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Letter to Pakistan Chief of Army Staff
General Pervaiz Ashfaque Kayani,
Abdul Basit Khawaja
Campaign to Restore Democracy to Pakistan
General Kiyani Sahib,
Every citizen of Pakistan who wants to chose the path majorly of Jinnah’s Ideologies would applaud your February 13th decision to recall all military officers from Pakistan’s civil departments. Pakistan’s bourgeoning civil society will be strengthened through this brave reversal of your predecessor’s heavy-handed and dictatorial imposition of the military in civilian affairs. Our men in uniform were pledged to defend Pakistan’s citizens and its Constitution. Instead, President Pervaiz Musharraf’s domestic policy had forced them to make the unnatural choice between doing their job and defending their country or deferring to their chief’s decision to hold civil society and the Constitution hostage at the barrel of a gun.
Musharraf has brought loss to our country and nothing else. The proclamations by his aides regarding economic prosperity, peace, low poverty levels and on war on terror illustrates a false image in the minds of the people.According to a corruption watchdog survey I saw on a website, Pakistani public opinion perceived the first and second terms of Musharraf’s administration as respectively more corrupt than the first and second terms of previous administrations led by Bhutto and Sharif, respectively. Musharaf’s government has cost taxpayer’s money hundreds of millions of rupees in order to hire a team of aristocratic lawyers to represent him in the courts. For instance, regarding the privatization of Pakistan Steel, whose worth is around Rupees 600 billion was being sold out for a mere Rupees 20.6 billions, the government had spent Rupees 90 million , with Sharifudin Pirzada-a prominent lawyer- alone hoarding 6.6 million rupees as fees. Another example from several more, Musharraf appointed Shaukat Aziz as finance minister during his tenure as the Chief Executive. World powers supported Pakistan financially rescheduling debt to reward Pakistan due to the support it gave in the war on terror which helped in saving hundreds millions of dollars, in addition Musharaf was able to secure new loans. Result - foreign exchange reserves increased exceeding $16 billion in 2006, but at the same time foreign debt hit an all time high topping $40 billion.The portrayals from his side are so bogus so that he can create an illusion to put his trial and accountability on the back burner. To lead one needs to be honest i.e. not to break their undertakings. Late 2003, Musharraf made a deal with the religious party MMA agreeing to resign from the army by 31 Dec 2004. With that party’s support, pro-Musharraf members were able to gather the two-thirds majority required to pass the controversial17th Amendment, which legalized Musharraf’s 1999 coup and many of his decrees. In late 2004, Musharraf went back on his promise and Musharraf’s legislators in the Parliament passed a bill allowing him to keep both offices.According to the following articles from the constitution mentioned here, Musharaf should be charged for treason and fire-starting corruption to the country.According to Article 6 of the Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan:-
“Any person or persons who commit the act of mutiny against the parliament, judiciary and/or the elected members and officials of parliament is/are guilty of committing the highest treason. This person or persons committing such an act must be charged and prosecuted in the court of law and sentenced to death if found guilty”
Article 243.1 of the constitution of Pakistan states that ‘The Federal Government shall have control and command of the Armed Forces’ and when a person is commissioned as a member of the Armed Forces, takes the following oath
“I ——, do solemnly swear that I will bear true faith and allegiance to Pakistan and uphold the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan which embodies the will of the people, that I will not engage myself in any political activities whatsoever and that I will honestly and faithfully serve Pakistan Army (or Navy or Air Force) as required by and under the law”
Such a person should not be supported by your institution as he is a de-stabliser to our solidity. Additionally, he should face the court for his actions because it will create an example for Generals, Ministers power and stake holders not to indulge in corruption. If the voting was in the favor of the ‘Kings Party’, Pakistan would have been thrown back into the times of ‘Pharaoh’ where the people of Musa (A.S) were harshly treated as slaves. A quote of Lao Tzu strikes a chord in my mind, “Governing a great nation is like cooking a small fish - too much handling will spoil it,” this quote shows the true picture into the minds of the people of Pakistan of what Musharaf is doing to the country.
We hope that you will perform your duties assigned in the constitution and not indulge in the political arena of this country like your forerunner and your ‘ancestors in the military’ .
However, the work to restore democratic political participation in Pakistan has only begun. A majority of Pakistan’s judiciary was dismissed on November 3rd when President Musharraf imposed martial law in the guise of “emergency.” On November 13th, Pakistan’s Supreme Court was due to hear the cases of 485 victims of enforced disappearance over the past six years. Many of these had returned with horror stories from detainment centers around the world, including the one in Guantanamo Bay.
Cases of enforced disappearance are not unique to Pakistan. This problem has been created through a global regime of inter-state paranoia, government’s defiance of key principles of the Rule of Law, cash-payments made to mercenary kidnappers, intelligence forces that are held accountable to neither the judiciary nor the executive, and covert foreign operations that flout state-sovereignty and government’s accountability to its own people. The agents abduct people in broad day light and scuttle them across the globe to hold them without charge in unspeakable places: Guantanamo, Bagram, Kandahar, Adiala, Attock, Mianwali, Military confinements that’s the most my mind could gather, must be a dozen more.
Consequently, the campaign to restore missing persons to their families is a global effort. Thanks to the courage of members of the international media in continuing day-by-day coverage the social and political upheavals in Pakistan, the partners and supporters, who are Pakistanis, are demonstrably poised to seize this historic opportunity to help the vibrant, multi-ethnic fabric of Pakistani civil society secure for itself the hues of democratic participation, pluralism, and peace for all its citizens.
