Visibly invigorated resistance

WITH Benazir Bhutto calling for General Musharraf to step down not only as army chief but also as president, the latter has lost the most valuable card he had picked up on the way to the election. As the former prime minister was placed under house arrest for the second time in a few days, Islamabad must have been bracing for a visibly invigorated resistance to the emergency rule as the political party with the largest following stands ready to join opposition forces protesting against the Musharraf regime. This is a significant development that will alter the government’s plan of action significantly. Besides the need to bolster its police clampdown on the streets, it will have to revise political alliances yet again, as Musharraf’s personal efforts aimed at appeasing the west by going into the controversial deal with Benazir Bhutto suddenly amount to naught. As warned in this space recently, the harsh clampdown on anyone and everyone questioning Musharraf’s tactics, in addition to the unfair treatment meted out to Pakistan’s media and judiciary, has created a situation where the government is forced to further its muscle-policy with time or risk caving in. Growing opposition will prompt stricter punishment. And if the centre recedes, the protesters will claim vindication. Little surprise, therefore, that so far the military regime is opting for the show-of-force option.
It bears noting that with all his energies consumed in defending himself from what are described as pillars of civil society — political parties, media, judiciary, etc — it is difficult to see the General Musharraf justifying the rationale for the emergency, pressing demands of the war against terrorism. And if popular opinion from within and outside Pakistan is to go by, General Musharraf has already lost much credibility. Few outside the government and military buy the suggestion that militants, not journalists and judges, and self-interest, were reasons for the Nov 3 decision. Already, Islamabad’s strong-arm tactics are responsible for all but wasting the historic opportunity that had come Pakistan’s way. With elections due, this was the ideal time to empower the people by putting up likely candidates for a fair vote. But with all manner of campaigning banned, except the ruling party that goes about its cause in its majority province, there must be very few stakeholders still convinced of Musharraf’s commitment to democracy. Concerned quarters are reminded that people will have their say eventually. And it would be in everybody’s interest if that comes through the ballot as opposed to the street, embodied in more violent clashes with security forces defending an increasingly isolated dispensation.
 

Cost of war

ANOTHER Iraqi civilian was shot dead this week by US mercenaries guarding a diplomatic convoy in an incident which looks like a repeat of the Blackwater outrage, though this time involving another security company, DynCorp International. It is simply unacceptable that such guards should continue to be deployed while they are unaccountable to anyone except some distant company executive. The position is hardly any better in Afghanistan where local and international security firms have burgeoned. The situation is becoming so bad that civilians complain they can no longer recognize the difference between gun-totting guards and terrorists and criminals. Indeed, there is strong evidence that some of the local firms providing individual security do have criminal links. The foreigners meanwhile have, as in Iraq, established a reputation for treating ordinary citizens in a high-handed fashion that often borders on contempt. It should be the job of the police and soldiers to ensure security and act within both civilian and military law. They are accountable. The reason these mercenary armies have mushroomed is that there are not enough policemen and soldiers to do the job. This is wrong both in principle and practice. The moral case against highly paid civilian guards is that they owe allegiance only to the people who pay their wages. They have accepted no obligation to behave in a decent and measured manner, nor are they committed to support the search for peace in either Iraq or Afghanistan. The practical case is that their existence adds a dangerous ambiguity to an already fraught security situation, which destroys trust in the authorities who permit these gunslingers to operate. In the strictest sense, if the conduct of mercenary guards brings terror to the local population, then they too are terrorists.
Washington is spending hundreds of millions of dollars every year on the services of these security firms. Doubtless the real cost is only now emerging as Congress, having counted up the actual cost of US involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, has discovered the bill is twice the official estimate. The “hidden cost” of the war is now put at $1.5 trillion. This almost unbelievable sum includes $32 billion in payments to US soldiers disabled by the fighting and the cost of servicing US debt raised to fund the campaigns. It represents, say Democrats, a cost to the average US family of $20,000 a year and the figure could rise to $46,300 over the next decade. Much of this money, however, is merely being paid into the pockets of US arms, security and logistics companies, so it generates beneficial economic activity. Nevertheless, US taxpayers have good reason to recoil at the bills they are being asked to foot. But at least back on Main Street this price is not being paid in blood. In Iraq the cost of blundering Bush policies, or rather the complete lack of them, is being met daily by dozens of Iraqi lives. Americans can always earn some more. Iraq’s dead cannot get up and walk away.

—Arab News