Natural allies- exposed as nincompoops and anti-human lot that their students, the Taliban, were
<Then the Mullahs would have to govern. They would have to tackle the problems of the people. They would have to come up with a programme. And all that they have been able to show in the one province they control is that they are only capable of chasing the mirage of negativism that springs from the depths of their own minds.>
ABDUL BASIT HAQQANI
General Pervez Musharraf is necessary for the MMA. But for him and the common cause provided by a target for all components to hate, they might have fallen apart by now
The ‘Mullah-Mullah Alliance’ and the ‘democratic dictator’ make ideal bedfellows. This statement may seem strange in view of the opposition’s very public antagonism towards General Pervez Musharraf in the National Assembly, but the bellicosity of the maulvis is matched by the obdurate refusal of the General to remove his uniform.
The General has good reason not to shed his uniform and present himself for approval by the elected representatives of the people. As long as he sports four stars on his epaulets, he is recognisably the boss. Submit himself to the will of the people, as represented by the civilian politicians in the National Assembly, and who knows what will happen. The bearded ones may promise that once he ceases to be army chief, they will elect him as president, albeit with greatly reduced powers.
But who knows. If there is to be an election for the post, how can others be prevented from contesting. If that happens, the opponent may give him a hard time. The General would probably win even a hard-fought contest as long as Chaklala continues to support him, but he will not be in a position to command that support as an ex-General. And loyalty, as the General probably knows all too well, is assured only to a serving commander.
There are other dangers too. It is well known that since General Zia ul Haq and the days of the frontline state, some of his fellow officers have been favourably inclined towards the obscurantists. It may well be that once they are freed from the discipline of obeying the senior officer, they will indulge their natural inclinations and support the Mullah brigade instead of their erstwhile chief. And once the contest begins, his successor in the Army House could decide that it is his turn to rule the roost. No, for the General, there are definite risks involved in abandoning his real and most powerful argument.
There is the question of the people’s will which has to be expressed through the observance of laws, and above all, the Basic Law. Shenanigans by Sharifudin Pirzada, whose contempt for the spirit of the law is probably greater than John Ashcroft’s, cannot legitimise the sleight-of-hand by which he assumed the presidency. But the people are the farthest thing from the minds of our successive rulers. The General may well think, “What do the people have to do with it!” As Chief of Army Staff, he is far above the hoi polloi and is not answerable to them for anything he decides to do. So he will take off his uniform when he wants, usually just before going to bed; and he will wear it when he wants, usually when he wishes to emphasise the fact that he is a ‘democratic dictator’.
Do not, he seems to be saying, take the ‘democratic’ in the title too seriously. The operative word is ‘dictator’ and dictators never bother with due process, provisions of the Constitution or the will of the people. If one of them gets ‘elected’ through a referendum (for which there is no provision in the Constitution), it is only because such a trick has been sanctified by the tradition established by a similar, high and mighty — and uniformed — predecessor. And that, too, because winning by as much as 99 per cent of the ballot was a certainty, even if no one bothered to turn up to vote. Nor should the ignorant lot set much store by legitimacy. Who cares about legitimacy if all the guns are on the side of the uniformed one. Then the mullahs seem to be in the right. But only accidentally and because they are opposed to what is manifestly wrong.
However, we must not forget that these same democrats were quite happy to serve the interests of a previous and much more despotic product of the coercive apparatus. Members of the bearded fraternity were great supporters of General Zia. They never asked him to shed his uniform. They never questioned his right to assume the office of president while continuing to ‘serve’ in the Army. They never expressed any doubt about the legitimacy of that dictator’s referendum and never asked him to submit himself to an election by the electoral college as stipulated in the constitution.
So if they are opposed to the present man in office, it is only an accident that they happen to be on the side of right and constitutional propriety. They oppose the man because, right at the beginning of his political career, they saw two poodles peeking from under his arms. Being the obscurantist zealots that they are, they think that his love for the canine is evidence of the General’s liberal outlook, though the rest of us know that he has practically done little to further the liberal cause or to stem the tide of suicidal fundamentalism that threatens to engulf us all.
If he and his political party have, belatedly, decided to join forces against the Taliban, it is not because of that fanatical gang’s activities. It is only because joining in the international outrage could give his unconstitutional rule a degree of acceptability if not legitimacy. But in seeking the approval of the international community, the General has been forced into opposing the protégés and pupils of the fundamentalist lobby. No wonder the bearded ones refuse to see the parallel between the present regime and that of their late benefactor.
The General is said to have watched as the results of the elections arranged by him were coming in. It is said that someone expressed concern at the strong showing being made by the religious extremists. I am told that the General was unperturbed. “They are our natural allies,” he is said to have remarked. Perhaps he meant that they could be bought off. If so, he failed to realise that you can buy someone off if he is willing to be content with a little and leave the lion’s share to you. Even so, as our successive governments should have learnt, pandering to such people only encourages them to make more demands. But even that is not relevant any more.
The Mullahs will not be appeased, even if the General takes off his uniform and comes to them naked, much like Henry II, to be scourged. When everything is within your grasp, you do not settle for anything less than all. And that is a vision shown to the fanatics by the General’s principal backers and their ‘intelligent’ covert guard.
Nevertheless, the Mullahs are important for the General. For all these years, he has tried to win over the democratic, liberal community by whispering in their ears that the alternative to him is religious mayhem. And the General is even more necessary for the MMA. But for him and the common cause provided by a target for all components to hate, they might have fallen apart by now. In that case, it would be in the MMA’s interest to keep him there as an external foe providing a cement for internal cohesion. Even more, what if the MMA won a complete victory and the General became history?
Then the Mullahs would have to govern. They would have to tackle the problems of the people. They would have to come up with a programme. And all that they have been able to show in the one province they control is that they are only capable of chasing the mirage of negativism that springs from the depths of their own minds. With the General there, they can pose as champions of democracy. With him gone, they will be exposed as the kind of nincompoops and anti-human lot that their students, the Taliban, were.
Basit Haqqani is a former ambassador
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