Pakistan: A Downward Spiral?

It looks like Pakilands # 1 export is being targeted....

Obama fires terrorism warning to Pakistan


Agencies
Wednesday August 1, 2007
Guardian Unlimited

The US presidential hopeful Barack Obama will today say he is prepared to send troops into Pakistan to hunt down terrorists if he is elected to the White House.
The remarks, from a speech to be delivered later today, appear to be an attempt to show strength after Hillary Clinton, his chief rival for the Democratic nomination, described his foreign policy approach as naive.
Mr Obama will warn the Pakistani president, Pervez Musharraf, that he must do more to shut down terrorist operations in his country and evict foreign fighters.
________________________________________
He will say failure to do so could mean a US troop invasion and the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in US military aid under an Obama presidency.
"There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans," he will add, according to an advance copy of the speech supplied by his campaign team.
"They are plotting to strike again. It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al-Qaida leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won't act, we will."
Ms Clinton has widened her lead over Mr Obama, according to a new poll published today.
The Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll put support for the New York senator at 43% among Democrats, while Illinois senator Mr Obama slipped from 25% in June to 22% in July. Ms Clinton's support stood at 39% in June.
The poll also revealed that if the presidential election was held today, either Ms Clinton or Mr Obama would beat the former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani, the current favourite for the Republican nomination.
Ms Clinton and Mr Obama have sparred in recent weeks, trading accusations over foreign policy positions.
Mr Obama said he would be willing to meet the leaders of Cuba, North Korea and Iran without conditions - an idea Ms Clinton said was irresponsible and naive.
He responded by using the same words to describe her vote to authorise the Iraq war, calling her "Bush-Cheney lite". Today's speech is also intended as a condemnation of George Bush's Iraq policies.
Mr Obama said the focus on Iraq had left the US in more danger than before the September 11 2001 attacks, adding that Mr Bush had misrepresented the enemy as Iraqis fighting a civil war instead of the terrorists responsible for the attacks six years ago.
He said that, as US commander in chief, he would remove troops from Iraq and put them "on the right battlefield in Afghanistan and Pakistan", adding that he would send at least two more brigades to Afghanistan and increase non-military aid to the country by $1bn (£492m).
Mr Obama also said he would create a three-year, $5bn programme to share intelligence with allies worldwide to take out terrorist networks from Indonesia to Africa.

The US presidential hopeful Barack Obama will today say he is prepared to send troops into Pakistan to hunt down terrorists if he is elected to the White House.
The remarks, from a speech to be delivered later today, appear to be an attempt to show strength after Hillary Clinton, his chief rival for the Democratic nomination, described his foreign policy approach as naive.
Mr Obama will warn the Pakistani president, Pervez Musharraf, that he must do more to shut down terrorist operations in his country and evict foreign fighters.

He will say failure to do so could mean a US troop invasion and the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in US military aid under an Obama presidency.
"There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans," he will add, according to an advance copy of the speech supplied by his campaign team.
"They are plotting to strike again. It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al-Qaida leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won't act, we will."
Ms Clinton has widened her lead over Mr Obama, according to a new poll published today.
The Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll put support for the New York senator at 43% among Democrats, while Illinois senator Mr Obama slipped from 25% in June to 22% in July. Ms Clinton's support stood at 39% in June.
The poll also revealed that if the presidential election was held today, either Ms Clinton or Mr Obama would beat the former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani, the current favourite for the Republican nomination.
Ms Clinton and Mr Obama have sparred in recent weeks, trading accusations over foreign policy positions.
Mr Obama said he would be willing to meet the leaders of Cuba, North Korea and Iran without conditions - an idea Ms Clinton said was irresponsible and naive.
He responded by using the same words to describe her vote to authorise the Iraq war, calling her "Bush-Cheney lite". Today's speech is also intended as a condemnation of George Bush's Iraq policies.
Mr Obama said the focus on Iraq had left the US in more danger than before the September 11 2001 attacks, adding that Mr Bush had misrepresented the enemy as Iraqis fighting a civil war instead of the terrorists responsible for the attacks six years ago.
He said that, as US commander in chief, he would remove troops from Iraq and put them "on the right battlefield in Afghanistan and Pakistan", adding that he would send at least two more brigades to Afghanistan and increase non-military aid to the country by $1bn (£492m).
Mr Obama also said he would create a three-year, $5bn programme to share intelligence with allies worldwide to take out terrorist networks from Indonesia to Africa.