We, the people of Pakistan, demand the release of all those who have been abducted and detained without charge by the military and the intelligence agencies under your command. The families of victims of enforced disappearances are demanding that the COAS’s office issue a list of the names and charges of all Pakistanis held under extrajudicial detainment on account of actions taken by the army and intelligence forces under his command.
Hopefully, we the people of Pakistan are worried about the above
Respectfully,
The People of Pakistan
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Tags: Arrests, General Kayani, military, Missing People, Musharraf, Pakistan, Protest
5 responses so far ↓
1 Farooq Malik // Mar 31, 2008 at 10:54 pm
I fully endorse the view expressed in this highly informative article. However I’ve to add a question for Gen. Kyani as well as all the generals of the Pakistan Army.
Is Pak Army a National Institution or a “One Man Show”. ( who is imposed as The Chief of Army Staff).
Dicipline, no doubt , is the core of Army Training and so it should be. But is it part of the discipline, by any standards, that the Army is used as a Private Army of the Chief of Army Staff.?, the way it has been used by the successive Chief of Army Staffs turned Chief Martial Law Administrators.??
I’ll give a few examples only;
Gen. Ayub Khan sold out 3 rivers on perpetual basis to India without any justification under the International norms. Downstream countries are entitled to their rightful share from the upstream rivers under all circumstances. The poisonous seed is turning into a huge Tree of thorns , ultimately turning Pakistan and particularly Punjab into an upcoming Ethipoia.
He totally ignored that Quaid knew better than him what the Kashmir’s Indian held Rivers mean to the future of Pakistan. Isn,t that an irrepareable and perpetual loss to the Agrarian based economy of Pakstan.
He deprived the country of the entire lot of the politicians who had a clear vision of Quaid’s teachings and the compulsions which led to the creation of Pakistan. Thereafter, a vicious campaign to undermine the Politicians was launched which, till date, has become a fashion for all the Military Dictators and Civil / Khaki bureaucracy. The leadership gap caused immense and permanent loss to the Body Politic of the country. He totally forgot that a leader cannot be created in a Laboratory. The political leaders are an assett for any country and decades of hard work, dedication and trust of the people create a leader. The vanishing of the National leaders from the political hirizon gave birth to the elevation of the likes of Mujeeb ur Rehman and rest of the regional leaders which ultimately led to the dismemberment of the country.
It was during his tenure of so called ” Decade of Industrialisation “, that created a selected priviliged elitist class vs a deprived ocean of toiling masses.
To be continued:
2 amin // Mar 31, 2008 at 11:00 pm
It was the Q-League which has violated the teachings of the Quaide Azam the maximum times and yet they used their name as Q-League.
3 Sufi // Apr 2, 2008 at 3:35 pm
This is highly iformative article-highly appreciatable. The army of Pakistan has become a symbol of hate now.Its Musharraf and his colleagues have badly damaged the image for detaining the chief justice of Pakistan and appreahending the great lawyers. Qatil Musharraf called the great chief justice at the GHQ and the Qatil Generals around him intimidated him including Gen.Kayani.The great Chief justice stood firm, and now Musharraf is inching towards the hottest place of hell.
Gen.Kayani must understand the gravity of the situation before it is too late. He must keep the army at bay and work with the civilians to restore the image of the armed forces. It is true that Pakistan army has become a client army of the state department. It is no longer a national army.
Gen.Kayani must ensure that the monsterous and notorious agencies should check the activites of the terrorists rather then filiming the activities of the lawyers and judges. He should ask the unconstitutional and illegal president to vacate the army house once and for all.
4 Pakistani // Apr 3, 2008 at 2:39 pm
@ sufi no man i dont agree with u pakistan army is a gr8 institution that has always helped pakistan during the times of crisis whether its earthquakes or other natural disastors army is the first to respond secondly as u said pak army has become a client army ur wrong again pakistan army is a national insitute and a source of unity among the pakistanis as it consists of pakistanis from every area of the country.Well there are bad people or ganda andas in every institution what if musharraf isn`t a good man we cannot blame a whole institution for his actions.
5 Farooq Malik // Apr 3, 2008 at 9:49 pm
The comments of a “pakistani” tantamount to negation of the “charred” 61 years history of this country. The typical ” Sheikh Rasheedian ” style of buttering that the institution comes to the help in of civil authority during earthquakes and natural disastours sounds like a crude joke with this unfortunate nation of over 160 million. Which Army of the world doesn’t do that.?…. Another watershed between the bitter truth and the self concocted mirage. The Pakistan Army did everything it was not supposed and meant to do BUT did nothing to do its real job, ” The defence of the geopgraphical borders of the country, like anyother Army in the world does. The Pakistan Army has been holding the reins of ” Direct ” Rule and pulling the strigns , ” indirectly ” from behind the scene since October, 1958. ( If not since Ayub Khan made his way to the civilian cabinet as defence minister in uniform). Only a brief spell of 5 years was granted to Z.A.Bhutto as a “powerful” civilian Prime Minster and that too was under compulsions of the debacle of 16th December, 1971 when East Pakistan was surrendered, most unashamedly, at the hands of combined forces of ” Mukti Bahini ” and The Indian Army.
Now was the time for the Army to utilise the services of the real Civil Leadership to ” reap the bitter harvest” sown by the 0ver 13 years of Military Rule, depriving the masses of their basic right, ” The right to rule themselves by their chosen representatives”. There is no other example in the known history where a majority of a country is forced to secede itself from the minority.
( The term ” Army ” is used for a handful of opportinst generals and their cronies and not the Officers and Jawans of the “Real Army “). To be continued:–
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