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SECTARIAN TERRORISM AT ITS WORST
EXCERPTS FROM THE FRIDAY TIMES
AUSTERITY, LOCAL ELECTIONS AND DISSIDENCE
In one of the worst sectarian incident of its kind in pakistani history five gunmen in a red Suzuki Potohar with probably a false faisalabad numberplate gunned down 20 shiites and a couple of sunnis at a majlis in a lahore graveyard on the 11th. The incident came on the heels of the escape of five terrorists of the Lashkar e Jhanghvi faction from a DGkhan jail which according to a jang report carried out the attack in retaliation for the killing of one of its operation incharges ie Qari Allah Wasaya. The incident seems to be similar to other ruthless sectarian incidents. However in other incidents the targets were usually specific while in this case the killings were probably mindless terror oriented. The TNFJ which claims shiite leadership immediately retaliated with a show of street violence in which cars, shops, hotels and offices were set on fire. The incident came at a time when shiites had been losing their influence on the present govt which had literally coralled all TNFJ opponents and provided them with full police protection. But as is obvious from this incident when the root causes of sectarian conflict cannot be resolved , intermittent flareups of such a nature cannot be controlled. Shiites too have been known to be behind such incidents to keep supporters in line. Why this incident occurred can obviously only be explained by the perpretrators. The most probable cause they say is that sectarianism had sort of died down and some incident was needed to keep it alive. Others cite continued shiite and iranian opposition to the Taliban as the cause. The police has in the process rounded up a number of SSP activists aswell as a number of TNFJ troublemakers. However there are complaints that the police stood around as the incident occurred as well as later when the TNFJ went on a rampage. Iran as usual has tried to interfere in pakistani affairs by commenting on the incident and seems tobe openly challenging the pakistani premier. Given Irans habit of exporting terrorism and the vehemence of irans statements one could almost state with conviction that iran might again be meddling in affairs where it is neither welcome nor wanted. Most TNFJ leaders are iranian backed and trained. The TNFJ leaders which have been hand in glove with the Nawaz govt have again demonstrated their duplicity and lack of control over their supporters. There are reports in the press that the whole situation went out of control because of the timidity of Shahbaz Sharif who apparently ordered the police not to interfere. There are reports obviously unconfirmed that various groups such as ousted feudals , unnerved politicians ,former intelligence walas , religious groups who think they can arrange anything, and even pukhtunkhwa supporters could also be behind such incidents? While the police is usually not good at preempting, controlling or even chasing the culprits they are pretty good at investigating and will soon find out the actual persons involved. According to another press report the culprits left the jeep in front of a police station. That could point to either police involvement, local culprits or opponents, or that the culprits thought it easier to make the getaway on foot.
In another coincidental event three major generals have been promoted to lieutenant generals. The timing of the promotions is extremely bad. One has noticed before that army promotions have taken place in uncertain times and one wonders if the promotions have a link to recent events. Does the army blackmail the govt in matters of promotion?
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This article is based on this weeks Friday Times which calls itself Pakistans First Independent Weekly Paper. The TFT is run by Najam Sethi and Jugnu Mohsin former PPP supporters who starred in a the Benazir is corrupt documentary and played a role in the interim caretaker regime when Benazir was toppled. According to Sethi, Benazirs corruption instructions were on Stick It notes which were later removed and torn due to which the Meraj Khalid govt could not find any evidence of corruption!!??
The TFT leads with an article that states that Nawaz works for the americans to the extent that they write his agenda. The article also states that america is going to cite pakistan as an anti minority state. The topic of minorities treatment is a fad amongst pakistani journalists as they hope that the west will keep turning the screws on this issue thus keeping pakistan away from becoming too religiuos and obviously locking women up in their homes.
The next article is on the court case in which Murtaza Bhuttos first wife Fauzia(seperated from Murtaza for the last thirteen years) apparently on Benazirs instructions is asking for the custody of her daughter Fatima who has lived with Murtaza and second wife Ghinwa for the last thirteen years.
The next article apparently by Salman Hussein raises the fears of a Taliban invasion. The Afghan Taliban are apparently training a 10000 pakistani taliban force . The taliban argue that we should not be frightened of them and that leaves the TFT frightened and scared out of its wits. Pakistan of course is not going to be easy meat as it has a relatively liberal populace although given the frivolity of the rich one might someday welcome a Taliban type rule.
State Bank Treasury Bills auction rates have risen to 14.75% from 12.5% in November and 17.64% in may. One wonders why since there is an overabundance of cash with banks reluctant to lend to the private sector. Most banks can survive on just selling money to the state bank.
The Economy shows no signs of improvement.Exports up, Imports down, tax collection below targets by 33 billion in the first five months. Trade Deficit down to $999million vis a vis $1506million last year. Foreign Exchange reserves down to 1.16 billion from 1.6 billion a few weeks ago.
