Pakistani politics (catch all)

[omarali50]

He will not win the election unless the army decides to fix it for him (which seems unlikely..the army's non-jihadi faction is slightly ahead of the jihadi faction right now).
His popularity in the English speaking world and among middle class punjabis can be misleading. If you read Urdu, Dr Manzur Ejaz has a very good analysis of his actual impact: http://www.pakistanpost.net/epaper/allimages/p10-2.html

[Ray]

He will not win the election unless the army decides to fix it for him (which seems unlikely..the army's non-jihadi faction is slightly ahead of the jihadi faction right now).
His popularity in the English speaking world and among middle class punjabis can be misleading. If you read Urdu, Dr Manzur Ejaz has a very good analysis of his actual impact: http://www.pakistanpost.net/epaper/allimages/p10-2.html

You are right.

Even Imran Khan is candid about that.

While he feels he can sweep the polls, he has also said that in case he cannot get absolute majority, he will not go into coalition and instead sit in Opposition because coalition will mean compromise and he is not ready to do it with the tainted parties that have been holding power in the present and the past.

[Peter Dow]

I have 2 recent blog posts that may be of interest:
1. ...

2. On the shooting of Malala Yusufzai yesterday: http://www.brownpundits.com/2012/10/...sake-of-islam/

Please watch my video



Malala Yousufzai - Free Pakistan - Kill the Taliban

Video in 2 parts -

1) CBS News story reporting Malala Yousufzai shot
2) Musical tribute to Malala Yousufzai - Free Pakistan - Kill the Taliban - "May it be" by Enya.

May it be the shadow's call
Will fly away
May it be your journey on
To light the day
When the night is overcome
You may rise to find the sun
...
A promise lives within you now

http://www.brownpundits.com/2012/10/...sake-of-islam/

This links to an article headed

Shooting schoolgirls in the head for the glory of Islam..

"for the glory of Islam"? Oh really? Well the Taliban's own reasons are as stated. That's how they see their motivation.

But what is the true reason that the Pakistani state has not stamped out this kind of terrorism before now?

Is the Pakistani state failing to end this terrorism really and truly "for the glory of Islam" or is terrorism not being ended to justify more aid from the US government?

Is so-called "Islamic" terrorism

• for God, or
• for money and power for the elite?

My scientific analysis of the political dynamics of aid and business suggests the latter explanation to me. Here's why I think this.

Pakistan, Egypt and other countries with a terrorist problem have long been getting billions of dollars in aid from the US government.

Kansas City Star: "Pakistan freed of anti-terrorism obligations; U.S. billions flow instead"

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration has refused for the first time to declare that Pakistan is making progress toward ending alleged military support for Islamic militant groups or preventing al Qaida, the Afghan Taliban or other extremists from staging attacks in Afghanistan.

Even so, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has quietly informed Congress that she’s waived the legal restrictions that would have blocked some $2 billion in U.S. economic and military aid to Pakistan. Disbursing the funds, she said in an official notice, is “important to the national security interests of the United States.”

This military aid is most perverse and harmful to US national security because the Pakistani military via its military intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) trains, arms and supplies the Taliban who are killing US and allied soldiers in Afghanistan and committing terrorist acts in Pakistan as well.

This 2-hour video is of a British TV programme which explains in great detail the role of the Pakistani state via the ISI (Inter-services intelligence) has in supporting the Taliban's war against our forces in Afghanistan.

BBC Documentary - "SECRET PAKISTAN - Double Cross / Backlash" (2 hours)

RECOMMENDED VIDEO - 2 HOURS WELL SPENT!

The USA thoughtlessly throwing vast amounts of cash at poor countries like Pakistan is precisely what is encouraging the Pakistani state and other poor countries never to eradicate and always to sustain Islamic extremist terrorism because Pakistan and the rest reasonably believe that if they had no Islamic extremist terrorists to cause problems for the world then they would not get their corrupt hands on quite so much aid money to spend on, in Pakistan's case, making more nuclear weapons and on other things that the aid recipient country's elite want.

It's not just Pakistan but also Egypt and a host of other countries know that the best way to get their state bankrolled by the USA's aid money is to invest some time and effort in covertly organising Islamic extremist terrorists in their country and in other countries. Then the country puts on a "good cop, bad cop" routine for the USA's pleasure asking for cash to deal with the very terrorist problem which they themselves have created.

