Brave Pakistan army

TO understand them, there’s just two dates you need to know: 1971 and 1977. In 1971, the Pakistan Army contrived to lose half of Pakistan. In 1977, the Pakistan Army was back running Pakistan. Six years was all it took. And if 1971-1977 happened, what’s 2008-2014? Nawaz didn’t stand a chance. But Nawaz has also helped write his political obituary. Twice now he’s been called a liar. First, it was the Musharraf promise: the boys let it be known that Nawaz had reneged on his government’s promise to indict and then allow Musharraf to leave the country.

Maybe the Musharraf promise had been made or maybe it hadn’t. What was alarming was that the boys were quietly letting it be known that they thought they had a deal and the PM double-crossed them. In essence, the boys were accusing the PM of being a dishonourable man. That’s a perception — correct or incorrect, right or wrong — that you don’t want the boys to have. It explains what came this week. Briefly, Nawaz himself tried to shift perceptions, to collar Imran and Qadri and stick them in next to the boys.

Immediately, the boys hit back. This time there were no leaks, no background chatter, no carefully sown doubts. Sorry, Prime Minister, you’re a liar — it was direct, it was blunt and it’s devastating. You have to wonder if a third time will be necessary. Why would Nawaz do it? Even if he’s right — he hasn’t lied — and they’re wrong, why would he so casually let such poison flow so freely in so vital a relationship?

Take your pick. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t know better. Or he thinks it will work. None of them really make sense. It also doesn’t matter. The mandate was already dead. Now, Nawaz will survive on sufferance — their sufferance. You don’t make them out to be liars and stay in control of your destiny. The other thing you don’t do is call them out on their lies.

Nawaz knows plenty of their lies. As does anyone who’s dealt with the boys and dealt with people who’ve had to suffer the boys. Stories, apocryphal and true, suffice. Just this term, Nawaz has caught them twice. Once, he was told the Taliban were lying, that there were no non-combatant captives. Then the Achakzai line to Karzai was opened to get the real story from the other side. Nawaz knew he was being dissembled with.

How strong are they? Nawaz knows. He once told the story of the other Pakistan, the one they contrived to lose in 1971. Nawaz went there, some years ago, and met all the big guns, the fearsome political rivals and the boys in charge there. Each one of them complained about interference and those three letters: I.S.I.

Isn’t it extraordinary? Bitter rivals they are over there, opposing camps, fiercely divided — and yet all speak about our boys and all say the same thing.

Playing all sides against each other in faraway Bangladesh? You’d think everyone has forgotten about Bangladesh, or would like to forget. But that’s our boys: they never forget. It doesn’t take much to figure out what they can do with home advantage. So many sides, so many angles, so many games, so many Qadris and Imrans — always one bottom line: they stay strong; everyone else stays weak.

But Nawaz keeps quiet. As did Zardari. As do all the civilians. Because to call them out is to invoke a wrath that can bring all your skeletons tumbling out. And you don’t want your skeletons to come tumbling out.

Where to now? The transition has ruptured. If that wasn’t dismal enough, there’s no one on the horizon who can help put it back on track. So now we have to go big, to look at epochs and what makes them. There’s two that matter so far.

The boys and their system were forged in the first decade of this country’s existence. Ayesha Jalal in The State of Martial Rule has explained it more convincingly and eloquently than anyone else: in the shadow of the Cold War and in combination with regional and domestic factors, the structure of the Pakistani state was forged. That’s the edifice, that’s the system, that’s the boys and what makes the boys the boys. But the boys are in denial. There is a second epoch. Fast forward to the late 1970s. Three events in quick succession, the meaning and combined effects of which the country has yet to figure out: Zia and his Islamisation; the Shia-Sunni schism reignited by revolution just when petro-dollars were coming into their own; and the Soviets wading into Afghanistan.

The civilians haven’t been allowed to grow, but events — blessed, cursed, events — have grown. Everything the boys are contending with, the big changes they have been forced into stem from those events. See, one hundred and seventy five thousand troops in Fata fighting Islamist militants. So change is here, we’re already living it and the boys are struggling to cope. Which means, eventually, either they’ll have to make choices or events will make the choice for them. When the rupture does come though — when things break apart — it may not be the civilians who will get to collect the pieces and put Pakistan back together; it could be something far uglier.

But that’s the risk. Because Zardari failed, Nawaz is failing and Imran is a failure. But, most of all, because the boys think failure is victory. That’s what got them from 1971 to 1977. And that’s what’s got them from 2008 to 2014.

Supporters of fiery anti-government cleric Tahir-ul-Qadri, his images seen at background, take part in a protest, in Islamabad, Pakistan. Qadri led rallies  in Pakistan’s capital, demanding Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif step down over alleged fraud in last year’s election in front of  of protesters.

Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri (born 19 February 1951) is a Pakistani politician, former law professor and SufiIslamic scholar.[3][4] He was a former professor of international constitutional law at the University of the Punjab.[5] Qadri is also the founding chairman of Minhaj-ul-Quran International. 

Qadri learned from a number of classical authorities in Islamic sciences, including Abu al-Barakat Ahmad al-Qadri al-Alwari.[citation needed]

Qadri studied law at the University of the Punjab in Lahore, where he graduated with an LLB in 1974, gaining a Gold Medal for his academic performances.[6] Following a period of legal practice as an advocate, he taught law at the University of the Punjab from 1978 to 1983 and then gained his PhD[7] in Islamic Law (Punishments in Islam, their Classification and Philosophy) in 1986 from the same university. His supervisors were Bashir Ahmad Siddiqui (‘Ulum al-Islamiyya) and Javaid Iqbal.[8][9] He was appointed as aprofessor of law at the University of Punjab, where he taught British, US and Islamic constitutional law.[citation needed]

On 25 May 1989, Qadri founded a political party, Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT). This party aims to introduce the culture of democracy, promote economic stability, and improve the state of human rights, justice, and women's roles in Pakistan. The PAT also aims to remove corruption from Pakistani politics. Its official website contains its formal manifesto.[10] In 1990, Qadri participated in the national election. In 1991, PAT and TNFJ (Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Fiqh-e-Jafria A shia political group), now known as Tehreek-e-Jafria,[11] introduced the idea of political working relationship. From 1989 to 1993, Qadri continuously worked as an opposition leader.[12]

He was also elected as a Member of the National Assembly for his constituency. On 29 November 2004, Qadri announced his resignation as a Member of the National Assembly.[13] Qadri views an Islamic state as a Muslim-majority country which respects freedom, the rule of law, global human rights (including religious freedom), social welfare, women's rights and the rights of minorities.[14] He also claims that the Constitution of Medina "declared the state of Madinah as a political unit". He also mentions that the Constitution declared the "indivisible composition of the Muslim nation (Ummah)".[15] With respect to the Constitution of Medina, Qadri says: "This was the constitution, which provided the guarantee of fundamental human rights in our history." He believes that "a constitution is a man-made law and by no means it can be declared superior to a God-made law."[15]

Qadri apparently made contradictory statements regarding his role in the making of Pakistan's blasphemy Law. In an Urdu-language speech he said: "I would like to lift the veil that this blasphemy law ... it was I who had this law made, that no matter who commits blasphemy, whether Muslim or Non-Muslim, man or woman, Christian or Jew, whoever commits blasphemy should be killed like a dog!" Yet in another video he says: "Whatever the Law of blasphemy is, is not applicable on non Muslims, is not applicable on Jews, Christians, and any other non-Muslims. I was never a part of shaping this law in the parliament made by Zia-ul-Haq.".[16][17][18][19][20] After the disclosure of this apparent contradiction in the Danish Media, the Integration and social affairs minister, Karen Hækkerup, pulled out of a conference on religious radicalism after she discovered that Qadri helped to fashion Pakistan’s anti-blasphemy law. She said she would not share a stage with a controversial Muslim scholar who helped to create that law.[21]

In December 2012, after living for seven years in Toronto, Canada, Qadri returned to Pakistan and initiated a political campaign which called for a "democratic revolution"[this quote needs a citation] through electoral reforms. Qadri called for a "million-men" march in Islamabad to protest against the government's corruption.[22] On 14 January 2013, crowds marched down the city's main avenue. Thousands of people pledged to sit-in until their demands were met.[23] When he started the long march from Lahore about 15,000 people were with him.[24] He told the rally in front of parliament: "There is no Parliament; there is a group of looters, thieves and dacoits [bandits] ... Our lawmakers are the lawbreakers."[25] After four days of sit-in, the Government and Qadri signed an agreement called the Islamabad Long March Declaration, which promises electoral reforms and increased political transparency.[26] Although Qadri called for a "million-men" march, the estimated total present for the sit-in in Islamabad was 25,000 according to the government.[24]

Critics have charged that the protests were a ploy by the Pakistan Armed Forces to delay elections and weaken the influence of the civilian government, citing Qadri's close ties to the military, dual nationality and foreign sources of funding.[27][28] Lawyers for the Supreme Court of Pakistan claimed that Qadri's demands are unfeasible because they conflict with the Constitution of Pakistan.[29] The Tribune reported on 17 February 2013, that Qadri seemed to have capitulated on most of his demands in the Islamabad Long March Declaration.[30]