Government – Taliban talks begun, where it will go?
A mass movement of working masses can defeat the Taliban and violence.
The negotiations begins
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif nominated several non-political actors to his negotiating team including Irfan Siddique, Rustam Shah Mohmand, Rahimullah Yousafzai and Major Amir Khan (formerly of the ISI). Regardless of their nomination, members of the team itself claim to not have high expectations. Mr Yousufzai and Mr Mohmand have both expressed reservations. Faced with the prospect of multiple insurgent groups attacking the state’s sovereignty, the negotiators seem left in a state of uncertainty, without knowledge of the government’s strategy, what to communicate, or indeed what the end result of negotiations will be. The committee then seems more like mediators shuttling between the two sides than negotiators.
On the other side, in an apparent attempt to delude the government into believing the peace talks might work, the TTP nominated Imran Khan (PTI), Maulana Samiul Haq (JUI-S), Mufti Kifayatullah (JUI-F), Maulana Aziz (of Lal Masjid fame) and Professor Muhammad Ibrahim (JI). The disparate construction of the committee would have made it hard to solve national security problems at the negotiating table. Maulana Fazlur Rehman expressed his dismay at the nomination and also at the lack of implementing a jirga (council) system for talks, though that would negate the peace process as it stands. The choices reflect that the TTP is aware of rifts between the parties and is mindful of their inability to find a consensus. Moreover, none of them are actively a part of the TTP, so their ability to hold the group to its promises appears limited. No wonder the nominees appear reluctant to participate.
Peace committees formed by the government and Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) have taken an interesting path to start negotiations. First, it was the government’s four-member committee that refused to meet TTP’s peace team on Tuesday and asked TTP negotiators to clarify their position and mandate. A day later, the government’s committee made several futile attempts to contact the TTP-nominated committee. Coordinator of TTP committee, Maulana Samiul Haq, (also known as father of the Taliban), instead of focusing on peace talks, preferred delivering a fiery speech on February 5 on the platform of Pakistan Defence Council in connection with the Kashmir Day.
He criticised the government and its committee in his speech and said that neither the prime minister nor his committee was fully authorised to hold peace talks. “Taliban are fighting a war of supremacy of the constitution and independence of the country because foreign powers are controlling it. Taliban are demanding enforcement of sharia in the country,” he said, warning the government that an operation against the Taliban would put the whole country on fire.
Maulana Abdul Aziz, another member of the Taliban committee, also said the same day that without an agreement on the implementation of sharia, the Taliban would not take talks as successful. “Their real agenda is the implementation of sharia. All secular courts based on the common law system should be abolished,” he said, adding, “The only way forward is to accept Taliban’s demand.
It seems the present government has provided TTP with an opportunity to consolidate and increase its support base — both operational and ideological in the country. TTP negotiators have been presenting TTP as an organisation which has been fighting for Islam. The government or its committee has failed, so far, to counter the TTP narrative.
On the other hand, TTP’s demands are clear: it wants implementation of its version of sharia in the country, it would like the constitution to be amended, it would want women dress according to its sharia, it would also want that its prisoners would be freed and drone attacks to end. It is interesting that, at one level, TTP and its committee have been terming implementation of sharia as the first step to start talks while, on the other, the government’s committee is authorised to talk within constitutional parameters.
The TTP nominees wanted to know whether the government negotiators had full powers and could ensure that “the demands of the Talban are met.” They also sought meetings with the prime minister, the COAS and the DG ISI.
The government team insisted that: (i) the discussions should be held within the parameters of the constitution; (ii) “activities” which could hamper the talks should end; (iii) the respective mandates of the TTP’s negotiations committee and its nine-member monitoring mechanism needed clarification; (iv) the dialogue process should be short and; (v) “the scope of the talks will be limited to insurgency affected areas.”
The last of these points is significant as it implies that the government could eventually allow the TTP to impose its hideous ideology in some of the tribal areas, notably North Waziristan, as did the previous government in Swat in 2009. On that occasion Mullah Fazlullah quickly overran the adjacent Buner district and boasted: “The day is not far when Islamabad will be in our hands.”
The question of Islamic laws (Sharia)
Will negotiations contribute to violence or help reduce them? If they reduce violence, will they contribute to an already-ongoing negative transformation of Pakistani society into one that is dominated by arbitrary violence, coercive politics, and religious authoritarianism, intolerance of dissent and persecution of unrepresented people?
The talks have opened up the question of Sharia in a hitherto unprecedented way. Reading through the pro- and anti-talks debate unfolding in the national media just now, it is clear that of the concerns that preoccupy those against negotiations, the re-opened question of Sharia evokes some of the most troubled reactions.