The problem with Pakistanis is that they are transforming from good looking warriors to ugly banias:

"Longtime rivals India and Pakistan agreed Wednesday to boost two-way trade by more than five times to US$10 billion (€7.3 billion) by 2010 as they defused a dispute over the export of a variety of basmati rice."

#21 Posted by GT on August 1, 2007 8:35:02 am

Did they use their own numbers or the numbers doctored by the paki government?

Oh? you hadn't heard? apparently telecom has provided a big boost to Pakiland's GDP..

link

How bad is Pakistan doing?

Arjun, Manto, Tahmed etc (all those interested in crosscountry comparison):

"According to the Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) ‘International Programme (ICP) in Asia and the Pacific: Purchasing Power Parity Preliminary Report’, Pakistan at 14th place was ahead of China and India which were at 15th and 17th positions respectively when economies were compared based on per capita ‘actual final consumption of households (AFCH)’, a measure of economic wellbeing of the population"

Let the games begin ..... :)

Maulana Zeemax (RA),

Re#15

Don't have to look as far as South India just look in your own backyard- the NWFP. Bannu, the cradle of the jehad was described by one of your oooooooon friends (Manto Mian) as San Fransisco of the East.

Regards

Some more reasons for the Spiral or is it Meltdown....???

The militants are roaming the streets of Karachi, Lahore and other major cities of Pakistan raising the slogans of 'jihad' as if 'jihad' is their mental and spiritual diet. It is, to be honest, is a dangerous state of affairs for the Pakistani society and its health. There are number of reasons why Pakistan is passing through the jihad mode today.

Pakistan was conceived as a homeland for the Muslims. There were so many contradictions in this concept of Muslim homeland which were totally ignored at the time. The heat of partition melted all such contradiction. But these contradictions are surfacing with all intensity. The concept of Muslim homeland implied that all Muslims are united merely on the basis of religion and there are, among them, neither ethnic differences, nor class or sectarian differences. And that all Muslims will equally benefit from this homeland.

Religion is very vital force in human life but it is so on spiritual plane. There are several factors on the secular plane which motivate human behaviour. Human behaviour, it must be remembered, is not determined by religious beliefs alone; rarely it so happens. Human behaviour more often is determined by worldly interests. Muslim homeland itself was product of worldly interests rather than spiritual homogeneity. It was thought by Mohammad Ali Jinnah and his Muslim League colleagues that Muslim political and economic interests would not be taken care of in the 'Hindu India' and that a separate homeland for Muslims is needed.

The underlying assumption was that if a community of people who follow same religion will automatically have uniform interests. But this has been totally belied today as it ought to have been. Religion can never ensure unity of interests. In a democratic society various divisions surface which also become political fault lines. No truly democratic society can suppress these divisions which also ensure formation of identities. Diversity, in other words, is the lifeline of democracy and genuine national unity can emerge only from respect for this diversity.

But in an authoritarian society these diversities are considered as sign of danger and is sought to be suppressed. The authoritarian society seeks uniformity and confuses uniformity with unity. In all authoritarian societies all other identities - ethnic, linguistic or sectarian, is sought to be suppressed and only one identity - be it national identity or racial or religious identity is enforced from above to ensure unity. But as soon as authoritarian structure is demolished and replaced by democratic or even proto-democratic structure, these identities emerge to the surface and tend to assume more volatile form after a prolonged period of suppression.

Pakistani society has undergone similar process. It was for long under military dictatorship which tried to suppress all other identities except either overarching Pakistani identity or Islamic identity. But ethnic identities exploded the moment first general elections were held in 1969. The Bengali identity was feeling suffocated and the first election itself provided an opportunity for it to break loose from the overarching Pakistani identity. The Pakistan went through great crisis during seventies when a kind of proto democratic structures were surfacing in that country. It was a period of semi-democracy for Pakistan.

