Daily Times

The ISPR, repeatedly, states that the army operation in FATA is almost complete. Is the government of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) ready to put the region under civilian rule? Obviously, it is not. The problem is structural and is not particular with the Sharifs only.

The ruthless class that the colonial masters created and made it ride the throat of the people centuries before has grown in size enough to push the state to the wall, that too in the name of democracy. The conflict between indigenous desire to matter in the realm of international politics and the historical struggle to enslave the people seem to be ending nowhere.

Since last eight years of ‘pure’ democratic rule there has been observed phenomenal laxity on the part of the parliamentary parties to take on extremists and hard-core criminals. It was imperative to make necessary changes in the law of evidence in order to utilise the state-of-the-art techniques of investigation, rather than rely on statements of eyewitnesses to put criminals on trial. But the bill to this end kept rotting in a parliamentary committee led by a Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) senator during the heydays of the tenure of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP).

The usual practice had been that the law enforcing agencies nabbed criminals and the judges were forced to free them due to lack of evidence. A time came when the criminals ganged up into the sorts of Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP), and the courts remained no more relevant to the unholy front they opened on the people of FATA and the nearby regions.

None wondered when the question of military courts was raised, and the whole political lot caved in because it knew very well the country’s fragile legal system was no match to terrorism funded from home and abroad. Pakistan is probably a land that is owned less but abused more by its political class. It is not merely the question of law and order that has been dealt with lightly. One can easily understand the negative impact of poor governance on the socio-economic growth. Is it not bad governance to draw more than 30 percent revenues from the energy sector? Why the lower and middle-income groups have been subjected to heavy taxation? Who prevents legislators to devise stringent laws so as to bring the black economy into the tax-net?

Now it is not difficult to calculate the domino effect — just think of high inflation, low purchasing power and little prospects of the country getting out of the debt-trap. One may not be distracted too much by conspiracy theories while analysing politics but going by the dismal performance of parliament vis-à-vis implementing fundamental rights, low quality of debate and trends in budgetary allocations speaks volumes of the mindset of the leadership controlling political parties.

If civilian regimes are meant to take care of merely fiscal deficit and leave the rest of the matters, right from diplomacy to law and order, to the wishes and whims of the vested interests, which quite understandably manipulate decision-making structures of the political parties, who will steer the country clear out of dire straits of poverty and violence? Can the country have peace merely by having a strong army and multi-layered law enforcement structure?

Come to the question of administrating the neglected and least-ruled parts of Pakistan, and one is struck with disbelief as to how the nexus between race and religion is eroding chances of peace and prosperity in the ‘Land of the Pure’.

What stood in the way of the wise and worthy leadership of political parties when it was undertaking para-wise revision of the Constitution? Was not its focus of attention on retaining the religious credentials of the country, securing autonomy for provinces and winding up the question of new ones, and paving way for two-party system?

Why one should wonder if religious parties play a fundamental role in radicalisation of society while they have been assigned a space in national politics by the so-called progressive lots? Has not Pakistan transformed into an ethnic federation after the 18th Constitutional amendment?

Had Pakistan been lucky, its course and directions would have been set and followed as per the famous address of Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah to the first Constituent Assembly. He warned of corruption, nepotism, provincialism and communalism as poisonous, and suggested religious freedom and rule of law as panacea. Now, he could not imagine that his prime minister would later get the Objectives Resolution passed, and take away sovereignty from the people to heavens. Quite understandably, Pakistan treaded on the path of disintegration by reverting to authoritarian rule.

Now it is not that difficult to understand why FATA is being treated so casually and carelessly. During the Afghan jihad, the region was used as a base camp to harass Soviet forces in the neighbouring country. The youth from across the country and the world were welcomed here to receive training to fight a regular army equipped with modern weaponry. After the Soviet pullout, the task of jihadis changed to supporting the friendly regime inside Afghanistan. FATA became an abode of the Taliban and al-Qaeda outfits when the US-led army attacked the neighbouring country, making Mullah Omar, the self-proclaimed caliph, flee Kabul on a motorbike.

The fate of FATA is hinging on the question what should its status be. Should it be hyphenated with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa or become a separate province? Had Pakistan been ruled by a broadminded and a truly progressive lot, the issue would have been effectively and fairly settled a long time ago. But see how the PPP regime extended the Political Parties Act to the tribal regions but let the FCR remain intact. The PML-N has yet to come up with a solution, while the army has almost finished the job to clean FATA of the TTP and its associates. The commission on FATA reforms, nonetheless, is moving at a snail pace.

The indecision on FATA has roots in the ethnic character of the federation that provincial autonomy has brought forth. The inclusion of a fifth province means admitting a new ‘nation’ into the federation. The likes of the Awami National Party do not want the Pukhtoon nation be divided. What the rest of the political parties want is clearly reflected through the way the North West Frontier Province was renamed, and Gilgit-Baltistan was assigned an ambivalent status.

The writer is Director at the Center for Policy and Media Studies