of history but the PPP is still the largest political force in the country under the leadership of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto. They said that such claims by Arbab Rahim would not deter the party workers from carrying out a vigorous campaign to oust the dictatorship from the country. They demanded of the Chief Election Commissioner to take notice of Arbab Rahim’s statement and play its role in holding free, fair, impartial and transparent elections.

Mohtarma Bhutto denounces Hisba bill as reminder of taliban

Persecution of moderates by Musharraf had pushed country into dark ages

Islamabad July 16, 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson f the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto expressed concern over the Hisba Bill of the Frontier Government and said that the bill was violative of the fundamental human rights of citizens.

In a statement today she said that the bill was a bid to copy the policies of the Taliban in our country, which did not bode well for the strength, and stability of the nation.

The former Prime Minister deplored the intrusion in the private lives of citizens whereby official were now empowered to snoop around private individuals to push people back into the dark ages.

She said that all this was being done by exploiting the name of Islam while Islam categorically prohibited its followers from spying on each other. The bill aims at setting up a Moral Brigade to deny freedom of choice through a chain of priest judges at the provincial, district and tehsil levels to enforce what the politically appointed Mohtasib regards as 'virtue' and whip out what he considers as 'evil' in the name of religion.

The enforcement of virtue and vice brigade would remind many of the darkest days of the Taliban in Afghanistan, she said and added, ‘the establishment of the Hisba brigade was one more step towards unenlightenment, immoderation and tyranny which had flourished since the PPP government was overthrown in 1996".

The draconian Hisba force, which can interfere with the media, Provincial Assembly and private lives of individuals but not the armed forces, has no provision of appeal.

Ironically, Mohtarma said, that while the bill claims to protect women, minorities and disadvantaged groups, its sponsors reject legislation aimed at eliminating honour killings, bar women from participation in polls and hound women NGOs in the province. They refuse to protect the minorities by amending the blasphemy law and exploit the poor by increasing poverty to force the youth to join madrassahs to become cannon fodder in their fights for political power.

She said that General Musharraf's regime had taken Pakistan backwards by persecuting moderate parties and allowing full freedoms to religious parties. She said this was being done to frighten the world that the choice in nuclear Pakistan is only between military dictatorship and religious fascism.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto meets with Secretary General Commonwealth

Islamabad, July 20: Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto, former Prime Minister of Pakistan and Chairperson PPP met with the Secretary General of the Commonwealth Mr Don Mckinnon here yesterday. The two held wide ranging discussions on various issues of importance and also political situation in Pakistan and the prospects of forthcoming local bodies elections.

NAB calls for file in murder case against Senator Asif Zardari
PPP condemns NAB action as based on ulterior motives
Urges Supreme Court to take suo moto notice

Islamabad July 20, 2005: Pakistan Peoples Party has expressed shock and condemned interference by the NAB in the judicial process in the Mir Murtaza Bhutto murder case against Senator Asif Ali Zardari now being the Sessions Judge East Karachi and termed it as yet another proof that the NAB was being used for the political re-engineering of the country.

The acquittal application of Mr Zardari in the Mir Murtaza Bhutto murder case was heard by the Sessions Judge East Karachi Mr. Sherwani on July 19 who reserved his judgment till August 20.

As soon as the Sessions Judge reserved his verdict the NAB prosecutor Zaheer Khan called for the file of the case from the special prosecutor Ilyas Khan in the Mir Murtaz murder case. The Sindh law secretary also called for the details of the case from the district public prosecutor.

In a statement today PPP vice chair Makhdoom Amin Fahim said that NAB has nothing g to do with the murder case pending before a court of competent jurisdiction. NAB was a self styled investigation and prosecution agency only in cases of corruption and had nothing to do with murder cases, he said.

Makhdoom Amin Fahim said that NAB’s going out of the way and showing interest in the case demonstrated its ulterior motives.

The NAB and the regime owe an explanation as to why such extraordinary interest is being taken by the NAB in a case with which it has nothing to do in terms of its mandate and stated functions, he said.

Makhdoom Amin Fahim said that the PPP has always maintained that NAB was serving as political arm of the rulers to re-write the political landscape of the country so as to give a permanent role to the military in the country’s politics.

He urged the Supreme Court to take suo moto notice of NAB’s interference in the murder case against Senator Zardari. He also asked the legal fraternity and the human rights bodies to take notice and raise their voice.

Makhdoom Amin Fahim said that the Party will raise the matter with the UN Rapporteur on Judges and also with the diplomats and international bodies.

PPP demands CEC to take notice of violations of election rules

Islamabad, 20 July 2005: Pakistan Peoples Party has asked the Chief Election Commissioner to take notice of victimisation of party workers in Jamshoror, Larkana and Nawabshah and has demanded of the Election Commissioner to take action against the Chief Minister Sindh Arbab Ghulam Rahim who has reportedly said that it is the right of the government party to use state resources during local body elections.

These demands were made in a meeting of PPP Committee formed for monitoring local bodies elections. The meeting was held today at Central Secretariat Islamabad chaired by Syed Nayyar Hussain Bokhari MNA and attended by Senator Enver Beg, Media Coordinator of the Central Monitoring Committee Nazir Dhoki, B A Malik, Ilyas Mohsin and Mansoor Sheikh.

The committee expressed its concerns over prime minister Shaukat Aziz’z recent visit of Hyderabad in which in a public meeting organised by MQM, he announced several development project as part of election campaign. The meeting also took notice of transfers of officials and demanded of the election commissioner to take measures to stop these violations of elections rules.

Raja Pervez Ashraf awarded Honorary Citizenship of Houston Texas

Islamabad, 13 July 2005: Secretary General Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians and Deputy Parliamentary Leader in the National Assembly, Raja Pervez Ashraf MNA arrived back in Islamabad today after an extensive tour of the United States, United Kingdom and Dubai.

During his stay in the United States, he attended a seminar organised by APNA, an organisation of Pakistani doctors practising in the Unites States. Raja Pervez Ashraf also held meetings with party chapters in different American cities.

During his visit, Raja Pervez Ashraf was awarded honorary citizenship of Houston Texas by the Mayor of the city, Mr. Bill White and was also appointed a goodwill Ambassador of the city for his services to the people and for his achievements in his political career. Mr. Bill White presented a scroll to Raja Pervez Ashraf in this regard.

Raja Pervez Ashraf MNA, during his stay in the United States also held meetings with US Senators, congressmen and Think Tanks.

During his stay in the United Kingdom, Raja Pervez Ashraf visited several cities and met with the office bearers of party organisation.

On his way back, Raja Pervez Ashraf made a brief stopover at Dubai, where he called on to Senator Asif Ali Zardari to enquire about his health.

Islamabad, 13 July 2005: On the instructions of Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto a monitoring committee for monitoring the local bodies elections has been constituted. Senator Latif Khosa would be the Coordinator and Senator Enver Beg, Syed Nayyar Hussain Bokhari MNA, B.A. Malik, Kamran Zafar, Ilays Mohsin, Masood Sharif, Sheikh Mansoor, Palwasha Behram and Nazir Dhoki would serve as its members.

The monitoring committee would apprise the foreign embassies, diplomats and Human Rights Organisation regarding irregularities in the elections, violations of human rights, rigging and cases of victimisation of political opponents by the government.

The committee held its first meeting today at the Central Secretariat of the Party in Islamabad, chaired by Senator Latif Khosa and attended by members as well as party Secretary General Jahangir Bader who conveyed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto’s instructions to the committee. The meeting condemned victimisation of party workers and supporters in Sindh province. The Secretary General, PPP instructed the party district office bearers to send all cases of irregularities in the elections and cases of victimisation of party workers and supporters to the Central Secretariat, Islamabad.

PPP will oppose disenfranchising women in LB Polls

Islamabad July 14, 2005: Pakistan Peoples Party believes in gender equality and empowerment of women and will resist any attempt to disenfranchise women during the forthcoming local or general elections.

A section of the press today reported that efforts were afoot at the local level by candidates of different political parties in the Frontier province to agree on keeping the women out of elections.

In a statement today the President of Frontier PPP Rahimdad Khan categorically denied that the Party was taking part in such deliberations.

He said the Party’s political principles were well known and it was unthinkable that its leaders or workers would enter into any arrangement at local level that was inconsistent with its policy, principles and manifesto.

He said that the Party will mobilise women voters from Chitral to Dera Ismail Khan come rain or sunshine in the polls.

If any candidate who claims affiliation with Party manifesto in any manner takes part in the undemocratic and unconstitutional practise of debarring women from exercising their right of franchise will be so doing in violation of the Party’s discipline and will be dealt with accordingly, he said.

Rahimdad Khan urged the women throughout the province to come forward and not abandon their legal and constitutional right in the face of opposition from obscurantist.

Islamabad July 13, 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has expressed profound grief and shock over the train accident near Gotki in Sindh in which about 130 people were killed and some two hundred people injured mostly seriously.

Three trains collided in the wee hours of Wednesday at railway station Sarhad near Gotki in Sindh resulting in the death of 130 people and serious injuries to countless more passengers in what was one of the worst train accidents in the country.

In a statement today she said that she was profoundly grieved over the tragedy and called for immediate and adequate compensation to the kin of those killed in the accident and free treatment of those injured in the accident.

She said that it appeared that the accident was the result of carelessness and improper supervision of the affairs of the railways department. She demanded a judicial probe into the accident, fixing of responsibility at all levels and punishment to those whose carelessness led to this tragedy. Some heads must roll, she said.

Mohtarma Bhutto also appealed to the progressive women organizations to step forward and provide at least symbolic relief and soccer to the victims to wake up the regime to its responsibility. She also asked the provincial PPP leadership of Sindh to undertake rescue and relief work and alleviate the sufferings of victims.

The former Prime Minister who had arrived in London also asked the local Party leadership that she be kept posted with the progress in rescue and relief work.

She also prayed for those who had lost their lives and expressed sympathies with the families of victims of the accident.

Sindh govt criticized for ‘pre-poll rigging’

KARACHI, July 13: Slamming the regime for alleged pre-poll massive rigging in the upcoming local government elections, the Pakistan Peoples Party on Wednesday announced launching a website to expose what it called the “fraud” of the government in the upcoming elections on a daily basis. The website would provide every detail of the government’s attempts to allegedly manipulate elections, said the PPP monitoring committee’s chief former Senator Taj Haider at a news conference which was also addressed by Mr Nisar Khuhro, MNAs Sherry Rehman and Dr Fahmida Mirza, who is also the provincial information secretary. Additioal information secretary Waqar Mehdi and chief of the Karachi chapter Rashid Rabbani were also present.

Mr Taj Haider condemned the arrest of PPP leaders Khadim Hussain Chhachhar and Qambar Solangi in Dadu district on Tuesday.

Mr Haider said that they were arrested for refusing to join the PML or supporting its candidates in the local bodies’ elections.

Mr Haider said that arrests were part of the pre-election rigging campaign launched with the arrest of Awam Dost Nazim Mohan Lal Meghwar from Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim’s home district Tharparker, who was still being tortured at Central Jail, Hyderabad and being held in solitary confinement without allowing a meeting with relatives or lawyers.

Taj Haider said the arrest of the PPP leaders from Dadu or elsewhere in Sindh cannot deter from giving a tough time and defeat the ruling party candidates all over Sindh.

He asked the Chief Election Commissioner to take suo motu notice of the arrests and detention of the supporters of the PPP who are being deprived of a level-playing field in the local bodies’ elections.

Taj Haider also demanded the Election Commission to reverse the transfers and postings of hundreds of police officials in Sindh and stop the Sindh government from playing a game of hide and seek with ECP by suspending the senior police officers and replacing them with juniors to get the required results of the local bodies’ elections.

He also announced that in addition to the monitoring committee, the party had constituted information cell, foreign liaison committee, legal aid committee besides the website “dhandli.com” which would become operational on Thursday.

Leader of the Opposition in Sindh Assembly Nisar Khuhro described the upcoming LG elections a “farce” as governor, chief minister and other coalition partners were openly flouting rules. He pointed out that despite the fact that LG elections were party-less, but when alliance is formed between the PML and the MQM, the provincial governor takes part in that.

He alleged that Federal Minister Liaquat Ali Jatoi had himself led raiding parties in Mehar and Khairpur Nathan Shah Tehsils of Dadu to threaten PPP supporters against contesting the local bodies’ elections.

Nisar Khuhro said Sindh was facing blatant form of pre-election rigging and writ of the Election Commission was invisible. He regretted that the EC was not taking notice of the chief minister’s alleged “manipulation”.

He urged the ECP to take serious notice of the pre-election rigging being committed allegedly by the military regime and the test-tube politicians riding on its bandwagon.

He also recalled the alleged police excesses against the PPP supporters near Nooriabad and other parts and refusal of the jail authorities to release of Guddu Bihari from prison, despite court orders.

They urged the Election Commission to take notice of the violation of electoral laws and urged the superior court to take suo motu notice of contempt of its orders.

The PPP leader alleged that the chief minister and other functionaries had made a mockery of democracy.

He appealed to the superior courts to take notice of the happenings in Tharparker desert and establish a judicial commission to probe into the Bhada Sandha incident.

MNA Sherry Rehman and Dr Fahmida Mirza also expressed similar views and gave details of individual cases of transfers and postings in violations of the election commission rules.

PPP’s demo: Activists of the Pakistan Peoples Party on Wednesday staged a unique anti-government protest when they ate grass and displayed stale bread outside the Karachi Press Club to express their anger over mounting poverty and unemployment in the country.

It was organized by the PPP Karachi division’s cultural wing. PPP MNAs Ms Sherry Rehman and Dr Fahmida Mirza also joined the protestors and hung stale bread around their necks to condemn the government policies of price hike and increasing unemployment.

The protesters, who were led by the PPP Cultural Wing’s President, Suleman Selia, and Dr Sarfraz Rajar, also included school children, who were carrying banners inscribed with slogans, ‘aunty Benazir come soon’, and ‘please get my papa his job back’.

The protestors chanted anti-government slogans and carried placards inscribed with slogans against Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz’s policies and the PPP’s resolve to bring Ms Bhutto back and emancipate the judiciary from the shackles of dictators.

Mohtarma Bhutto Stresses Annulment of All Discriminatory Laws against Minorities

Islamabad, July 14, 2005: "Discriminatory laws against minorities must be repealed and they should be given equal opportunity in every walk of life". Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto said this while talking to the chairman All Pakistan Minorities Alliance (APMA), Shahbaz Bhatti, who called on to Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto at her residence in London Yesterday.

She said that Pakistan Peoples Party believes in equal rights for minorities and will continue its struggle for their uplift and empowerment. She appreciated the services and sacrifices of minorities for the development and prosperity of the country.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto reiterated party’s resolve to continue its struggle for the rights and development of poor, oppressed and marginalized people of Pakistan. She also assured PPP support in raising the issues of injustices meted out to the minorities and problems faced by them in the parliament.

She assured her support to the minorities for better representation in the Senate and in the National and Provincial Assemblies. While appreciating (APMA) continued support, she stressed for a renewed vigour and commitment for the on-going struggle for the restoration of democracy, supremacy of Parliament, independent judiciary, protection and promotion of human rights in Pakistan". She emphasised PPP's commitment and continued support to All Pakistan Minorities Alliance

(APMA) in its struggle for social justice, human equality, religious freedom and minority rights in Pakistan.

Islamabad, 11 July 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and her spouse Senator Asif Ali Zardari has condoled with Zafar Ali Shah, MNA over his wife’s death.

Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto in a condolence message addressed to Zafar Ali Shah, wrote, "Senator Asif Ali Zardari and I are writing to condole the sad demise of your wife after a prolonged illness. The loss of a spouse is a great tragedy. Our sympathies are with you at this difficult time. Please accept our heartfelt condolences and convey the same to other members of the bereaved family."

She also prayed for eternal peace to the deceased soul and courage to the family members to bear this irreparable loss with equanimity.

In a separate message addressed to Begum Shahzada Suleman, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and her spouse Senator Asif Ali Zardari condoled the death of her sister. She also prayed for eternal peace to the soul of deceased and courage to family and friends to bear this irreparable loss with equanimity.

Party Chairperson approves PPP AJK Organisations

Islamabad July 11, 2005: Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has approved the nominations to the Central Body, Executive Council, Divisional, District and other organisations of the Party in Azad Kashmir.

The central organisation includes Sahibzada Muhammad Ishaq Zafar MLA as the President PPP AJK, Chaudhry Abdul Majeed Senior Vice President, Chaudhry M Yasin Secretary General, Chaudhry Lateef Akbar Vice President

(Muzaffarabad) and Muhammad Matloob Inqilabi as Secretary Information.

Besides the central body, approval has also been given to 23 members of the executive body, 87 members of the AJK Council, and office bearers of the divisional organisation Muzaffarabad, district organisations of Muzaffarabad, Bagh, Bhimber, Poonch, Sudhnoti and Kotli, Women Wing, Peoples Youth Organisation (PYO), Study Circle, Ulema-Mushaikh Board and the Traders Wing of the Party.

PPP apprises US Ambassador of victimisation of political opponents and pre-poll rigging

Islamabad July 11, 2005: PPP MPA from Sindh Humera Alwani today called on the US Ambassador in Islamabad Mr. Ryan C. Crocker in the latter’s office today.

The PPP apprised the US Ambassador of the victimisation of the opposition particularly the PPP leadership by the regime through fabricated and politically motivated cases and laws given back dated effect. The PPP MPA also briefed the Ambassador on the pre-poll rigging launched on a massive scale on the even of local bodies’ polls that includes large-scale transfers of government servants in Sindh and Punjab despite ban imposed by the Election Commission and bifurcation of PPP districts in Sindh.

The meeting lasted for about 45 minutes.

Raja Pervez Ashraf’s rejoinder to Faisal Saleh Hayat

Islamabad, 11 July 2005: Secretary General Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians and Deputy Parliamentary Leader in the National Assembly, Raja Pervez Ashraf MNA in a rejoinder to federal minister turncoat Faisal Saleh Hayat said that it does not suit the turncoat like Faisal Saleh Hayat to talk about democracy because he had taken refuge behind military uniform.

Raja Pervez Ashraf said that Nabzada Faisal and his associates if have any bit of moral fibre left in them, then they should resign from their national assembly seats because they got votes in the name of the flag bearer of democracy in the country. Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto. Raja Pervez Ashraf said that Faisal and his associates had signed on their political death warrants, the day they ditched the party and fell in the lap of a dictator. The backstabbers like Faisal have no place in Pakistani politics and people of Pakistan abhor them and their role in hoisting dictatorship in the name of democracy, he said.

Secretary General PPPP said that Faisal Saleh is trying to charm the General because he has lost even confidence of his colleagues. He should remember that people would never forgive him for the crime he has committed against the people of Pakistan, Raja Pervez Ashraf said.

Islamabad July 10, 2005: “The Hisba Bill being tabled in the Provincial Assembly on Monday by the MMA government is against of the Constitution, violates the fundamental human rights of citizens, is a recipe to polarise the society, and is a blatant attempt at talibanisation that will push the people back into the dark ages in the name of Islam”, said PPP Senator Farhatullah Babar in a statement today.

He said that the Party condemns the bill in the strongest possible terms and urges the human rights bodies and civil society to thwart this naked bid to rob them of their rights guaranteed in the Constitution behind the façade of religion.

The Bill allows the provincial government to set up a chain of offices of religious ombudsmen in province at the provincial, district and tehsil levels and raise a brigade of new Hisba police to impose on the citizens a partisan world view in the name of ‘propagation of virtue and preventing the vice’ (Amr bil-maroof wa nahin anil munkar).

He said that the bill was aimed only at doling out judicial jobs in grade 18 to 20 to madrassah graduates on the one hand and to fool the people on the eve of local bodies’ on the other.

The PPP Senator warned against the implications of allowing the Pakistani Taliban to regulate the private lives of citizens in the name of enforcing ‘Islamic value system’.

“Spending of hundreds of millions on these new institutions amounts to foisting medieval non sense at public expense”, he said.

He said laws already existed for dealing with the transgressions listed and sincerity demanded that existing laws were implemented rather than making new ones.

It is atrocious that mohtasib has also been given powers under section 10 (c) to regulate the media and make it promote what the Pakistani Taliban regard as ‘Islamic values’.

The armed forces will not be questioned but under section 2 (2) the secretariat of the elected Provincial Assembly can be summoned and questioned by the Mohtasib, he said adding “there appears to be some collusion to undermine elected representatives”.

He said that the religious parties in collusion with the undemocratic forces first undermined the Parliament through the 17th Amendment. Now another assault on the Parliament had been mounted through the Hisba Bill, he said.

He said that the Council of Islamic Ideology had declared in September last that the Hisba bill clashed with the Constitution and “will not achieve the purposes of Shariah and instead raise controversies over the teachings of Quran and Sunnah”.