Different identities began to emerge and ethnic identities began to submerge the overarching identity after a long period of suppression. While all people of Pakistan are proud of their Islamic identity they are not prepared to barter their regional or ethnic identity for the Islamic identity as the Punjabi ruling classes would like them to do. The ethnic identities become quite explosive even if they are sought to be hegemonised by one particular ethnic identity, the Punjabi identity in case of Pakistan. The Sindhis, the Baluchis, the Pathans and the Urdu speaking Muhajirs who, ironically are also referred to as Sindhis by domicile, are sought to be dominated by the Punjabis. Even within the Punjab the Saraiki speakers are resenting Punjabi domination. The Saraiki speakers claim to be 60% of the Punjab province.

The ultra rightist party of Pakistan - the Jamat-e-Islami is almost exclusively Punjab based party now and it is the Jamat which wants to bulldoze all other identities in the name of Islamic identity. It is the Jamat which is raising the slogan of jihad, jihad to save not the Pakistan but the Punjabi domination. And there is silent collusion of the Punjabi ruling classes with the Jamat and its attempt to bulldoze all other identities in the name of Islam.

It is also to be noted that the word 'jihad' is being utterly misused by the Pakistani religious fanatics. It is interesting to note that one does not find in the Qur'an the word 'jihad' in the sense in which it is being popularly used i.e. 'holy war'. The word in the Qur'an for war is 'qitaal' and not jihad. The word 'jihad' is used in its literal sense i.e. to strive, to assert or to make efforts. Thus jihad in the Qur'anic terminology means to assert oneself or to make efforts to promote what is right and to prohibit what is evil.

And in Qur'an qitaal is also permitted against persecution and to establish justice, not for territorial aggrandisement. Even if the word 'jihad' is used, it is also for defense of faith and not for annexation of territory or to solve territorial dispute. Also to kill innocent civilians as the extremists are doing in Jammu and other parts of J & K cannot be jihad. It is against all principles of Islam. Thus to wage 'jihad' in Kashmir is a total misnomer. Kashmir is a territorial dispute between India and Pakistan which has to be resolved between the two countries. There is no question of religious persecution as far as the Kashmir question is concerned. The Muslims of Kashmir under Shaikh Abdulla had clearly supported the National Conference and its programme of alliance with India. In fact the Kashmiris from the valley fought against the raiders from Pakistan and checked their further advance. It was a purely political move in order to annex territory and could not be construed as jihad by any stretch of imagination.

Similarly, the intrusion in Kargil is also part of territorial dispute and cannot be called 'jihad' at all. It is real irony that the intruders are described as 'mujahidins' (i.e. those waging jihad). Are these 'mujahidin' defending the faith of Islam in any sense in Kargil? On the other hand, the most affected people by their 'jihad' are the Muslims of Kargil. Their homes and hearths have been destroyed by the relentless shelling in Kargil. The Kargil Muslims have resented the Pakistani intrusion most. Who would, any way, like their homes being destroyed and their normal life completely disrupted? To disrupt the lives of fellow Muslims cannot be a part of jihad anyway.

The Pakistani society is undergoing violent phase. There are several factors responsible for this. The Taliban factor is one among them. Many sagacious thinkers, writers and journalists from Pakistan, the noted anthropologist and scholar Akbar Ahmad being one among them, had pointed out that supporting highly orthodox religious students who have undergone rigorous and rigid religious training in Madrasas in the North West Frontier province, to fight a partisan war in Afghanistan, would not be in the best interest of Pakistan.

The Taliban have not only tested the gun, they have tested the power of religious orthodoxy also. And religious orthodoxy and power of the gun is a heady mix. The Taliban after finishing their job in Afghanistan are returning to Pakistan and wish to recreate Afghan society there. It must be said that compared to many Islamic countries Pakistan is far more 'secular' and 'modern'. The military dictators, after all, were not religious fanatics with the exception of Zia. In fact Ayub resisted the influence of orthodox 'ulama and introduced many modern laws. Yahya Khan too, by and large, refrained from invoking religious orthodoxy for legitimising his rule.

