Pakistan – in Search of Identity

Pakistan is besieged between its ideology, its meaning and the encompassing corrupt and wicked political governance. Rationally, we define ideology and concepts to give clear meaning and purpose for understanding and role-play, discarding the abstract assumptions to vital topics of human interest and values. Pakistan appears to have its ennobling enemies within itself and daily death tolls and societal destruction provide ample data to think of the growing despotism and politically geared domestic madness to undo the foundation of its existence. Few days earlier, Allama Mohammad Iqbal’s 133 birthday was celebrated across the nation. Dr. Mohmmad Iqbal, the poet and philosopher of the East, was not just an imminent scholar but a visionary leader and political reformer of the Muslim nation that had lost sense of political direction, and moral and intellectual identity and lived under the continued subjugation of British imperialism. His vision for the rebirth of the Muslim Ummah was not subjective but an objective movement and a passionate goal of political freedom for the confused Muslims of the colonial India into an Islamic State of Pakistan. Those celebrating the Iqbal’s birthday, were they conscious of what Iqbal had envisioned of the Muslim people and their freedom from the colonial rule vis-à-vis what Pakistan is today? Not sure, if majority of those involved in the festive activities knew who Iqbal was and what his mission was for the future of the Muslims in British occupied India. Imagine, if Mohmamad Ali Jinnah and Iqbal were alive today, would they have identified themselves as nationals of the contemporary Pakistan? Objectively, there is nothing common between the Pakistan of today, and what those leaders had envisioned to free the believing people from the yoke of Hindu-dominated colonial India operating under the British sovereignty.

Alarming rates of domestic and foreign generated bloody conflicts –”the “war on terrorism” have sucked up the resources of the poverty stricken nation for change and development goals. The military leaders and the politicians are ignorant of the consequences of such catastrophic engagements. The nation lives in great discord under corrupt political governance as it slipped away from its original roots of the ideological THINKING to encounter the emerging political challenges of the contemporary 21st century world. Islam, the real lifeline and identity of the Muslims, has been denied its rightful place in the working of institutions and governance of Pakistan. If Islam is not the point of reference for the Muslims, then what else would be relevant and rational to make sense for the existence of the nation? Another major setback seems to be that after the death of Sheikh Abu ul Alla Moudoodi, Pakistani political institutions failed to produce an Islamic thinker and visionary to assume the leadership role. Emerging conflicts expose divergent challenges that Pakistan appears incapable to deal with.

The US is not only morally and politically corrupt but financially a bankrupt nation lacking global trust. It wants to reassert its superpower hegemony to avert challenges to its global claim to military and political supremacy. The American led “War on Terrorism” is a continuing 12th century Crusade against Islam and Muslim people, and its major thrust has been to conquer the Arabs and other Muslims people, occupy the much needed natural resources of oil and gas for the industrialized West and to maintain its political hegemony over the rest of the world. Authoritarian Arab rulers and the egoistic rulers in Muslim societies have collaborated with the Western onslaught to weaken the Islamic unity and identity and to invade the Muslim world under false pretext implying gangesterism and causing killings and societal destruction. Muslim intellectuals and the so called Muslim leaders are indifferent to the ultimate purpose of the Western Crusade. It means massive deaths and destruction of the Muslim world and making them subservient to the US command and imperialism. They talk of peace, freedom and justice but war is the means to achieve this goal. War is a business and a favorite trade to support the Western economies. The Western political leaders have heavy investments in the war economy that the Arabs and other Muslims do not comprehend as the end users. They have given-up Islam as system of life in return for favors of political and military protectionism from the British and American masters. The modern slavery is more comfortable and enjoyable to the beleaguered Muslim rulers than challenging the combined US and European political agendas of global domination and control over their natural resources. The “war on terrorism” is a planned menace to human growth and survival. The US led war will consume all the wealth and resources of the Muslim people and instigate reactionary extremism and sectarian killings within the Muslims and make them redundant for any useful role in global affairs. Realism points out that once again the entire Christian world has been united to pursue the Crusade against Islam. The wars on terrorism in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan are the net result of this strategic plan. Across the Muslim world, there is no Sultan Salahudeen to challenge and defeat the Western crusaders. All the contemporary rulers across the Muslim world are subservient to the American and European political masters. If the Muslim rulers failed to grasp this overwhelming fact of the global politics, it is their mental sickness and absurdity. Those thinking people of the Muslim world questioning the rationality of the “war on terrorism” are dubbed as “Islamists”, insurgent fighting against the Western interests and “terrorists.”