He asked the framers of the draft whether they accepted the CII as a constitutional body to advice the government or whether a certain law was in accordance with the Islamic tenets or not. If it was accepted as such they must explain as to whether the recommendations of the Council of Islamic Ideology have been accepted and if not why not, the PPP Senator asked.

The refrain of “amr bil maroof and nahin anil munkar” ominously brings to mind the Taliban’s era in Afghanistan and the summary shaving off of heads of Pakistani football players in Qandahar some years for wearing shorts.

“The deafening silence of the proponents of ‘enlightened moderation’ in the federal government is intriguing and smacks of unholy alliance”, he said.

Mohtarma Bhutto grieved over loss of lives in floods
Expresses concern over inadequacy of relief work

Islamabad July 10, 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has expressed her profound grief over the loss of lives and property due to floods in the Punjab and Sindh.

The current wave of flash flood in Chenab and Indus rivers has caused the death of at least 16 people and displacement of over three hundred thousand people in at least ten districts of the Punjab. Deaths have been reported in Sahiwal, Chiniot, Layyah, Samrial and Kot Mithan Shaif. Earlier floods also caused huge damage in the Frontier province.

In a statement today the former Prime Minister said that she was grieved to learn about the loss of lives and damage to property due to floods in various parts of the country. She asked the rulers to take immediate steps to alleviate the sufferings of the flood affected people.

Mohtarma Bhutto said that the regime's apathy towards the flood affected people as reported in the media has been pathetic. Flood affected people have complained that the government was only making tall claims while practically it had taken no steps to gear up relief operations. "We are forced to leave our homes and spend nights under the open sky" flood affected people have been reported in the media as saying. The media also reported the Punjab Chief Minister as acknowledging that relief measures have not been adequate.

She said she had warned the regime of the dangers in the coming monsoon and had urged it to take timely steps to avert large scale loss of lives and damage to property but the rulers chose to ignore her warnings. She was said it was most unfortunate that rulers spent time and energy in chasing political opponents rather than planning to alleviate sufferings of the people.

The compensation announced by the federal government to the flood affected people in Frontier has been dismally low and showed that the rulers in Islamabad had no idea of the havoc caused by the floods, she said. The former Prime Minister demanded that part of the funds spent on chasing political opponents and on white elephant non productive projects should be immediately diverted towards rescue and relief operations.

She also directed the Party organisations to be vigilant and organise rescue and relief missions and set up emergency medical and relief centres to help alleviate the sufferings of the flood affected people. She also asked senior Party leadership to personally monitor the situation and submit reports to her.

The Islamabad shenanigans

By Naheed Khan

A new drama is once again about to be staged. The name of this play is "masking the undemocratic rule". The producer, director and the main actor in this play is the same person who had produced "local bodies' elections under federation", "referendum" and the infamous "elections 2002". There are no two opinions about the failure of these plays. All were a record flop on the box office of the people of Pakistan. They also failed to fetch any foreign award.
The first of these plays was the local bodies' elections and it was claimed that this is being held to empower the people of Pakistan at the grass roots level. These were the first elections after the military takeover in October 1999 and were declared as non-party elections but the political parties openly supported candidates. The candidates supported by the PPP won from every corner of the country. The military regime used and abused all its resources to install its favourites on the Nazim posts. Despite all the anoeuvring of the state apparatus several districts Nazims supported by the PPP won the Nazim slot. Then the military apparatus used arm-twisting tactics for forcing these Nazims to change loyalties and toe its line. These local governments were then used to facilitate the fraud referendum. This first play was continued to be played in empty houses until the recently announced second part of the sequel.

The second play was the referendum in which everyone, everywhere, and as many times as one liked was allowed to vote. The producer, director and the hero claimed a resounding success at that time but later on had to admit that this was a mistake to launch such a flop project. Then came the biggest flop of them all called elections 2002. These elections were held keeping the two former Prime Ministers, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif out. The military junta tried its best to stop the PPP from participating in these elections by displaying every intention that it would not register the PPP as a political party under Benazir Bhutto. This design of the military junta was countered by the PPP and a new party was registered by the name of PPP Parliamentarians, which took part in the elections and got the highest numbers of votes in the country despite pre-poll, during poll and post-poll rigging. The European observers of these elections declared these elections as 'massively flawed'. This production of the military and its agencies failed as soon as it was released. It was impossible to form a government without the PPP so the military regime resorted to its old tactics of divide and rule and found a bunch of unscrupulous individuals who had won the elections under PPP banner and had got votes in the name of Benazir Bhutto, defected and chose a comical name for their group. They called themselves Patriot. What followed is a sad story. A story of miseries of the people, a story of unemployment, a story of suicides, a story of gang rapes, a story of retrenchment of employees, a story of price hike and a story of horror. This production was used by the regime to hoodwink the world community. The producers succeeded in their efforts to some extent but were exposed when the going got tough for example at the time of nuclear proliferation allegations and worsening relations with the neighbours. These issues have kept the military regime busy as these keep surfacing every now and again and have been a constant irritant for the regime. The question keeps arising that who violated Benazir's nuclear doctrine that had successfully blocked any proliferation effort. Benazir Bhutto has been a thorn on the side of the regime because she keeps exposing the inability of the regime to run the country and the corruption at high places whether it be the land grabbing scam, the increasing gang rape incidents or the deteriorating law and order situation in the country.

The regime that produced flops like the first local bodies' elections, referendum and elections 2002 has launched a new project of local bodies' elections 2005. This local body system introduced by the regime failed because of inherent faults in it. People instead of getting power became powerless. Land mafia, drug mafia, bearded mafia and corrupt mafia are the kind ruling the streets of the country. Power has concentrated in one hand. General Musharraf takes every decision whether big or small. He decides the foreign policy after a telephone call. He is about to decide NFC award. He takes the decision of whose name is to be put on the exit control list. He takes the decision to send a lady doctor abroad because she refuses to keep quite. General Musharraf has too much on his plate. The districts in Sindh province where PPP has a strong support have been divided in smaller districts with the aim to give on a platter the Nazimship of several new districts to a party supportive of the dictatorship. A party which itself is under dictatorship of an individual. A party, which uses every illegal means even torture and force to win the election. Massive discrepancies have been found in the electoral lists prepared by the election commission. Nearly 7.5 million voters are missing from these lists.

Constituencies have been demarcated in a way that supports the King's Party. Bickering between the provincial and district governments continues over money and authority. Nazims were dismissed by the Sindh provincial government and reinstated by the Supreme Court. In these circumstances the time and money of taxpayers are being misused and wasted to produce another flop. How long would this continue? Not much longer because the people are sick and tired of these tomfoolery and want decency in state affairs.

CUT-THROAT CAMPAIGN

In the run-up to the local bodies elections, Sindh Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim is stifling the voices of dissent in his native Tharparkar district
By Gamoo Sachar

Sindh Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim's detractors claim that he is out to sweep the upcoming local bodies elections by any means necessary. The claim does not seem unfounded given the increased harassment of opposition politicians by the Tharparkar administration, where Rahim currently holds sway. Many perceive the chief minister's actions to be those of a feudal lord who is not loath to claim that he owes his position to a military dictator.

In recent months, Rahim's most renowned victim has been Jam Saqi, 59, a former student and peasant leader who earned popular respect by resisting successive military regimes in Pakistan, for which he spent 12 years in jail. An erstwhile leader of the Communist Party of Pakistan, Saqi joined the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) in the early 1990s. He confronted the influential Arbab family in elections as early as 1970 and again in 1988. Though he lost on both occasions, his subsequent affiliation with the PPP gave him wider appeal. He also gained political influence during the mid1990s when he became an adviser to the Sindh chief minister.

Given these credentials, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), of which Saqi is a member, had least expected the chief minister to ruthlessly persecute Saqi when he visited Khetlari. The HRCP had sent Saqi to Rahim's native village in Tharparkar to investigate a rape and kidnapping case involving the chief minister's nephews. Saqi, who lives in Hyderabad, returned home from Khetlari on May 28 and submitted his report to the HRCP. The next day, he was arrested and charged with the possession of 1,250 kilogrammes of explosive material. Apparently, Saqi's name was added to a first information report (FIR) for the explosives case lodged on May 21, which originally charged only Urs Daidano, Ahmed Razi and Akbar. According to Rao Amir Iqbal, the station house officer at the Market Police Station, Hyderabad, Saqi was released the following day on a personal bond" as no evidence was found against him".

But on June 5, a heavy contingent of police from Karachi raided Saqi's Hyderabad residence. Since he was not at home, the officials arrested his wife Akhtar Sultana instead on the charge of kidnapping for ransom. It later transpired that Shakil Naich, a journalist close to Rahim, had filed an FIR with Karachi's Eidgah Police Station on May 29, the day Saqi was picked up by the police. In the FIR, Naich accuses Saqi and his wife of kidnapping his minor son for a 500,000-rupee ransom. A former husband of Akhtar's sister Afsar Sultana, Naich had previously moved to obtain custody of his sevenyear-old son when Saqi's family had landed in trouble. The child has now been handed to Naich in an out-of-court settlement. Meanwhile, Saqi's wife Akhtar was released from Karachi's women's police station on June 15 after a 10-day detention. As for Saqi, he went into hiding following the June 5 raid on his house and has only recently come into public view.

Another object of Rahim's alleged vendetta is Arbab Murad Ali and his family. A 70-year-old lawyer and PPP leader, Ali stands out as the only scion of Tharparkar's Arbab family since the early 1970s to have challenged Arbab Ghulam Rahim and his clique. Over the decades, Rahim is alleged to have persecuted Ali and his family and implicated the lawyer in petty criminal cases such as the theft of goats. In April 2005, the Hyderabad Electric Supply Corporation (HESCO) charged Ali with stealing electricity and consequently, the power supply to his native village Bhukrio in Diplo Taluka was also suspended. The residents of Bhukrio, who maintain they have been regularly paying their bills, have since gone to the court in Mithi to challenge the disconnection.

For his part, Ali, who was arrested on HESCO's complaint in April, faces an uphill task. The sessions court granted him bail in the power theft case on June 2 but Fazlur Rahman, Mithi's town police officer, rearrested him the same day on charges that were not immediately known. It was later discovered that the authorities had booked him under the multi-purpose Maintenance of Public Order law. The Sindh High Court, where the detention was challenged, ordered Ali's release on June 25. But before he could be set free, Ali had to register yet another shock: his nephew Arbab Mohammad Haroon, a school teacher and PPP activist, was arrested by the Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE) on June 21 in a corruption case. Haroon had been actively pursuing Ali's case until his arrest.

Observers believe that Ali's freedom may be short-lived because Rahim "cannot afford to let him off the hook". Apparently, the chief minister is embroiled in some serious disputes of a personal nature with Ali's family. According to these observers, the family feud became particularly intense after 1997 when the PPP government was ousted from power. Locals allege that at the time, Rahim took advantage of Ali's vulnerable position and seized a portion of his agricultural land. Rahim is also accused of abetting in the kidnapping of Ali's daughter a few years ago, an offence that is rarely allowed to go unpunished in rural Sindh. "Rahim fears retaliation from Ali in case the PPP comes into power," explains one observer.

As a result of this paranoia, Rahim's government is reportedly out to crush the entire PPP leadership in Tharparkar. On May 29, the police arrested PPP leader Mir Mohammad Khan Lund from his village Kaloi without specifying any charges against him. In June, Lund's son Abdul Aziz moved the Sindh High Court which then ordered the regional police officer of Mirpurkhas to produce Lund in court and specify charges against him. That demand remains unmet. Initially, the police had detained Lund at the Kaloi Police Station. But in a bid to prevent him from contacting his family and sympathisers, he has been moved to a police check post in the distant Rann of Kutch area.

Similarly, PPP activist Mohan Lal Meghwar was arrested from Thatta by the provincial ACE on May 13 for overdrawing salary funds from an education project receiving foreign funding. Meghwar is the brother of Engineer Gianchand, a PPP leader who ran against Rahim in the 2002 general elections and was also the PPP's covering candidate in the August 18 by-election. Another reason for Meghwar's persecution, say observers, is that he is the only pro-PPP member of district council Thar, which is otherwise dominated by Rahim's supporters. A special ACE judge granted Meghwar bail on May 27 but the authorities of the Hyderabad jail, where he is lodged, refused to release him. Although Meghwar remains incarcerated, no fresh charges have been brought against him as yet. In light of such" officially sponsored" intimidation, observers do not expect the opposition to make a mark in the forthcoming local government elections in Tharparkar.

Reign of Terror

Sindh’s handpicked Chief Minister goes on the rampage against his opponents.
By Massoud Ansari
 

Sixty-plus Dhanoo Meghwar's hopes of retrieving her son from the clutches of the Thakurs of the Thar Desert were revived when the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) decided to take up her case. However, they were soon to be dashed when the man appointed by the HRCP to head its fact-finding mission, was put behind bars for "carrying explosive material."

He was none other I than the renowned leftist, Jam Saqi, also known as Comrade Saqi. Saqi was released after much media hype, but his house in Hyderabad was raided again by over a dozen police sleuths.

The story, however, doesn't end here. Within a few days, the police apprehended Akhtar Jam, Saqi's wife, on charges of kidnapping her own nephew. Saqi went into hiding, while his wife was unceremoniously taken to Karachi by the police. The police managed to get a remand for interrogation even though the eight-year-old nephew was produced in person to tell newsmen that no one had kidnapped him. Akhtar was finally released on court orders after staying in the police lock-up for 10 days.

"With the fabrication of phony cases against a person of Jam Saqi's stature, Sindh Chief Minister Arbab Rahim wanted to show how he plans to deal with those who dare to expose his family's high-handedness," says Jamil Soomro, a political activist.

Jam Saqi's ordeal and that of his wife may have ended, but Mai Dhanoo's is far from over. Her trauma began some three years ago. In 2002, the family was woken up in the middle of night by the screams of Mai Dhanoo's daughter-in-law. Atam Meghwar, Dhanoo's son, spotted three men who had entered the house and took them to be thieves. He picked up a stick to challenge the intruders, hitting one of them on the head, but the men managed to escape. It transpired that the men were no ordinary thieves and had entered the house with the intent of raping Dhanoo's daughter-in -law.

Dhanoo, presently in hiding in Karachi, said the family discovered that the three intruders were the sons of Arbab Alam, elder brother of Arbab Ghulam Rahim. Fearing the inevitable repercussions, Mai's son left the village the next day and took up a job in a nearby town. "He kept visiting us off and on but mostly in the darkness of the night. We never told anyone in the village about his secret visits," Mai said.

On one of these visits, however, word leaked out and Dhanoo found several policemen, led by Arbab's nephews, entering her house to get hold of her son. “They started beating him badly, while all the women in the house pleaded for mercy. They didn't listen to anyone, dragged him out and took him away in front of dozens of villagers," she said, wiping her tears. Mai claims that she's had no news of him since then. "I don't know if he is dead or detained," she says. Fearing the worst, Mai fled from her village and has been offered shelter by human rights activists.

The Arbabs, who are known as the 'uncrowned kings' of the Thar Desert, are notorious for their gross violations of human rights. "Since Arbab Rahim was crowned king of Sindh province, the family's ruthlessness against political opponents has become even more brazen," says a political activist. Arbab Rahim himself minces no words about his demeanour and quite often says that he was "possessed by the spirit of Jam Sadiq," the day he took over as chief minister.

Arbab's ruthless tactics led Ghulam Asghar Abbasi, a sitting additional and sessions judge of Tharparkar, to appeal to the chief election commissioner in 2002. During the scrutiny of nomination papers, Abbasi had recorded a statement alleging a false declaration by Arbab, and he claims that Arbab had made an attempt on his life in retaliation.

The judge said that he complained to the concerned authorities, including the District Police Officer (DPO) Tharparkar to provide guards for his security but they did nothing to ensure his safety.

Despite these serious charges, no action was taken against Dr. Rahim by the election commission. As a result, the elections in the Thar area witnessed the height of high-handedness. At about 46 polling stations, votes between a whopping 85 to 97 per cent were polled. According to the Pakistan Election Commission's statistics, the overall turnout of the voters in densely populated cities of Karachi, Hyderabad and Sukkur ranged from 25 to 35 per cent. However, in Tharparkar, which is sparsely populated, some 68.4 per cent of the voters apparently turned out to vote for Dr. Rahim.

Rahim, who was made a provincial minister, got dozens of locals who chose to side against him, badly beaten by his henchmen. According to the official records, he managed to get 1,100 criminal cases registered against individuals who opposed him in the elections. All these men continue to fight their cases in the courts, but the struggle for justice is likely to prove an uphill task.

His political opponents say the Arbab family's high-handedness increased manifold soon after his takeover as chief minister of Sindh. Wali Muhammad Rahimoon, an engineer by profession, is a case in point. Rahimoon, a local of Tharparkar, resigned from his job in October last year, announcing that he would contest elections against Arbab Rahim. He says that within days of the announcement, Arbab Ghulam Rahim started harassing him and his family through local touts. Failing to intimidate him, Arbab got Rahimoon arrested on charges of dacoity at a petrol pump. He was also charged with murder, the fraudulent appointment of 600 persons during his career as a civil servant, and the purchase of 2,250 acres of agricultural land.

"The police took me to a CIA torture cell in Karachi where I was kept for 16 days and severely tortured. They wanted me to announce that I would never again contemplate contesting elections against Arbab Rahim," Rahimoon said.

Rahimoon, who was released only recently, said he was also victimised because he wrote a letter to the NAB Chairman describing how Arbab had multiplied his fortune after becoming chief minister. The letter states that "Before he took over as chief minister he used to live in a rented house in Manzoor colony, Karachi, paying 6,000 rupees as rent. Now he owns a bungalow numbered FT-1 / 13 / 3 Datari Villas, Bath Island Karachi, S. M. Service Station, Petroleum (Caltex) Block 2, Sher Shah Road Karachi, Five Star Service Station Petroleum (PSO) near Lal Kothi Sharae Faisal Karachi, a bungalow in Rawalpindi on Peshawar Road and a host of other properties."

Rahimoon levelled charges of a serious nature against Arbab that include allegations of how two of Arbab's front men collected money from contractors and consultants, who work for the Sindh government, and purchased a diamond necklace worth two million rupees for Rahim's second wife. Instead of an inquiry being initiated against Dr. Arbab Rahim by the NAB, Rahimoon ironically found himself in the lock-up.

Arbab's opponents in his hometown, Tharparkar, have become victims of the worst form of torture and many of them have migrated to other towns in Sindh. Locals say that incidents ranging from rape to thefts, forced occupation of opponents' lands to their eviction, to the disconnection of irrigation water as well as the use of the police force as a private army by the Arbabs, is the order of the day in Tharparkar. "They behave like mini-gods and have virtually turned the area into their fiefdom," says a local.

Mohan Lal Meghwar, Nazim Union Council Jhirmirio, was arrested on May 13, 2005 from Thatta, where he took refuge after he sensed danger at the hands of the Sindh chief minister. He was taken to Mirpurkhas and charged with embezzling 57,000 rupees. Mohan was bailed out by the court but arrested from outside Central Jail Hyderabad as yet another case was fabricated against him. His only crime was that his brother, Engr. Gianchand, contested the general elections against Arbab Ghulam Rahim and, later, against Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz.

Similarly, 70-year-old advocate, Arbab Murad Ali, was arrested from his village Bhukirio, near Arbab's village, after he chose to offer legal support to Mir Mohammad Khan Lund who was put behind bars for opposing the Arbabs in the area. Arbab Murad Ali has been jailed in an electricity theft case.

The brazen high-handedness of Arbab Rahim is not limited to the remote Thar Desert but has been allowed full play elsewhere. Even members of the assemblies have become targets of his wrath. In one case, a PPP-backed MNA from Nawabshah, Ghulam Qadir Chandio, was arrested after he was implicated in a case of kidnapping. Ironically, the person who was nominated as a kidnap victim in the police case by the Sindh government held a press conference soon after Chandio's arrest, saying that he was never kidnapped. Chandio was then implicated in yet another case and was finally released by the courts on bail.

In the most astonishing case yet, another PPP-backed MP A from Hyderabad, Zahid Bhurgri, was arrested by the Hyderabad police while he was sitting with his friends at a restaurant in Latifabad. The next day, when his colleagues made a ruckus about the arrest during a Sindh Assembly session, the speaker, Muzaffar Hussain Shah, asked Jamshoro police officials for an explanation.

