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Intent and credibility

Given that military regimes are not in fashion in the New Millennium, the Chief Executive’s “live” presence in New York was a success by itself. Staying at home when 150 or so of the world’s leaders were assembled for the UN Millennium Summit would have been a disaster, force-multiplied by the massive anti-Pakistan propaganda unleashed by India. His absence would have been exploited as nervousness in facing the “free world” averse to giving “legitimacy” to a military regime. The democracy practiced by leaders of more than two-thirds of the nations attending the UN Summit is a sham. We are neither hypocrites in posing to have “democratic credentials” nor hypocrites in accepting them as “democrats” knowing them to be otherwise. Not only did the CE address the assembled leaders from the UN pulpit, he met a dozen plus leaders despite the heavy agenda of a host of Heads of State and Government running free in the few square miles of Manhattan. Apparent from the world media attention, including breakfast meetings at the “Asia Society” and the “Council of Foreign Relations”, no social ostracism, of the nature that the malicious one-page Ads planted by the Indians in prestigious international newspapers sought, happened. This undercut the credibility of the “anti” campaign, the motivated were left with very little to try and build a mountain out of a molehill.

With the mysterious appearance of the Supplementary Report of the Hamoodur Rehman Commission in India a day before Pakistan’s Independence Day in August, one braced for more “Dirty Tricks” to malign the Pakistan Army. Even then avowed peacemaker Hasina Wajid’s tirade in the UN about “non-representative governments” and their exclusion from the Commonwealth was a surprise. As the daughter of the only “democrat” who tried a one-party (BAKSAL) State in South Asia since 1947, the lady seems to have selective amnesia. Hasina Wajid must not be taken seriously, simply as another motivated cog in a relentless defamation campaign. Our Heads of Government/State have paid their respects at the Savar War Memorial for the Bangladeshi 1971 war dead near Dhaka on three separate occasions, one cannot keep on apologizing forever. The killings of many thousands and thousands of Bengalis is nothing to be proud of, indeed one does regret the very bitter events of 1971 but one cannot continue living in the past. 1971 was a political debacle that led to a very nasty military situation. The bloodbath that ensued was a shame that will live with us, who will measure the quantum of liability thereof? “Let him cast the first stone, he who has not sinned”. Many Pakistanis (a major percentage children, old men and women) were also killed by rampaging civilian mobs in isolated places in cold blood, is there hope for some remorse for these innocents from Hasina Wajid? Pakistan came worse off in the tragedy and will continue to regret the blot on its history, a shame that will take some washing away, but is it right to keep harping on it?

Pervez Musharraf is best when he is himself and not what his media-handlers would like him to be. Whenever faced with either a skeptical or a hostile Press, he has managed more often than not to make “believers” out of them. Military leaders, at least those having some sense, are best giving blunt, honest answers to questions. Visible credibility disarms hostility, as when he spoke to the largely Indian audience at the SAMA gathering in July last in Islamabad. Analysts may have noticed that traditional private sector Indian media hostility (other than the virulent Hindu fanatics) has virtually come to a dead stop, and that is why the “public sector”, i.e. the Indian government is now resorting to paid Ads in international newspapers to stoke anti-Pakistan feeling among the world intelligentsia. The CE needs to be coached on most issues as much as he needs two left feet and even if he does require “special briefing” on a few “technical” issues these should be restricted to brief ones by specialists. The only criticism one could level at the Pakistan contingent in New York is that there were too many media-chiefs around, the domestic front was left unguarded, some conspiracies had a field day in fostering controversies, including the CE’s remark pertaining to “Lifafa” journalism, that is journalists paid to toe a certain line. Private sector “donations” to media persons and/or entities will never become known unless the paymasters come forward, which is hardly likely, but the monies paid out by ISI, MI, IB, the PM’s Secretariat, the CM’s Secretariat, etc would be documented and should be made public. The CE can strike a big blow for the sake of accountability on which he is trying to build a genuine democracy by exposing those “paid out of government estimates” whether they be publishers, editors, columnists, journalists, reporters etc or whether it be newspapers, magazines, other periodicals etc. We need to restore the credibility of the Fourth Estate. However, less than 20% of the “free world”, India included, has a freer print media than Pakistan presently. Let any Indian write anything anti-Indian in Bodoland, Assam, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura, Sikkim, etc. For that matter let anyone try writing anything anti-Indian in Bhutan or the Maldives.

We are far better off, relatively speaking, than what we were on Oct 12 last, why does the perception persist that Pakistan is still in a deep crisis? To start with we have still to shake off the economic crisis, particularly the debt repayments due, but we should give credit to the military regime in having rescued us from a one-way short road to sudden economic apocalypse. Part of this can also be labelled to good luck and good weather (Divine intercession is always helpful), and even some policies inherited from the past, e.g. wheat subsidy. Unfortunately the economic team put together by the CE is only good for working the routine, “sweet talking and good PR” is no substitute for real radical changes to rejuvenate the economy, to kick-start it to the promise of the early 90s, what to talk of the heydays of the 60s. The weak composition of the team alone is not the only problem, barring exceptions the civilian cabinet has proved incapable of achieving what the military regime expected from them, in short they have failed to deliver. The intent of our military ruler is sincere, to change the lives of our citizens for the better, they have not acquired powers to make their own futures bright but the civilian “status quo” team chosen to effect the transition has been hard put barely stemming the rot that had eaten into the economic and political fabric of Pakistan. As a noted instructor in the National Defence College, the CE must have taught, “never reinforce failure”. Good managers we do need but also innovators who will improvise and dynamise, the CE alone cannot carry the ball all the time. The CE could (1) shuffle his cabinet around so that each person’s “genius” is profitably utilized in the right slot (2) put out to pasture those who are there God alone knows for what reason and (3) induct entrepreneurs and politicians of outstanding quality to energise his team. Almost one year of the three-year period is over, the consolidation period needs to give way to the “breakout phase”, full exploitation of our human and material resources by persons of proven ability.

If the credibility of the military regime is impaired, however sincere their intent, disaster will ensue. The world community recognizes that there was something very horribly wrong with our democracy, that there is an ongoing need to conduct accountability and to put a system in place that will be self-accountable and fair, where merit will prevail over a process presently weighted in favour of the elite and the privileged at the cost of the downtrodden and poor. In today’s dynamic information age the negation of merit is a self-defeating process. That is the true “Jehad” the Army, where merit is supreme more often than not, has set out to wage, a war we cannot afford to lose, notwithstanding bomb blasts designed to derail the regime’s credibility. Unfortunately the public likes to see tangible progress, subtle changes across the board have yet to translate into visible relief for the man-in-the-street. That is where media-handling comes in to shore up credibility. And that has to be done holding the national interest supreme, without dividing responsibility which makes individuals engage more on “personal agendas” rather than the national mission statement. The CE should do well to give one man full control of media affairs and move others to positions consonant with their potential. The present infighting about fiefdoms is undercutting the credibility of the regime. More than any other military regime, the present one is blessed with both sincerity of intent and credibility of action, it would be a tragedy to waste that potential.

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