This is not hard to understand. It is because the talks are an opportunity to restate the case for Pakistan to adopt an ‘Islamicised’ law for its state and officially sanctioned Islamic codes in everyday life. This, it is argued, is the logical culmination of the identitarian Muslim state that was founded in 1947, and a development which has been thwarted by the hypocrisy of certain influential sections of society. These ‘conspiring’ sections of society have never exactly had the courage to say that they are against Sharia or that Sharia ought not to be enforced. Instead, they have blocked it on various grounds: that it is unenforceable because of sectarian divisions, that it contradicts international norms of law and human rights and would isolate Pakistan, and that the already present Islamic provisions in the constitution are sufficient guarantee of the Islamic character of the state and should be accepted as a line of control that for all practical purposes is permanent.
It’s clear to anyone that these demands subtract everything that is not only problematic and divisive but promising and complex in religion to arrive at a loosely defined religious social practice that really affirms a refusal to change or to think.
Against this, advocates of Sharia advance a mixed arsenal of arguments, ranging from the visionary to the abjectly reactionary. Sharia comes to assume, in their discourse, something like an unfulfilled promise of equality and justice, a grand project of social engineering whose scope is limitless, a romantic and metaphysical utopia, which is able to unite and inspire society and give direction to political action.
The reactionary arguments for Sharia are mainly of two types. They ask what the least common denominators of Sharia are: on what do ‘we’ agree as undeniably Islamic? And, they ask, who wants to see us deprived of our Islamic identity? The answer to these questions taps into the reservoir of social conservatism (present in varying degrees anywhere) that pools fears of losing control and identity, of seeing rapid and confusing change, of loosening traditional bonds of hierarchy and privilege. In Pakistan’s case, it translates into: no drinking, no sexual freedom, no co-education, full face veil, no interest, no repeal of any laws labeled Islamic, and nothing that overlaps with the ways of life seemingly espoused by the other and the outsider — West, Hindu, Ahmadi, Shia.
The list can expand and probably will. It’s clear to anyone, even perhaps to the pro-sharia themselves, that these demands subtract everything that is not only problematic and divisive but promising and complex in religion to arrive at a loosely defined religious social practice that really affirms a refusal to change or to think. It affirms a reactionary social conservatism, and with reason. Yet, being able to see this doesn’t necessarily amount to a discourse that can challenge it. Whatever else the negotiatory process may or may not accomplish, it will fling open the door on this question. As this happens, arguments on the religious right are bound to sound more persuasive because they are an abstraction and intensification of what many people think without thinking anyway. This, perhaps, is part of what commentators mean by ‘creeping Talibanisation’.
The religious right in Pakistan uses the issue of Sharia and Islamic laws just to divert the attention of the working class and poor masses from the burning issues of the daily life faced by them. The main reason why the reactionary forces both inside and outside the state apparatus raise the issue of Islamic system and Sharia in the country, because they have no answers to the problems and issues faced by the society and working class. The burning class issues, poverty, hunger, the economic questions and social inequality. They have no programme how to solve these issues. They have no clue how to distribute or redistribute the wealth and resources among the masses. So they use the religion as smoke screen.
The violence continued
Last Sunday’s grenade attack at a Peshawar cinema hall, which resulted in five deaths and 13 injuries, was followed by Tuesday’s suicide bombing of a hotel near the city’s historic Qissa Khwani Bazaar leaving nine dead and 42 severely wounded — mostly Shias from Parachinar. Though the TTP distanced itself from both incidents, responsibility for the attack on the movie theatre was promptly owned by its Jundullah faction.
On Wednesday Mufti Hassan Swati, who claims to be the TTP head in the Peshawar district told reporters that his group had suicide-bombed the hotel “to fulfil the wish of our central deputy emir Shaikh Khalid Haqqani to avenge the deaths of innocent students in Rawalpindi in November.” He added that it was for the same reason that the local head of the Tehreek-e-Nifaz Fiqah-e-Jafria, Ali Asghar, and a Shia bank manager had also been killed a few days earlier.
The attacks on both the security forces and ordinary people are still taking place on daily basis. In last two weeks, more than 20 attacks have occurred in the different parts of the country. The main target of these attacks was the security forces and shias, while the anti Taliban groups were also targeted. Taliban have also attacked and killed four journalist of a private news channel in Karachi and warned the other journalist and media houses.
Split in Taliban Movement
This is the context in which the disassociation of the TTP spokesman from the recent terrorist attacks has to be evaluated. What emerges is that there is no centralised command and control mechanism within the outfit and it operates through its various franchises which act independently. It is not clear which of the estimated 40 or so TTP factions the government’s four-member committee will be talking to.