To the shock of many, Sikandar Magsi, the District Police Officer (DPO) Jamshoro, wrote a letter to the Sindh Assembly speaker, saying, "Some unknown terrorists tried to blow up Wapda electricity poles near Sann subdivision. At least three explosions were heard but no damage was done to public property. Actually, such terrorist acts are carried out these days by anti-state elements to give a bad name to the country. However, at about four in the morning of June 13, police spotted three militants who were trying to run away towards the Rani Kot area. They chased these militants and managed to arrest one of them, while two of his accomplices managed to flee. During the interrogation, police identified one of the accused as Zahid Bhurgri. He has been charged for terrorist acts and the police is investigating the case." Bhurgri has been detained at an unknown location where, according to the police, he is being interrogated.

Cases of corruption have also been filed against relatives of two MPAs, Shamim Ara Panhwar and Farheen Mughal. Their relatives, who work for the Sindh government, have been suspended on phony grounds or transferred to remote areas as punishment. The MPAs complained that they had been under pressure from the Sindh government to switch sides or else face the worst consequences.

During his speech in a budget session of the Sindh Assembly, Dr. Rahim hinted at the reasons behind the arrest of some assembly members. "Members of the opposition should learn to behave in assembly session. They should stop wearing black bands over their eyes, avoid dancing on the assembly desks or burning copies of the budget. When they are guilty of such acts, they should stop complaining about the consequences," he said.

According to Nisar Khuhro, Arbab Rahim and his family had at their disposal over a 100 vehicles, including Land Cruisers and Pajeros of various Sindh government departments. "Arbab's family members use these vehicles illegally and the cost of petrol and maintenance of these vehicles is borne by various Sindh government departments," contended Khuhro and questioned this corruption and misuse of power.

In a 15-point written charge-sheet, the PPP leader alleged that roads worth millions of rupees had been built around the village of Ghulam Rahim for the use of Arbab Ghulam Rahim's family in Tharparkar, and nobody else was allowed to use these roads. Commenting on Arbab's statement that he wouldn't flee from the country, Khuhro said: "Can Arbab tell us whose frontman Rehmatullah Jhanjhi is and for whom has he purchased a palatial house in Dubai? Jhanjhi has been awarded contracts worth millions of rupees in Tharparkar, including one for the coal highway." He alleged that thousands of acres of state land and the land of poor people in Tharparkar was illegally occupied by Arbab Ghulam Rahim and his family.

Arbab openly declares that he does not owe his election as Chief Minister solely to Parliament, but to the military. It's time the Chief Minister's chief patrons took him to task for the reign of terror he has unleashed on his opponents in Sindh.

The Islamabad shenanigans

By Naheed Khan

A new drama is once again about to be staged. The name of this play is “masking the undemocratic rule”. The producer, director and the main actor in this play is the same person who had produced “local bodies’ elections under federation”, “referendum” and the infamous “elections 2002”. There are no two opinions about the failure of these plays. All were a record flop on the box office of the people of Pakistan. They also failed to fetch any foreign award.

The first of these plays was the local bodies’ elections and it was claimed that this is being held to empower the people of Pakistan at the grass roots level. These were the first elections after the military takeover in October 1999 and were declared as non-party elections but the political parties openly supported candidates. The candidates supported by the PPP won from every corner of the country. The military regime used and abused all its resources to install its favourites on the Nazim posts. Despite all the manoeuvring of the state apparatus several districts Nazims supported by the PPP won the Nazim slot. Then the military apparatus used arm-twisting tactics for forcing these Nazims to change loyalties and toe its line. These local governments were then used to facilitate the fraud referendum. This first play was continued to be played in empty houses until the recently announced second part of the sequel.

The second play was the referendum in which everyone, everywhere, and as many times as one liked was allowed to vote. The producer, director and the hero claimed a resounding success at that time but later on had to admit that this was a mistake to launch such a flop project.

Then came the biggest flop of them all called elections 2002. These elections were held keeping the two former Prime Ministers, Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif out. The military junta tried its best to stop the PPP from participating in these elections by displaying every intention that it would not register the PPP as a political party under Benazir Bhutto. This design of the military junta was countered by the PPP and a new party was registered by the name of PPP Parliamentarians, which took part in the elections and got the highest numbers of votes in the country despite pre-poll, during poll and post-poll rigging. The European observers of these elections declared these elections as ‘massively flawed’. This production of the military and its agencies failed as soon as it was released. It was impossible to form a government without the PPP so the military regime resorted to its old tactics of divide and rule and found a bunch of unscrupulous individuals who had won the elections under PPP banner and had got votes in the name of Benazir Bhutto, defected and chose a comical name for their group. They called themselves Patriot. What followed is a sad story. A story of miseries of the people, a story of unemployment, a story of suicides, a story of gang rapes, a story of retrenchment of employees, a story of price hike and a story of horror. This production was used by the regime to hoodwink the world community. The producers succeeded in their efforts to some extent but were exposed when the going got tough for example at the time of nuclear proliferation allegations and worsening relations with the neighbours. These issues have kept the military regime busy as these keep surfacing every now and again and have been a constant irritant for the regime. The question keeps arising that who violated Benazir’s nuclear doctrine that had successfully blocked any proliferation effort.

Benazir Bhutto has been a thorn on the side of the regime because she keeps exposing the inability of the regime to run the country and the corruption at high places whether it be the land grabbing scam, the increasing gang rape incidents or the deteriorating law and order situation in the country.

The regime that produced flops like the first local bodies’ elections, referendum and elections 2002 has launched a new project of local bodies’ elections 2005. This local body system introduced by the regime failed because of inherent faults in it. People instead of getting power became powerless. Land mafia, drug mafia, bearded mafia and corrupt mafia are the kind ruling the streets of the country. Power has concentrated in one hand. General Musharraf takes every decision whether big or small. He decides the foreign policy after a telephone call. He is about to decide NFC award. He takes the decision of whose name is to be put on the exit control list. He takes the decision to send a lady doctor abroad because she refuses to keep quite. General Musharraf has too much on his plate.

The districts in Sindh province where PPP has a strong support have been divided in smaller districts with the aim to give on a platter the Nazimship of several new districts to a party supportive of the dictatorship. A party which itself is under dictatorship of an individual. A party, which uses every illegal means even torture and force to win the election.

Massive discrepancies have been found in the electoral lists prepared by the election commission. Nearly 7.5 million voters are missing from these lists. Constituencies have been demarcated in a way that supports the King’s Party. Bickering between the provincial and district governments continues over money and authority. Nazims were dismissed by the Sindh provincial government and reinstated by the Supreme Court. In these circumstances the time and money of taxpayers are being misused and wasted to produce another flop. How long would this continue? Not much longer because the people are sick and tired of these tomfoolery and want decency in state affairs.

Mohtarma Bhutto condemns London Bombings

Islamabad July 8, 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has condemned the terror bombings in London on Thursday which left forty people dead and hundreds more injured.

She said that the Pakistan Peoples Party strongly condemns the indiscriminate acts of terror perpetrated in London in which innocent civilians became victims of terrorism.

She said that the PPP stands firm alongside the people of London who reacted calmly and courageously in the face of these acts of barbarism, demonstrating that the values of freedom, tolerance and humanity shared by citizens from London to Islamabad and all other cities of the world, cannot be destroyed, contrary to the designs of those behind these attacks.

She conveyed the PPP's sympathy and condolences to all those who were affected by these terrorist acts, and solidarity with the people of the United Kingdom and the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair, leader of the British Labour Party.

She said that Islam forbids the killing of innocents and particularly of women, children and old people. She said that the Muslim world in particular was doubly pained by the terrorists’ attacks as those carrying them out claimed affiliation with Islam. These attacks, she said, would be used by bigots to further fuel suspicion against the Muslim community.

The former Prime Minister urged the civilized world must join hands in fight against terror and not allow the London bombings weaken their resolve to fight and eradicate terrorism in all its manifestations.

Mohtarma Bhutto said that by perpetrating this gruesome and barbaric act the terrorists had not only killed innocent people but also compounded the woes of the peaceful travelers who would now have to face the consequences of a heightened terror alert throughout the world.

"The London attacks are attacks on humanity and must be condemned by all people, irrespective of religion, caste, creed or nationality", she said.

At the same time instead of weakening it must strengthen the resole of humanity for root out the scourge of terrorism, she said.

Mohtarma Bhutto also condoled with the bereaved families and sympathized with the government and people of Britain.

SANA Calls For Unfettered Democracy in Pakistan: Resolutions Adopted At The Convention

Resolutions passed at the 21st. SANA Annual Convention at Washington, DC

The general body of the Sindhi Association of North America (SANA), during its 21st. Annual Convention, held from July 1 - 4, 2005, in Washington, DC, adopts the following resolutions:

1. Political Victimization of Opponents: The general body (GB) of SANA condemns the highhandedness of the ruling regime of Pakistan in general, and Sindh in particular. It is a matter of great concern that even a gentle soul like Jam Saqi is not immune from the terrorization perpetrated by the present puppet government in Sindh. SANA demands that all the political and other victimization must end in Pakistan and in Sindh and the people be allowed their birthright of dissent and freedom of _expression.

2. NFC Award: SANA GB demands that the distribution of financial resources be made on the basis of revenue generation among other factors and the policy of appeasement to one particular province at the cost of others be abandoned forthwith. The GB is concerned that by blocking the just award of NFC, the federal government of Pakistan is depriving Sindh of its rightful share of billions of rupees.

3. Priority to education, health: SANA demands drastic cuts to the huge military budget and diversion of funds to education, health and other social sector projects.

4. Provincial Autonomy: SANA is of the view that the provincial autonomy is the core issue in Pakistan and at the center of many ills in the country. SANA demands that the provinces be granted autonomy according to the 1940 Resolution.

5. Sindhi should be made National Language: SANA demands that Sindhi be made one of the national languages of Pakistan besides Punjabi, Siraiki, Pushto and Balochi.

6. Division of Districts and Towns: The SANA GB reminds the present Chief Minister of Sindh and his unpopular Sindh Government that their policy of dividing districts and town to benefit an ethnic group is harming the permanent interests of the people of Sindh. The GB demands that the policy to divide the districts, talukas and town on ethnic basis must end as it will create permanent split in the province and would be harmful for the peace and harmony.

7. Return to unadulterated Democracy: The SANA GB demands of the military government of Pakistan to return power to the people, who are sovereign and the real masters of their destiny. The GB observes that whenever there is a military government in power, it is always Sindh that has to suffer the most due to its non-representation in the armed forces. Even now a number of military officers, are occupying prized positions in Sindh, at the cost of Sindhi civil servants, and making decisions contrary to the interest of Sindh.

8. Just Distribution of Water: The SANA GB observes that while the towns in the NWFP and Punjab provinces are under the threat of submerging due to floods in Kabul and Indus rivers, not a single drop of water is flowing downstream from Kotri barrage, thus leaving Badin and other towns of Sindh in the worst kind of drought. It is due to the highhandedness and unjust policy of the masters ruling the country with an iron fist that hundreds of thousands of acres of fertile land in the southern Sindh are turned into barren, sandy marshes or taken over by the sea. The SANA GB calls upon the powers that be to abandon the anti-Sindh schemes of Kalabagh and other dams and stop the construction of Greater Thal Canal forthwith. The SANA GB warns the government of Pakistan that by continuing with these anti-Sindhi schemes, it is greatly jeopardizing the unity and integrity of the federation.

9. Unsafe drinking water: SANA is concerned that a vast majority of the people don’t have an access to safe drinking water. Most of the sources of drinking water including the Indus River, canals, lakes and reservoirs have been poisoned due to the unprocessed drainage of human, industrial and agricultural waste. SANA demands immediate measures of the provision of potable water to all the people and compensation to the affectees of the RBOD and LBOD.

10. Land allotments to Military: SANA demands an end to the allotment of agricultural, residential and commercial land to the military personnel.

11. Justice through Jirga: The SANA GB condemns the new practice of endorsement of Jirga system by the government of Sindh in the name of reconciliation and settlement. The GB reminds the chief minister of Sindh that the Sindh High Court has outlawed such practices of deciding bloody feuds by non-judicial people; therefore, by encouraging jirgas he is committing the contempt of court. The GB demands of the government of Sindh to stop the illegal practice of Jirga system, continuation of which will greatly harm the civil society and take the Sindhi people to dark ages.

12. SANA condemns the government for hushing up the ghastly crime of rape against Dr Shazia Khalid, a lady doctor in Sui, Balochistan. It demands that an impartial inquiry be instituted and culprits brought to the justice. SANA also demands justice to Mukhtaran Mai and other victims.

13. SANA demands protection to minorities in Sindh and Pakistan and stop atrocities against them.

14. SANA expresses concern over the lawlessness in Sindh and Pakistan and demands immediate steps to establish the writ of law.

VIEW: Is Pakistan a democracy?
Ahmad Faruqui

Daily Times July 5, 2005: The “boots on the ground” all wear khaki. The best that can be said about those boots is that they tread softly. Under a post-modern military dictator, Pakistan appears to have perfected the art of enlightened militarism

My friends in America often quarrel with me when I say that Pakistan is not a democracy. Our discussions quickly devolve into one of three arguments. The first one is that Pakistanis don’t want democracy, since they have had uniformly bad experiences of it. The second one is that General Musharraf is an enlightened ruler so why bother looking for anyone else. Finally, I am told that Pakistan is already a democracy.

The first argument implies that because Pakistanis have had bad experiences in the past, they have given up on democracy. That is surely not the case. The University of Michigan survey cited in an earlier column showed conclusively that Pakistanis want the right to choose their own rulers and to get rid of them if they don’t like them.

Some argue that Islam does not allow for democracy. This is clearly false since Pakistan is governed by a constitution that calls for parliamentary democracy and many other Muslim nations including Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia and Turkey have democratic governments. Still others have argued that poor and illiterate countries cannot be democracies but the presence of democracy in India belies this thesis.

All this does not mean that democracy is a panacea. There is no dearth of bad democratic leaders in Pakistan or elsewhere. But if democracy lets in bad leaders through the ballot box, the same mechanism also provides for their removal. The ballot box is a much better means for removing bad rulers than a coup d’etat.

The second argument overlooks the fact that a military dictator, regardless of how benevolent and competent he might be, is a ruler with no checks or balances on his or her powers. History has shown that most such rulers ultimately become despots and tyrants and as witnessed in the case of Pakistan, none leave their post voluntarily. Moreover, there is no guarantee that future military rulers will be benevolent or competent. This too has been discussed in prior columns.

Thus, in this column, I focus on the third argument, that Pakistan is a democracy. To settle the debate, we need a definition of democracy. Perhaps Abraham Lincoln said it best, when he dedicated the national cemetery at the battlefield of Gettysburg on November 19, 1863 and said that democracy was a “government of the people, by the people, for the people.”

In the fifth century BC, Greeks coined the word by combining demos (people) and kratia (to rule). To them, democracy simply meant “rule of the people.” The earliest democracies were practised by small city-states such as Athens where each citizen participated in the law-making.

Today, a democratic dispensation includes political parties that contest elections and a polity in which individuals are treated equally and enjoy constitutional rights and freedoms as well as duties. Thus, democracy is a form of government in which supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation that usually involves regular elections.

It is important to note that elections are a necessary but insufficient condition for a successful democracy. They have often been used by dictatorial regimes to give a false sense of democracy, internally and externally. Authoritarian rulers such as Hosni Mubarak, Ferdinand Marcos and Saddam Hussein have imposed restrictions on who can stand for election, limiting the laws that can be brought before parliament, by using unfair voting practices and falsifying results.

When making a transition from dictatorial to democratic rule, it is equally necessary to create a democratic culture in which a “loyal opposition” can exist. All sides in a democracy need to share a common commitment to its basic values. The ground rules of society must encourage tolerance and civility in public debate and the losers must accept the judgment of the voters when the election is over, and transfer power peacefully.

The losers are safe in the knowledge that they will not lose their lives or liberty, but can continue to participate in public life. They are loyal not to the specific policies of the government, but to the fundamental legitimacy of the state and to the democratic process itself.

Another feature is that parliament has sovereign authority over all government expenditures (including those of the military) and to impose taxes. The judiciary has the power to declare military coups unconstitutional and to uphold the rule of law while settling disputes.

Good governance should not be confused with democracy. A benevolent dictator might be selfless and less corrupt than all prior civilian rulers. He may well act in the national interest, pursue sound economic policies that result in rapid economic growth and development, lower the poverty level, encourage freedom of the press, push a liberal social agenda and establish peace with neighbours. But none of these conditions individually or collectively converts a dictatorship into a democracy.

Pakistan experienced rapid economic growth during the Ayub and Zia dictatorships but that did not transform either ruler into a democrat, even though both tried to surround themselves with the trappings of democracy. Musharraf is pursuing many sound social, economic and political policies but this does not make him a democrat.

The people of Pakistan do not have the ability to understand, let alone challenge General Musharraf’s edicts, such as his decision to place Mukhtar Mai on the Exit Control List. Yes, there is a parliament that makes laws and there is a judiciary that dispenses justice. There is even a civilian prime minister with a cabinet of civilians. But none can prevail against the writ of the Praetorian state.

A supra-constitutional executive exists outside of legislative and judicial purview. At the federal and provincial levels, the real power resides with the army chief and his corps commanders.

A couple of analogies come to mind. A woman cannot be half pregnant. An individual cannot be half married. And so it is with countries. They can either be democracies or dictatorships. They cannot be both.

There is something to be said for the dictatorships that govern China, Myanmar and North Korea. They do not claim to be democracies.

Politics has been called the art of the possible. Thus, nuances matter. But they do not change the ground reality of Pakistan’s polity. The “boots on the ground” all wear khaki. The best that can be said about those boots is that they tread softly. Under a post-modern military dictator, Pakistan appears to have perfected the art of enlightened militarism.

Dr. Ahmad Faruqui is director of research at the American Institute of International Studies and can be reached at Faruqui@pacbell.net

Who's afraid of democracy?
Ghazi Salahuddin

The News July 7, 2005: Though monsoon, coming after a scorching spell of heat, must surely make some disruption in our lives, the political landscape is about to be inundated with the electoral downpour of the local bodies. There had been some suspense about the timing of these elections but the schedule was finally announced on Thursday. The elections will begin in the third week of August and the entire exercise will be completed by the end of September. But will these elections lead to the induction of convincing democracy at the local level?

Many very difficult questions are bound to arise when we pose this question. In the first place, we are not sure if these elections will be free and fair. Indeed, our painfully disconcerting political experience makes it very difficult for us to expect the ruling administration to play fair in this game. And if the beginning is likely to be so imperfect, it might be pointless to proceed with the thought that elections in themselves do not a democracy make.

Ah, but President Gen Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz have, in the words of the official news agency, "reiterated their firm commitment to holding of the forthcoming local bodies elections in a free, fair and transparent manner." The two leaders, who met in Rawalpindi on Friday, said a level playing field would be ensured to all candidates and no one would be allowed to influence the elections.

Now, do you honestly believe them? The idea is not to cast aspersions on their integrity or motives. Perhaps our rulers are not consciously intending to be dubious when they profess their belief in democratic values, rule of law and social justice. It is a politician's occupational hazard to make these assertions. A civilian ruler is compelled to go through the motions of an election to be able to extend his or her tenure. The military ruler may have some other devices to remain in power. That is how an "elected" prime minister remains unable to complete the prescribed term in office and the military interventions are not constrained by any time-frame.

At the heart of this incongruity lies the weakness of our democratic and administrative institutions. All our rigged and manifestly flawed elections and also the two unspeakably deficient referendums were dutifully certified by the honourable members and heads of our election commissions. Instances of rigging before and after the polling are dotted across our political history. Add to this the continued domination of tribal and feudal lords and the induction of extremism and violence in our political behaviour.

It is true that the local bodies' elections, to be held in a few weeks, are not as crucial as elections to the National Assembly. But their conduct, particularly in the context of their foundational significance in a democratic dispensation, would indicate the emerging sense of direction of the present arrangement. The big question is: have things changed since 2002 to oblige our rulers to be more circumspect in these matters? Or will it be business as usual?
Pakistan's democratic experience has consistently mystified serious observers, mainly with reference to the Indian example. Both countries had inherited similar institutions and the system of governance. So, why did democracy fail to take root in Pakistan or, conversely, why did militarism not rise within the chaos of Indian democracy? This is not the occasion to debate these issues. However, it is relevant to see that the Indian elections have been more credible and have prompted constitutional changes of regime. Our elections, unfortunately, have almost always been flawed and have usually generated political or social disorder.
In that sense, the holding of free and fair elections that are universally accepted as credible should be the first step for us to take to move towards a democratic dispensation. This is one thing that the military could have ensured, with the power and authority that it has wielded in our polity. Come to think of it, every military intervention is sought to be vindicated in the name of democracy. Institution of "true" democracy is invariably its goal. Yet, every military intervention further degrades the practice and the morality of our politics.
Coming back to the promise made by President Musharraf and Prime Minister Aziz that elections to the local bodies will be free, fair and transparent, we have no obvious reason to believe that there is any specific significance in this statement. It may have been made in a perfunctory manner. They had, as the news story tells us, many other issues to discuss when they met. Nevertheless, the chance that the forthcoming elections can be truly transparent and meticulously honest will be revolutionary in its impact. We do have an opportunity, as a nation, to make a new beginning.