A decade earlier, Pakistan was identified as a “failed state.” After the 9/11 attacks, Pakistan was sought as a “friend” and “partner” in fighting the US led war. According to the US strategic plan, Pakistan is now the most dangerous country hatching terrorism. In the process, Pakistani nation has been victimized by the foreign mercenaries, causing daily bloodbaths of innocent civilian population engulfed with sectarian violence, destroyed businesses and trades and installing corrupt political elite to wage war against their own people. The US bought and bribed the Pakistan Generals and politicians to achieve this strategic goal. The Pakistani Generals and their accomplice politicians (Bhuttos, Zardaris and Sharifs – all by products of the military rule), are driven by self interest, greediness and cruelty toward the national interest. Pakistan lives on borrowed money and foreign aid as it owes some $64 billions to the World Bank. Its economy is underdeveloped, its masses live in primitive ways devoid of modern luxuries and most often deprived of the basic human needs and amenities of life. No nation has ever developed its economy based on borrowed money and foreign scheme of things to their culture and values. Nobody can justifiably explain where these loans of $64 billion dollars were spent in the interest of Pakistani nation and their development priorities. Few corrupt rulers have encroached the rights and freedom of the people and Pakistan survives under neo-colonialism. After more than 63 years of freedom from the British colonial rule, Pakistanis continue to be an impoverished nation always wanting foreign aid for its meager survival. One major factor which made defining impact was the role of intelligent and visionary leadership and development of public institutions to build the nation’s capacity in economic and politics to further the goals of change and development. Pakistani society has not produced any proactive visionary leaders to lead the nation into the 21st century.

The enthusiastic people seem to celebrate the birthdays of Qaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Allama Mohammad Iqbal but forgot their mission and its pursuit and political priorities. The physical body remains in tact but soul is dead. Even some of the most educated and intelligent ones cannot THINK out of the box. Whereas, able and educated Pakistanis look for escape from reality and are rushing to migrate to foreign lands. Consequently, Pakistan is run by ignorant, corrupt and cruel people who have nothing common in thoughts and values with the Muslim masses. Was this the meaning and purpose of the Pakistan’s ideology dear to Iqbal and Jinnah? Out of its life span since the independence, forty years were stolen by the military Generals and the remaining time is exploited by the military generated politicians and the feudal lords, all owing allegiance to the foreign masters. General Musharaf was rewarded for his loyalty to the US policies and practices by killing thousands of fellow Pakistanis and transforming others as reactionary “terrorists” to enrich the US databank and lives happily in a $1.4 million mansion in London under 24/7 security extended by the British Government. With stolen wealth from Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto family and Zardari own many splendid palaces in Dubai, Paris, UK and Switzerland. The current rulers of the PPP Zardari-Bhutto gang are the wrong people, with wrong thinking, wrong policies actively following the US led agenda to dismantle Pakistan. The on-going “war on terrorism” is the means to achieve that goal. Most in the political governance are corrupt and uneducated people. Had Iqbal and Jinnah lived so long, would they have liked to identify themselves with these liars and indicted criminals as Pakistani nationals? During his recent visit to India, President Obama went out of the way to appease India and offer political support for its futuristic ambitions to be a global power. Indian politicians were not corrupt nor did India have the military rulers, so it advanced progressively and became a self-sufficient industrial power. India has historical image veered by the Western nations.

Pakistanis have lost on many fronts. The military rule enabled India to grab the East Pakistan and make it Bangladesh, how foreign agents like Musharaf and Benzair Bhutto and Zardari could argue the rights and freedom of Kashmir and a decaying culture of war and fighting against themselves. Mr. Qureshi, the Pakistani Foreign Minister claims (DAWN, Nov 13), that Pakistan has made its concerns and objections known to the US ambassador in Islamabad on the Obama statement of support to India’s proposed seating at the UN Security Council. Strangely enough (DAWN, Nov 14), reports that Philip Crowley, the US State Department spokesman, clarified that that he was not aware of any concerns made by the Pakistani Government. You can draw your own conclusion who is lying? Do thugs and criminals ever speak the truth? What happened to the $60 million dollar money laundering case against Miss Benzair Bhutto-Zardari in Switzerland? Who is responsible for the daily killings of the civilians by the US managed drone attacks in Pakistan? How did the Pakistani Generals acquire $10.billlion dollars worth of assets? Why there are still 8 millions people or so the recent flood victims uncared for and living under the open sky? If the Pakistani politicians have consented to the US coercion to get the innocent people killed in return for cash rewards, one wonders, how would it matter to Zardari-Gilani or any other if they let the whole of the Muslim nation go down the drain for billions of paper money in Swiss banks?

Islam is a divine force of human UNITY, not division and destruction. It unites the diverse humanity as One People-Ummah, whereas, the non-believers divide, exploit and kill the mankind. Visionary thinkers and reformers are always few to forbid the evil and invite the people towards goodness. Often true benefactors of mankind are wrongfully identified and labelled as “insurgents” and “terrorists” but they are always determined in their pursuit of revulsion against the evil and wickedness. Wicked people deceive nobody except themselves. Zardari-Bhuttos, Sharifs and the Generals are dead entries of the past, not the leaders to lead for the futuremaking. Pakistan NEEDS change and visionary leadership for its rebuilding of the unity of the nation, its freedom from foreign coercion and exploitation and to have a sustainable future of its own. Are there any educated and intelligent Pakistanis around with living conscience to THINK of a navigational change and to take steps for the security of Pakistan and its freedom from foreign slavery and deliver justice to the people who scarified their lives for the making of Pakistan?