Daily Times

State’s reliance on non-state actors to accomplish its foreign and domestic policy objectives has resulted in a divided society.

Today, Pakistani society is caught between religious adventurism of 1980s and self-styled project of enlightenment initiated in the country after 9/11.On one hand, we see fanatics glorifying extrajudicial killings while on the other, so-called liberals are demanding merciless governmental response to the religious fundamentalism. The origin of destructive fault-lines between religious zealotry and liberal extreme can be found in shortsighted policies of last two military dictators namely General Zia and General Musharaf.

After deposing elected prime minister in 1977, General Zia remained an all-powerful ruler of this country for 11 long years. Zia used Islamisation as his only fateful refuge to secure external and internal political legitimacy for his regime. Domestically, religious sentiments of the people were stimulated through a number of legal and administrative reforms ostensibly aimed at Islamizing the society. On international front, however, the military government decided to be part of US coalition against the communist bloc. Thus, foreign policy objective to fight Soviets in Afghanistan was outsourced to non-state actors. Pakistani and US administrations not only militarily supported these non-state actors but also equipped them with a moralistic slogan of Islamic Jihad. This brazen exploitation of concept of Jihad to recruit zealous fighters helped military regime achieve its immediate objectives but the nation is still paying price for this lack of forethought.

The dawn of 21st century saw another military regime in Pakistan with slogans exactly opposite to those of General Zia. The watchwords this time were ‘enlightened moderation’ and ‘counterterrorism’ as opposed to ‘Islamisation’ and ‘Jihad’.

Though the new venture was quite dissimilar to the old one but the coalition partner and its influence remained the same. Under mounting international pressure, General Musharraf not only conceded to US demand to be part of anti-terror strike in Afghanistan but also brought numerous legal and administrative reforms destined to liberalise society.

Consequently, the military dictator decided to launch a hunt for Jihadis — blue-eyed boys of his predecessor- in the length and breadth of the country. Secondly, the government outsourced part of its liberalizing agenda to national and international NGOs by patronizing them at the highest level. Again, Pakistani and US governments vehemently supported these non-state actors to launch an offensive against Jihadis in particular and hardcore religious faction of the society in general. This disproportionate reliance on NGOs and activists for domestic gains failed to bring long-term peace to people of Pakistan.

We see fanatics glorifying extrajudicial killings while on the other, so-called liberals are demanding merciless governmental response to the religious fundamentalism. The origin of destructive fault-lines between religious zealotry and liberal extreme can be found in shortsighted policies of last two military dictators namely General Zia and General Musharaf

The current wave of violent extremism, we have been experiencing for more than a decade now, is a direct result of quick-fix policies of the two military generals. Both regimes brought an unnatural and authoritative intervention to trigger an engineered change in the society. What our well-disciplined generals and civil bureaucrats forget is the fact that society has a life of its own. Societies change on their natural pace and any external intervention attracts unforeseen reactions. The divide between progressive and conservative factions of our society has turned extraordinarily violent because of uninformed and arbitrary efforts to bring desired change.

In order to protect so-called national interest, pens were traded for guns in 1980s. Jihad as holy war was glorified under governmental umbrella and the society was trained in the dangerous art of self-righteousness. After some 15 years, a different military general led a similar unnatural intervention for a hasty reversal of what his predecessor nurtured under his appealing slogan of Islamisation.

Quite naturally, many religious elements got suspicious of imposing design of Musharaf’s enlightenment and rushed back to the core of religious extreme. In contrast, those who were suffocated in post-Zia religious zeal rushed to the outskirts of liberal ideals. Resultantly, society got divided into religious and liberal extremes with little or no intermediary communication channels left for harmonious settlement. To add to the misery, government sided with one of the two extremes and, for a decade afterwards, the two sides have been talking in language of arms and violence.

Because of this violence, more than 70,000 Pakistanis embraced martyrdom, billions of dollars loss occurred to the economy, tribal areas are destroyed in military operations and immeasurable social loss has been caused to the society. It is high time for the democratic government to responds to social needs while synchronizing with societal pace and capacity to adjust with change. Further, the state must not surrender its writ to any non-state actor under any appeasement policy. The hope is revived after many sacrifices.

The writer teaches Political Science at GC University Lahore and can be reached at
aamir9465@gmail.com

Published in Daily Times, November 19^th 2018.