One thought is that the Americans and other western donors of Pakistan are growing impatient with our derelictions in the area of democracy and human rights and would now exert more pressure to set things right. The Mukhtaran Mai episode, some kind of a parable for our society, may serve as an example. To be more charitable, perhaps the government has itself recognised the imperative of playing the game according to established rules.

But the sincerity of our rulers in restoring credibility to the ongoing democratic process would demand a full realisation of the transgressions that have been made in the recent past, particularly in the conduct of the 2002 elections and the horse trading that followed. It might even be necessary to make a public admission of this and deal effectively with the people's loss of confidence in the political process. Alas, this does not seem to be possible. Already, the manner in which the federal and provincial governments have treated their political opponents has exposed their democratic credentials. That the forthcoming elections will be party-less is political misconduct in itself.

This messy situation sometimes encourages feelings of antipathy towards democracy. To a considerable extent, this approach is fostered by organised and vicious propaganda against politicians and politics. With their half-baked ideas, some people vehemently argue that authoritarian rule that may ensure stability as well as prosperity is better for Pakistan than a democracy run by the present political parties. Irrespective of how arguments for and against democracy have been settled by history, Pakistan does present an interesting case.
Incidentally, the subject of democracy is embedded in the making of the French and American revolutions. Tomorrow, on July 4, America will celebrate its Independence Day at a time when its president is promoting the policy of supporting the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every country. Leave aside the contradictions that this policy enshrines, the American experiment has great appeal for people around the world. But July 4 is not relevant for us. We have indelible memories of the day after -- and the ghost of Zia-ul-Haq has continued to haunt us. We have to contend with it when we dream our democratic dreams.

The writer is a staff member Email: ghazi_salahuddin@hotmail.com

Washington Post
A Hot Afghan Summer
Wednesday, July 6, 2005; Page A16

THE DEATH of 16 U.S. Special Operations troops and at least two members of a reconnaissance team they were seeking to rescue last week in Afghanistan was the largest American combat loss in that country since the beginning of the U.S. intervention there in 2001. It was also a jarring reminder for anyone who has not been following developments in the smaller of the two ground wars the United States is fighting. As in Iraq, violence by local insurgents and foreign terrorists has been surging in Afghanistan this spring and summer, along with American casualties. And once again, confident declarations by senior U.S. officials that the enemy was nearly broken have proved premature.
In April the former senior U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Lt. Gen. David Barno, described his opposition as a "small, hardcore remnant of the Taliban," and he predicted that most of it would collapse or join the Afghan political process within a year. Instead the Taliban has launched an offensive including near-daily attacks, some by well-armed units numbering in the scores. Senior Afghan officials concede they have been surprised by the scale of the campaign. In the past three months more than 45 U.S. service members, as well as hundreds of Afghan soldiers and civilians, have died. The insurgents have begun using the roadside bombs so common to Iraq; they may be getting help from other Afghan factions opposed to the U.S.-backed government of Hamid Karzai, as well as from al Qaeda and other foreign volunteers.

The bright side of this troubling picture is that the Taliban has not succeeded in gaining significant territory or public support, and so far seems unlikely to accomplish its evident aim of disrupting the next round of Afghan elections, planned for September. Despite the attacks, voter registration is proceeding, and some 6,000 candidates are competing for seats in a national parliament and 34 provincial councils. U.S. forces, together with an Afghan army numbering more than 20,000, have been winning lopsided battles against the enemy forces they encounter; they have reportedly killed more than 450 since March. With the heavier fighting, however, have come new reports of collateral civilian casualties. Yesterday the Afghan government criticized the U.S. military for a bombing raid near the site of last week's fighting that may have killed several civilians. To its credit, the Pentagon acknowledged civilian as well as enemy casualties from what it described as an attack on a terrorist base, and it promised to investigate.

In all, the danger is growing that Afghanistan could begin to look more like Iraq, with an entrenched insurgency that seriously disrupts reconstruction and becomes a magnet for Islamic extremists. To prevent that, the Bush administration needs to bring more pressure to bear on Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, a nominal ally who has pocketed billions in U.S. aid while allowing the Taliban to use Pakistan as a base for its Afghan operations. Afghan officials plausibly suspect that elements in Mr. Musharraf's army and government would like to see the coming elections disrupted. The administration must also continue to press its NATO allies to step up their deployments to Afghanistan, which currently amount to only 8,000 troops, compared with roughly 20,000 Americans. If the Taliban can be turned back before the elections, Afghanistan could take a major step toward stability. For now, the worry is that a turn in the other direction appears equally possible.

PPP observes black day on 5th July in UK and Holland

Islamabad, July 6, 2005: Pakistan Peoples Party UK observed black day on 5th July at Mangrove restaurant Birmingham. Leader of opposition in the Senate Senator Mian Raza Rabbani and member Punjab assembly Ms. Farzana Raja, former Law Minister Sindh, Pir Mazhar ul Haq, former Health Minister Sindh General (r) Ahsan Ahmed former High Commssion Wajid Shamsul Hasan and former minister Works in Azad Kashmir Chaudhri Muhammad Yasin attended the black day function in Birmingham.

The speakers at the occasion paying glowing tributes to the first directly elected prime minister of Pakistan, Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto said that the country was on its way to prosperity when a military dictator overthrew elected democratic government and plunged the country into drug and Kilashinkov culture. They expressed their resolve to continue their struggle for a just and democratic Pakistan.

Pakistan Peoples Party Holland observed Black Day on 5th July at Aroza Hotel in Amsterdam attended by a large number of party workers, supporters and sympathisers. Raja Riaz, Saifullah Saify, Karamat Ali, Nasir Nizami, Malik Mohammad Afzal and Munir Jamil addressed the gathering.

Addressing the gathering Raja Riaz paying rich tribute to Shaheed Bhutto said that Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto gave honour and dignity to Pakistan. He gave us nuclear capability to make Pakistan’s defence impregnable. By refusing to bend before might, by upholding the constitution and legal order he had become a legend, a source of inspiration to the struggling masses.

The speakers addressing the gathering said that Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto will always be remembered for creating political awareness amongst the poor and downtrodden of Pakistan. He is the man who has been killed by General Zia but has lived in history and in the heart of the masses. General Musharraf, successor of General Zia is continuing the same things and victimizing the daughter of Shaheed Bhutto but will not succeed like his predecessor. They said General Zia deceived the people in the name of Islam and today once again General Musharraf is doing the same in the name of enlightened moderation. General Musharraf’s fraud would not last long. It is time for him to resign and handover the power to the elected representative of the nation.

The members and workers of PPP Holland reiterated their resolve to fight dictatorship in Pakistan under the leadership of Chairperson Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and to defeat the despotic and anti people forces.

Mohtarma Bhutto condemns murder of women rights activist
Condoles with family, demands arrest of killers

Islamabad July 6, 2005: Former Prime Minster and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has expressed profound shock and grief over the murder of a woman counsellor and her daughter in Dir in Frontier province the other day.

Zubeda Begum a woman rights activist and an elected lady counsellor of the local union council was gunned down at her house in Dir at night last Friday. Her daughter who received bullet wound also died three days later at a hospital in Peshawar where she was shifted immediately after the shoot out. The assailants made good their escape.

Zubeda Begum also worked as Manager of the resource centre for women counsellors set establishment by a woman rights NGO in Dir.

In a statement today Mohtarma Bhutto said it was shocking beyond measure that a women activist should be so brutally cut down just because she was working for the uplift of the women of her area.

She said that the brutal murder of the women rights activist and her daughter only showed how much the women of this country had to struggle to end male prejudice and discrimination against women.

Mohtarma Bhutto said that Zubeda Begum and her daughter had given the supreme sacrifice in the cause of women emancipation and would be long remembered.

Mohtarma Bhutto also condoled with the family members and said that in this hour of grief and agony her thoughts and prayers were with the bereaved family.

The former Prime Minister demanded the immediate arrest and punishment according to the law to the killers.

Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Foundation and PPP Canada observe black day on 5th July

Islamabad, 7 July 2005: Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Foundation observed black day on 5th July in the United States at the residence of senior Vice President PPP USA and Convener of the Foundation, Chaudhry Ijaz N Furrukh, Chief guest at the occasion was Senator Sajjad Hussain Bokhari. A large number of party workers, supporters and sympathisers attended the gathering.

Senator Sajjad Bokhari addressing the gathering paying glowing tributes to the founder of the party, Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto said that he brought politics from the drawing rooms to the streets. The country was on its way to progress and prosperity when General Zia illegally and unconstitutionally usurped the power and destroyed political institutions. General Zia promoted kilashinkov and drug culture.

Khalid Awan, Mian Basharat, Shafqat Tanveer, Malik M Iqbal and Chaudhry Ijaz N Farrukh also addressed the gathering. The speakers vowed to continued their struggle for a democratic Pakistan under the leadership of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto.

Workers of PPP Canada observed black day in Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, Hamilton and Toronto. The main event was in Toronto at the Tabaq restaurant where PPP Toronto President Liaqat Malik presided the occasion. Speakers paid glowing tributes to Shaheed Bhutto and sacrifices of the Bhutto family for the down trodden people of Pakistan and for the country.

Speakers condemned Gen-Zia's over throwing of popular democratic government of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and judicial murder of PPP chairperson later. Pakistan is still under the continuity of the remainder of Zia and the leadership and workers of the party will never give up the struggle of restoration of real democracy under the leadership of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto.Said Liaqat Malik.

Jamil Chaudhary,Aftab Malik,Alamdar Kazmi,Sajid Mughal,and Saleem Janjua also spoke on the occasion.

ISLAMABAD July 08, 2005: President General Pervez Musharraf should clarify the contradiction between his claim about not letting Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif contest the next general elections and the parliamentary affairs minister’s statement that both leaders are eligible to contest, said Pakistan People’s Party Parliamentarian (PPPP) spokesman Farhatullah Babar.

Dr Sher Afgan Niazi, federal minister for parliamentary affairs, said there was no bar on either Nawaz Sharif or Benazir on their third term as prime minister. Dr Afgan said both leaders were agitating on the restriction just to gain public sympathy. He said the Constitution had no such article which even indicates any bar on consecutive terms as prime minister. The Constitution only outlined qualifications of members of the provincial and national assemblies who aspired for the post of prime minister, he added.

Babar said on one hand it was admitted that there was no constitutional bar on Benazir or Nawaz to contest elections for prime minister, but on the other, they were not allowed to do so because they both had been prime ministers twice. “This is contradiction galore like so many other contradictions in the government’s claims and actions,” he said. He demanded the president make a categorical policy statement on the issue.

WISCONSIN, July 7: In a democratic Pakistan, General Musharraf has only one place to go to: Prison. Since his coup on October 12, 1999, his every move has been aimed at evading that fate.

The very day he gunned his way to power, he was quaking in his boots at the thought of having been carted off in cuffs. All day, on October 12, his fellow Bonapartes in the General Headquarters (GHQ) kept pleading with him to have him get down to Islamabad right away. Instead, he sat cowering in Karachi, awaiting an “all clear.” So much so that he had his first speech recorded in the port city for fear of life in Islamabad.

Like Gen. Musharraf, all dictators are cowards. His predecessor Gen. Zia-ul-Haq set up his command post in the GHQ to topple the Government of the day. His biggest headache was to find someone who would “safely” tie down the “wolf,” a reference to Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. His top comrade, Gen. Faiz Ali Chishti, took upon himself to “do the job.”

When he stepped out of the “war room” to hunt down Prime Minister Bhutto, Gen. Zia called out after him: “Murshud KIthey Merva Na Dayeen” (Lest you saint have us all killed). Prime Minister Bhutto was asleep with his arms folded on his chest, but his wakeful generals were trembling at “what if scenarios.” So was Gen. Musharraf, who survived to this day by having been missing in action (MIA), even on the day a coup was being staged in his behalf.

Over the past nearly six years now, he has been living from day to day. He has never been sure of tomorrow. This abiding uncertainty is anchored in his distrust of everyone around him. Which is why he has chosen to be his own bodyguard, i.e., staying in military fatigues.

He knows that the day he quits the army command, he will be history. The very constituency of corps commanders that he flamboyantly claims stands solidly behind his power-grab does not keep his faith. Every corps commander is a “suspect conspirator” until the day he doffs his uniform.

On the lonely planet that Gen. Musharraf has now come to inhabit, there is only one person that he trusts: himself. This is true of every dictator. Gen. Zia-ul-Haq never went to sleep without calling each of his corps commanders and making sure that they are tucked away in homes, especially after midnight. According to his Chief of Staff, Gen. KM Arif, he would stick to this routine even on his overseas trips. It was not enough for Gen. Zia to find his commanders, after midnight, in the safe confines of their bedrooms. He could still be rattled if, in the wee hours, a general would answer his call at the first ring. He once called a general well past midnight. The general answered his phone at the first ring. Startled, Gen. Zia greeted him with a nervous quiz: “Aap Abhi Tak Jaag Rahey Hein.” “Saab, Hum Gunah-garoon Ko Neend Kub Aatee Hey,” defensively retorted the general.

Gen. Musharraf is no different. Unlike Gen. Zia, he is favorite of the few among “men and men” in uniform. And even those few are ready to stab him should he turn his back. If anyone got lucky with his ambitions, he would find the “free world” with its arms and heart wide open to take him into an ever tighter embrace. This is because the international community believes that no dictator in Pakistan can survive without its blessing.

So any soldier who is adventurer enough to make it to the top is welcome into the “free world.” This saddest of all facts further places Gen. Musharraf on an even shakier ground. To hedge his bets, he already has named a co-ethnic as his Vice Chief of Army Staff (VCOAS). Yet even the co-ethnic is not trusted. He has been assigned to oversee the work of “boy scouts” in the army. He is kept light years apart from the real work of the command.

A case in point is the MS (military secretary) branch, which is believed to be the nerve center of the GHQ. Nothing moves there without a nod from the COAS, i.e., Gen. Musharraf. As a matter of fact, VCOASs are set up as straw men to show who actually wields power. To understand how haplessly hopeless their job is, look no further than Gen. Zia’s model. One of his Vice Chief of Staffs, Gen. Sawar Khan, a four-star general, sent out a request for purchasing a computer, only to be turned down by his subordinates! Such exercises in humiliation are well-calibrated to keep the stay within his shoes.

In addition to a co-ethnic VCOAS, Gen. Musharraf has appointed his cousin as corps commander of Lahore, a city that is credited with making and unmaking governments. His cousin takes the court of politicians, publicly advises on running the affairs of the Quaid-i-Azam Muslim League, and watches over the Chief Minister and Governor of Punjab.

Where cousins are in short supply, Gen. Musharraf has substituted them with layers after layers of authority. All provincial governments are overseen by his self-appointed governors. They in turn are overseen by respective corps commanders, who in turn are watched by the ISI (Inter-services Intelligence) and MI (Military Intelligence), and the latter are pitted against one another.

This Byzantine way of governing does not make things easy for the COAS either. As a result, the balance of power has now shifted in favor of intelligence agencies. It is no wonder that every attempt on Gen. Musharraf’s life was traced back to one or more than one of such agencies. The hand that shields him is more tempted do him in also.

One of the most dangerous outcomes of this “hound-after-hound approach” is mutual distrust that has risen to unmanageable extremes since his coup. After surviving a succession of assassination bids, Gen. Musharraf has now come to accept that no one in the military will pass up an opportunity to bump him off.

This sense has further deepened by the opposition’s demand for his head under Article 6 of the Constitution. He thinks he may survive intra-military scheming with counter-scheming of his own; but he cannot survive the opposition’s accountability should he be overthrown. His predecessor dictators – right from Sikandar Mirza down to Gen. Zia – however could not survive even internal conspiracies to have a day in court.

Like all dictators, Gen. Musharraf, too, thinks that his end will be different from his predecessors. With this belief, he has hitched his star to his co-ethnic Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) to escape the opposition’s demand for justice. He believes the MQM can and will “blackmail” any government in Islamabad into leaving him alone. History speaks to the contrary, somehow.

What is, however, evident is that his wayward ways of ethnicizing, personalizing, and politicizing the military already are proving divisive. As a result, the enlisted base of the military stands opposed to the officer corps; the officer corps to the general officers, and the general officers to the corps commanders.

It is this split that has different inspiration for the enlisted men and members of the officer corps who have mounted several attempts on his life; and for the general officers and especially the corps commanders who he claims are firmly lined up behind him.

A senior military officer told The Nation, a Lahore-based centrist broadsheet, that colonels, and not generals, would be the future makers of coups in Pakistan. It comes, then, as no surprise that opposition leaders were barraged with letters from dissenting middle-ranking officers who urged them to try Gen. Musharraf under Article 6 of the Constitution. When the opposition leader Javed Hashmi articulated their concerns, Gen. Musharraf had him sentenced to 23 years in prison. A man who divides the military rules; one who questions his divisive ways gets 23 years!

The democratic opposition has a chance to undo such paradoxes once and for all. In doing so, it will stem the tide of downward spiral of the military. Opposition can take the first step toward this goal by sticking to its demand for trying Gen. Musharraf for sedition, which is punishable with death, under Article 6 of the constitution.

Talks of “deals” and “dialogues” with a felon do not inspire faith in democracy. It is, however, heartening for all democratic forces in Pakistan that both Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had nixed such options.

Leaders of democracy must understand that no general will second guess his decision to force his way into Islamabad, unless Gen. Musharraf is brought to justice and made into a “price tag” for future seditions. Leaders of democracy must live up to the immortal pledge of the ultimate democrat, late Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan: “Gen. Musharraf will be the last dictator Pakistan ever had; and he will be the first one Pakistan ever tried.”

LAHORE, July 4: Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf's June 25-26 unscheduled trip to Saudi Arabia has raised many an eye brow in Islamabad-based diplomatic circles.

These diplomats believe the visit was meant to seek the assistance of the Kingdom to circumvent the ongoing International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) investigations into reports that the Saudis might have purchased nuclear technology from Pakistan. The Musharraf-King meeting was aimed at chalking out a joint strategy on what stance the two leaders should adopt to satisfy the IAEA and address its concerns.

Saudi Arabia has been under increasing pressure to open its nuclear facilities for inspection as the IAEA suspects that its nuclear program has reached a level (with Pakistani cooperation) where it should attract international attention. The pressure has also come from Europe and the United States, who want Riyadh to permit unhindered access to its nuclear facilities.

Well before the IAEA probe began, the US had been investigating whether or not the father of Pakistan's nuclear program, Dr. AQ Khan, sold nuclear technology to the Saudis and other Arab countries. Acting under extreme pressure of the IAEA, the Saudi Government signed the Small Quantities Protocol (SQP) on June 16, 2005, which makes inspections less problematic. However, the US, European Union and Australia want it to agree to full inspections. The Saudi stand is that they would agree to the demand only if other countries did so, including Israel. Click to see October 2003 report in Washington Times

International apprehensions that Saudi Arabia would seek to acquire nuclear weapons have arisen periodically over the last decade. The Kingdom's geopolitical situation gives it strong reasons to consider acquiring nuclear weapons: the current volatile security environment in the Middle East; the growing number of states (particularly Iran and Israel) with weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the region; and its ambition to dominate the region.

International concerns intensified in 2003 in the wake of revelations about Dr. AQ Khan's proliferation activities. The IAEA investigations show that Khan sold or offered nuclear weapons technology to Saudi Arabia and several Middle Eastern states, including Iran, Iraq, Libya and Syria.

Last year's unearthing of the black market nuclear technology network increased international suspicions that Khan had developed ties with Riyadh, which has the capability to pay for all kinds of nuclear-related services. Even before the revelations about Dr. Khan's activities, concerns about Saudi-Pakistani nuclear cooperation persisted, largely due to strengthened cooperation between the two countries. In particular, frequent high-level visits of Saudi and Pakistani officials over the past several years raised serious questions about the possibility of clandestine Saudi-Pakistani nuclear cooperation.

In May 1999, a Saudi Arabian defense team, headed by Defense Minister Prince Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz visited Pakistan's highly restricted uranium enrichment and missile assembly factory. The prince toured the Kahuta uranium enrichment plant and an adjacent factory where the Ghauri missile is assembled with Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and was briefed by Dr. AQ Khan.

A few months later, Khan traveled to Saudi Arabia [in November 1999] ostensibly to attend a symposium on "Information Sources on the Islamic World". The same month (November 1999), Dr. Saleh al-Athel, President King Abdul Aziz City for Science and Technology, visited Pakistan to work out details for cooperation in the fields of engineering, electronics and computer science.