The most important item is that Wasim Akram the pakistan cricket captain has been dropped for apparent match fixing. They say he asked some lahore betters to bet on a india win in the indo- pak match in Sharjah recently. Pakistan won and the betters who lost 5 million kidnapped Wasim Akrams father who was later released on payment of 1.5 million.?? Apparently Wasim also deliberately lost the pakistan england match by scoring only 4 of 19 balls. That is a bit tough on Wasim who has been in terrible batting form for most of his life. He has only a few good innings to his credit.
Plunder of Pakistan Steel continues. Pet topic of various journalistic groups. That's how they get things privatised.
Apparenty Gujral the outgoing indian premier is being financed by Nawaz Sharifs son.!! Gujral is sure too lose and any finances being spent on him would only be in a losing cause. The BJP and Congress are the two parties which are going tobe one and two in the indian election with the BJP expecting to win a near majority. The BJP is apparently succeeding in hoodwinking some Muslim leaders although muslims continue to be under represented in the indian parliament. The indian muslims who are more than 10% of indias population have never gotten more than a few seats thus pointing to a political immaturity which is baffling.
Nawaz Sharif looses in an economic survey which suggests that only 24% think that he can turn the economy around.
Nawaz Sharif and Benazir are too small a people to cope with humanity. They are fake rulers-they neither believe in capitalism or feudalism. They are a bunch of highwaymen, opportunists to the core.--Dr. Mubashir Hassan(civil engineer and former PPP leader)
Lots of useless articles on other countries, paintings,celebrities,books etc.
The austerity prone Nawaz Sharifs son apparently drives around in a white mercedes!!
Nawaz Sharifs wife apparently has a PHD in Urdu Literature and is the power behind the ehtesab scam while little brother shbaz is apparently opposed to saif ur rehman. Another pro zardari character in the govt is interior minister Shujaat who recently allowed top crony and corruption coordinator Salman Farooqui to leave the country with his family for medical treatment. Previously Salman Farooqui guided Nawaz thru his first three years in power.
Nawaz Sharif the erstwhile clean politician has got rescheduled loans worth 970 crores.
"Good king nwaz bilt a great big road called the mtrway to end all poverty. The vast emptiness of the mtrway was its great achievment. No poor people, no poor hamlets, no battered vehicles. So that by making the mtrway, good king nwaz solved the problem of poverty in pakistan. On the mtrway the poor were nowhere to be seen. Out of sight, Out of mind. The End."
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Nawaz Sharif who had in a mock convention of his jiyalas agreed to hold local elections on a party basis has again turned turtle. His cabinet forced him back to partyless polls as the news was that otherwise the PPP could embarrass him fatally. He also rescheduled the elections for April 21. During this period the provincial govts will try to shore up support at the local level by ensuring funds/approval for local development. The Nawaz govt has been terribly slow on development projects and apart from a few huge projects has not initiated any major development at the provincial and local level. According to the press only a miserly 10 billion has been allocated for development upto now. There are also reports that provincial and federal level funds are being reappropriated without approval from parliament.
The attempt at dissidence by foreign minister Gohar Ayub has ended with a whimper. He now says that he is not opposed to Siddik Kanju and is a diehard supporter of Nawaz Sharif. He was reportedly not considered for president because he is a failed industrialist, loan defaulter and has had loans of around 100 million written of . His reported corruption was also supposed to be one of the reasons for the end of the reign of his father the dictator Ayub Khan . He was also a diehard opponent of the opposition presidential candidate Fatima Jinnah(Quaids sister) in the 1965 elections. Belonging to the village rehana in haripur the ayub family used to be orange growers and sheep farmers. In the ayub era the ayub sons got loans and setup a wool processing unit and a car manufacturing unit(like the soeharto children and sanjay gandhi(maruti) and Nawaz Sharif(24 factories) and the Bhutto children(commisions mafia)). However the budding ayub industrial empire did not take off and both industries failed. The car manufacturing unit was taken over by relatives and the wool processing unit went bankrupt. There were widespread allegations in the sixties that ayub and his sons were corrupt.
Coming hard on the heels of the 18 lakh CBR chief the PPP appointed head of HBL has reportedly hired 14 executives at salaries of between 1 lakh and 4.5 lakhs. Most of them were local executives of the american CITIBANK while a few are from those who were fired from HBL under the golden handshake scheme. One wonders at the logic of such high salaries. Those employed from CITIBANK had already been superceded in that organisation and were getting much less there. The salaries are much higher than the average salaries of the best executives in the country. There are also reports that these high salaries are a new method of kickbacks. Some people suggest that the high salaries are unique methods of austerity and prevention of corruption. There are widespread allegations that the Citibank executives have been hired because of their cooperation in cornering Benazir and Zardari.Still others suggest that they were ISI moles in Citibank who have returned after being identified or being rendered useless.
