( with Answer from Omar Abdul Qadir)
22 December 2005
THE situation in pakistan’s Balochistan province is acquiring alarming proportions. The strategically sensitive province bordering Iran and Afghanistan has been in media spotlight throughout this year.
Earlier this year, it witnessed clashes between Baloch tribesmen and security forces when the rebels targetted the country’s energy and industrial installations in Sui protesting against the molestation of a doctor. Now the army has undertaken a major offensive in the region when a helicopter carrying President Pervez Musharraf recently came under fire. Violent clashes in the past few days are said to have claimed scores of lives besides bringing the life in the province to a halt.
Whatever the grievances of the people in Balochistan, there is no excuse for lawlessness and sabotaging of vital installations and public property. Acts such as the missile attack that narrowly missed Musharraf’s chopper constitute an open challenge to the state. And no government anywhere can tolerate such an open threat to the country’s sovereignty. Having thrown the gauntlet to the army, the so-called Baloch nationalist leaders such as Akbar Khan Bugti, who have been adding fuel to the fire of tribal unrest raking up genuine and imagined causes, have no reason to complain now. They had it coming.
In fact, pakistan should have dealt with feudal and tribal lords such as these soon after independence just as India dealt with its own.
pakistan is paying for those costly mistakes now. Successive governments have appeased and indulged these alternate centres of power - these corrupt vaderas, landlords and chieftains - allowing them to continue ruling over their ’subjects’ even though independence had liberated everyone else. They make their own laws and run their own private armies. It is thanks to these feudal lords and chieftains that democracy hasn’t been able to take root in the country whereas it flourished in India where all rajahs, princes and ’jagirdars’ were divested of their power as soon as the country gained independence. Even now it’s not too late for pakistan to show its own feudal lords their place. They have indeed no place in a democracy.
While all sections in a democratic society have every right to air their genuine grievances and seek justice from their government, this should be done using peaceful, and democratic channels. The discovery of heavy weapons such as missiles, rocket launchers, heavy machine guns and loads of explosives do not exactly betray democratic designs of the rebels. pakistan army is justified in resolving to restore the rule of law and peace in the frontline province that is home to the country’s energy resources. It’s time to rein in all lords and highnesses along with their private armies and weapons. No civilians must be allowed to carry weapons.
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Balochistan and its rights 27 December 2005
I WAS shocked to read the editorial, Back to Balochistan. You are saying that the Baloch people have no right to indulge in lawless sabotage. I agree with you. But, please note that the Baloch nation has tried every other option, but nothing works. And please don’t compare Pakistan with India.
In India, there is democracy and every state has got its rights, unlike in Pakistan where every government comes to work for Punjab and exploit the
other three provinces.
Sui Gas comes from Balochistan, but it’s not available in Balochistan. The Baloch have been asking for it for more than half a century, with no result. A respectable journal like yours, that supports the causes of justice and human rights, is unfortunately supporting the massacre in Balochistan by a dictator and then you talk about democracy!
You say no civilian should be allowed to take up guns. Let me tell you, no one wants to spend sleepless nights in the mountain away from the family or avoid a normal life, unless they are forced to do so. And it’s the basic right of the people to defend themselves against any attacks.
Look at Palestine, and you will know what it means to defend your homeland. The General and his men were attacked many times in Punjab, but why was there no military offensive there? The Pakistani government gives the right to Kashmiris for self-determination and the right to fight the Indian government, but when it comes to Balochistan, even a journalist like you ask the Pakistani government to crush the Baloch nation.
Is it what Pakistani democracy is? Every nation has the right of self determination. This is part of the UN charter which the Pakistan government has signed.
So, nobody can deny a nation its basic human rights and the right of self-determination or their right on their resources.
Omar Abdul Qader, Manama, Bahrain
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