Courtesy: → Express News Tv (Kal Tak with Javed Chaudhry, 11th aug 2011 -p3)
Daily Archives: 11/08/2011
SLGO is a conspiracy to divide Sindh
- Sindhi nationalists protest against restoration of the LG system
By Sohail Khattak
SINDH – KARACHI: Members of civil society, legal fraternity and political activists declared the restoration of the Sindh Local Government Ordinance (SLGO) as a conspiracy to divide Sindh.
While staging a demonstration in front of Karachi Press Club here on Tuesday, protestors condemned the restoration of the SLGO [Local government Ordinance aka dictator general Musharraf’s repressive & discriminatory ordinance that has been used to deny people of Sindh to access Karachi, the Capital of Sindh] and demanded an end to conspiracies against Sindh.
They were holding placards and banners and shouting slogans against the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) government for restoring the LG system ….
Read more → The Express Tribune
Chairman Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz, Bashir Qureshi announced to hold a sit-in in front of the Sindh National Assembly during its coming session.
- JSQM chief threatens sit-in outside SA building
SINDH – KARACHI: Chairman Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz (JSQM) Bashir Khan Qureshi while rejecting restoration of the Sindh Local Government Ordinance 2001 [dictator Musharraf’s repressive & discriminatory ordinance that has been used to deny sons of soil to access Karachi, the Capital of Sindh built by our forefathers!] announced to hold a sit-in in front of the Sindh Assembly (SA) during its coming session. This he said while addressing a press conference here at his residence on Monday. Qureshi said that it was the history of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) to take decisions against Sindh and its people. He said the PPP had passed Language Act in 1972, which created ethnic violence in the province, especially in Karachi and Hyderabad. PPP has divided Sindh on administration basis in a portion of Karachi and Hyderabad for survival of its power, which is a step to separate Karachi and Hyderabad from rest of Sindh, he observed. Qureshi said the people of Sindh would not compromise on the sovereignty of Sindh and would resist any decision against it. He said the JSQM would not accept the restoration of SLGO 2001 at any cost. He announced that the JSQM would stage a sit-in outside Sindh Assembly when SLGO 2001 would be presented during its coming session. Qureshi said peaceful protest demonstrations, sit-ins and rallies would be continues until the restoration of commissionerate system in Sindh.
Courtesy: → Daily Times
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Pakistan’s foreign policy: grandeur of delusions – II. By Dr Mohammad Taqi
- The most dangerous outcome of the decades of indoctrination is a mutant urban middle class that grew up on a steady diet of the concocted stories of victories and revisionist history in the Pakistan Studies textbooks
“Our object should be peace within and peace without. We want to live peacefully and maintain cordial and friendly relations with our immediate neighbours and with the world at large. We have no aggressive designs against anyone. We stand by the United Nations Charter and will gladly make our full contribution to the peace and prosperity of the world” — Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s address on August 15, 1947.
I had noted last week that the recent events in Turkey indicate that any military’s control over the domestic and foreign affairs of a nation-state is unsustainable and discordant with the new geopolitical realities. There is nothing new about this. The single-party communist and non-communist governments, military juntas in Latin America, the Ba’athist regimes or the mom and pop dictatorships a la Ferdinand and Emelia Marcos all had one thing in common — the national security state paradigm was central to their domestic policies.
The foreign policy of these regimes was by and large reflective of their domestic policies. Leon Trotsky had aptly noted: “Foreign policy is everywhere and always a continuation of domestic policy, for it is conducted by the same ruling class and pursues the same historic goals.” In case of these assorted dictatorships, their militaries played the pivotal role in carrying out these policies and held sway either as an institution or sharing power with the ruling individual, clique or party.
Before the echo of Quaid-e-Azam’s above quoted words — spoken at the inauguration of the Pakistan Broadcasting Service — could fade, the signs of what was to become Pakistan’s lot started manifesting themselves. The events starting with the October 1947 tribal incursion into Kashmir from the Pakistani side, which eventually snowballed into a war between the two new countries, also set the stage for the national security state paradigm becoming the sheet-anchor of Pakistan’s domestic and foreign policies. In this case, Trotsky’s adage was turned on its head.
The involvement of the military in achieving the nascent Pakistan’s immediate foreign policy objectives when the democratic institutions of the country were in an embryonic form set the stage for its larger-than-life role in the affairs of the new state. In due course, the military enterprise displaced and/or co-opted both the civilian bureaucracy and the politicians. Three martial laws were merely an outward manifestation of this chokehold that the military has continuously exercised over Pakistan’s polity.