Two more oldtimers have as they say kicked the bucket. Ghafoor Hoti known as the "Cheeni Chor" during the sugar crisis in the Ayub era and head of a faction of the PMLj and Ahmad Bashir intellectual,socialist,prolific but useless article writer and a former head of APP have moved on.
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All the former presidential hopefuls are being made to meet Tarrar to show a united front which seems a bit contrived. Even Abbaji(father of nawaz) has given a hazri. Tarrars lack of political experience is showing thru and there is a definite lack of public support. Having no real political base he only has a few PMLn walas left to meet. The only presidential hopeful who seems to be refusing to accept Nawaz Sharifs choice is Gohar Ayub. Todays Frontier Post has headlined his opposition to Nawaz Sharifs policy on pukhtunkhwa, Siddik Kanju and Tarrar. He is reportedly thinking of dropping out of the cabinet. He had hoped to be a joint govt-opposition candidate for the presidency. Nawaz seems to be preferring Siddik Kanju as forign minister and is reportedly issuing orders directly to Gohars underlings in the ForeignMinistry. The removal of Gohar if it happens will be another event showing Nawaz Sharifs preference for punjabis in all important slots.
Whenever the top political leaders in the country feel threatened they start visiting tombs or the socalled shrines or mazars. Recently there have been a spate of tomb visits by Nawaz Sharif and Tarrar. Theoretically Tarrar should not be the tomb visiting kind but he is showing that for the sake of high office they are ready to bypass personal feelings and beliefs. However I might just aswell warn them that allah does not change his mind just because of their visiting a shrine. Benazir used to visit a shrine where the Pir beat visitors with a broom. I however don't know whether he beat Benazir with the broom or not. In another incident Benazir sent a sindhi pir on a joyride in her govt helicopter when he expressed the desire in exchange for letting her rule the country!!!.She apparently didn't remain in power for very long after that. There are rumours that Nawaz wants to rule for ten years while Shahbaz wants to be in power for twenty years.!!??
Nawaz Sharif seems to be losing the total support that he had enjoyed upto now from the provincial govts. A few provincial govts have refused to hold local body elections forcing him to delay the elections to April. He is also going to allow political parties to particiapte openly as than it would be easier to control the local bodies who have a habit of going their own way. He is reportedly also mulling the formation of Khidmat committees something on the line of PPP's Social Action Boards to forestall the image of local bodies being in total control at the grassroots level. In effect he wants to give his jiyalas something todo. Once they are corralled with some responsibility they become insecure and harmless as they are also shown to be ineffective. There are widespread suggestions that Nawaz does not like sharing power even with his own henchmen not even at the local level.
Newspaper reports suggest that two prominent PMLn walas ie Sheikh Raschid and Mehtab Abbasi(CM) have started their own qabza groups ie people who forcibly occupy land.
The hooligan and irresponsible nature of PMLn leaders is becoming legend. Recently when Nawaz inaugurated the MNA Hostel complex they broke doors and windows causing him to order the PMLn to pay for the repairs. During the Islamic summit PMLn workers and journalists were accused of robbing ash trays and other fixtures from the same MNA hostel. When he opened the motorway the PMLn workers broke the window panes of several toll booths.
The motorway has several unique problems. There are stray donkeys, foxes, goats, sheep and dogs which become dangerous at night. While travelling on the motorway one noticed several foxes lying crushed on the road. The motorway police has been ordered to confiscate all sheep and goats and apparently to eat them. People living on both sides of the motorway are facing extreme problems as they cannot cross over to the other side due to fencing. They have to trek several miles just to cross over. The other contrast is the extreme difference between the dilapidated roads once one gets off the motorway . The approach roads in and around the motorway also need to be improved. Seeing the broken down bumpy roads after getting off the motorway some people have been known to comment that there is a great difference between the real and unreal.
PMLn MNA and loudmouth Tariq Aziz has been photograhed trying to remove/steal the Supreme Court nameplate during the PMLn attack on the Supreme Court . His explanation is that he was trying to save the nameplate from other looters.!!!
The pakistan cricket captain Wasim Akram has resigned after some lackluster captaincy. He was being publically accused of betting against his own team and dire threats were even being printed in the pakistani press.The pakistani selectors are trying to remove all the big name players and bring in youngsters whose talent is usually suspect. The Cricket board has named Rashid Latif as captain who has no experience of captaincy and whose place in the side is also not secure. The cricket board head Majid Khan is being blamed for nepotism. He has appointed his son Bazid Khan to captain the under nineteen on three consecutive series. Bazid Khan would probably not even be selected in the team if his father were not head of the PCB. The selection committee of Zaheer Abbas, Shafik Papa and Saleem Altaf are a divided lot and seem to be making decisions on who does well. If Zaheers favourites dowell than he makes the decisions otherwise Saleem does with Shafik Papa being the odd man out who seems to be against players like Ejaz Ahmed who has been the countries best batsman alongwith Saeed Anwar and Inzamam. Saleem Altaf tries to control events even on the field and seems to be rigid in his attitudes. For example he pushed out Saleem Malik just because some players did not like his attitude. The end result is that Nawaz Sharif is going to be made the PCB Patron who will than move to remove Majid and other PPP appointees to the cricket setup. The Selection committee has done well in one aspect ie to try out a number of youngsters all whom have failed despite a few brilliant outings. The latest in this line are Yousaf Youhanna and Fazle Akber.