It was General Zia who, for the first time, invoked religious orthodoxy to perpetuate his rule and to legitimise it. He also welcomed the Afghan war as a godsend and got much help from CIA which was interested in defeating Soviet Russia. The Afghan mujahidin too had to invoke Islamic orthodoxy to fight against the atheistic Russians. All the training to them was imparted on the territory of Pakistan adjacent to Afghanistan. Thus it was General Zia who systematically injected religious orthodoxy in Pakistani politics.

The Taliban phenomenon was its natural outcome. And the madrasas then set up in the North West Province are churning out large number of 'Taliban' every year. These religious students are being injected with the heavy dose of jihad and what is worse, along with the religious training, they are also being imparted military training in these madrasas. Thus the emphasis is more on jihadist mind set rather than on truly religious mind set. These madrasas have acquired vested interest of their own as they receive funds from various sources, including some Islamic countries.

It is, to say the least, not in the interest of Pakistani civil society. It amounts to spreading cult of violence in Pakistan. The ruling classes want to use these 'mujahidin' to suppress ethnic unrest and to maintain the Punjabi hegemony. But so far there is no sign of success. The cult of violence is spreading fast in the civil society without there being any sign of ethnic unrest vanishing. The ethnic groups have their own legitimate aspirations and no amount of jihadist mind set, being promoted by powerful vested interests, can suppress these aspirations. The suppressed ethnic groups, particularly the Sindhis, the Baluchis and the Muhajirs, have acute political consciousness and they will not barter away their legitimate aspirations for an illusionary Islamic identity. However, this does not mean that they are not good Muslims. In fact they are much better Muslims that those selling 'Islamic' identity to them.

In Pakistan unfortunately the military is not under civilian control and has autonomy of its own. It is also thus interested in keeping the Jihadist mind set alive and spreading the cult of violence. It is only through this strategy that the civil society will remain under its thumb. The civil society will have to wage many a struggle to liberate itself from the hegemony of the armed forces.

Yaar Zeemax, looks like you've well and truly lost it.

Also from bhangilauru (is it chennai now?)...what morons ...

(.... *andoos in other words ... )

Haha ... unbelievable ... always knew all these madrasis were ac/dc.



originally uploaded by javeja.

recently all over bangalore… you can come across those ads for lee stores… very interesting campaign i think…. ;)

here is some article about MSM and WSM in Bangalore in the supplement of the Deccan Herald due to the lee campaigning…

http://www.deccanherald.com/Content/May212007/metromon20070520 2778.asp

an update (30.Juni 07): i had a talk with a colleague of mine, who told me that the effects of this campaign were rather differently received in delhi and mumbai. in mumbai the shiv sena made it possible that all the ads and posters had to be removed within a couple of days after the beginning of the campaign. he told me that in delhi on the other hand it was no big deal at all. they came, stayed and went again without people reacting violently about them… he said that in delhi people are more open-minded about this topic…

Some reasons for this spiral......
Inside the booming madressah economy


By M Ismail Khan

Take this with a pinch of salt, but let us admit that two weeks from its 60th birthday, Pakistan is ticking at a point where the question of who runs the country means little in relation to how it can be run. The gender of the next prime minister is of little importance, nor does it make a difference if the next president puts on a shirwani or a burqa, what really matters for the people is that they have a leader who is wise enough to understand the difficult challenges and strong enough to overcome them. One such impossible task at hand is to put the genie of the madressahs back into its original bottle.

Neutrally speaking, President Musharraf's eight-year rule, like the earlier two military governments of the 60s and 80s, turned out to be a period of decent economic growth. I do not mean to say that military governments are better economic managers and therefore there is no need for the country to return to 'true democracy'. But since 'growth' is all about data and figures there is hardly anything one can do to prove it otherwise. But one inherent dilemma which cuts across all military led governments has been the tremendous social and political pressures it leaves behind for the precarious civilian set ups to deal with, that ultimately proves to be the main reason for demise of civilian dispensation and the country's return to military rule. The phenomenal rise of madressahs during the recent years can be seen in the light of this vicious cycle in store for the next government, if there is one coming.