There are more than 22 small factions or offshoots of the main Taliban groups which are against the negotiations and wanted to continue their attack on the security forces and ordinary citizens. There are also sectarian outfits likes of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ ) an Al-Qaeda affiliate which is involved in the attacks on Shia’s.
The problem is further compounded because the newly-appointed TTP chief, Mullah Fazlullah is a Yousafzai from Swat whereas the group is exclusively dominated by the Mehsuds of the tribal areas. It is uncertain to what extent Fazlullah is acceptable to the major commanders. This applies particularly to those in charge of the seven tribal agencies who are all fiercely independent men.
An English weekly recently identified these commanders as Shehryar Mehsud of North Waziristan; Khan Said, the head the South Waziristan chapter; Hafiz Dolat, the TTP chief in Kurram; Abdul Wali, in Mohmand; Abu Bakr, the leader of the Bajaur chapter; Hafiz Saeed Khan, the emir in Orakzai and the notorious Mangal Bagh, leader of the Lashkar-e-Islam in the Khyber Agency.
In addition there are several other TTP commanders outside the tribal regions who are as opinionated and resent excessive interference by the TTP’s inner circle. Prominent among these is Muhammad Arif who is responsible for Darra Adamkhel, Hangu and Kohat; Shah Jehan of Swabi and the list goes on and on. What brings the TTP factions together is the single-minded determination to impose their interpretation of Islam on the country.
It is anyone’s guess whether the prime minister realises what he is up against. Three of the four members of his panel of peace negotiators are TTP sympathisers. This is apparent from the alarming background of Major Amir. According to a columnist, some years back his father, Maulana Tahir, founded a madressah at Panjpir where the Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Muhammadi chief Sufi Muhammad, Mullah Fazlullah, Mangal Bagh, Maulvi Faqir Muhammad and other diehard militants were indoctrinated.
Eroding democratic rights and freedom
The only substantive thing that may come out of the talks) is change in the overall nature of the state. If the talks succeed, we may actually see a metamorphosis of the state from a hybrid-theocracy, which it is at the moment, to a complete theocracy. The Taliban and their allies, including both good and bad militants, want implementation of sharia in Pakistan. Even if there is an agreement on limited implementation in parts of the country, it will eventually trickle down to the rest.
Everything will depend on how far the military and civilian leadership wants to go in accommodating the Taliban demands. Although a more important question would be how comfortable is the leadership in changing the nature of the state. The Taliban may not want to compromise on anything less than implementing sharia — also release of prisoners, which means adding to the militant force that aims at capturing the state. So, if we have made up our mind to surrender, there is no way anyone will challenge the Taliban. If not, then yes, some form of conflict is inevitable.
Similarly, how can we think of an operation when we have all kinds of militants sitting in our heartland, in Punjab and Sindh. It is not just Jamaat ud Dawa (JuD) and Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM) but also TTP and Lashkar e Khorasan, allegedly part of al-Qaeda and has men that were once part of JeM. These organisations are thriving in Punjab and Sindh. They even have links with the politicians and military establishment.
It is not clear if the military has a plan to abandon the good militants/Taliban. The good Taliban are connected to the bad Taliban by blood, friendship and alignments. One can’t separate the wheat from the chaff. If the establishment wants to use some of them after the US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014, one can’t really be serious about launching a serious operation. Or can we?
All this talk of sharia entirely excludes even any mention of the Islamic welfare state where every citizen was assured a living wage under the law. There is no mentioning proper income distribution and an adequate safety net for all citizens. However, it seems that besides banning everything that might be fun, the only other thing that concerns them is women. They do not want women in the movies or on television, they do not want women in the workplace, they do not want women to be seen in public except in shrouds, they do not want women to get an education and they definitely do not want coeducation.
They wanted to exclude women from the daily public life. They wanted complete social segregation of women in the society. For them, the only role women can have is to please the men, give birth to the children and do the household. For them, women should be confined in the four walls of the house. The women going to park, restaurant and even to market is un-Islamic and create all ills in the society. So women should be banned from all joys and entertainment that all normal human beings needs.
The present government is going on the road to erode the basic democratic and human rights guaranteed in the constitution. The PML-N government has recently introduced a new piece of legislation in which it gives right to the security forces to shoot in body seems suspicious. This legislation also gives sweeping powers to the security forces and intelligence agencies including the legal right to arrest any body for unlimited period of time. This is in fact the legalisation of the forced disappearance. This law is going to be used against any dissent against the government. This law will turn a police state into a military state. The police and intelligence agencies are notorious for the violations of human rights and after getting more powers these violations will increase.
If these negotiations between Taliban and the government succeeded than the working masses will suffer more and enjoy less rights.