|
Bugti’s killing and General Musharraf’s dilemma |
 |
Harjeet Singh
Although the Pakistan President, Gen. Pervez Musharraf is showing no signs of concern and anxiety over the elimination of the veteran long-standing tribal leader, Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti and is instead feeling relieved that “a big thorn’ has been got rid of , it may not be that easy for the military ruler to overcome the Baluchi wrath. Heaping humiliation over their resentment, the Government refused to hand over his body to his family for burial and put it to rest at an unmarked grave leading to suspicions that chemical weapons were fired in the cave that killed him and his 30 plus supporters. That the body of the tribal leader was not shown to anybody and even the Maulvi of a Bugti mosque who recited prayers during the last rites, refused to testify that the body in the coffin, which remained locked when it was lowered into the gave, was that of the 79-year old former strong man of Baluchistan, raises many awkward questions.
That Gen. Musharraf remains isolated in his vendetta against Bugti becomes clear from the fact that no senior leader from the ruling PML[Q] has come out in support of his action. In fact, some leaders of the ruling PML[Q] had been suggesting to Gen. Musharraf to initiate a dialogue with Akbar Bugti. Chodhury Shujaat Hussain, PML[Q] President even formed a parliamentary committee when he was the caretaker Prime Minister in 2004 and visited Akbar Bugti in his stronghold in Dera Bugti. But, many proposals drawn up by the committee were not acted upon and the process was not allowed to go ahead. The ceasefire that had been negotiated broke down and the dialogue came to an abrupt end.
The Opposition to Gen. Musharraf is consolidating both within the political and strategic establishments. As many as four former military Generals have come out with a statement opposing the military action that killed Bugti. They called it an “ill-conceived idea and badly handled operation”. He is also finding it difficult to silence the media and the joint Opposition that has stepped up the protest through strikes in Baluchistan and Sind. The four-party Baluch Alliance has already quit the Provincial and National Assemblies and the radical Islamic alliance is thinking of doing likewise. Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, in a telephone talk with Opposition leaders as well as his own party leaders, told them to resign, thus creating a huge political crisis for Gen. Musharraf who is already facing a growing demand to quit as the Army chief before the general elections next year. The followers of Bugti and his shadowy Baluch Liberation Army have vowed to avenge the killing of their leader and it would not be surprising it in the coming days, there is a spurt in the attacks on the Pakistan army in Quetta and elsewhere in Baluchistan, in spite of the presence of some 80,000 troops in the restive region of NWFP and Baluchistan. The Pakistani ruler is only sowing the seeds a 1971-style uprising in erstwhile East Pakistan which culminated in the birth of an independent Bangladesh.
Just days after the killing of Bugti, Gen. Musharraf has signed a peace deal with the local Taliban in NWFP under which they will not attack each other. The Pakistan President is hoping that with the peace with Taliban, his forces can concentrate on wiping out the Baluch rebels. But, Gen. Musharraf needs to be told that a dead Bugti may be more effective in galvanizing support for ending Islamabad’s exploitation of Balochistan than the one seen in flesh and blood. A dead Bugti will emerge as a rallying point for the Baluch rebellion against the exploitation by the Punjabi-dominated Government and army of its natural resources.
So, what Gen. Musharraf needs to do is to address the genuine grievances of the Baluchi people. Baluchistan is the poorest of Pakistan’s four provinces in spite of its being the richest in natural resources with large gas, oil, coal, uranium, coal, copper and iron ore deposits. It is Pakistan’s refusal to share with Baluchistan the revenue from the gas and oil it was extracting from the Sui and other gas and oil fields that turned Bugti from a national leader to a rebel. One wonders how the genuine demands of the Baluchs could be called by President Musharraf an attempt to scuttle his development plans in the Province like the moderanisation of Gwadar port with Chinese help which would benefit Beijing more than Pakistan. Musharraf’s ruthless Punjabi military-businessmen clique is determined to colonize Baluchistan completely with Chinese help. Musharraf has chosen military suppression and failed to see that the only way forward for Pakistan is political accommodation of both Baloch and Pashtun aspirations. Musharraf needs to recognise the feeling of alienation of the Baluch tribals which has been caused by the short-sighted policies of his Government and his other military predecessors. The Government of Pakistan has a history of large-scale violation of human rights in Baluchistan. When in January last year, a woman doctor was raped by four Pakistani soldiers, she was not allowed to file FIR and no action was taken against the guilty. Their traditional tribal way of life is being disturbed in the name of the development of the region. What even the British before 1947 could not do and let them remain semi-autonomous and a buffer between British India and Afghanistan, he is now trying to undo.
|