Like the growth in real estate and services, Pakistan is witnessing a massive boom in the madressah sector; according to researchers during the last eight years there has been over 150 per cent increase in the number of madressahs in and around Islamabad alone, a trend following the rise of real estate value in the capital.

At the time of independence, Pakistan inherited a meagre 200 odd madressahs, which as per government's conservative estimates has now increased to over 17000 (though some analyst put this number at 25-30,000). These religious schools are catering to about 2.5 to 3 million students and employ thousands of mullahs as teachers, mentors and instructors. How has this country managed to trigger and then sustain such a spectacular growth in madressahs is a secret worth sharing with the posterity.

A key driver of growth in the madressah sector, we are informed, is poverty -- an endemic problem of all developing countries -- something successive governments in the last six decades have wowed to eliminate but end failing to even reduce it to a manageable level. Interestingly on the one hand the country has struggled to improve enrolment in formal schools and has been grappling with issues of large scale drop outs at primary and secondary levels, on the other hand there is a stiff competition going on in the rural areas, where Pakistan's majority of poor live, to enrol their kids in madressahs mainly situated in cosmopolitan cities and sub-urban areas.

Perhaps there is more to it then the so-called poverty; it is indeed easy to blame the poor. But this could also be because of other reasons including failure of formal education system, social safety nets, and simply madressahs outperforming the formal education sector through better packages e.g. free education, food, boarding and almost free educational material. One cannot write off the growing religiosity, again not just in Pakistan, but all over the world, and not among Muslims but also amidst people adhering to other faiths.

There is also a need to analyse the source of funding of these madaris against the theological inclinations. Compared to Barelvis and Jam'at Islami driven schools, a number of Ahle-Hadith and Deobandi madaris have seen a big jump in numbers. The number of Shia madressahs has also grown sharply. But the biggest gain has been made by the Deobandi religious schools that have reportedly crossed the figure of 10 thousand. Taliban, including the ones in Islamabad, are products of Deobandi madressahs, while credit for introducing the likes of Lashkar-e-Taiba has been claimed by some Ahle-Hadith madaris in the past; hopefully President Musharraf might have broached these worrying trends to his interlocutors during the recent visit to Saudi Arabia. Philanthropists in brotherly countries including Iran must find overt, transparent and legal ways to collaborate and support a better madressah system, so that the government, media and more importantly public can play their role in the public interest.

Traditionally, madressahs have played a good role in imparting religious education and promoting literacy among downtrodden segments. It is also correct that only a small portion of the country's madaris can be branded as truly radical, but there is no guarantee that the moderate ones will stick to the right path or will not change their course at some point. What happened in the Lal Masjid / Madressah Hafsa and its aftermath has sent shivers down the spine of the ordinary souls. There is a need to strategically revisit the so-called madressah reforms. Conducting registration, teaching science, English and computer or equating the madaris' degree with the formal system will not work unless the institutions are cleansed from dangerously biased teachers, money and ideologies sowing the seeds of hatred and prejudices.

Many politicians and civil society activists openly raise fingers at certain quarters in the government for indoctrinating religious schools, first for the purpose of curving a strategic depth to Afghanistan and later for jihad in Kashmir; even if this is true, politicians and the civil society cannot absolve themselves from their responsibilities. What have we done to arrest this dangerous drift, except for organising a cultural extravaganza at Trafalgar Square in London? There is no reason why the public cannot and should not stand up to save the country from threats of anarchy and self-destruction which the growing number of suicide bombings have started to present.



The writer is based in Islamabad; he has a background in media, public policy and development. Email: ismail.k2@gmail.com

Damn google ...

Spiral? Islamophobic morons ...

Atlaf,

Downward spiral, my foot, It all depends on what spiral you are taliking about. Medals in sports has nothing to do with anything other than medals. Did you forget East germany, it was second in olymics for a long time. How about north Korea. The artcile only confirms the irrelevance of pak mind set, they only focus on the irrelevant simply because nobody told them to think for themselves, it is all in the book.

Here is some good news for you.