There seem to be rifts developing in the Nawaz coalition in Sind. The followers of Jiye Sind or the Sindhudesh are out to create trouble and there is the appearance of a new group being formed who oppose Liaqat Jatoi. The son of Pir Pagara has fallen into the PPP camp due to a widening rift and the hope of a PPP coalition govt being formed in Sind if sufficient numbers can be broken away from the PMLn fold. The breakaway group is attempting to use the kalabagh issue to widen the division.
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Strange things have been happening since Tarrar (some say TERROR) became president. Two prominent people ie Khan of Kalat and Razziuddin Siddiui(vice chancellor of several universities) died. 65 people died in a truck, tanker, bus and car collision/fire. Several bank dacoities have taken place. A KRL engineer was hacked to death!. They say whenever an election is near bank dacoities shoot up. Several reportedly sectarian terrorists were allowed to escape from a prison in DG Khan.
The Friday Times a mouthpiece for feudals and ahmadis reports that Tarrar is pro hadood laws and anti appointment of ahmadis to the higher courts. Ahmadis according to the pakistani constitution cannot be appointed to important positions. Tarrar apparently approved the cutting of a hand and leg for a robbery worth only 40000???!!! They say a hand and leg are worth much more than that and judges should realise that money is not that expensive these days.
The nawaz coalition is now hedging and hawing in its pledge to reappoint the fired UBL workers. After nearly a month since Nawaz made that pledge he is now only considering who to reappoint. They say now only those will be reappointed who have not approached a court of law which is a clear injustice and derogatory as far as respect for the judiciary is concerned. I can only say that "grow up Nawaz Sharif and stand up for what u say".
Nawaz Sharif is continuing to play the innocent victim rather than ruler . As a casual observer there are few in this country left who can victimize him and it is he who is doing most of the victimizing.
The Nawaz cabinet is doing a lot of heeing and hawing. After announcing local body elections without consulting the provinces they are now considering whether to go back on that too as the NWFP, BALOCHISTAN and reportedly the MQM donot want anything todo with local body polls as it would reduce the influence and powers of the provincial govts. Previously they have backed down on several fronts including downsizing and not devaluing the rupee. The only thing that they have remained firm on is not increasing electricity rates. One is waiting to see how long that pledge lasts.
The Friday Time reports inits Bakwasi section that new president Tarrar has a special problem. He reportedly suffers from vertigo and apprently falls over when attempting sajda during prayer(sometimes)??!! Reports appearing in the pakistani press suggest that the appointment of Tarrar is not a very popular move . According to a photograph appearing in the press of the three armed sevices chiefs , Jehangir Keramat COAS found it extremely difficult to talk to the president??!! In the photograph Jehangir seemed ill at ease while Tarrar tended to avoid looking at the three chiefs. Tarrar is nowadays meeting all the other contenders for president and is trying to mend the fences that Nawaz has ruthlessly torn down.
In another controversy making the rounds apparently someone wrote the words "Long Live Pukhtunkhwa and Pakistan Murdabad" on one of the ballots of the presidential election. The ANP and the PMLn are at odds over the name Pukhtunkhwa. Since the ANP has a long anti pakistan history it is being assumed that someone from the ANP wrote it. There are few ANP legislators in the NA and it would not be difficult to find out who wrote it. Political leaders are calling for the head of the traitor who wrote .
People are now referring to the Punjab as one of the smaller provinces. Shabaz Sharif had stated that the president would come from one of the smaller provinces. Other commentators from the real smaller provinces are referring to pakistan as the punjab nowadays as there is no longer any opposition to punjabi hegemony and domination. According to ANP logic NWFP should be renamed as Pukhtunkhwa as the majority in NWFP are Pukhtuns. Since Punjabis they say are a majority in pakistan it too should be renamed Punjabistan or Punjabkhwa. OR since almost everyone speaks some urdu it could be named urdukhwa or urdistan.(joke)Another ANP logic is that we should not have any problems renaming anything. However they also suggest that once NWFP is renamed its new name cannot be changed. Why u can rename NWFP and not Pukhtunkhwa or for that matter Pakistan causes the logic to loose effect.
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