Interestingly, Saudi defector Mohammed Khilevi, who was first secretary of the Saudi mission to the United Nations until July 1994, testified before the IAEA that Riyadh has sought a bomb since 1975. In late June 1994, Khilevi abandoned his UN post to join the opposition. After his defection, Khilevi distributed more than 10,000 documents he obtained from the Saudi Arabian Embassy. These documents show that between 1985 and 1990, the Saudi government paid up to five billion dollars to Saddam Hussain to build a nuclear weapon.

Khilevi further alleged that Saudis had provided financial contributions to the Pakistani nuclear program, and had signed a secret agreement that obligated Islamabad to respond against the aggressor with its nuclear arsenal if Saudi Arabia is attacked with nuclear weapons.

In 2003, General Musharraf paid a visit to Saudi Arabia, and former Pakistani Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali visited the Kingdom twice. But the United States had warned Pakistan for the first time in December 2003 against providing nuclear assistance to Saudi Arabia.

Concerns over possible Pak-Saudi nuclear cooperation intensified after the October 22-23, 2003, visit of Saudia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz to Pakistan. The pro-US Saudi Defence Minister Prince Sultan, who is next in line to succeed to the throne after Abdullah, was not part of the delegation. During that visit, American intelligence circles allege, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia concluded a secret agreement on nuclear cooperation that was meant to provide the Saudis with nuclear-weapons technology in exchange for cheap oil.

However, in 2005, the US claims to have acquired fresh evidence that suggests a broader Government-to-Government Pak-Saudi atomic collaboration that could be continuing.

According to well-placed diplomatic sources, chartered Saudi C-130 Hercules transporters made scores of trips between the Dhahran military base and several Pakistani cities, including Lahore and Karachi, between October 2003 and October 2004, and thereafter, considerable contacts were reported between Pakistani and Saudi nuclear scientists. Between October 2004 and January 2005, under cover of Hajj, several Pakistani scientists allegedly visited Riyadh, and remained "missing" from their designated hotels for 15 to 20 days.

The closeness between Islamabad and Riyadh has been phenomenal and it is not without significance that the first foreign tour of General Pervez Musharraf, who ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in October 1999, was to Saudi Arabia. Moreover, Sharif himself, his younger brother, Shahbaz Sharif and their families live in Saudi Arabia after a secret exile deal between Musharraf and Sharif, in which Riyadh had played a key role.

During Sharif's prime ministerial tenure, the Americans believe, Saudi Arabia had been involved in funding Islamabad's missile and nuclear program purchases from China, as a result of which Pakistan became a nuclear weapon-producing and proliferating state. There are also apprehensions that Riyadh was buying nuclear-capability from China through a proxy state, with Pakistan serving as the cut-out.

Following Khan's first admission of proliferation to Iran, Libya and North Korea in January 2004, the Saudi authorities pulled out more than 80 ambassador-rank and senior diplomats from its missions around the world, mainly in Europe and Asia. The pull out is widely thought to have been meant to plug any likely leak of the Pak-Saudi nuclear link.

Before 9/11, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Pakistan were the only countries that recognized and aided Afghanistan's Taliban regime, which had been educated in Pakistan's religious schools. Despite the fall of the Taliban regime, the Saudis continue to fund these seminaries that are a substitute for Pakistan's non-existent national education system and largely produce Wahabi extremists and Islamist militants. Also, a substantial proportion of their curricula, including the sections which preach hatred, has also emerged from that country.

Pakistan, with a crushing defence burden, only spends 1.7 per cent of GDP on education (compared to 4.3 per cent in India and 5 per cent in the United States). An estimated 15,000 religious schools provide free room and board to some 700,000 Pakistani boys (ages 6 to 16) where they are taught to read and write in Urdu and Arabic and recite the Holy Koran by heart. No other disciplines are taught, but students are indoctrinated with anti-American, anti-Israeli and anti-Indian propaganda, and encouraged to engage in jihad to defeat a 'global conspiracy to destroy Islam'. These schools supplied thousands of recruits for the Taliban militia in Afghanistan and are still being used to recruit militants to fight the US-led Allied Forces and the Afghan troops in that country.

While Saudi Arabia actively uses charities to promote Wahabi extremism across the world, Pakistan has been the recipient of huge direct economic assistance from the desert kingdom. The Saudis have bailed out Islamabad over the past decade by supplying Pakistan with an estimated $ 1.2 billion of oil products annually, virtually free of cost. Just after the visit of Dr. AQ Khan to Saudi Arabia in November 1999, a Saudi nuclear expert, Dr. Al Arfaj, stated in Riyadh that "Saudi Arabia must make plans aimed at making a quick response to face the possibilities of nuclear warfare agents being used against the Saudi population, cities or armed forces."

Following the departure of American troops from its soil, the biggest problem for the Saudi Kingdom is how to deal with such nuclear contingencies. More recently, Saudi officials have discussed the procurement of new Pakistani intermediate-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads.

Some concern remains that Saudi Arabia, like its neighbors, might be seeking to acquire nuclear weapons, apparently by purchase rather than indigenous development. The 2,700-kilometres range CSS-2 missiles the Kingdom obtained from China in 1987 are useless if fitted only with conventional warheads.

One cannot, therefore, avoid the inference that, like the Pak-North Korean "nukes for missiles deal", Dr. Khan might have struck an "oil for nukes" deal with Saudi Arabia on behalf of Islamabad at a time when there is a growing homogeneity of strong Pan Islamic affiliations worldwide. If Dr. Khan's interaction with the scientists of Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Libya were similar to those during his reported visits to North Korea, norms of the nonproliferation regimes may have been violated.

The internal Saudi situation is complicated by the fact that many powerful Saudi families financially support the al-Qaeda effort as part of a strategy to purge the Kingdom of 'infidels and Western corruption'. In many cases these influential Saudis reach into the extended Royal family, including the murky figure of the former Saudi intelligence chief, Turki al-Faisal, son of the late King Faisal. The Americans had accused Turki's Faisal Islamic Bank of involvement in running accounts for Osama and his associates. Turki himself maintained ongoing ties with bin Laden even after the latter fled Saudi Arabia in the mid-1990's, after imprisonment by order of the King.

Considered close to both Osama as well as AQ Khan, it was Prince Turki who had persuaded King Fahd to grant diplomatic recognition to the Taliban. The possibility of Turki having played a role in a nuclear deal between Osama and Khan cannot, consequently, be ruled out, especially when many members of the Pakistani military and nuclear establishments have been found involved in holding meetings with the al-Qaeda leader.

The first indications of the presence of pro-jihadi scientists in Pakistan's nuclear establishment came to notice during the US-led allied forces' military operations in Afghanistan against al-Qaeda and the Taliban, when documents recovered by the troops reportedly spoke of the visits of Pakistani nuclear scientists, Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, to Kandahar when Osama was operating from there before 9/11. Bashiruddin was the first head of the Kahuta Uranium Enrichment project before Dr. AQ Khan, who replaced Bashiruddin in the 1970s.

Subsequent investigations carried out by American intelligence discovered that Osama had contacted these scientists for assistance in making a small nuclear device. On February 12, 2004, Dr. Khan appeared on Pakistan's state run Television after holding a lengthy meeting with General Musharraf and confessed to having been 'solely responsible' for operating an international black market in nuclear-weapons' materials. The next day, on television again, Musharraf, who claimed to be shocked by Khan's misdeeds, nonetheless pardoned him, citing his service to Pakistan (he called Khan 'my hero').

For two decades, the western media and their intelligence agencies have linked Dr. Khan and the Pakistani Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), to nuclear-technology transfers, and it was hard to credit the idea that the successive governments Dr. Khan served had been oblivious of these activities. In the post-9/11 period, analysts continue to express fears about the possibility of extremist Islamic groups like al-Qaeda gaining access to Pakistan's nuclear weapons or fissile or radioactive materials. Secret deals with Saudi Arabia can only aggravate such risks and concerns.
The writer is a Senior Pakistani journalist affiliated with Karachi-based Monthly, 'Newsline'. He was until recently associated with Monthly 'Herald'

Jack up of Petroleum Prices during 2000-2005 and other issues pertaining to Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources

The Previous and the Present Government had made tall claims of Good Governance Merit and Transparency this slogan was initially welcomed by the people of Pakistan. However, as it has now appeared, to be otherwise in the case of Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Resources (MP&NR).

There is a monopolistic situation in the Petroleum sector. The present setup in the oil industry which was placed at key position by the oil mafia is still continuing till to day. All these handpick corrupt low level officials from the private sector and multinational have been posted all over the oil industry e.g OGDCL, PSOCL, SSGC, SNGC, NRL, PPL, OCAC and other organization under the umbrella of Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources.

It is prerogative of the federal Government to appoint a Chairman and a Board of Director to have and effective control on the management of the above mentioned organizations but in the Petroleum sector it has been otherwise so much so the Chairman and Directors of the Board of all these Organization were also appointed in consultation with all the new appointed CEOs of the above-mentioned organizations. Which totally negated the system of Check and Balances.

The biggest fraud in the oil sector is going on through setting of Petroleum Prices which are being fixed by OCAC with the blessing of the Petroleum Ministry from the last five years. The so called commercial wizards hired at huge salary packages have been allowed to do massive graft as in the case of fixing up of petroleum prices. The Oil Companies Advisory Committee (OCAC) which is a regulatory body with members comprising from the companies who are beneficiaries by the favorable actions. Formation of OCAC and its functions Annex-I. As the plunder of the people of Pakistan continues these officers who were sitting in MP&NR (Public Servants) deliberately kept on looking the other way for the past five long years. As part of their duty, they could have corrected such anomalies and lately if they had taken necessary steps as recommended by World Bank in their report “Pakistan Oil & Gas Sector Review”, dated July 2003 (reports sponsored by Ministry of Finance at the cost of 1 million US Dollar). The recommendations of this report is very clear and all the anomalies have been identified and the report has also quantified in terms that unnecessary money (in billions) is being paid to the refining and marketing companies (Annex-II). Planning Commission is also on record regarding the exorbitant profits pocketed by the oil marketing and refining companies while their marketing shares have gone down or reduced by virtue of competition from new players (Annex-III). As it is known that the determination of petroleum products pricing by OCAC is done by the people working for oil marketing companies/refineries and they have formed a cartel to decide amongst themselves the prices of POL product without any credible logic thus inflicting a huge burden on the consumer but little or no gain to the exchequer and in return receiving kickbacks in the tune of billion of rupees. This oil mafia is enjoying varied support openly from people posted at higher positions and till to day have resisted involvement of the Oil & Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) which was formed as per Presidential ordinance March 28 2002. This mafia never wanted any outsider to know about their illegal practices in the pricing Mechanism. As a matter of fact they should not have been involved in the price setting responsibilities to start with. It can be understood that the authorities were kept in dark and painted a picture as if most transparent system is in place. The Recent shoot up of oil prices in international market played its part in curtain-raising after which the lobby has become active in safeguarding their interests. They have issued various statements which are nothing but figments of their own imaginations and nothing more than attempts to hide the real issues behind technical jargons. They have issued statements on floor of the Parliament House explaining crude oil reaching US $ 52 a barrel. This is the price West Texas Intermediate (WTI) a US crude. Pakistan import crude oil from the Middle East where price of crude oil is US $ 10 per barrel less than WTI. This lobby also compares retail prices of India and Sri Lanka which is also illogical as the retail price includes taxes and duties so certainly cannot be termed as correct comparison.

The truth of the matter is that PSO is taking supplies from Kuwait Petroleum on long term basis since last 35 years M/S Shell buys POL products from its mother company Shell International while M/S Caltex buys POL products from its mother company Caltex International in the prices till to day and never crossed USD 37 $ per barrel which can be verified as per (Annex-IVa,b,c). It is surprising that OCAC has not updated the oil import graph since September 2004.

Under the coverage of the Revitalization and Restructuring of Refining Industry of Pakistan. Under this incentives were given and onus was on the refineries to expand and reconfigure. The summary by the then Chief Executive of Pakistan as of 8-12-1999 this was captioned in item 3, “The ex-refinery prices should be competitive with international prices on landed cost of product basis from natural sources of products. New refinery projects should be allowed these prices. However existing refineries not having proper configuration and economic crude slate may be allowed a premium on current competitive prices for three years during which they must expand and up date their refineries after which they will be on same ex-refinery prices as new ones”

The above approval was for 3 years and the incentives given should have ended in 2003 but OCAC did not discontinued neither the refineries have made the necessary up-gradation / changes for which incentives were given on the first place.

Under the auspices of OCAC, the OMCs refineries and lately the two state owned gas companies have been benefiting as if it is there own in-house department totally and blatantly bypassing all ethical business conducts through maneuvering that crooks were taken out from refineries and Multinational Companies (MNCs) and placed inside OCAC to oversee their interests. Names of such individuals who do not have a good track record of successful industry managers are not difficult to figure out, namely Qaisar Jamal, Feroz Cowasjee, Abid Saeed Ibrahim, Asad A Siddiqui, and two PSO employees (one given handsome VSS and then placed in OCAC and one sent on deputation) etc and are managed by heads of PSO, Shell, Caltex, PARCO and other refineries.

The good intentions of government were cleverly maneuvered by powerful lobby having vested interests and on very onset were ready to share the plunder of people of Pakistan. It is not that difficult to figure out the deliberate mistakes and deviations from the simple guidelines issued by the Government of Pakistan obviously providing level playing field to all the industry players. Bottom line to this entire affair is that this all was carried out with full support of Ministry of Finance and Petroleum. During the tenure of Mr. Usman Aminudin as Petroleum Minister and Abdul Yousaf as Secretary Petroleum. This irregularity of price fixation is still going on in collaboration with Ministry of Petroleum and Finance unchecked.

NAB Sindh has notified to Secretary Petroleum and Secretary Establishment in October 2003 that Mr Qaisar Jamal was being investigated for corrupt practices to the tune of billions of rupees but the mafia has been instrumental in getting him two years extension in till February 2005. This was despite the fact that NRL is to be privatized in June 2005 and NAB has not issued him any clearance. Who is protecting Qaiser Jamal and why?

The same is the case of Mr. Tariq Kirmani MD PSO and his colleague who are being investigated by NAB Peshawar and Rawalpindi, public accounts committee, standing committee for Petroleum of National Assembly and Senate but no result are coming out because of their connection at high places.

JACK UP MECHANISM AND QUANTUM
Even after the repeated credible revelations in press, media, and cases in NAB and may be by concerned individuals, OCAC still had the courage to hoodwink the senate committee members which discussed the plunder in their meeting on August 2004. This is certainly a punishable act and it’s high time that these people be taken to task. Explanation below would depict how it became hugely beneficial for these companies to keep managing the wrong doings to their benefit and somehow do not come under scrutiny / observation:

Gasoline Price Jack up
Pakistan product price mechanism is based on import parity i.e. FOB AG plus the incidentals incurred to effect it. Platts Oilgram the official reference journal started publishing 95 RON Gasoline FOB price from January, 2002 but OCAC continued to adopt old formula, i.e., Naphtha price plus maximum of US $ 60. For five years these people have managed to get US$ 30-35 per ton more than a superior gasoline. Pakistan consumes 1.4 million tons a year so quantum for 5 years is not difficult to be assessed (approx. US $ 245 million) has been misappropriated

HSD Price Jack up
Platts Oilgram started to publish premiums of AG way back in June, 2001 and till June, 2003 no product in Pakistan was considered as premium product but OCAC continuously cooked up a premium figure ranging from US $ 1.67 per barrel to US $ 2.6 per barrel. Conversion factors for HSD (Gasoil) and gasoline are 7.5 and 8.5 per ton therefore level of jack up can be quantified whereas to build import parity only freight should have been of suffice. The freight remained in vicinity of 6 US $ per ton during this period. OCAC issued two premiums one for black products and one for white products and gave no basis of its estimation. As Platts given figures were certainly not adhered to then the figures in tenders in favor of their mother companies were used to arrive at the premium figures. In turn the award of tenders was not transparent and void of any competitive bidding. This all exercise levied an un-necessary extra artificial lift in prices. Pakistan started to import 0.5% Sulfur HSD (Gasoil) from June, 2003 this product is a premium product but as per Platts the premiums ranged from US $ 0.8-1.3 per barrel. In Pakistan none of the refineries produce 0.5% Sulfur HSD but all through this period continued to extract premiums of product they were in-capable of producing. Estimated plundered amount is Rs. 21.32 billion PER YEAR.

Import Duty Assisted Jack-up
Since the illegal activities with respect of gasoline and HSD were successful, the people responsible went ahead by unnecessarily imposing 6% regulatory duty on other products and 11% on HSD in June, 2002. In that scenario, local refineries were benefited to the tune of Rs 4.8 billion per annum as duties were included in the price setting mechanism. The duties benefited Pakistan’s only on amount generated through 40% HSD which truly was imported. As some products such as JP-1, kerosene oil and motor gasoline were not imported the imposition of duties on these products yielded not a single rupee benefit to GOP but the companies and refineries extracted billions of rupees from the poor people of the country. It is unimaginable how the government has allowed and is letting it happen till to day.

Specifications’ change based Jack up
The illegal practice of dumping kerosene (spec grade or not) into HSD which was under law a punishable offence was legitimized to advance benefit of Rs. 2-2.5 per liter. The kerosene dumped which additionally polluted atmosphere due to obvious reasons of adulteration, Such money-making alternatives allowed OMCs and refineries to enhance their financial returns e.g., these artificial lifts boosted the EPS of NRL from Rs 4 in 1998 to Rs 27.82 in 2003-04 despite the fact commercial auditor reported Rs 5.0 billion crude un-accounted for. The OCAC claim that corrections would result in refinery closure, this does not hold water as 700% EPS enhancement is absolutely a plunder.

Escalations in Marketing Margins and Retailer Margins
OMCs prior to October 1999 were getting fixed margins ranging from Rs 0.22-0.55 per liter initially. The then Secretary Petroleum therefore lied to The Cabinet that it was pegged it to 2% of retail and wanted it to be increased to initially 3% and later to 3.5%. On paper it seemed 50% -75% raise. Instead of applying this raise on fixed margins of Rs 0.22-0.55 per liter they applied it over retail this increased their margins by up to 300%. For example the margin on gasoline which stood at Rs 0.52 per liter has after the changes increased to Rs 1.89 per liter. Same was done in the case of retailer margins. These can be examined in Pakistan Energy Year Book published by Ministry of Petroleum. The Financial advisor of Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resource has observed in his report that these margin were increased on a condition that oil marketing companies will build additional storages in the country but till to day not a single storage has been build after the increase in margin.

Illegal Increase of 700% in inland freight Margins (IFEM) and Decrease of 700% in Petroleum Development (PDL).
Since August 15th 2004 the OCAC has arbitrarily increased the IFEM from Rs. 1.99 to Rs. 9.70 per liter and decreased PDL from Rs. 9.27 to Rs. 0.0 thus giving wind fall profits to OMC and refineries witch encouraged them to promote dumping of POL products and claming fake carriage bills from OCAC which was conformed after the inquiry by ministry of petroleum.

(As per the Pakistan Oil and Gas Sector review 10th July 2003 it’s states the average inland freight cost of the main Petroleum products is in the range of Rs. 1.0 –1.25 per liter, which has been the difference between the price of diesel in Karachi and Peshawar Page 156). While and the other hand OCAC have been determining Cost of Freight as high has Rs. 9.70 per liter if this calculated where Pakistan consume 9 million metric ton of POL Products per year the quantum of manipulation goes into billions). OCAC is charging the same freight for POL products sold all over Pakistan infect the cost of freight should be less in Sindh and gradually increased in Balochistan, Punjab and should be highest in NWFP and Northern Areas because of long distance from Karachi. (Annex-V).

Furnace oil Price Jack-ups
In early 2001, the tenders for the import of finished petroleum products used to appear in the newspapers but then the master manipulating company Shell started to award its diesel and furnace oil tenders to its parent Shell International thus allowing transfer of jacked up element out of the country. Pakistan requires 180 Cst furnace oil which as per Platts is not identified as a premium product. The price C& F set by OMCs for furnace oil in June, 2002 was Rs 13600 per ton. FOB AG the main cost element during this period was US $ 125 per ton. At present FOB AG for the same is US $ 185 per ton still the price is Rs 13800 per ton, with $/Rs parity at same level the jack up was of US $ 60 per ton. Pakistan demand is 7 million tons a year therefore the annual jack up in 2001 was to the tune of US $ 420 million. These figures can be verified from Pakistan Energy Year Book published by Government of Pakistan (Annex-VI).

Meeting of Senate Sub Committee on P&NR held on 15-2-2005 in the office of Additional Secretary P&NR (Annex-VII).