Pakistan is a nuclear power, even the americans are afraid. They have long range missiles to boot.

The number of madrassas are the maximum in the world, the suicide bombers are in their thousands.

People from the world over comes to pakistan for jihadic training. Meeting of the opposition political parties are held in London, what a great colonial tradition, which other third world country can afford that.

Atlaf, look at the positive. Look at the options available for pakistan to corner a clear segment of high tech work.

The jihadis can be used as crash test dummies.

One can put a picture of geoge bush and ask the jihadis to walk through the mine fields of cambodia to clear the mines.

The jihadis can be put to great economic benefit for pakistan, if only the likes of you can think properly, look at the positive side of an inherent pak predilection to be a jihadi due to the influence of jinnah islam.

Anjum Sahib,

I disagree with the premise of your article. Pakistan is not in any downward spiral. One can say that it is in a mess but there a lot indicators that are positive -

1. The people of Pakistan have basically rejected wahabiism. The fairly mature response of the people to the Lal Masjid incident, except by the taliban types in NWFP, is quite encouraging.

2. The religious parties are in no way popular with the people.

3. Attitude towards India and hindus/sikhs has changed significantly. Recently Katas Raj temple has been opened. Sikh and hindu pilgrims are welcomed from India. In general, relations with India are thawing out.

4. The identity crisis in Pakistan after partition is finally resolving itself. The ordinary masses in Pakistan have rejected the typical jingoistic brainwashing spearheaded by the Urdu speaking mohajir elites who migrated from India. The latter wanted Pakistanis to believe that they were all arabs/central-asians/mughals with religion as their only identity to unify them etc. That sort of delusional absurd thinking seems have disappeared with Pakistanis getting quite comfortable with an ethnic identity that is tied to the soil i.e. they are mostly son of the soil desis who happen to be muslims. Even the mohajirs themselves seem to have snapped out of their delusiuons as well. As a result, we see a big change among Punjabis and Sindhis who are beginning to reach out to sikh/hindu counterparts in India.

Why has this happened? I believe it is because muslim countries themselves have kept Pakistan at an arms length except for the Saudis who have tried to spread wahabiism there. Iran, Afghanistan, Central Asia have all firmly rejected kinship with Pakistan based on religion, a fact that is evident when Pakistanis travel to those countries and from the fact that there is no military or economic alliance with Pakistan. They do not even have a free trade agreement with Pakistan. Arab countries do not hesitate to treat Pakistanis as second class people, islam or no islam. The treatment Pakistanis get there is sometimes worse than what Indians get.

As compared to that, Pakistanis are treated very warmly by India. India's constant overtures for trade and economic relations as well as people to people contacts, contrast with the cold, careless manner in which the Islamic world treats Pakistan. The cultural affinity with India is undeniable and the role played by Bollywood is evident to all. Pakistanis cannot deny that in spite of all the iron curtains, they are naturally drawn towards Indian culture as compared to the culture of the countries to their west. Finally the strong encouragement from the US to patch things up with India is playing a huge role as well to modify Pakistan's erstwhile identity crisis.

5. The war on terror and its after-effects seems to have finally convinced Pakistanis on two things - a) It is terrible to mix religion with politics b) It is terrible to let the military become an all-powerful mafia like institution. As a result, we see that secular forces in Pakistan are winning ground. In addition, people are absolutely fed up with the army as evidenced by the latest saga of the Chief Justice.

Basically Pakistan is moving towards its natural state - the state in which people lived there for a 1000 years before 1947. Essentially it has always been a region of peace loving, secular desi people who happen to be muslims. The absurdities that crept in due to the event of partition are slowly shaking out. The future direction depends on the ability of the pakistani people to build some institutions and curb the power of the army by instituting proper checks and balances. The chief justice saga is particularly encouraging. Hopefully more reforms will happen in the near future.

Why only Asian games, look at squash, hockey, cricket games where Pakistan once ruled the day but has since lost its glory days and now ranks in the bottom tier. Having said that, peak in these sports ranged from the late eighties to the mid nineties, just about the time when we discovered talibanism ie new born muslimhood.