So the USA is paying, inadvertently, for and encouraging terrorism which undermines its own national security all the while thinking to itself it needs to pay up "for" national security whereas its foolish payments are really acting against its own national security.

The solution to "Islamic" terrorism is not to pay military aid to Pakistan because the terrorism is being organised not for God but for money.

The US and other NATO countries could force Pakistan honestly to confront and end their business of terrorism by ceasing all military aid and by bombing the Pakistani ISI for their part in organising Taliban terrorism.

By paying military aid to Pakistan etc the USA is simply encouraging the Pakistani state covertly to promote the terrorist perversion of Islam so as to keep that aid money flowing.

A similar argument applies with Saudi and other wealthy states support for Islamic terrorism but in the case of those oil-rich states who don't need aid, what they do need from the US and other Western countries is to maintain business-as-usual and political support rather than any Western intention to pursue regime-change towards democratic republican regimes for the Arabs.

So the Saudi royals and other Arab royals paint the only possible political alternative to the Arab monarchs' "stable" rule as being instability leading to the terrorists the Saudis covertly support seizing power and becoming the official government.

But whether the hidden reason for state sponsors of terrorism is cash for poor country elites or business and political support for rich country elites, the "Islamic" justification only really exists in the minds of the terrorists but since it is the stated reason then unscientific and popular political commentators tend to discuss that to the exclusion of the real political reasons why states sponsor terrorism.

For my ideas of how we can win the war on terror in Pakistan please see my topic in the SWC - "OEF - Afghanistan" forum

How to beat the Taliban in Afghanistan / Pakistan (and win the war on terror)

[omarali50]

Not sure where this fits, but my latest article is about the Shias and their future in Pakistan

http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksd...tan-.html#more

[davidbfpo]

A curious article from The Economist: 'The mystery of Tahir ul Qadri'; which opens:

WHO and what is Tahir ul Qadri? And, more importantly, who is behind him? Those are the questions now racing through political Pakistan, with no firm answers. The religious cleric, previously a minor figure politically, has been living in Canada since 2006, where he acquired Canadian citizenship. Since he arrived back in Pakistan last month, however, Mr Qadri has caused a political sensation with his demands that Pakistan's democratic system be reformed. He wants to throw the “criminals” out of Pakistani politics, the implication being that doing so would leave very few of today’s politicians still in business.

Mr Qadri seems to have unlimited funds available to him and a huge and growing following. A rally held on December 23rd in Lahore, the provincial capital of the politically all-important Punjab province, attracted hundreds of thousands of people. (Mr Qadri claimed it was a crowd of two million.) Now he is to march on the capital, Islamabad, aiming to take four million people to that small and usually serene city on January 14th.

Link:http://www.economist.com/blogs/banya...stani-politics

Having heard him speak, to a UK conference of the faithful, he is a good speaker and can drift into very direct criticism of Saudi Arabia / Wahhabism.

Added

A different viewpoint in a BBC report, indicated by the headline 'Tahirul Qadri - Pakistan's latest political 'drone'?':http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-20998010

[omarali50]

Meanwhile in other parts: http://www.brownpundits.com/2013/01/...-alamdar-road/

[omarali50]

My article about Pakistan's creation myths and some problems arising therein

http://pragati.nationalinterest.in/2...-consequences/

the last para got cut due to space issues, so I will post it here:

The argument is not that Pakistan exists in some parallel dimension where economic and political factors that operate in the rest of the world play no role. But rather that the usual problems of twenty-first century post-colonial countries (problems that may prove overwhelming even where Islamism plays no role) are made significantly worse by the imposition upon them of a flawed and dangerous “Paknationalist-Islamic” framework. Without that framework Pakistan would still be a third world country facing immense challenges. But with this framework we are either committed to ideologies that further undermine existing cultural strengths, sharpen existing religious divisions (including the Shia-Sunni division) and most important, do not have any blueprint for actually running a modern state. Or we are condemned to hypocritically mouthing meaningless and even destructive Paknationalist and Islamist slogans while actually trying to do something else. Damned if we do and damned when we don’t even mean to do it.
History was old and rusted, it was a machine nobody had plugged in for thousands of years, and here all of a sudden it was being asked for maximum output. Nobody was surprised that there were accidents… (Salman Rushdie, Shame)

[davidbfpo]

The long mooted return from exile in the UK to Pakistan of General Musharraf has finally happened, he landed in Karachi a hour ago. His status is rather strange:

He faces a string of charges including conspiracy to murder, but on Friday the Pakistani authorities granted him protective bail in several outstanding cases, freeing him from immediate arrest once he sets foot in Pakistan.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-21914946

One Pakistani paper comments on the benign influence of Saudi Arabia:http://etribune.express.com.pk/Displ...11201303240041

[omarali50]

A follow up to my earlier article in Pragati is up at 3quarksdaily.com

http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksd...ries.html#more

[Ray]

Musharraf is hard at image change.

