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Tuesday March 19, 2024

Pettifoggers abound

Legal eye
The writer is a lawyer based in Islamabad.
Whatever happened to taking a position in

By Babar Sattar
March 02, 2013
Legal eye
The writer is a lawyer based in Islamabad.
Whatever happened to taking a position in this land of the pure and then taking responsibility for the consequences of such position? The ruling regime and the opposition parties have convened their respective all party conferences (APCs) and all parties seem to agree that we must talk to the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and other murderous militias as the preferred way to end violence.
The khakis (who jealously guard their exclusive control over defining and executing our national security doctrine) tell us with folded arms that they have their hands tied given that there is no ‘national consensus’ in favour of fighting throat-slitting terror brigades.
So who in the end is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis? How long will the highest executive office holders – the president, prime minister, cabinet members, chief ministers, army chief and key bureaucrats – continue passing the buck around hiding behind the elusive non-consensus?
Do we now have a doctrine of power and responsibility where public office-holders are only to exercise power and it is media houses, journalists and civil society that must shoulder the responsibility of making policy choices and evolving consensus around them?
Let us understand that it is not the preferred strategy to root out violence and neutralise terrorists that is mired in confusion but the goal itself. The patrons of jihadi groups still believe in their continuing utility.
Other apologists argue that the means employed by faith-inspired terrorists might be objectionable but their demands are legitimate: liberating Kashmir by force, cleansing Afghanistan of infidels, establishing a Shariah-run Sunni emirate in Pakistan and exporting the model to other nation-states even through use of non-state actors.
The debate about talks with terrorists is thus about values and policy and not just strategy. This is no theoretical debate about whether we live in Jinnah’s Pakistan or Zia’s. We are at a crossroads and this conversation is about what kind of society we wish to be. This is not about the past. It is about the present and the future.
Will we be the place where Facebook and YouTube get banned because they have objectionable content? If the principle behind banning websites is correct, will we ban the Internet if we can’t ban websites because there are too many horrid ones out there? Will we ban TV sets for they show obscene content? Will we ban radio sets because music is the work of the devil?
As a Muslim, is it not preferable for men to grow beards? If it is, why shouldn’t there be a law requiring everyone to grow one and punish the shameless shavers? Why shouldn’t law prescribe decent dress code and require flogging of violators?
Bottom line: In organising our collective life where will we strike a balance between individual freedom and the collective right to be offended at the personal choices of others? Once you refuse to defend individual liberty, it is a slippery slope. Soon you’re in TTP land – banning music, radio, barbers and schools.
This is about what kind of state we wish to be. Will we be a responsible state playing by agreed rules of international law as a country of our size and influence ought to, or will we rebel against the nation-state system on the basis that if the US doesn’t abide by it, why should we?
Will we continue to employ non-state actors and jihadists to poke other states, while hosting proxy wars of other states on our territory? Will we be a state where it is fine for groups to impose their views and ideology on others through use of force? Will we be a state where force will trump law and accumulating brute force will be the only means to defend ones rights and interests?
And this takes us back to the debate about talks. What principles and values will form the basis of the position we ought to take in ‘negotiating’ with terrorists? Will these negotiations be with hostage-takers? Are we in agreement that the TTP and its Jaish-this and Lashkar-that cousins are holding the state and society hostage and in order to set the hostages free, we must submit to their demands?
But in hostage situations, the hostage-takers also seek exit so they can escape? Here we aren’t negotiating with some foreign jihadists who’ll be provided a safe passage out of Pakistan and it will all be over. These terrorists are sons of the soil and will remain here.
What will become of the principle of territorial sovereignty if there are formally recognised sanctuaries within the state, where the writ of an independent militia runs supreme? What if the TTP facilitates jihadist activities in Afghanistan, India, Iran or elsewhere from such sanctuary? Will Pakistan be able to demand respect for the sanctity of its territorial sovereignty when it simultaneously accepts that it has no control over the territory in question?
Will the state concede that militant groups have a right to share the state’s monopoly over use of force? Article 256 of the constitution prohibits private armies. Articles 9 and 10 require the state to guarantee right to life, safety and liberty of citizens. Will the TTP run its own state in North Waziristan and citizens living in Fata will look to the Taliban for their life and security?
Can separate legal codes and scheme of fundamental rights be allowed in any one part of Pakistan? If the state accepts and allows imposition of the TTP brand of Shariah in North Waziristan, will they not wish to export it to other agencies, then settled districts and eventually to the rest of Pakistan and beyond? Have we not already tried this experiment in Swat, which blew up in our faces?
Will the fundamental premise of negotiations be that TTP will not attack citizens and government forces or that it will give up violence? Plea-bargaining is an acceptable way forward if someone accepts guilt and the negotiation is about quantum of punishment. If we are only talking about suspension of attacks, we’re clearly not talking about permanent solutions.
And why would the TTP and others give up violence? We have created an exclusionary state and society. Those who have taken to violence mostly have no other skill-sets.
Control over violence is a source of power, prestige and authority for them. Insurgencies, sectarian and ethnic violence have nurtured a militant elite, supported by a war economy. Will our Hakimullahs, Fazalullahs and Malik Ishaqs just give up their ideology and means of power and begin selling watermelons?, cynics wonder.
The no-consensus argument of khakis and the political leadership’s insistence on talks is nothing other than lack of vision, clarity and courage amongst our leaders. We need to mainstream Fata, not marginalise it further by handing it to the TTP.
We need zero-tolerance for militants of all hues, instead of negotiating their privileges. We need to provide progressive education to all kids across Pakistan and curb hate-spewing madressahs instead of letting the TTP terrorise schools into shutting down. We need to provide economic opportunities to our burgeoning youth by ensuring 8-10 percent growth instead of allowing violence to stifle our economy and private investment.
Unless our state and society offers the promise of upward social mobility, the growing sense of injustice in society and the temptation to take to the gun will not subside. But the need to reform predatory state policies and exclusionary political, social and economic structures doesn’t assuage the immediate-term need to suppress militants, unfit for a safe and civilised society, running amuck.
An anti-terror policy resting on the naïve premise of talking terrorists out of violence is a non-starter. We need not endorse a kill-and-dump policy but we do need clarity of thought that militants who are a threat to society will have to be fought and even killed if they refuse to give in.
Email: sattar@post.harvard.edu