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Vital ground

The unfortunate elongation of the 1977 Martial Law destroyed the fabric of many national institutions sustained by unfettered democracy and which inculcate built-in safeguards to cope with the social problems accompanying the spill-over of the Afghan war, millions of refugees, arms proliferation and the drug menace. Compounding the 80s decade, the two major Sindhi communities of ethnic Sindhis and Mohajirs felt dispossessed and discriminated against respectively, blaming each other mostly but also the majority Province of Punjab as being representative of Martial Law (and thus the Federal Government) in their eyes. Though Martial Law benefited only a select few, the image of the Army as a whole suffered. The lack of democracy created a ready-made vacuum for the ethnic parties to flourish, in the long run ethnicity is anathema to nationhood. Because of the sagacity of the Army leadership led by the then VCOAS, General Aslam Beg, the military opted for the democratic route in August 1988. The routine changeover to a new COAS, General Asif Nawaz, who was part of the process of the return to full democracy, added to the restoration of the credibility of the Pakistan Army.

The Pakistan Army remains almost the last remaining institution, other than the superior judiciary, still invoking universal respect among the masses, if not so much among the intelligentsia (and despite them). Sindh is our vital ground and as much as we cannot afford that Sindh is lost, failure on the part of the Army and loss of credibility thereof in restoring the writ of constitutional authority would be an unbearable catastrophe. To quote Edmund Burke, Sindh was “in such a strait (that) the wisest may well be perplexed and the boldest staggered.” For the most part, Pakistan has been dogged by a succession of poor leaders, a luxury that poor nations cannot afford. These leaders of Pakistan opted for short-term solutions, pursuing policies suited to their vested (mostly in the continuance of their rule) rather than the national interest. Those myopic policies continue even today and somebody someday will have to bell the cat in the higher interest of the nation. Before analysing the problems, we are obliged to follow Edmund Hodnetts’s advice, to quote, “a problem statement often includes (a) what is known (b) what is unknown and (c) what is sought,” unquote. Not much being left unknown, the corrective sequence invokes three distinct phases viz, (1) the first phase involves bringing peace and tranquillity to the Province with the objective of restoring the constitutional authority of the civil administration, (2) the second phase would be devoted to bringing back democratic rule by genuinely elected representatives and (3) once the environment is conducive, the third and final phase must initiate far-reaching socio-economic changes that will bring social justice and economic amelioration of all the populace residing in the Province. In contrast to previous internal security operations in Pakistan and the rest of the region, particularly India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and recently in Afghanistan (Kabul), the urban area phase in Karachi has been successful in achieving the initial objectives without any bloodshed. History will record this as a magnificent performance. To quote Sun Tzu from The Art of War, “To subdue without fighting is the acme of skill” the intention being “to overthrow without bloodying swords.” In avoiding a BLUE STAR-type blood cycle, the Pakistan Army has had to absorb unfair criticism. Better that criticism than a Vietnam-type body count any day!

The Army is now poised to flush out the criminals/terrorists and their weapon caches from their hideouts. Most dacoits having moved to urban areas, particularly Karachi, house-to-house searches should commence with the elite areas of Defence Housing Authority, Clifton and Kehkashan, KDA-1, PECHS and adjoining localities as well as Gulshan-e-Iqbal, a symbolic representation of the determination of the Army to go after all recalcitrants irrespective of their influence and place in society. An immediate requirement should be that every home owner (and if the home is rented, the tenant separately) should provide information on a single sheet of paper pertaining to (a) name of owner and NIC No, address, and tel no (b) address and tel nos including mobile nos if owner not living in own house (c) name and NIC No of tenant if premises rented as well as address and tel no (include mobile nos) of his/her place of work (d) details of occupants of the house whether owner or tenant inclusive of name, address, tel no of place of work if any (e) details of servants, name, NIC No, home address (f) registration details of vehicles including motorcycles. A severe penalty must be imposed for giving wrong information and for not updating information promptly. Once the information is collected, it must be collated by computers, adequate software can be developed to show up discrepancies. Other than being a safe haven for criminals, Sindh is full of illegal immigrants causing severe strain on the economy, therefore drastic situation require drastic solutions.