Illegal Appointments
After this move one of multinationals using Omar Asghar Khan, then a Minister started to replace MDs of public sector with its own employees. For instance a manager level person in PRL (same Qaiser Jamal) replaced as MD NRL and the other (Tariq Kirmani) replaced as MD of PSO. A permanent Shell employee took over as Secretary General OCAC and then moved to Parco as DMD, again a newly created position. Present Secretary General OCAC Abid Saeed Ibrahim a full time employee of Shell has been appointed irregularly without proper procedure. He is son of ex PSO MD. Only a B. Com qualification was enough for Asad A Siddiqui to be appointed as DMD NRL after creating un-lawful position without necessary approvals necessary in pubic sector. Several of these have serious cases registered in NAB but there is no move to apprehend them.

PSO MD has created a big unrest in the company through his “self created kingdom” by appointing incompetent and greedy people around him that has resulted in massive resignations of career professionals from PSO. Many 60 years+ employees are re-hired on contract at senior positions as they are either submissive or have obligations to please him for this favor. Both Executive Directors hired earlier, namely Jalees A. Siddiqui (ex-Phillips with no oil & gas experience and was removed from his employer) and Kalim A. Siddiqui (ex-Caltex, brought in after retirement from Canada was only a manager and now have cases against him for favoring his brother and in-laws for CNG and petrol stations) and Mr. Yacuub Suttar has joined PSO on the recommendation of Mr. Pervaiz kusar Chairman PSO and EX employee of Engro Chemicals as Executive Director Finance & IT. It may be noted that Mr. Suttar was CFO in ECPL, a highly paid job and opted to join PSO at lower salary and particularly when PSO is up for privatization in June 2005. This is to cover their tracks of financial irregularities carried out in a last five years because GM finance Imran Mirza, Executive Director Finance Jalil Tareen and many new appointed general manager have already made their package and left for safe havens.

Additional demand of Multinational Companies (MNCs)
Also, one would like to argue that the demand of MNCs and refineries that they be compensated for the increase in international crude prices hike is also baseless as Pakistan import crude oil where it stands at US $ 42 per barrel or lower. It is difficult for a common man to comprehend why the Government kept a blind eye on such facts and hence obviously were not investigated. These companies have so far been paid over Rs. 3.5 billion already in this account. It is high time that group of so-called professionals serving their own and international cohorts bosses be taken to task after rightful due-diligence and after corrective actions, the benefits be provided to the nation.

It is very sad to know that the Government is trying to bail out all these culprits who have been involved in all these corrupt practices from the last five years by introducing a bill in the National Assembly for taking the authority of price fixing of POL products in to it’s on hands. While OGRA who was the real authority to fix the oil prices has been kept out of this practice for the last five year.

We know that no notice will be taken of this complaint but be consider or obligations to the country and the people of Pakistan to apprize them of this plunder of Billions of Rupees which has been purposely unchecked by the authorities.

July 5, 1977 And Its Lasting Ramifications

Wajid Shamsul Hasan

Nations are proud of some dates as inerasable landmarks that make them hold their heads high. Such as July 4 when "we the people" formed the United States of America, set the world ablaze with a new momentum to human endeavour, gave new meaning to human liberty and dignity, equality and fraternity and opened floodgates of change globally. However, not many nations can forget some dates that have scarred their lives eternally.

Pakistan is no exception to it. July 5, 1977 was the darkest day in our checkered history when General Ziaul Haq uprooted the nascent sapling of democracy. And that act of high treason committed by him continues to hang like a cursed albatross with all its evil ramifications casting a long shadow of doubt on country's future.

Why I have chosen to write on July 5, 1977 nearly 28 years down the road is its continuing impact, the similarities between General Zia's and Pakistan under General Pervez Musharraf and the fact that military rule than had put Pakistan on the road to destruction and under Musharraf the journey to doom is doing the final run.

Pakistan's 'savior' in 1977 had dug the country's grave; our latest 'saviour' now is all geared up to lay the body to rest.

The Quaid had established Pakistan with hopes of making it a model of a democratic state. While Zia made Mr Jinnah's dream sour, it is Musharraf who has converted it into a horrific nightmare. Zia's greatest disservice to Quaid's Pakistan was to drown his democratic liberal ideological Muslim moorings into an ocean of confusion with the objective of converting it into a Sunni Wahabi state.

I am referring to this issue because of the controversy ignited by Indian BJP leader Mr L. K. Advani. It has finally dawned upon him that Mr Jinnah was a secularist and not a communalist. It is indeed an irony for Mr Jinnah that we in Pakistan have to have a certificate from Mr L.K. Advani to merely assert the truth and nothing but the whole truth what Mr Jinnah was. As early as 1893 Sir Syed Ahmad Khan had made it clear that India was a two-nation state. He based this observation not on ground of religion but on account of economic disparities. He believed that Muslims with the best of education and talent would always be outnumbered by sheer numerical strength of the Hindus when competing for jobs. Nowhere did he assert that Muslims as a religious minority would be at the receiving end. Besides, Muslims at that time were free to go to their mosques, observe their religious festivals and prayers without any hindrance.

It was fear of economic annihilation at the hands of the majority rather than religious domination became the raison d'etre for a separate Muslim homeland. Mr Jinnah's Pakistan was to be essentially an egalitarian state based on the sound principles of Islamic social justice and use of religion was to be forbidden to identity its citizens. They were to be equal, free to go to their mosques, their temples, churches etc., and that religion had nothing to do with the affairs of the state. In short, his idea of Pakistan was to be a modern democracy-with minorities and women enjoying equal rights.

Zia straight jacketed Pakistan into his Sunni-Wahabi-Deobandi mould. His ten years were most abusive for the minorities and oppressive for women.

Remember Nawabpur incident when village women were paraded in the nude, molested, depraved and outraged in public. Ever since then such orgies have become a common feature to the point that now under Musharraf hardly a week passes when a woman or two are not raped, paraded in the nude and their spoilers remain unpunished.

The General instead of going after the criminals has extended to them a license to do it more with pleasure, by putting a ban on the travel of such victims (i.e. Mukhataran Mai case). Now he wants to resolve the issue of the growing incidence of rapes by calling a convention of rape victims to hear their tragic stories. This seems to be a sickening manifestation of a sadist mentality reflected in his desire to hear rape stories. If Dr Freud were alive and had to examine him, he would have surely pronounced such a person as a sex maniac and depraved pervert. Not only the rape cases, in others too his government supports men who disparage womenfolk. Look at the fate of the opposition's legislative bid to outlaw Karo-karo-the so-called honour killings that too have acquired an epidemic form under Musharraf and that have been justified by his King's Party. Besides, to rub salt into the national wounds, the General does not get tired of orchestrating on his enlightened moderation and when it comes to action-be it removal of highly abused blasphemy law, draconian action against rapists or putting his foot down firmly to stop introduction of religious column to discriminately identify Pakistani citizens in the new passports, the General surrenders to the religious extremists as usual.

When I compare Zia's with Musharraf's time, I am reminded of a story of a notorious coffin thief who had made life miserable in a village by stealing coffins from bodies in the graveyard. Villagers took turns to guard the graves. Their vigil did pay off but the moment they relaxed, the devil struck again. Finally Providence heard their prayers and the coffin thief was on his deathbed. He summoned his sons and asked who among them would do something extra-ordinary that would make the villagers remember him kindly. His son in the army promised that he would do something that will force villagers to remember his father kindly. For a few days there was no incident at the graveyard until the coffin thieve's son got back home on leave.

Lo and behold, soon villagers found themselves facing a bigger predicament.

Now some one was not only stealing the coffin but also putting a spear through the body. They gathered in the local mosque to discuss the new problem. Every one among those who spoke on the occasion remembered kindly the deceased coffin thief for respecting the bodies and cursed the new for not only stealing the coffin but also desecrating the dead. The moral of the story is obvious.

(1): Musharraf has definitely made good use of his nearly six years of power by outdoing Zia. No doubt Ayub started it all, Yahya followed him, it was General Zia who laid the foundation and it is Musharraf who as the incarnation of all three has soldered all the dirty tricks of the Praetorian management as the primary weapon of demolishing the civil society beyond reprieve.

(2): All the four military dictators-more so Musharraf-- obtrusively raped the constitutions of the day and trampled with their jackboots those institutional oaths that give meaning to patriotism, loyalty and commitment by all and sundry to serve and protect the country more dearer than their children.

(3): Except Yahya who did not get time-rest of the three dictators had referendums carried out for perpetuating their hold on power. Zia had a referendum on the issue whether people liked Islam or not and by virtue of the seven per cent of the votes cast in favor, declared himself President for all time. Musharraf circumvented the constitutional requirements for presidential election by holding his own referendum to declare himself President. He had 97 % votes cast in his favour of the total seven per cent registered voters who voted in the internationally declared fraudulent referendum.

(4): General Zia had made the judges of superior courts take oath on his provisional constitutional order so did General Musharraf. Both showed the door to those self-respecting judges who refused to join hands- although few and far between-who preferred to stay put at home defending their honor.

(5) Like Zia's various electoral contraptions to keep doors closed on Benazir Bhutto, Musharraf commissioned polls in October 2002 were loaded with Bhutto-specific laws to keep her out of the electoral race, declared by international observers as overly rigged and manipulated before, during and after the votes had been cast-in favor of King's Party and Mullas of MMA in cahoots with his Intelligence apparatus. He has kept the mullahs alive and kicking to blackmail the Americans as well to counter the liberal democratic forces.

(6): Musharraf's Legal Framework Order (LFO) later incorporated in the Constitution of 1973 as part of a sinister deal between him and the MMA-making him an absolute ruler-has been much of distortion, disfigurement and dislocation of a sacrosanct document playing foul with it that amounts to high treason and carries with it death sentence as punishment.

(7): When one refers to political horse-trading during his time, Musharraf wins the race hands down. Bunch of political thugs, co-op swindlers, sunshine politicians-all wanted by his very own National Accountability Bureau for various financial scams running into billions-have been allowed by him to remain scot-free in exchange of political support that he needs to sustain himself. Over and above that they have been given an open licence to convert their ill-gotten millions into trillions. The entire accountability process has become a joke. His minister of Information acknowledged the other day that the country is in the grip of various mafias. Invariably most of the uniformed top guns or their kith and kin are doing full time real estate business. Besides the whole army of white-collar criminals, many of the king pins in his government are history sheeters and killers.

(8): The Constitution of 1973 was the most outstanding achievement of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and the post-1971 political leadership. It resolved the tricky issue of the quantum of provincial autonomy to the satisfaction of the elected representatives of the federating units who agreed to its shape and form unanimously. By introducing arbitrary amendments in the 1973 Constitution, he converted it into a handmaid of the President and Praetorian centre to transform it into a garrison state rather than the guarantor of equal distribution of resources, just power sharing, equality in job opportunities to all the citizens of the federation. By pitching one province against the other, fanning of fissiparous tendencies and by letting the Mullas run berserk-he has provided fuel to a process initiated by General Ziaul Haq, that would sooner than later Talibanise Pakistan.

(ix): Remember Zia's promise of holding elections in 90 days and his great betrayal. As his obedient follower Musharraf more or less did the same when in December 2003 he pledged that he would give up the post of army chief by December 31, 2004. He is still holding the two offices and the news is that he would keep his uniform until 2012. His uniform is what hair to Samson were-source of all his manly strength and prowess.

(x) Zia demolished Pak-Afghan borders for the American Jihad. Zia kept quiet on Kashmir, Musharraf is about to do a sell-out. He has already surrendered Pakistan's traditional stand. Musharraf has rendered our independence into a myth for Washington's war on terrorism. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto gave his life to provide nuclear glow to Pakistan, Musharraf is hell bent in extinguishing it. South Waziristan is still under Pakistani military's occupation with American commanders breathing hot air down our necks. There is a civil war on in Baluchistan. Instead of putting balm on their ulcerating wounds, Musharraf wants to hit them hard so hard that they would not know what hit them. The Baluch Liberation Army has been striking with great impunity. Even Chief Minister Jam Yusuf's well-secured residence is not safe and is hit by rockets. Anger from Dr Shazia's rape continues to simmer. It reminds one of General "Tiger" Niazi who used to ask his officers and jawans during the civil war in East Pakistan not how many enemies did they kill but how women did they rape.

This is the story of Pakistan under Musharraf and it began under General Zia on that ill-fated July 5, 1977. Pakistan today is not known for enlightened moderation but because of the outrageous stories of rape like that of Mukhtaran Mia and Musharraf's bid to kill the patient rather than cure the disease by putting a ban on her travel. Zia sowed the seeds of Balkanisation and Talibanizaton, Musharraf's policies have made it a failed state or a failing state that is likely to meet the fate of Yugoslavia under its jackbooted leadership.

If I get down to enumerate in detail what more is common between Zia and Musharraf, I will require many thousand words to do some justice to the topic. Briefly, I will remind the readers to recall the co-op and financial scams of Zia's time and look for the key players in them. They will find them safely ensconced in Musharraf's cabinet or perched in high offices in his King's party. Zia lost Siachen Glacier to India without firing a shot in its defense, Musharraf's Kargil misadventure has had a devastating effect on the morale of the Pakistani jawans-many of whose colleagues were brought dead in the dark of night and post mortemed to discover they had been living on grass while their generals continued to lead "spirited" lives that according to Shakespeare "takes away the performance".

Both Zia and Musharraf sold Pakistan's vital interests by assuming the role of disposables in the service of their foreign masters. President-General Musharraf as the so-called democratic leader of the "most militarized state" in the world has acquired the stamp of legitimacy not from his own people but from outsiders. Zia had laid the foundation of making Pakistani military a business enterprise; Musharraf has erected a whole empire on it. There is a consensus that our generals have pushed Pakistan into a quagmire of problems that pose much more serious a challenge than that of 1971. When they surrendered half of the country to the Indian army (December 16, 1971), the residual Pakistan was fortunate enough to have a dynamic leader like Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who had the enormous capacity to "pick up the pieces" and re-galvanize them into a proud nation. Unfortunately, with a General fully dressed in army chief's uniform as the President backed to the hilt by "summer soldiers and sunshine patriots" taking the country onto the road to disaster, there is no one within Pakistan who could save the country as Zulfikar Ali Bhutto did when the defeated generals handed him over a truncated Pakistan.

There is no doubt that Pakistan today is at a cross- road. There is a big question mark on its future and its very survival as a federal state is in doubt especially when its generals and those politicians in cahoots with them seem to be determined in pushing Quaid's Pakistan it into the dustbin of history. Since we are facing a situation worse than 1971, we have got to go back to the leadership that could emulate Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's foot steps to bring the country back to safety from the edge of the precipice.
 

The writer is a former Pakistan High Commissioner to UK.

Remembering This Darkest Day of History When Generals Shamed Us

By Wajid Shamsul Hasan

LONDON, July 5: Nations are proud of some dates as landmarks that make them hold their heads high. July 4, when "we the people" formed the United States of America, set the world ablaze with a new momentum to human endeavor, gave new meaning to human liberty and dignity. For Pakistan July 5, 1977 was the darkest day in our checkered history.

On this day 28 years ago, a General, Ziaul Haq uprooted the nascent sapling of democracy from Pakistan and that act of high treason committed by him continues to hang even today like a cursed albatross with all its evil ramifications casting a long shadow of doubt on country's future.

The similarities between Pakistan under General Zia and Pakistan today under General Pervez Musharraf are plentiful. The fact cannot be ignored that military rule then had put Pakistan on the road to destruction and under Musharraf the journey to doom is doing the final run.

Pakistan's so-called 'savior' in military uniform in 1977 had dug the country's grave. Our latest 'savior' now is all geared up to lay the body to rest.

Our Founder, the Quaid, had established Pakistan with hopes of making it a model of a democratic state. While Zia made Mr Jinnah's dream sour, it is Musharraf who has converted it into a horrific nightmare. Zia's greatest disservice to Pakistan was to drown Quaid's democratic liberal ideological Muslim moorings into an ocean of confusion with the objective of converting it into a Sunni Wahabi state.

I am referring to this issue because of the controversy ignited by Indian BJP leader LK Advani. It has finally dawned upon him that Mr Jinnah was a secularist and not a communalist. It is indeed an irony for Mr Jinnah that we in Pakistan have to have a certificate from Mr Advani to merely assert the truth and nothing but the whole truth what Mr Jinnah was.

As early as 1893 Sir Syed Ahmad Khan had made it clear that India was a two-nation state. He based this observation not on grounds of religion but on account of economic disparities. He believed that Muslims with the best of education and talent would always be outnumbered by sheer numerical strength of the Hindus when competing for jobs. Nowhere did he assert that Muslims as a religious minority would be at the receiving end. Besides, Muslims at that time were free to go to their mosques, observe their religious festivals and prayers without any hindrance.

It was fear of economic annihilation at the hands of the majority rather than religious domination which became the raison d'etre for a separate Muslim homeland. Zia straight jacketed Pakistan into his Sunni-Wahabi-Deobandi mould. His ten years were most abusive for the minorities and oppressive for women.

Remember Nawabpur incident when village women were paraded in the nude, molested, depraved and humiliated in public. Ever since such orgies have become a common feature to the point that now under Musharraf hardly a week passes by when a woman or two are not raped, paraded in the nude and their spoilers remain unpunished.

The General instead of going after the criminals has extended to them a license to do it more with pleasure, by putting a ban on the travel of victims like Mukhtaran Mai. Now he wants to resolve the issue of the growing incidence of rapes by calling a convention of rape victims to hear their tragic stories. This seems to be a sickening manifestation of a sadist mentality reflected in his desire to hear rape stories.

Not only the rape cases, in others cases too his government supports men who disparage womenfolk. Look at the fate of the Opposition's legislative bid to outlaw Karo Kari, the so-called honor killings that too have acquired an epidemic form under Musharraf and that have been justified by his King's Party.

To rub salt into the national wounds, the General does not get tired of orchestrating on his 'enlightened moderation' and when it comes to action, be it removal of highly abused blasphemy law, draconian action against rapists or putting his foot down firmly to stop introduction of religious column in the new passports, the General surrenders to the religious extremists without a squeak.

When I compare Zia with Musharraf, I am reminded of the story of a notorious coffin thief who had made life miserable in a village by stealing coffins from freshly buried dead bodies in the graveyard. After a while he got sick and summoned his sons and asked who among them would do something extra-ordinary that would make the villagers remember him kindly. His son in the army promised that he would do something that will force the villagers to declare that his father was a kind person. The man died and for a few days there was no incident at the graveyard until the coffin thief's son struck. Some one had not only stolen the coffin the body had been raped and a spear put in the back. The villagers gathered in the local mosque and all remembered the deceased coffin thief in kind words for respecting the bodies.

The moral of the story is obvious: Musharraf has definitely made good use of his nearly six years of power by outdoing Zia. No doubt Ayub started it all, Yahya followed him, it was General Zia who laid the foundation and it is Musharraf who as the incarnation of all three has soldered all the dirty tricks of the Praetorian management as the primary weapon of demolishing the civil society beyond reprieve.

All the four military dictators, more so Musharraf, obtrusively raped the Constitution of the day and trampled with their jackboots those institutional oaths that give meaning to patriotism, loyalty and commitment to serve and protect the country.

Except Yahya who did not get time, rest of the three dictators had referendums carried out for perpetuating their hold on power. Zia had a referendum on the issue whether people liked Islam or not and by virtue of the seven per cent votes cast in favor, declared himself President for all time. Musharraf circumvented the constitutional requirements for presidential election by holding his own referendum to declare himself President. He had 97 per cent votes cast in his favor of the total seven per cent registered voters. The international community declared his referendum as a fraud.

General Zia had made the judges of superior courts take oath on his Provisional Constitutional Order so did General Musharraf. Both showed the door to those self-respecting judges who refused to join hands, and were sent home for defending their honor.

Like Zia's various electoral contraptions to keep doors closed on Benazir Bhutto, Musharraf's, polls in October 2002 were loaded with Bhutto-specific laws to keep her out of the electoral race, declared by international observers as overly rigged and manipulated before, during and after the votes had been cast, in favor of the King's Party and Mullas of MMA in cahoots with his Intelligence apparatus. He has kept the mullas alive and kicking to blackmail the Americans as well as to counter the liberal democratic forces.

Musharraf's Legal Framework Order (LFO) later incorporated in the Constitution of 1973 as part of a sinister deal between him and the MMA, making him an absolute ruler, has been much of distortion, disfigurement and dislocation of a sacrosanct document playing foul with it that amounts to high treason and carries with it death sentence as punishment.

When one refers to political horse-trading during his time, Musharraf wins the race hands down. Bunch of political thugs, co-op swindlers, sunshine politicians, all wanted by his very own National Accountability Bureau for various financial scams running into billions, have been allowed by him to remain scot-free in exchange for political support that he needs to sustain himself.