He claims that he won the Kargil War.

[Ray]

SHIAS AND THEIR FUTURE IN PAKISTAN

by Omar Ali

Rather enlightening!

[davidbfpo]

As Pakistan marks the first time an elected civilian government has reached its five year term a long, detailed Indian portrait of Nawaz Sharif, the opposition leader:http://www.caravanmagazine.in/report...hrone?page=0,5

It ends with:

In an expansive mood while in exile, Sharif told Warraich one evening: “Once the chief of army staff assumes his title, he begins to think of himself as a king, or super prime minister.” So if Sharif comes back to power, will he really put the generals into Suzukis? He may not go that far, but he will expect the military to heed his legitimacy. He will not rush into embracing India as a long-lost friend, but he will not be drawn into another military adventure. He wants to have a friendly working relationship with the United States and the international community, but he will neither accept them as masters nor spurn them as adversaries. He may once again crack down on the Taliban inside Pakistan—but if he does so, he will still accommodate, as he has always done, the deeply conservative sentiments of religious parties and groups. This, after all, is his history and his patrimony: an old and deep lesson from the real love of his life.

[omarali50]

at AFTERMATH: PAKISTAN ELECTIONS 2013 http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksd...2013.html#more

by Omar Ali
.....

All in all, the elections are a step forward. People voted in large numbers, proving once again that the Taliban propaganda against this “heathen system of government” is not getting much traction. The Zardari regime, for all its faults, managed to get Pakistan to this point and deserves appreciation for this achievement. The rigging allegations and various administrative irregularities have dented the image of this election but a more energetic and forceful elections commissioner next time can repair credibility in the heartland without a big problem. Miracles of various sizes (see above) may be needed in Karachi and Balochistan. Miracles will also be needed to bring the war with the Taliban and the war with India to simultaneous closure. If the PMLN can deliver a more capable regime and restore the economy (doable) and some of the miracles happen, we may be in a much happier place by 2018. If not, we may still hope for more of the same. The one thing we cannot afford is a revolution (Islamic, PTI-Paknationalist or Marxist-Leninist..the last is not on the cards but comrades are still around and appreciate the plug). We dodged a bullet this time and with luck we may get away next time as well.

[carl]

Omar:

I am always completely pessimistic about Pakistan having any chance at all given the Pak Army and the feudal elites. But after reading some of your comments I should be thinking more often that Pakistan is filled with people like that ambulance driver and policeman in Karachi that were profiled in the TV special I forgot the name of.

[davidbfpo]

Carl's post:

I am always completely pessimistic about Pakistan having any chance at all given the Pak Army and the feudal elites. But after reading some of your comments I should be thinking more often that Pakistan is filled with people like that ambulance driver and policeman in Karachi that were profiled in the TV special I forgot the name of.

My initial post April 2011

Peter Oborne, one of the UK's best reporters IMHO, has been in Karachi, Pakistan's commercial capital and a huge city beset with problems:

In the last 60 years the population of Karachi has risen from 300,000 to nearly 20 million. The pressure for homes, water and food - compounded by high levels of unemployment - has lead to furious conflict between the rival ethnic groups, with around 1300 people killed in gangland violence last year.

His report is based on following an ambulance driver, employed by a charity and a shorter period with a police inspector, who states:

...at least 100 of his officers have been killed in the past year.

The title of the thread comes from his closing comment - worth fast forwarding to, if twenty five minutes cannot be spared.

The film clip on: http://www.channel4.com/programmes/u...ld/4od#3180510

The written summary is on: http://www.channel4.com/programmes/u...2011/episode-4

The links do work in the USA and a SWC viewer responded:

They should stop making cop shows about Americans and make cops shows about Karachi cops. That was something.