The final part of the first phase is to restore confidence among the masses vis-a-vis constitutional authority. The civil administration (including the police) has been badly politicized and/or compromised due to rampant corruption. An outside temptation to recommend the cleaning-up lock, stock and barrel would be an injustice to the many good men and women who remain devoted civil servants inspite of the morass around them, but there is need to earmark people for outright removal or for temporary shifting to other Provinces. Some civil servants known to be corrupt or in league with criminals continue to be in or around critical positions of authority. Inter-action with the hierarchy of the Army at public functions gives them a legitimacy of sorts and erodes the credibility of the Army. While corruption is also rampant in other Provinces in Sindh the audacity of the corrupt knows no bonds. This combination in Sindh with secessionist tendencies requires priority in stamping out. Those being exchanged with other Provinces should be done in the ratio Punjab 60%, NWFP 20%, Balochistan and Azad Kashmir 10% each for a period of 3 years. The Sindh Police needs complete overhauling, the last thing needed would be to create a so-called elite force within the force. Karachi has already had a bad experience from the bunch of elite thieves called the “Eagle Squad”. There a number of good senior officers of the rank of SPs, SSPs and DIGs, these are hopelessly outnumbered and overwhelmed by the corrupt majority. The suggestion is that Rangers completely take over the duties of the present Police Stations (PS) for a period of 18 months or so, with officers upto the rank of Captain detailed as incharge of the PS. The present police rank and file should be formed into holding police battalions, with the command nucleus from the Army. The majority of new recruits should be educated, drawn from within Sindh on the basis, 50% Sindhis 35% Mohajir 15% Others. While this new force is being trained by the Army, workload being distributed among the formations, each district of Sindh should have one infantry battalion as a back-up to the Rangers, being rotated every 6 months with a one month overlap. The new police force should have a clear demarcation of responsibilities being used for Crime and Traffic Control in their locality and should not be put on Escort Duty, Riot Control etc and vice versa, except in emergencies.

Unfortunately the judiciary at the lower level is badly undermanned and also compromised, partly due to coercion, mainly due to corruption. Given that the Higher Courts in the Province are for the most part still unaffected, we should take meaningful steps to support the judiciary. The vacancies among the magistrates must be filled and the judiciary completely separated from the executive. The morale of the judiciary is abysmally low, steps must be taken to take such remedial action as may be necessary to restore their self-confidence so that justice is dispensed fairly and quickly. Too many kidnappers and dacoits have walked away free from courtroom on trivial technicalities, this does not give a conducive message to the masses. Constitutional authority cannot be imposed by force for any length of time, it has to be genuinely accepted by the people. Unless the people have confidence that criminals will be booked and prosecuted by an honest law enforcing agency, thereafter given suitable punishment by strong, honest and fearless judiciary, they will always be skeptical about constitutional authority.

The Army’s flexibility, given the scope of its objectives, was emasculated (1) in the major cities by the need to avoid a bloodbath (2) in the countryside by the need to avoid the impression of an anti-Sindh posture, both to be accomplished even-handedly and (3) above all in the whole Province (and the country) by not allowing the influentials to be hauled up. The confidence of the rural area population has been restored, even buttressed, by the Army’s sincerity in the method of operations. Unfortunately due to bad media handling, the urban area population, mostly Mohajirs, has been offended despite the lack of bloodshed. While the media is labelling the on-going operations as a “failure”, time is on the side of the law enforcement agencies. As more and more people volunteer fresh data, a policy of studied patience will flush out the recalcitrants. This may take as long as a year or even more, in the life of a nation what is a year or so, we should be able to afford more in coming to grips with hitherto seemingly insoluble problems. The only sad part is that genuinely elected democratic representatives of the urban areas have abrogated their responsibilities to the populace and to the nation by going underground. Most of these are selfless leaders who have no compatibility, except by default of political grouping, with the handful of criminals that are being sought, it will be a sadder day if this callous few escape justice.

The Pakistan Army should not keep on asking for a free hand, they should operate on the strength of their convictions about the greater national interest. Ambivalence may regretfully be taken as an excuse or lack of courage in going after the influentials. This could badly affect their credibility and commitment. Syed Muzzafar Hussain Shah may rule the civil Administration as the CM, it is the Corps Comd, Lt Gen Nasir Akhtar, who calls the shots. The perception of the masses about the seriousness of the Army vis-a-vis accountability will decide the ultimate success in bringing the first phase to end. The Army must not be seen to be playing games by avoiding the apprehending of influentials. Loyalty is always a two-way street, loyalty to the Constitution transcends loyalty to the individual, circumventing the law by individuals in authority also amounts to subverting the Constitution. All Armies are historically prone to blunt speaking, this message must be delivered in actual practice if Sindh is to be kept in the Federation.

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