Pakistan under Musharraf

Let me recall a few incidents. A gentleman was picked up by the police on suspicion of some minor offence, a few months ago in a town called Khanewal, around 300 km south west of provincial metropolis Lahore. The police started the routine chittor-parade (the slang word given to the police beating suspects with leather straps), the helpless guy could do nothing, but he hurled curses at his tormentors. He had forgotten the golden rule of our society that one should keep his mouth shut after suffering injustice. His mouth was physically sewn shut by policemen to silence him. The picture was carried by all television networks in Pakistan, and some abroad, and he was produced in the courts. The police denied any torture and lo and behold, everybody got down to his business thereafter.

Another person who forgot the above golden rule was a ladynow famous in the world for her courage

Mukhtaran Mai. She raised her voice against injustice. She was denied permission to visit the US by the self-proclaimed champion of Pakistan's image, General Musharraf. Of course, that a respectable lady, who had been teacher of Holy Koran for a long time, was publicly paraded naked and gang-raped had done nothing to our image, only her visit to United States would have done so. And also Pakistan being represented by a military general in itself does nothing to tarnish our image since our civilian dummy Prime Minister, with no powers, is usually not allowed to make international visits. At least, Mukhtaran Mai shares this commonality with the minister, neither can go to the US without the permission of our military chief!

The above were just ordinary mortals, but what happens to VIPs is not so different. By the way, in Pakistan's political jargon, VIP stands for Very Important Person or Very Idiot Person. Two of the former Law Ministers also forgot the golden rule; the Law Minister of Pakistan and the Law Minister of Azad Kashmirtechnically a separate state. Probably the learned ex-ministers had thought that the police would respect them as their former bosses.

Or had they forgotten the visit of the Mongolian Maritime Affairs Minister whom one of our Prime Minister had asked why was there a Maritime Minister in Mongolia, when it was landlocked. The minister looked askance and said, "But, sir, you have a Law Minister, don't you?"

One thing that Pakistan's Law Ministers and the law enforcement machinery has nothing to do with, is law, since the law does not exist. The only thing in Pakistani society that is close to law, is an unpalatable lady relative called the "mother-in-law."

Former Law Minister Afzal Haider was part of the mixed marathon in Lahore along with human rights activists like Asma Jehangir and others, who tried to exercise their right to free assembly in a free country. Just a few days before the government had taken a somersault, when it converted from being the champion to an opponent of mixed marathon events in Pakistan, under mullah pressure. The way Haider was dragged by the police and thrown in a prisoner van, in front of the world cameras, was shameful especially when the learned senator had already gracefully given his arrest any way.

Azad Kashmir's former Law Minister Farooq Ahmad was treated more roughly. He and just fifty of his supporters held a small demonstration against the shifting of a local girls college in Muzaffarabad. On the orders of the Prime Minister of Kashmir, the police made an unprovoked baton-charge on the protesters. The ex-minister was beaten so much that he received multiple bone fractures. Many of his supporters were left seriously wounded on the road and Geo television showed policemen still kicking them. Worse was to come, Farooq Ahmad was later picked up by police from a local hospital bed and ten cases under various criminal and anti-terrorist laws were registered against him. If he ever comes out of the his physical and emotional injuries, the court cases are likely to take at least the next ten years of his life. Whether Pakistani Kashmir's police has received training from their Indian side's counterparts or vice versa is not known.

An isolated incident betrays the mind of our military rulers who arbitrarily sacked and persecuted a distinguished and decorated civil servant Saad S. Khan for speaking his mind about the affairs of the country in a column titled "Open Letter to the Prime Minister." Khan, a Cambridge educated author and writer, was one of the most respected top civil servants of Pakistan. He was the former head of the civilian intelligence in the troubled province of Balochistan. He had been granted Siachen War Medal for his gallantry years ago. He was known among officer circles, for courage of conviction. He has since been run out of Pakistan.

On the economic side, although we were not doing extremely well anyway, the natural disaster of massive earthquake has compounded our problems. We are now flaunting the very same begging bowl that each of our rulers in the past 56 years claimed to have broken. We do not have enough money to pay for the tents. The 504 billion rupees that we are spending on a new GHQ in Islamabad, when we already have one just 25 km away in Rawalpindi, we cannot spare, of course. As long as aid and charity does not dry up, we are not going to tighten our belts.

Why not beg when we can easily gloat over the fact that lately even the United States received international aid after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. And we can easily justify the police brutalities in Sargodha jail when the prisoners captured the whole premises to protest against water shortage and gang bullying, because we had luckily read the report that in many prisons in the UK bullying is common of weaker prisoners, After all, these are the only two things on God's earth, in which we have to compare ourselves with the US and the UK!

The new year is bracing up for centennial celebrations of Muslim League, where a request by Chaudhry Shujaat and twenty odd prime ministerial hopefuls waiting in the wings, shall be made to President Pervez Musharraf of accepting centennial presidency of the Muslim League, giving him a uniformed lever head to continue to remain president beyond 2007. Jinnah's democratic soul would cry in his mausoleum in Karachi.

The most controversial dam in Pakistan's history would also be laid foundation to this year. Over the cries of even allied parties, over police beatings of anti-Kalabagh riots that will happen next year, over the dismissal of Chief Ministers of Sind and Balochistan, the president would try to start construction. Already his flatterers have asked him to accept the re-naming of Kalabagh dam as "Pervez Musharraf Dam." The dam will have to be dropped the moment Musharraf goes, but another 300 billion rupees or so would have been spent by then on Musharraf's personal ambitions.

We, the Pakistanis, are reaping the destruction caused by the Zia-ul-Haq years. It will take us another few decades to come out of the Musharraf follies.

The writer is a retired military officer who was Special Advisor to Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto during 1993-96.