The establishment’s subsequent misadventures in Kashmir actually created a situation where the domestic policy continued to be crafted to suit the means and ends of the foreign policy agenda. The state’s patronage of the Islamist groups and religio-political parties was used to support this jingoism and the symbiotic relationship peaked under General Ziaul Haq with the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan. To raise such jihadist cadres, the Pakistani state moved from the primordial secularism of Quaid-e-Azam to the obscurantist and Arabised Islamisation of Pakistan under Zia. The proxy warfare that started in Kashmir in 1947 remains the bedrock of Pakistan’s defence strategy. The quest for so-called strategic depth in Afghanistan is also a manifestation of this phenomenon. Ironically, a conventional military has been betting on an unconventional war strategy that relies on the presumed but untested success of guerrilla warfare in the event it is run over in a war.
The initial call to the holy war in Kashmir was rather generic but the next decades saw the full-fledged use of highly indoctrinated jihadist proxies inducted into Kashmir, especially after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan. All pretences to the Kashmiris’ right of self-determination were jettisoned along the way. Organisations like the JKLF — supported initially by the Pakistani state — were abandoned in favour of Islamist proxies, when they started moving away from the Pakistani position to demand a “Kashmir for Kashmiris”, i.e. independence from both India and Pakistan.
The admixture of military jingoism and jihadism unleashed a massive radicalisation of Pakistani society that eventually culminated in the rise of several domestic militant Islamist outfits with ties to similar international groups. But the most dangerous outcome of the decades of indoctrination is a mutant urban middle class that grew up on a steady diet of the concocted stories of victories and revisionist history in the Pakistan Studies textbooks. Quaid-e-Azam’s nationalism — itself not without a modicum of communalism — was eventually replaced by full-fledged Pakistani chauvinism. Any desire for ‘peace within and peace without’ was replaced by faith in mutually assured destruction through nukes. The grandeur of delusions perhaps could not be more grandiose and delusional.
The 19th-century US Senator Stephen Decatur’s words, “Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations, may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong,” seems to have become the national creed, replacing the Quaid’s desire “to live peacefully and maintain cordial and friendly relations with our immediate neighbours and with the world at large”. In contrast to Turkey’s “zero problem” foreign policy aimed at harmonious relations with its neighbouring, regional and international states, Pakistan’s foreign policy became a zero-sum paradigm vis-à-vis its neighbours.
However, the hyper-nationalists, especially in the intelligentsia, are losing sight of the fact that all aforementioned dictatorial regimes had one more thing in common — a transition from authoritarianism to democracy that set in motion the processes that eventually saw civilian supremacy established over the military. The transitions to democracy may have had various different routes and means, ranging from the implosion of regimes like the USSR or through protests and mass movements, but one common denominator was the role of civil society and scholars as the guiding force as well as the watchdogs of this civilian oversight.
Whether it is establishing the constitutional parameters for robust defence ministries or exercising control over the military through making it accountable via transparency in budgeting, planning and procurement processes, it is ultimately the opinion leaders who have to ask the hard questions of both the military and the politicians. But before one can objectively ask such questions, one has to get past Decatur’s delusional belief in his country’s certitude. And how aptly had Senator Carl Schurz responded to Decatur: “My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right.”
While we are holding seminars on de-radicalisation, it may not be a bad idea to hold one to discuss how we got here. Senator Schurz’s remark was an instant reality-check; perhaps that could be the theme of a frank dialogue.
Courtesy: → Daily Times
My Fellow American: understanding of as being American changes the whole dynamics
My Fellow American is a film project in the United States devoted to recognizing that Muslims are our neighbors. My Fellow American project was created to offer a new narrative about Muslims in America and offer people a safe platform to discuss their opinions. My fellow American is hoping to share this message of tolerance. This 2 minute film is actually praising Muslims and showing how they are helping their fellow Americans. …
Courtesy: → Elizabeth Potter, Unity Productions Foundation,
facebook.com/MyFellowAmericanProject@usmuslimstories
Karachiites accuse MQM-A of killing innocent citizens in Karachi
Courtesy: → Duniya Tv News (In Session with Asma Choudhry)
Via → Siasat.pk
MQM (Altaf) Importing Weapons Through Sea – says Writer, journalist, columnist, & intellectual, Najam Sethi
Courtesy: → Geo News Tv (Aapas Ki Baat with Najam Sethi, Muneeb Farooq)
via → Siasat.pk
We, the Sindhi nation, will never allow our motherland to be divided
Press release: (Aug 11, 2011) We the undersigned Sindhi Diaspora Organizations (SDOs) that represent the most educated, progressive and economically stable section of Sindh Civil Society and who continue to maintain deep and robust socio-economic and political relations with Sindh. We REJECT the recently promulgated Sindh Governor Ordinances aka dictator Musharraf’s repressive & discriminatory ordinance that has been used to deny Sindhis to access Karachi, the Capital of Sindh built by our forefathers!
