Struggle for democracy

PERHAPS the only light at the end of the tunnel for Pakistan amid present day political crises and security threats is the trying struggle for democracy, embodied in part in the judiciary’s newfound autonomy. It would be naïve, of course, to completely detach this sovereignty from the March rumpus that was triggered when General Musharraf tried to wield more power than due by effectively dismissing the sitting chief justice. But that since then the law community has come to respect its own inalienable rights, and their bearing on the constitution and country, is welcome. Tuesday was a good example of the two opposing trends presenting themselves in tandem. Just as a suicide bomber took seven lives barely two kilometres from the president’s army office in Rawalpindi, Pakistan’s Supreme Court ordered the government to allow former prime minister Nawaz Sharif back in the country. Significantly, it chided Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz for disobeying the court’s earlier orders, requiring the judgment to be implemented “in letter and spirit”. Ironically, both forces presently run counter to efforts of the Islamabad establishment. The security breakdown brings about international concern and suspicion whereas the court ruling beckons massive embarrassment. But while all forces stand united with the centre in beating off the terrorism threat, there is, rightly, colossal difference of opinion regarding President Musharraf’s power politics.
It is by now clear that the deal to allow Benazir Butto back and Nawaz Sharif’s deportation both owed principally to General Musharraf’s own political survival, not any greater good as Islamabad’s spin has tried to portray. It is little surprise that such reasons are responsible for erosion of much of Musharraf’s domestic, as well as international, goodwill. However, it bears noting that Islamabad has a way of mending the divergence, though one that would require another about-turn on another of its firmly held views. Clearly it is best for both Pakistan as well as the current president to leverage the upcoming general elections to engineer a political reconciliation between bickering groups in a bid to seriously strengthen the democratic process. If Nawaz Sharif is allowed back, as Benazir has also hinted, and the people allowed to choose the way forward in a fair election, Musharraf would have done quite a bit to redeem his government’s excesses of late. Since the March 9 CJ ouster, the government has come out embarrassed from a number of its decisions, including a clampdown on the media and sending Sharif packing. Repetition of such mistakes augurs ill for Musharraf and his men just ahead of the election, reeking of political immaturity. For the good of the country, Pakistan’s ruling party needs to step out of the way of steps critical for restoration of democracy, of which presence of all principal political players in the election is essential.

Lack of accountability

THE news yesterday that the US State Department had promised immunity to Blackwater security personnel involved in the shooting deaths of 17 Iraqis in Baghdad last month is both shocking and beyond belief. But should we really be surprised, considering that the Bush administration has treated Iraq as a colony since the 2003 invasion? Not really. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been promising a thorough investigation of the deadly fiasco committed by hyped-up American mercenaries who have a long history of being trigger-happy, testosterone-driven killing machines. But it now seems that those Blackwater personnel who let loose a barrage of bullets on Sept. 16 in Nisour Square, killing innocent Iraqis as they turned and tried to flee from the square, are never going to be held accountable. The worst that can happen to them is to be fired from Blackwater — which is what happened to the Blackwater employee who killed a guard of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani in a fit of drunken rage on Christmas Eve in 2004.
The Democrats have now lambasted the Bush administration for failing to hold Blackwater accountable. Sen. Patrick Leahy says, “In this administration, accountability goes by the boards.” Which is not really surprising, considering the deep ties that run between Erik Prince, the owner of Blackwater, and the Republican Party. He and his family have given the party more than $325,000 in political donations over the past 10 years, and have hired some high-profile former Bush administration officials to work at Blackwater. Which perhaps explains why the State Department has made Blackwater the main provider of security for its embassy staff in Iraq, and why it recently gave the company a new contract for even more security work in Iraq. According to statistics compiled by the US media, Blackwater has been involved in nearly 200 shootings in Iraq since 2005, most of them from moving vehicles where they did not bother to stop and check to see how many Iraqis they had maimed or killed. In two cases, Blackwater paid compensation to the families of victims and tried to cover up the other incidents. That Blackwater has long been the most irresponsible and violent security group in Iraq has been well-known to both Iraqis and foreign journalists in the country, even though their nasty tactics became apparent to the wider world only after the bloodbath that they caused on Sept. 16. The Iraqi Parliament is now trying to repeal Order 17, the law put in place by former US viceroy L. Paul Bremer III in 2003, which gives immunity to private security contractors. It seems doubtful, however, that they will be able to repeal the law without consent from their masters in Washington. That private security guards in Iraq are exempt from any law in the world, allowing them to kill at will, beggars belief. Even American soldiers are subject to US military law and have been held accountable in US military courts for unlawful killings and torture committed in Iraq. Why Blackwater and its overpaid soldiers of fortune should be above US law, let alone Iraqi law, is something that the Bush administration is going to have to fix extra-quick if they want to retain even the tiniest shred of a reputation for decency.

—Arab News