Over and above they have been given an open licence to convert their ill-gotten millions into trillions. The entire accountability process has become a joke. His minister of Information acknowledged the other day that the country is in the grip of various mafias. Invariably most of the uniformed top guns or their kith and kin are doing full time real estate business. Besides the whole army of white-collar criminals, many of the king pins in his government are history sheeters and killers.

The Constitution of 1973 was the most outstanding achievement of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and the post-1971 political leadership. It resolved the tricky issue of the quantum of provincial autonomy to the satisfaction of the elected representatives of the federating units who agreed to its shape and form unanimously. By introducing arbitrary amendments in the 1973 Constitution, he converted it into a handmaid of the President and Praetorian center to transform it into a garrison state rather than the guarantor of equal distribution of resources, just power sharing, equality in job opportunities to all the citizens of the federation.

By pitching one province against the other, fanning of fissiparous tendencies and by letting the Mullas run berserk, Musharraf has provided fuel to a process initiated by General Ziaul Haq, that would sooner than later Talibanize Pakistan.

Remember Zia's promise of holding elections in 90 days and his great betrayal. As his obedient follower Musharraf more or less did the same when in December 2003 he pledged that he would give up the post of Army Chief by December 31, 2004. He is still holding the two offices and the news is that he would keep his uniform until 2012. His uniform is what hair to Samson were, source of all his manly strength and prowess.

Zia demolished Pak-Afghan borders for the American Jihad. Zia kept quiet on Kashmir, Musharraf is about to do a sell-out. He has already surrendered Pakistan's traditional stand. Musharraf has rendered our independence into a myth for Washington's war on terrorism.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto gave his life to provide nuclear glow to Pakistan, Musharraf is hell bent on extinguishing it. South Waziristan is still under Pakistani military's occupation with American commanders breathing hot air down our necks. There is a civil war on in Balochistan. Instead of putting balm on their ulcerating wounds, Musharraf wants to hit them so hard that they would not know what hit them.

The Baloch Liberation Army has been striking with great impunity. Even Chief Minister Jam Yusuf's well-secured residence is not safe and is hit by rockets. Anger from Dr Shazia's rape continues to simmer. It reminds one of General "Tiger" Niazi who used to ask his officers and jawans during the civil war in East Pakistan not how many enemies did they kill but how many Bengali women did they rape.

Zia lost Siachen Glacier to India without firing a shot in its defence, Musharraf's Kargil misadventure has had a devastating effect on the morale of the Pakistani jawans, many of whose colleagues were brought dead in the dark of the night and post mortemed to discover they had been living on grass while their Generals continued to lead "spirited" lives that according to Shakespeare "takes away the performance".

Zia had laid the foundation of making Pakistani military a business enterprise. Musharraf has erected a whole empire on it.

Both Zia and Musharraf sold Pakistan's vital interests by assuming the role of disposables in the service of their foreign masters. General Musharraf, as the so-called democratic leader of the "most militarized state" in the world, has acquired the stamp of legitimacy not from his own people but from outsiders.

This is the story of Pakistan under Musharraf and it began under General Zia on this ill-fated date of July 5. Pakistan today is not known for enlightened moderation but because of the outrageous stories of rape like that of Mukhtaran Mai and Musharraf's bid to kill the patient rather than cure the disease by putting a ban on her travel.

Zia sowed the seeds of Balkanization and Talibanisation, Musharraf's policies have made it a failed state or a failing state that is likely to meet the fate of Yugoslavia under his jackbooted leadership.

There is a consensus that our Generals have pushed Pakistan into a quagmire of problems that pose much more serious a challenge than that of 1971. When they surrendered half of the country to the Indian army (December 16, 1971), the residual Pakistan was fortunate enough to have a dynamic leader like Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who had the enormous capacity to "pick up the pieces" and re-galvanise them into a proud nation.

Unfortunately, with a General fully dressed in Army Chief's uniform as the President backed to the hilt by "summer soldiers and sunshine patriots" taking the country onto the road to disaster, there is no one within Pakistan who could save the country as Zulfikar Ali Bhutto did when the defeated generals handed him a truncated Pakistan.

There is no doubt that Pakistan today is at a cross-road. There is a big question mark on its future and its very survival as a federal state is in doubt especially when its Generals and their cronies seem determined in pushing Quaid's Pakistan it into the dustbin of history.

Since we are facing a situation worse than 1971, we have got to go back to the leadership that could emulate Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's foot steps to bring the country back to safety from the edge of the precipice.

The writer is a former Pakistan High Commissioner to UK

Bhutto equates Musharraf with Zia

Islamabad, July 4: With talks for reconciliation with President Pervez Musharraf making no headway, former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on Monday lashed out at him comparing him with military ruler Zia ul Haq and predicted an early end to Musharraf’s ‘dictatorship’.

“The days of dictatorship will soon end,” she said in a statement on the eve of ‘Black Day’ to be observed by her Pakistan Peoples Party on the anniversary of the 1977 coup by Zia overthrowing her father Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was later hanged.

Equating Musharraf’s regime with Zia’s, she said, “the dark cloud of military dictatorship once again enveloped the country as a military adventurer exploits the situation in Afghanistan for his personal benefit but history teaches that dictatorships do not last when people fight for the truth”.

“July 5 is a black day in the history of Pakistan. It was on this day in 1977 when a military dictator struck in the middle of the night to overthrow a democratic and popularly elected government,” Bhutto, said.

Speakers pay tributes to Shaheed Bhutto at London Seminar

Islamabad, 5 July 2005: The leader of the opposition in the Senate Mian Raza Rabbani today said that the Pakistan Peoples Party did not believe in seeking power through the backdoor and that the talk of a so called deal was the part of disinformation campaign by the regime. He said that after the regime’s undemocratic demands were rejected by the Party there has been no talks with the rulers.

The seminar "Life and legacy of Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto", the first elected prime minister and the founder of Pakistan Peoples Party was organised by the PPP London.

Mohtarma Bhutto could not participate in the seminar because of change in her travel schedule due to Senator Zardari’s illness.

He said that the regime demanded that Mohtarma give up party leadership, not return to the country after the next elections and give blanket endorsement to the seventeenth constitutional amendments. Such undemocratic demands can not be accepted by the PPP.

Senator Mian Raza Rabbani asked the people to ponder as to where Pakistan stood on the eve of 5th, July when the Generals seized power and removed the popularly elected rime minister of Pakistan and where it stands today.

Before 5th, July 1977, he said, Pakistan was a sovereign country marching on the road of prosperity and democracy where every citizen lived with freedom under the law and constitution. Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto gave honour and dignity to the poor and downtrodden masses. Shaheed had also become a Champion of the people of the Third World particularly the Muslim and Arabs nations. He gave voice to the muted turbulence of human spirit and took practical steps towards the unity of the Muslim and the Third World, he said.

Senator Mian Raza Rabbani said taht Pakistan's military and civil bureaucracy was vainly employed to stop the march of history. Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto paid the price by giving his life but refused to compromise his principles. The establishment thought that by removing Shaheed they would stop the march of history but they were wrong. They tried to destroy the Pakistan People Party but every time they did that the Party became stronger, he said.

Today once again the Generals are illegally and unconstitutionally ruling the country and continuing the same things but their methods had changed. They spent hundreds of millions of the poor people to tarnish the image of Mohtarma and the Party by bringing false cases but have failed, he said.

He said that in the last election despite the rigging the people of Pakistan gave a resounding verdict in favour of PPP and its leader Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto.

General Musharraf who have taken 180 degrees turn since 9/11 now talks of peace with India, about crisis management and crisis resolution and taking credit for the bus service. It was Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto’s government that first talked about peace with honour in the region but at that time she was called "security risk".

Barrister Sibghatullah Kadri first Pakistani and Muslim Queens counsel in England paid glowing tributes to Quid-Awam Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Kadri said that Shaheed Bhutto was active in politics from student days and was the first Asian who was appointed professor of International Law in Southampton University at the age of 33.

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Shaheed was a man of great vision, a highly educated person, socialist at heart who gave the dignity to the workers and poor masses of Pakistan. He believed in strong Pakistan, a federation where provinces would live in harmony. He gave us nuclear capability to make Pakistan’s defense impregnable, he said..

Barrister Kadri said Mr Bhutto believed that the people were the real power and it was his ever lasting legacy that he empowered the people of Pakistan. Bhutto still lives in the heart of the people of Pakistan and Bhuttoism had become a creed.

Lord Nazir Ahmed speaking at the seminar said that Mr Bhutto stood for justice and equality. He described him as the best politician. Lord Nazir was highly criticised of General Musharraf and said his so called enlightened moderation as a big fraud. We feel ashamed when we read about gang rapes in Pakistan, he said.

Lord Nazir Ahmed said a Gen. Musharraf who cannot manage Islamabad Airport has no right to manage Pakistan. It is time for him to resign and handover the power to the elected representative of the nation.

Ch. Abdul Majeed, former speaker of Azad Kashmir who presided the seminar, said that it was Shaheed Bhutto who kept the Kashmir issue alive by getting India to sign Shimla Agreement. He said Gen. Musharraf has no right to negotiate the future of Kashmir without the participation of the real leadership of people of Kashmir. He said Shaheed Bhutto will always remain in the heart of people of Kashmir.

LAHORE: The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) organised seminars in Pakistan and abroad to mark July 5 as a ‘black day’ in the political history of Pakistan. Gen Ziaul Haq toppled Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s government on July 5, 1977.

PPP Secretary General Jahangir Badar said that the party would continue its struggle against dictatorship until Benazir Bhutto was elected prime minister for a third time.

He said that Gen Zia formed the Pakistan National Alliance to sabotage democracy in Pakistan and though the late Bhutto had accepted the demands of the PNA, still he was deposed on July 5, 1977. “The generals asked him to leave the country but Shaheed Bhutto refused saying that he would rather be killed by the generals than history,” Badar added.

He said those who betrayed Bhutto were unable to get the people’s support.

PPP Punjab President Qasim Zia said that the government could not control inflation, law and order and unemployment without establishing a democratic government and therefore fresh elections should be held in 2005.

PPP Punjab Information Secretary Naveed Chaudhry said that government agencies were spreading rumours about the PPP and PML-N making deals with the government to try and divide the opposition parties.

Peoples Labour Bureau also organised a seminar on ‘From dictatorship to dictatorship’ at the Lahore Press Club. Party leaders and workers, wearing black ribbons, attended the seminar and shouted slogans against military rule. PPP chapters in the US and UK also arranged seminars on the day.

PPP will restore Pakistan’s lost political and social rights

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) is a symbol of the country’s democratic journey and will restore its lost political, economic and social rights, said PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto. “The days of dictatorship will end soon. Repeated military interventions are aimed at military colonialism which is unacceptable. The PPP workers salute those who sacrificed their lives during Zia’s military dictatorship to keep democracy alive, democracy is still there despite all the attempts to end it by using state force,” said Benazir in her message on black day. She said the PPP would always work for the country’s progress and prosperity. online

Spread of fundamentalism and democracy
by Tariq Fatemi

HOW come a state that was created by the freely expressed will of the people, through various forms of participatory elections, has had to endure decades of unelected, authoritarian rule, from those who have shown scant regard for even the pretence of democracy? And, how come this same state, whose birth was bitterly and vociferously opposed by the religious parties, has now come to accept a primary role for these fundamentalist religious groups?

Finally, why and how did the United States, while proclaiming and preaching its strong attachment to democracy and the rule of law, nevertheless prefer to sustain and nurture authoritarian, fundamentalist regimes in this country?

These are questions over which many a Pakistani has agonized for years, wondering when and how things went wrong in their homeland for which millions sacrificed all they possessed. We now have as good an answer as any we are likely to get. Husain Haqqani, a well-known Pakistani journalist, who had the unusual distinction of gaining the confidence of two of the country's most bitter political rivals (Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif), has obviously spent his years in Washington DC to good purpose, as evident from his book, Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military released recently by the Carnegie Endowment.

The book should be welcomed for both its content as well as its timing, by political analysts and common citizens of this tormented land. Simultaneously, it should merit consideration by the establishments in both Pakistan and the United States, given the fact that not only is Pakistan the recipient of massive amounts of assistance from the US, but that Washington has declared Pakistan, and more importantly its military ruler, General Musharraf, as a lynchpin in American plans for combating global terrorism.

Mr Haqqani paints a wide canvas, in which he not only deals extensively with the role of the Islamic parties and the armed forces in the evolution and development of the country's politics, society and the economy, but goes back to the very origins of the country's quest for security and an identify. In pursuit of this ambitious objective, he seeks to examine all those postulates which became sacred over time, not because they emanated from the people, but because it was to the advantage of the ruling circles, to perpetuate these myths and turn them into shibboleths.

A stage was reached where Mr Jinnah's important policy pronouncement was altered to suit the whims of the rulers. Therefore, it is imperative to know the tragic events that led to the evolution and development of a polity that became religiously extremist and socially bigoted, that in turn transformed the country into a fundamentalist state, where the military claims for itself the unquestioned right to rule. And in this most bizarre mix, the United States became not only a key player, but one whose influence continued to grow, even at times when the two appeared to be drifting apart. No wonder then, that though Pakistan has been one of the major recipients of American largesse, the country's vast majority has a hostile view of the US.

Of course, many of the things that Haqqani writes about have been known or suspected for years. To see the confirmation of these misgivings, by reference to source material, is deeply disturbing. Should we then be surprised to learn that the army chief decided way back in September 1953 to visit the United States at his own volition, so he could offer Pakistan's services to serve US interests as the West's eastern anchor in an Asian alliance.

Or, that Gen Ayub had discussed with the British envoy his plans to topple the civilian government because the time had come for him to act, and presumably was encouraged to do so. And, notwithstanding his own aversion to religious rituals, Ayub recognized early on the usefulness of injecting Islam into the body politic of the country. Therefore, while abroad, he presented himself as an Ataturk, while at home, he moved Pakistan further along the road of a state-sponsored ideology.

It was however under Pakistan's second military spell that the regime not only co-opted the Islamists into the state machinery but made them and the military, the guardians of state ideology. That this should have been done by Gen Yahya, who in his personal life showed scant respect for the precepts of Islam, made it even more cynical.

Bhutto did succeed in creating a new Pakistani order in which secular civilians attained ascendancy, but he failed to protect it against the onslaught of the mosque-military combine..... because of his compromises with the forces of obscurantism and his desire for a large military beholden to him. Thereafter, Zia ul Haq not only attained power as a result of the mosque-military alliance, he also worked assiduously to strengthen it over the next 11 years.

On Afghanistan, the book tells us that much before the Soviets had installed Babrak Karmal in Kabul, both Pakistani and American intelligence were already funnelling in men, money and material into that country.

However, it was Gen Zia, who having seen his two military predecessors stumble into war with India, and thereafter lose American support and finally their power, who realized the folly of repeating the same mistake. He was fortunate in having the brilliant strategic thinker, Yaqub Khan as his close confidant and counselor. The latter had the foresight to point out the dangers of a conflict with India, especially at a time when we were already engaged in a war-like situation with Afghanistan.

General Musharraf, too, having engaged in the Kargil encounter and seen its fall-out, realized early on that the semblance of good relations with India had become a prerequisite for Pakistan's security relationship with the US. He, therefore, made normalization with India his major goal. This has not only earned him kudos in Washington, but made it possible for the resumption of American arms supply to Pakistan.

Significantly but tragically, the two civilian political leaders who were the most enthusiastic supporters of a strong military and went out of their way to prevent its humiliation met inglorious ends. True, both Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif made many mistakes, including ˜their refusal to compromise and work with each other, but it is equally true that the civilian leaders might not have blundered into many of their bad decisions if they had not had the mullahs and the military narrowing their options.

That the Americans have always had a preference for military rulers in Pakistan is well-documented. Nevertheless, to see fresh corroboration of this is an eye-opener, to any who suffers from the illusion that the US is committed to democracy and the rule of law.

Our military rulers, aware that American policymakers focus much more on the failings of politicians than on their shortcomings, make it a special point to cultivate the Pentagon. In this context, the roles played by Generals Zinni and Frank to facilitate General Musharraf's acceptance in Washington is fresh confirmation of this perception. Relevant here is also the observation of the American historian Dennis Kux, who in the context of the 1990 aid suspension has written that the Pentagon was especially sorry about the rupture in cooperative security ties.

Even more revealing are the aid statistics. Between 1954 and 2002, the US provided a total of $12.6 billion to Pakistan. Of this $9.19 billion was given during 24 years of military rule, while only $3.4 billion was provided to civilian governments covering 19 years.

Admittedly, American support for Pakistan's military regimes has not made the task any easier for Pakistan's weak, secular civil society to assert itself and wean Pakistan away from the rhetoric of Islamic ideology toward issues of real concern for the citizens. But is there any lesson in all this for the present leadership, should it ever wish to disengage itself from its involvement in national politics? Ironically, it may be the counsel of a senior general, who was one of the foremost proponents of the army's rule, that it may wish to recall.

In 1969, Major General Sher Ali Khan had advised Gen Yahya that the army's ability to rule lay in its being perceived by the people as mythical entity, a magical force, that would succour them in times of need when all else failed. It is for the current rulers to determine if any of that myth or magic remains. But they are patriots. They have to recognize that continued denial to the people of their inherent right to be governed by a freely and fairly elected government, that is accountable and answerable to them, amounts to preventing the inevitable march of history.

They must also realize that the alliance between the military and the Islamists has the potential to frustrate anti-terrorist operations, radicalize key segments of the Islamic world, and bring India and Pakistan to the brink of war. There are other dangers as well, arising primarily from the regimes willingness to adjust its priorities to fit within the parameters of US global concerns. Do we not realize that we are receiving military and economic aid from the Americans only because we have made Pakistan, a rentier state, albeit one that lives off the rents for its strategic location.

The US, too, must abandon its preference for quick, short-term, transient advantages for long-term, permanent benefits. It must recognize its past mistakes, and then embrace strategic choices, such as strengthening civil society, encouraging secular political parties, nurturing forces of peace and moderation and insisting on democratic values and the rule of law everywhere, but certainly so in countries that seek American support and assistance. It is only then that the Americans will be perceived as friends and not masters.

Islamabad, 4 July 2005: Former Prime Minister and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto said that the dark clouds of military dictatorship once again enveloped the country as a military adventurer exploits the situation in Afghanistan for his personal benefit but history teaches that dictatorships do not last when the people fight for the truth.

"Inshallah, the days of dictatorship will soon end", she said in a message on the eve of Black Day falling on July 5 when General Zia imposed military dictatorship in the country in 1977 by overthrowing the democratically elected government of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

"Repeated military interventions was aimed at Military colonialism and was unacceptable".

Let all of us who believe in the higher ideals of liberty, fraternity, equality, justice, human rights and empowerment determine to raise our voices forever to bring about the dawn of democracy, the former Prime Minister said.

Since Zia’s coup the military has refused to go back into the barracks. How the military establishment undermined Pakistan’s nascent return to democracy after the election of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto is now well documented, she said.

She said that the Pakistan Peoples Party is a symbol of the country's democratic journey and would make every effort to restore to the people their lost political, economic and social rights.

Following is the text of her message on July 5, which the PPP observed as black day.

"July 5 is a black day in the history of Pakistan. It was on this day in 1977 when a military dictator struck in the middle of the night to overthrow a democratic and popularly elected government. The arrest and murder of the elected Prime Minister on trumped up charges was internationally condemned and domestically opposed. The country was turned into a detention camp in the run up to and after the murder. The stain of the murder remained on the hands of the dictator till the day he died. Many think he was killed by those who had access to his C130, which could only be his close colleagues.

"What followed thereafter is a sordid and unfortunate tale of destruction of democratic state institutions, decimation of the judiciary, usurpation of fundamental rights and disenfranchisement of the people of Pakistan. A reign of terror was let loose, innocent people were flogged and hanged merely for political dissent and ethnicity and sectarianism were deliberately promoted by the usurper to create an artificial constituency for perpetuating his rule.

"The ugly legacy of the military dictatorship culminated in a society where drugs and guns flourished known as the kalishnikov culture. The military dictatorship, believing in divide and rule, created ethnic and sectarian parties to spread bloodshed and fear in the country.

"Corruption flourished with the creation of dollar Generals who exploited the Soviet presence in Afghanistan to line their own pockets. Hathora group was created to axe sleeping citizens to death, assassinations of leading figures were carried out and discriminatory laws against women and minorities passed. Siachen Glacier was lost while the dictator watched Indian cricket and Indian films.

"The dictatorship promoted and patronised the most extreme religious groups that went on to form Taliban and Al Qaeda and plunge the world into a most dangerous situation with suspicion against Muslims rising globally. The military dictatorship introduced the teachings of Maulana Maudoodi into the armed forces and promoted those officers that it felt would defend its ideology based on a particular religious school of thought. The Universities were destroyed as intellectual debate was prohibited and secular minded professors denied promotion. The students were killed at the hands of groups patronised by the military dictatorship. It was a brutal, barbaric period in the history of Pakistan, which will forever be a black chapter to warn future generations of the ills of military intervention.