__________________

[omarali50]

Not really about politics this time (except tangentially)

http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksd...real.html#more

[omarali50]

Shia and Sunni in Pakistan. Some musings about the latest outbreak of violence..

http://www.brownpundits.com/2013/11/...i-in-pakistan/

[omarali50]

The polio jihad
http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksd...ihad.html#more

excerpt:

...The fact is no CIA or Mossad operation and no unethical drug trial is sufficient excuse for killing innocent health workers trying to stop a lethal disease. If people are doing so, they need to be told that it is not acceptable to do so, instead of using every atrocity as another opportunity to attack imperialism, capitalism or whatever ideological current you hold responsible for the state of the world as a whole.

I realize that the above paragraph is not philosophically air-tight. If capitalism is indeed the cause of all evil, then everyone who is gumming up the onward march of international capitalism is, by definition, a good guy. But my contention is that Western activists (and their Westoxicated Eastern admirers) do not really believe in any such absolute clash of good and evil and would not really want to live in the pre-industrial utopia of the Taliban. They only find it easy to admire heartless killers when faraway people are being discussed. I realize that I cannot stop this huge anti-capitalist cultural force with one article, but I just wish they would stay off the topic of polio vaccination. Humanity is tantalizingly close to wiping out this menace. It would be a shame to fail now just to make a point about the CIA or capitalism or American imperialism.

- See more at: http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksd...ihad.html#more

[carl]

Here is another example of why the poor, long suffering Pakistani people don't deserve their miserable excuses for an army and gov.

A high school boy takes on a suicide bomber heading for his school and dies.

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Secur...801-10-2014%29

[omarali50]

The 12 year old game may be coming to an end...and the end is likely to be just the beginning of a bloody new phase. So I wrote a survival guide for Pakistani liberals:

http://blogs.outlookindia.com/defaul...id=3142&eid=38

Excerpts:

Everyone and his dog is predicting an operation against the Pakistani Taliban by the Pakistan army. The word is that the TTP (or factions of the TTP, confusion about that being a standard part of Pakistani discourse and probably of the situation on the ground) has crossed all limits, attacking even in Punjab and killing soldiers, not just bloody civilians. The army has responded with shelling and air attacks and if this pattern continues, then the unstable equilibrium of the last 12 years may not be easily restored. If that does happen, then Pakistan could be in for a rather brutal fight. The fighters are not equally matched; on one side is a nuclear armed semi-modern state, on the other a few thousand deranged fanatics and their distant backers (whether in Saudi Arabia, India or Langley hardly matters, though I do think there are more in Saudia than in the latter). It would seem an easy bet that the state will eventually triumph. But even insurgencies that do not succeed can go on for a long time. Besides, given the ideological support the Taliban enjoy in Pakistan, they are unlikely to be easily swatted away. They are also experts at blowing stuff up and seem to have a lot of explosives. On the other side, the state and its fighting arms are not exactly famous for their world-beating efficiency or the surgical precision of their actions. So irrespective of the outcome, the interim period is likely to be blood-soaked, violent, painfully long and frequently shocking. While Pakistani liberals are much more robust in the face of violence than their Western counterparts (having seen a good deal of it in the last 12 years), they may not be fully ready for the mayhem or the moral dilemmas to come. Therefore, I have penned a quick survival guide for you and us, the liberals and ruling-elite leftists of Pakistan. I hope it helps (and while some remarks are frivolous and even facetious, the overall intent is serious)....

...If you must (and if everyone you know is a Tariq Ali or Arundhati Roy fan, you may have little choice) stand up and create a huge storm in the phase V living room teacup about the corrupt Pakistani elite, slaves of America, oppressors of the Taliban, upper class nitwits, etc. then do so strategically. Be very visible within your own group and on social media, but completely invisible on the ground. Otherwise, people are known to vanish off the face of the earth and then turn up in Manghopir with a few extra holes in their body. Stick to you safe zone.
At the same time, don’t panic and sell everything to your Memon friend at half price. The state is likely to win. Every wise Jamatia in Pakistan has one foot in Malaysia if not in the US, so there is no reason why liberals should not take precautions and make sure their green card is current and cousin Jimmy in New York is not terminally upset at you for some silly thing or the other. But premature evacuation may leave you with egg on your face (or worse). Stay calm. Take reasonable precautions. Avoid panic. If the #### hits the fan, run for your life, but don’t up and run every time Uncle Rashid says the sky is falling. Uncle Rashid has been saying that for 65 years and his commercial plots continue to go up in value. Hold tight and pray to Allah. All will be well.