This thievery , gerrymandering and trickery by the obscure back room dealings between the MQM and the PPP in blatant disrespect of the recent parliamentary decision taken by the Sindh National Assembly.
We the diaspora members of the Sindhi nation, who are forced to live abroad due to lack of opportunities and freedoms in our own resource rich motherland will defy all and any attempts to introduce Military Rule or Civil Government Rule through Ordinances or Armed Threats.
We , the Sindhi nation will never allow our motherland to be divided politically, administratively, geographically or militarily.
Undersinged;
Sindhi Association of North America, SANA
World Sindhi Congress, WSC, UK-USA, Europe
World Sindhi Institute, WSI, USA-Canada,
Sindhi Sangat of Middle East, Dubai
Anna Hazare’s message to the Nation
My Dear friends, A decisive battle against corruption has begun. We are not against any political party. We want systemic reforms. We want a corruption-free country. After all, what are the people asking for – a strong anti-corruption law which provides for honest and time-bound investigations and trials that result in jail for the guilty, confiscation of embezzled money and their dismissal from service? Are we asking too much? For two months, we were talking to the government.
Government seems unwilling to take even small steps against corruption. Government appears insincere. We have met all prominent political leaders. We have tried everything. What do we do now? When I announced my indefinite fast from 16th August, the government threatened that they would crush us the way they crushed Baba Ramdev’s peaceful agitation.
Friends, this is a historic opportunity. We can’t afford to lose it. We are determined to fight to the end. If they arrest us, we will peacefully offer ourselves. If they use batons and bullets, we will happily lay down our lives but will not leave the place. We will not retaliate. It will be a completely non-violent movement. “If you fast on 16th August, you will be crushed” – this is what they are saying. “We will impose section 144 on Jantar Mantar” – this is what they are thinking. But I say that if every citizen in this country takes off from his work from 16th August, comes on the streets in front of his house, at the crossing, with a tricolor in his hands shouting “Mata ki Jai” and raising slogans against corruption, they will fall short of batons and bullets. The government may arrest one Anna Hazare but how will they arrest 120 crore Anna Hazares? They may impose section 144 at one Jantar Mantar but will they impose section 144 on the whole country? And let me tell you – the police and army is with us. At traffic signals, policemen stop us, express their support and wish us well; at Raj Ghat, the policemen donated generously for the movement! So, will you take off from your work from 16 August? Will you descend on the streets with me? This year, the country will wait for 16th rather than 15th August. In solidarity.
Thanks
Anna Hazare
Courtesy: → Desiyatra, August 11, 2011
JI “BLAMES” MQM for TERRORISM
KCCC’s alleged involvement in killings: Jamaat calls for judicial inquiry
LAHORE, Aug 10: Jamaat-i-Islami chief Syed Munawar Hasan has expressed concern over the reported involvement of the Karachi Command and Control Centre (KCCC) in terrorist activities and called for a judicial inquiry into the matter.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, he alleged that custodians of peace and civil liberties had turned into murderers.
Quoting reports published in a section of the print media, the JI chief said the criminals involved in target killings and terrorist activities were allegedly getting assistance from the Command and Control Centre.
The reports said that activities of police, Rangers and other law-enforcement agencies were being watched through secret cameras and targets identified.
Mr Hasan said the KCCC had been set up during the tenure of Karachi Nazim Mustafa Kamal and thousands of workers of a particular party had been recruited to it.
He said it was a tragedy and a matter of concern that the rulers were themselves protecting the killers of innocent citizens only to stay in power and the assassins were not being arrested despite having been identified. Mr Hasan alleged that certain parties in the ruling coalition were involved in the bloodshed and target killings, adding that some ministers and senators were on payroll of foreign agencies.
Courtesy: → DAWN.COM
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- JI chief condemns MQM’s terrorism
LAHORE, July 6: The Jamaat e Islami chief, Syed Munawar Hasan, has said that the writ of the government in Karachi has been eroded because of the MQM’s terrorism. He was talking to the family members of JI member ( Rukn) Mubinul Haq, who lost his life at the hands of the MQM terrorists in Faisalabad colony, Karachi.
Syed Munawar Hasan said that the MQM’s inclusion in the government had emboldened the terrorists who were moving about freely and the law and order in the port city had been shattered. The residents of the mega city had become hostages in the hands of a few terrorists, he added.
Read more → http://www.smunawar.com/2010/07/ji-chief-condemns-mqms-terrorism.html
via → Chagataikhan