"Most sordid was the cold blooded torture that was carried out of youth that with courage raised the flag of democracy. Hundreds of thousands were arrested in stages, thousands were whiplashed, women were taken to dark dungeons. The extreme ferocity of violence indulged in led to a backlash where the regime itself was challenged by armed force. Innocent young men, parliamentarians and press were tried by summary military courts, spread-eagled in a medieval fashion and whiplashed shaming the regime with its extreme despotism and fear of the public. Military summary courts were created to hand out death sentences to PPP and other democratic supporters who were then hanged. The decisions were taken by the military dictator individually and personally and then rubber stamped by his subordinates in the military courts.

"Scores of protestors were killed in movement after movement in cold blood. Nature took its own revenge. When the dictator died, his body could not be recovered. When it was recovered a week later, it was buried secretly without any family members in attendance. He who did not let mourning family members mourn those that he killed in scores was denied the opportunity to have his own family mourn him.

"The dictator did a great disservice to religion when he exploited the fair name of Islam to provide a cover for some of the most oppressive measures of the usurper.

"Today the dark clouds of military dictatorship once again envelop the country as another military adventurer exploits the situation in Afghanistan for his personal benefit. However, history proves that dictatorships do not last when the people have a will to oppose it and to fight for the truth. Inshallah, the days of dictatorship will soon end. Let all of us who believe in the higher ideals of liberty, fraternity, equality, justice, human rights and empowerment determine to raise our voices forever to bring about the dawn of democracy so that sunshine once again allows the hopes and aspirations of our oppressed, exploited and discriminated people to blossom and flourish.

"On this day the Pakistan Peoples Party workers salute Quaid e Awam and all those who gave their lives during the trial and terror the Zia military dictatorship to keep alive the flame of democracy which still burns brightly despite all the attempts to extinguish it by using state force and repression. In the end of the day, it is not the sword that triumphs but the pen because ideas live forever carried in the hearts of all those who dream of a better future, a future of hope, a future of progress, a future of justice and a future of prosperity. That is the future the PPP and I seek for our one hundred and fifty million people."

PPP slates damage to country through cable failure
Says crisis deeper than it appears.

Islamabad, 3 July 2005: Pakistan Peoples Party has expressed concern over the incompetence of the present military led regime for causing economic and financial damage to Pakistan.

In a statement today a spokesman of the Party said that the latest major crisis relating to information technology that has engulfed Pakistan is evidence of the incompetence and bungling of the present regime.

The PPP noted that despite the enormous damage caused to the country, no head had fallen and the Minister concerned was not asked to resign.

Pakistan's Internet and other telecom links with the rest of the world were severed last week on account of a fault in a key submarine cable that experts said could take two weeks to repair. It was unfortunate that the incompetent son of the disloyal Farooq Leghari, namely Minister of IT & Telecom, Mr. Awais Leghari, has no clue what happened and how it will be fixed.

The spokesman that the incident has shaken the will of foreign IT investors who before this incident were considering to invest in Pakistan IT sector. Cancellation of multinational IT and telecom contracts has already started.

The country's IT industry was shocked on Wednesday when Indian call centres that were about to outsource $10-$20 million business to Pakistan withdrew the offer, as the lingering Internet blackout caused a mistrust in India about Pakistan's telecom infrastructure.

The spokesman said that despite this huge financial loss, the incompetent and non-technical IT minister was not sacked. It said that the Musharaf regime has a Minister who has no idea that Pakistan is the only country in the region that relies on a single cable. There is no backup cable, no disaster recovery strategy and no business continuity plan in place. Even Pakistan Army was caught off-guard in this regard.

The PPP asked: who is defender of Pakistan's technology infrastructure? Why Pakistani Govt. depended only on single point of failure? Is it safe to give such a sensitive portfolio to a minister who is just B.A in political science and has no clue about technology.

The PPP expressed concern that the PTCL (Pakistan Telecommunication Corp. Ltd) was misleading the country about the time required to fix or repair the cable. Earlier it was 24 hours, then two days and now one week. However, independent observers say it could take two weeks to find and fix under sea cable.

The PPP spokesman said that the incompetent regime failed to realise that this issue is bigger than it appears. Pakistan may end up loosing 60% to 80% on its online trading transactions, turning away foreign investors etc.

But other than financial implications it poses another question, what is our backup/disaster recovery strategy if a glitch happens in our nuclear program? The PPP said that this is why it believes that democracy is the best system to safeguard the interests of the Nation. Elected officials are accountable and keep the interests of the country foremost. Dictatorships are pre occupied with self survival and have no time to give to the national interests.

PPP asks clarification on eligibility for third term as Prime Minister

Islamabad July 3, 2005: The Pakistan Peoples Party has asked General Pervez Musharraf to clarify the contradiction between his claim not to let Mohtarma Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif contest the next general elections and the statement by the Parliamentary Affairs Minister that both the former Prime Ministers were eligible to contest for a third term of office.

The Federal Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Dr. Sher Afgan Niazi has said that that there is no bar on either Nawaz Sharif or Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto on their third term as Prime Minister. In an interview with newspapers and on private TV channels he said that the two former Prime Ministers have been agitating about this so-called restriction just to gain public sympathy.

The federal Minister also said that the Constitution has no such article which even indicates any bar on consecutive terms as a Prime Minister. The constitution only outlined qualifications of members of the provincial and national Assemblies who aspired for the post of Prime Minister, he said.

It is strange that on the one hand it is admitted that there is no constitutional bar on contesting elections for Prime Ministership by Mohtarma Bhutto and Mian Nawaz Sharif and also claimed on the other that they would not be allowed to do so because they have been prime ministers twice each, spokesman of the PPP said in a statement today.

"This is contradiction galore like so many other contradictions in the regime’s claims and actions", the spokesman said and demanded of General Musharraf to make a categorical policy statement on the issue.

US urged to persuade Pakistan to respect human rights
By Khalid Hasan

WASHINGTON: Several experts have urged the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) to maintain pressure on Pakistan on human rights issues.

The Commission monitors the observance of freedom of conscience and belief in other countries and makes recommendations to the US President, Secretary of State and Congress. During a hearing - ‘The United States and Pakistan: navigating a complex relationship’ - on June 30, the Commission heard testimony from former Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia, Karl Inderfurth; Husain Haqqani of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the University of Boston, Christine Fair of the United States Institute of Peace and Daniele Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute.

The four witnesses agreed on the need for greater US pressure over human rights and democratisation issues but did not support any sanctions, saying sanctions would be counter-productive. “The Bush administration should temper its praise of General Musharraf for cooperating in the war against terrorism with criticism of his conduct in domestic politics,” one witness told the Commission.

The Commission chairperson, Preeta D Bansal, said that Commission members were not satisfied with Pakistan’s human rights record and had recommended the naming of Pakistan as a “country of particular concern (CPC)” for violations of religious freedom. To date, the US State Department has not designated Pakistan a CPC, obviously to avoid friction with a critical US ally.

Inderfurth praised Pakistan’s improved economic performance and the peace process with India, while stressing the need for progress in the area of Pakistan’s adherence to the universal principles of human rights. He said that it is in America’s interest to stay engaged with Pakistan and that US-Pakistan relations are better now than they have been in many years. According to Inderfurth, US criticism of the Musharraf government should be in private conversations with Pakistani officials as public criticism would hurt Pakistan’s national pride.

Ms Pletka of the conservative American Enterprise Institute told the Commission that the US needs Pakistan’s cooperation in the global war against terrorism, which limits the State Department’s options in dealing with General Musharraf. However, she added that Pakistan should not be “allowed to have it both ways” and claimed that Pakistan had continuously sided with violators of human rights in the United Nations instead of supporting the United States.

Haqqani presented a 30-page written statement outlining the history of religious tolerance and moderation in Pakistan. His recent book ‘Pakistan between Mosque and Military’ was also cited by the Commission’s chairperson as an important new research source about developments in Pakistan. The Pakistani academic and journalist told the Commission that Pakistan was created as “a non-sectarian state that would protect religious freedoms and provide the Muslims of South Asia an opportunity to live in a country where they constituted a majority.” He said, “Pakistan’s founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, was a Shia Muslim. Its first law minister was a Hindu. Its foreign minister belonged to the Ahmadiyya community.” He blaming the lack of adherence to constitutionalism for Pakistan’s descent into sectarian violence, militarism and religious fanaticism. He said the United States had provided Pakistan with $339 million for each year Pakistan had been under military rule since 1954, whereas US aid had totalled only $156 million for every year of civilian ascendancy. “US aid should not bolster the Pakistani military’s control over civilian institutions,” Haqqani argued, calling for US engagement with Pakistan to reflect a relationship with Pakistan’s people and their representatives instead of encouraging militarism, which he described as the main instigator of religious intolerance.

Haqqani said that ideally Pakistan’s political issues should be settled within Pakistan but if US assistance strengthens a regime violating citizens’ rights, then countervailing influence on behalf of Pakistani civil society was also needed. He cited the recent Mukhtaran Mai case and said that General Musharraf had reversed his decision banning Mukhtaran Mai’s travel outside of Pakistan after a call by US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice. “The US Secretary of State would never have called on behalf of Mukhtaran Mai if New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof had not drawn attention to her case in the influential American newspaper,” he observed.

He also proposed “more public US engagement with opposition leaders Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif” to indicate America’s concern about democracy in Pakistan because the civilian façade introduced by General Musharraf had failed so far to generate a popular political leadership.

Mohtarma Bhutto says discrepancy in voters lists evidence of polls rigging Calls for permission to use multiple identity proofs

Islamabad July 3, 2005: Former Premier and Chairperson of the Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has said that the discrepancy between electoral lists of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and NADRA, the identity card organization, are evidence of rigging in the forthcoming local elections.

In a statement today she said that in many villages across the country where hundreds lived, only four or five had identity cards without which one could not vote, adding "local elections are a farce when identity cards are restricted".

According to the ECP there were a total of 62,600,000 voters as of May 31, 2005. Nadra statistics show a total of 70,194,070 voters as on August 30, 2002.

The difference amongst the two lists amounts to 7,594,070 voters. As the ECP electoral lists are to be used, it means several million voters have disappeared if one takes the figures of 2002, she said. In fact the numbers should have increased with the population. It is this difference where the Party suspects the ghost voters are to be brought into play.

The PPP denounced the holding of local elections under such blatant undermining of a transparent process.

The former Prime Minister said that fresh electoral rolls through an independent body were essential to the holding of fair elections. She noted that although NADRA had more persons enrolled than ECP, nonetheless, NADRA enrolment had left out hundreds of thousands of citizens.

She said that in constituencies where there was population of hundreds, five to ten had identity cards which amounted to a massive disenfranchisement of the people of the country for political purposes.

She called upon the Election Commission to permit multiple identity proofs as hundreds of thousands of people would be disenfranchised if required to vote using only single identity. "Passports, licenses etc were also valid identity papers", she said.

During the PPP government, independent electoral rolls were drawn up in 1996. However, those independent electoral rolls have been abandoned and replaced with the present defective electoral rolls. The PPP has been calling for the Pakistan Human Rights to look after the Election Commission so that fair rolls can be prepared to prevent rigging. However, the present regime, fearful of losing, has not permitted this.

Musharraf Agrees to End Exile of Nawaz Sharif, under Saudi Pressure
 

By M Afzal Khan

ISLAMABAD, July 2: General Pervez Musharraf has agreed to allow exiled former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to end his exile later this year and return to Pakistan and Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah has played the key role to persuade him.
The Saudis have also used their influence with the Sharifs to push the reunification of the splintered Pakistan Muslim League (PML), reliable sources say. Prince Abdullah has secured assurances from Musharraf that Nawaz would be guaranteed an honorable return to Pakistan along with all his family members, once a deal is put in place.

Musharraf’s sudden dash to Saudi Arabia early this week was prompted by positive vibes from the Crown Prince, indicating his willingness to broker a rapprochement between him and the Sharifs.

Nawaz Sharif was appropriately briefed by the Saudi royal family about Abdullah-Musharraf meeting in Riyadh and is believed to be currently engaged in intensive consultations with his family members.

Musharraf took with him PML Chief Choudhry Shujaat Hussain and PPP-rebel Rao Sikandar Iqbal, now Defence Minister and Chairman of the pro-government PPP. Rao is reportedly joining the unified Muslim League in which he has been promised an important slot.

Efforts for invoking the Crown Prince’s intervention in bolstering Gen. Musharraf’s presidential ambitions beyond 2007 have been going on for quite some time. Apart from oblique suggestions in earlier meetings, diplomatic channels have been used by both sides to clinch the matter.

Once the things crystallized considerably, a presidential visit was hastily arranged and the meeting took place on June 25 in Riyadh where both sides worked out a methodology to proceed further.

The visit was so sudden that Senate Chairman Mohammadmian Soomro had to cut short his US visit and rush back to Islamabad to take over as acting president. Speaker Choudhry Amir Hussain who was also on one of his perennial foreign trips, was alerted as a standby arrangement, but Soomro made it well in time.

The initiative to reach out to Nawaz Sharif has been running parallel to the covert contacts with PPP chairperson Ms. Benazir Bhutto and her spouse Asif Ali Zardari.

Nawaz Sharif’s hard line stance towards military rule and Choudhry’s reservations towards Nawaz remained the major stumbling blocks in these contacts. Though Shahbaz Sharif had remained part of these efforts, he could not make any move until Nawaz was sufficiently persuaded to accept the terms of the rapprochement.

Nawaz Sharif is indebted to the Crown Prince for saving his life and providing him a comfortable abode in Jeddah where the family is also pursuing its business interests with great success.

“The Sharifs have endured lot of hardship during past four and half years and do not deserve it any more, “the Crown Prince was reported to have told Musharraf who was the first to raise the issue of PML unification. Musharraf is believed to have promised to take concrete steps by October in this respect.

The President has also surmounted another hurdle in these efforts which had come from Choudhry’s hesitation to make peace with Nawaz Sharif.

The Choudhries have been guaranteed that their political interests in Punjab would be protected. The arrangements with Sharifs would begin to take shape after the Choudhry have had their political hold strengthened in the local bodies’ elections. The President and the Choudhry would thus be negotiating with Sharifs from a position of strength.

Nawaz Sharif feels stung by the “betrayal” of the Choudhry whom he accused of stabbing him in the back by splitting the party. However, a satisfactory arrangement that ensures their respectable return to Pakistan would soothe these wounds.

For Choudhry, a revival of relationship with Sharifs would be far easier to conjure compared to accepting Musharraf’s rapprochement with Ms. Bhutto. They have already torpedoed Musharraf’s contacts with Ms. Bhutto. The anti-Bhutto lobby is also banking much on the outcome of Swiss case against her which they expect to go against her.

Rao Sikandar is reportedly all set to join the PML. He hopes to take along most of his PPP (Patriot) colleagues though Aftab Sherpao and Faisal Saleh Hayat may find it difficult to follow the suit.

The writer is a senior journalist based in Islamabad. He writes for the Khaleej Times and The Nation

PPP appreciates contributions of NGOs

Islamabad July 02, 2005: The Pakistan Peoples Party believes that most of the NGO's are serving the public and the Party appreciates the work that they are doing.

In a statement today a spokesman of the Party said that it is not correct to paint black all NGOs as has been done by some quarters.

The NGO's are often filling the gap in services which the state is unable to fill, he said. Alternatively, they are emerging as organized voices of civil society to create awareness about gender rights, minority rights, transparency, accountability, human rights and democracy.

The spokesperson said the Party respects the work done by the NGOs in these and other areas.

PPP district boards to identify Awam Dost candidates for LB Polls

Decision taken last year by chairperson to empower district organizations

Islamabad July 01, 2005: Awam dost candidates for the local elections will be decided by the District and Provincial Organizations.

In a statement today a spokesman of the Pakistan Peoples Party said that the Party in its meeting held in June 2004 with the Chairperson in London decided to follow a decentralized pattern for the LB polls. He said that news reports that the PPP will send list of candidates for LB polls to Chairperson Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto were not correct.

Under the Party procedure, the tickets for the National, Provincial and Senate elections will be decided by the Central Party. However, candidates for the local elections will be decided by the District and Provincial Organizations, he said.

The Chairperson took the decision to empower the district organizations because when bodies exercise power they become important but when organizations have no power they lose their influence.

The PPP would like to see strong grass roots leadership emerge and therefore it was decided to establish District Boards headed by the District Presidents to take decisions in consultation with organization members and ticket holders as well as sitting councilors and Nazims for the district, the spokesman said.

He said that the provincial presidents have been asked to monitor the process by ensuring that the districts indeed held the district board meetings with regard to the local elections. In areas of dispute, the provincial executive will be the final arbitrator, the spokesman said.

As for the election to the district Nazim position is concerned, the Provincial President will obtain three names from the district organizations and discuss the same with his organization and with the Chairperson before a final decision is made.

Meanwhile the Secretary General of the Party and the Provincial Presidents have called upon the District Presidents to expedite the process of holding meetings with their executives, ticket holders, sitting Nazims and councilors as well as presidents and secretaries of affiliate bodies including minority coalition partner the All Pakistan Christian Minority Association headed by Mr. Shahbaz Bhatti and other supporters.

For convenience the District president is authorized, should he wish, to decentralize further by setting up tehsil wise committees with the participation of members according to the criteria as established.

PPP appreciates contributions of NGOs

Islamabad July 01, 2005: The Pakistan Peoples Party believes that most of the NGO's are serving the public and the Party appreciates the work that they are doing.

In a statement today a spokesman of the Party said that it is not correct to paint black all NGOs as has been done by some quarters.

The NGO's are often filling the gap in services which the state is unable to fill, he said. Alternatively, they are emerging as organized voices of civil society to create awareness about gender rights, minority rights, transparency, accountability, human rights and democracy.

The spokesperson said the Party respects the work done by the NGOs in these and other areas.

Benazir debunks widening gap between rich and poor in Pakistan
Pakistan Times Foreign Desk

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan's ex-Prime Minister and Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party, Ms Benazir Bhutto has said that the country was facing a serious economic crisis but "unfortunately the regime was too busy taking free trips overseas to notice the poverty and unemployment which was destroying the lives of the majority of the people".

“This false image was an attempt to hide the reality of abysmal poverty and continued rise in rate of economic suicides, people who were killing themselves because they could not eat”.

The PPP, as a party of the people, was alleviating poverty and providing jobs "when power hungry people who did not care for the national interest toppled it", she said.

Ms Benazir Bhutto said that the Islamic values of humanism and equality were being ignored by the government that had "grown rich and was concerned only about the rich while the poor and the working classes were suffering".

Recaps 1970 Epoch

The PPP Chairperson noted that the situation was worse than in 1970 when the PPP first swept to power in a landslide win. She recalled that in 1970, top 20 % of Pakistanis accounted for 40 percent of national income while the lowest 20 percent held only 8 percent.

"Now the top 20 percent own 42% while the lowest 20% still have around 8% of the national income. Obviously, the increase in the income of the richest 20 percent has been at the expense of the middle 60%", he said.

Ms Bhutto said said that on Saturday June-25, the press reported that several people committed suicide. According to press reports, “Muhammad Shaaban, a 25-year old, committed suicide by drinking bleaching liquid. His mother, a widow, told reporters Shaaban had come home to find no food in the house".

The ex-Prime Minister said that in a PPP government "such criminal negligence could never take place". She said that she had refused to accept "the regime because she wanted the people of the country to prosper".

Mohtarma Bhutto slates petroleum price increase
Says decision has compounded common man’s hardships
 

Islamabad July 01, 2005: Chairperson Pakistan Peoples Party Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto has criticized the sixth rise in petroleum prices in seven months.

The Petroleum prices have touched a high of Rs 49 per liter which is one of the highest in the region.

The former Prime Minister said that the Petroleum price affected the entire economy and raising the petroleum price was similar to raising price of every day items including production of household items, electricity, tube wells and agricultural products in addition to transport costs.

She said that when the international prices of petroleum were low, PPP was bringing the prices down so that when they went up the consumer would not feel it as much as if it was raised from a higher level. However, with the undemocratic dismissal of the PPP government, the pro people policies were abandoned and the price of oil was not lowered to the international level, she said.

Mohtarma Bhutto said that if the regime could not lower the price when the international price was down, it should not raise the price when it is high. She criticized the regime for using petroleum as a way to tax the people of Pakistan.

She said that the Budget should have shown the true picture of the economy. However, this was hidden because the regime wished to stab the people in the back with slow, incremental increases over the year.

She said that the sufferings of the people had increased under the Musharaf dictatorship. It was only with the restoration of democracy and peoples rule that the people would begin to progress again.

Words of Shaheed