THE MUSHARRAF-JAMALI government has succeeded in obtaining a relatively mild unanimous resolution in the Senate that merely expresses “shock” and “dismay” at the war in Iraq and “deplores” its coming. This will doubtless be paraded as an achievement of sorts. The religious parties, we will be told, seemed bent on at least “expressing shock and horror and disgust” at the war and were determined to ‘condemn” the US and UK. In fact, their fiery speeches in the Senate had threatened to append a long list of demands to their resolution, including a boycott of US goods, an exit from an alliance with America against Al Qaeda and an end to the use of Pakistani airbase facilities for American troops fighting the Taliban-Al Qaeda nexus in Afghanistan. But the government has conceded nothing of the sort. Indeed, it will be stressed that by avoiding any fiery resolution against the US, General Musharraf’s pro-US policy since 9/11 will continue to serve the best “national interests” of the country.
It is, of course, no secret that for a host of non-sustainable reasons the PPP under Benazir Bhutto doesn’t overtly want to be seen in Washington as an anti-US party. So a mild anti-war resolution was probably what it wanted. But why did the MMA agree to a diluted resolution in the end? Did the government secretly pay a price for the MMA’s cooperation by agreeing to concede the role of the leader of the opposition in both the Senate and the National Assembly to Maulana Shah Ahmad Noorani and Maulana Fazlur Rehman/Qazi Hussain Ahmed respectively? Or is a deal being worked out between the MMA and the Musharraf-Jamali government to yield not just a constitutional compromise vis a vis the LFO in time to come but also a working understanding that the rump Pakistan Muslim League of Nawaz Sharif and the “parliamentarian” PPP of Benazir Bhutto will be further marginalised from the political system? In other words, is the future political landscape of the country being chiselled by the military establishment to produce a configuration of the right in which the two party system is represented not by the “anti-military” representative forces of the PMLN and PPP but by the pro-military, manufactured forces of the MMA and PMLQ?
Certainly, the MMA parties have been strategic allies of the military establishment since the time when their covert support was critical to the military’s “national security agendas” in the region. Even now they are needed to create the international perception that the military is the only moderate and credible force in the country with whom the USA can do business. This has been achieved by destroying the overtly pro-West, pro-peace-with-India, mainstream parties of Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif who were the main recipients of the vote bank of Pakistan and enabling the anti-India, anti-USA, MMA and PMLQ to fill the vacuum created by their forced erosion or ouster. The problem is that instead of state-to-state international relationships being defined by a balance of interests, the Military-MMA alliance seeks to define them on the basis of a balance of “nuclear and Islamic” terror. Is this in the national interest of Pakistan?
We think not. At the very least, the arrangement is a sure-shot recipe for continuing domestic instability and international insecurity. The MMA constantly seeks to implant its authority over the military and mould it according to its worldview. Should it succeed in so doing, it will drag Pakistan into the eye of an international storm and confirm fears that Pakistan’s weapons of mass destruction have fallen into the “wrong hands”. Equally, the MMA’s lingering hatred for General Musharraf personally and continuing attempts to deprive him of his uniform are aimed at precisely this objective – to remove him from the scene so that it can make decisive militant inroads into the military. It doesn’t much matter whether the MMA is likely to succeed or not in the short term. What matters is the perception that it is poised to become the most formidable force in the country.
The MMA’s birth and current centrality in Pakistani politics is due to General Musharraf. But if the MMA is poised for a great leap forward, thanks must go to President Bush and Prime Minister Blair. The “million men” marches commandeered by the MMA are a sign of the times. Given the unjust war against Iraq, the political space usurped by military governments or autocratic regimes allied with the US is in “danger” of falling into radical anti-West, Islamicist hands rather than mainstream, moderate and democratic forces.
Pakistan’s predicament is particularly worrying. With Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto becoming increasingly irrelevant, if the general elections were held tomorrow the MMA would do a Turkey in Pakistan. Two critical differences would then tilt the scales against Pakistan. The Pakistani Islamicists are not half as enlightened or moderate, and the Pakistan army not half as secular, as their respective Turkish counterparts. When will General Musharraf transcend his personal likes and dislikes for the sake of this country? When will President Bush and PM Blair be ousted so that the world can become reasonable again?