Daily Times

It is asserted sometimes that Pashtuns are incapable of coming to an agreement amongst themselves, uniting and following a leader. The Miranshah gathering once again showed that the assertion is based on a false understanding of the Pashtun people, their values and their character. Once again, the Pashtuns have shown that they possess the capacity and the willingness to unite. They have shown that they are willing and able to stand behind one leader. They have shown also that they are capable of bringing about changes to their social, political and economic life.

There were some very important speeches at the jalsa. Here, I wish only to point out three takeaways from the gathering: the emerging Pashtun position on natural resources, Pashtun unity, and women’s role in the movement.

The persecution and killing of Pashtuns and destruction of their homes and businesses did not start by chance. It has followed a plan. It has followed a realization among their detractors that Pashtuns have turned toward education and that their living conditions in the tribal areas and remote areas of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa are improving as a result. The plot always was to keep them uneducated so that they remain willing to be used as expendable pawns in terrorism and proxy wars in Afghanistan and Kashmir.

Manzoor Ahmad Pashteen told the Miranshah gathering that between 12,000 and 13,000 stores belonging to Pashtuns had been destroyed in the military operation ostensibly agaisnt extremist elements. He said the killing of the Pashtuns and the destruction of their wealth amounted to a systematic campaign to subjugate the Pashtuns.

He said there was a bid to exploit the natural resources of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, the Tribal Areas and Balochistan without sharing the dividends of development with those living there. He said the state was taking away the natural resources in its own name. He said there was a plan to extract these resources and transport them to the Punjab, as had been done in the past. The Pashtun areas, he said, were rich in natural resources. If the resources were developed equitably, he said, lives of those living in the areas as well as those living nearby would be transformed. There would be progress, development and prosperity.

Kaka Shafiq said Pashtuns had been involved in warfare for centuries. He said there was a need to understand why it was so. He said all their wars had been defensive. They had fought the Mongols when they invaded the Pashtun land. They had fought the Greeks after Alexander the Great tried to subjugate them. When the British Raj replaced the Moghuls Pashtuns were seen as a big challenge to its hegemony. They had to be subjugated or eliminated. Every time the Pashtuns were only defending their lives and liberty. When the state of Pakistan succeeded the British Raj, he said the subjugation continued, even got worse

Kaka Shafiq said Pashtuns had been involved in warfare for centuries. He said there was a need to understand why it was so. He said all their wars had been defensive. They had fought the Mongols when they invaded the Pashtun land. They had fought the Greeks after Alexander the Great tried to subjugate them. When the British Raj replaced the Moghuls Pashtuns were seen as a big challenge to its hegemony. They had to be subjugated or eliminated. Every time the Pashtuns were only defending their lives and liberty. When the state of Pakistan succeeded the British Raj, he said the subjugation continued, even got worse. He said Hellfire was brought upon the Pashtuns but this had united the Pashtuns who were demanding respect and dignity and will get it.

Women have had an important role in the Pashtun national struggle. The most prominent icon in this regard has been the Malalai of Maiwand. After 40 years of conflict, women make up more than half of the Pashtun population as more than a million men have been killed in the wars against the Soviet Union, the Afghan civil war from 1992 to 2001, and the so-called war on terrorism. Sana Ejaz told the gathering that all these wars were wars on the Pashtun people. She said the Pashtuns had always defended their land and sought to preserve their dignity.

She said while every part of the Pashtun land shared this history, Waziristan had always been special. It had always been a land of the freespirited. She recalled the Fakir of Epi’s struggle agaisnt the British. She said Manzoor Pashteen, Ali Wazir, Mohsin Dawar and their comrades were engaged in a similar struggle. The Pashtuns, she said were united in this struggle behind Manzoor Pashteen.

She also said a revolution was not possible without women. She said she looked forward to the day when there would be as many women in the Pashtun leadership as men.

The writer is a political scientist