Posted on 10 January 2012 by Tea Server
PT Report Gilgit, January 9: Sectarian conflict has taken the form of personal and familial enmities in Gilgit. Religious and sectarian organizations have been barred from interfering in state and government organizations. Those spreading sectarian hatred will never be spared. These views were expressed by GB Chief Secretary, Saifullah Chattha, while addressing a press conference [...]
Posted on 08 January 2012 by Tea Server
PT Report Gilgit, January 7: Police and other law enforcing agencies in Gilgit have been authorized to shoot terrorists at sight. The decision was taken in view of the dangerous violence that has gripped by region by fear, as dead bodies keep falling almost every day. Chief Minister Syed Mehdi Shah, who has been accused [...]
Posted on 07 January 2012 by Tea Server
PT Report Gilgit, January 6: A signed press note released by the Registrar of Supreme Appellate Court states that the Chief Minister or any other member of the executive cannot interfer in administrative affairs related to the judiciary and judicial processes. The press note states that the “Court is closed due to winter vacation and [...]
Posted on 04 January 2012 by Tea Server
Monitoring Desk Former Technocrat member of NALA, Attiqa Ghazanfar, has blamed the government of Chief Minister Mehdi Shah of practising double standards for the protesters of his home town, Skardu, and Hunza. “No Anti-Terrorism cases were not registered against violent protesters in Skardu who damaged public property but in Hunza hundreds of the youth were implicated in [...]
Posted on 30 December 2011 by Tea Server
Once upon a time, in the eighties, Gilani was a young minister in Prime Minister Junejo’s cabinet. At that point, Junejo wasn’t quite getting along with his Punjab chief minister, Nawaz Sharif. Most worryingly, even Ziaul Haq was convinced Nawaz was getting too big for his britches and had forgotten that the position he occupied was a generous gift from the General.
Zia expressed his reservations before kingmaker Pir Pagaro who promised to “fix” Nawaz. The next day, Pir Sahib called Gilani and instructed him to leave for Punjab and start laying the planks of his campaign as future chief minister. Gilani immediately went off and set up shop in Lahore.
As he mixed with dozens of political heavyweights, news spread that change was a-comin’. Big names like Nasrullah Dareshak, Aashiq Gopang, Malik Allahyar Khunda, Makhdoom Altaf, Rafiq Laghari and others flocked to see Gilani for secret meetings. There were reports that Manzoor Wattoo was becoming restless. When Chaudhry Parwaiz Elahi contacted Gilani and hinted at wanting to leave Nawaz, it seemed like a job well done.
The chief-minister-in-waiting couldn’t wait any longer and sent a message to the Pir saying the seeds of mutiny had been sown. Pagaro told him to wait.
So while Gilani waited in Lahore, rubbing his hands in silent expectation of torpedoing Nawaz’s career, the by now shaken chief minister arrived to meet his master in Islamabad. No one really knows what transpired during the meeting between Nawaz and Zia – expect that, after it was over the General announced before the media that the chief minister’s fort was secure. Junejo followed up with a similar statement that there would be no change in Punjab. And the final clincher came from Pir Sahib himself: there was a rip in Nawaz’s sack that had been patched up. It was indeed a job well done.
This turn of events created panic in Lahore, of course. The MPAs who had so readily lined up behind Gilani scurried away like roaches in the light. They all realised that they had been used. Gilani understood too.
A hangdog Gilani arrived to meet the Pir and asked him why he had done what he had done. Pir Sahib smiled. “Bacha, this is politics,” he said. “Nawaz was showing the eye to the General so I told him I’d teach him a lesson. I selected you because you are young. You don’t have absolute credibility in politics yet, but you come from a powerful political family in Multan; plus, you’re my relative and it would have been easy for you to convince MPAs to leave Nawaz. Thank God my hunch was not wrong. You have not disappointed me.”
“But this means you have used me,” a heartsore Gilani replied.
Pir Sahib smiled again. A defeated Gilani left, having learnt an invaluable lesson: that there are two kinds of politicians – the first, who masters the art of using others for his political gains, and the second who is always used by others for their political gains.
But over two decades after this incident – which reporter Rauf Klasra narrates in his book, Aik Siyasat Kaee Kahaniyan (One Politics, Many Stories) – any guesses what kind of politician Gilani has turned out to be?
After the 2008 general election, many wondered why exactly Gilani was selected by Zardari: because he would be a strong prime minister or because he would be a pushover prime minister? At the time some had, perhaps naively, suggested Gilani had the capability of being either. After all, he had resisted Benazir’s demands to use strong-arm tactics against the opposition when he was the National Assembly speaker in the mid-1990s. And he had suffered years as a political prisoner under Gen Musharraf rather than splitting from the PPP. Which is perhaps why the day after Gilani’s election as prime minister, one commentator wrote: “Gilani himself sets the limits of what he will and will not do.”
Nearly four years later, has he? If anything, the problem with this prime minister is that he’s good for absolutely nothing but being used by others. Charlatanism of some degree is indispensable to effective leadership. But Gilani has been religiously consistent in who he is: a pushover. Yes, President Zardari has used him again and again to get through political crises of all sorts. But what use is he outside the universe of political wheeling and dealing – where the economy is a gigantic mess, the security situation fragile, at best, and governance absolutely beside the point for the government?
Yes, Gilani has a special knack for starting near where he thinks the opponent is – at the fifty-yard line – and then moving closer to his position, and that has helped pull the government out of many a political crisis. But what does that mean for the poor, hungry, unemployed voter who doesn’t have electricity or gas, health or education, protection or justice?
Maybe, Zardari gets this now, and hence all the mutterings about a change of guard? Especially with Javed Hashmi and Shah Mehmood Qureshi both joining Team Imran, Gilani isn’t much use in Multan either. And he seems to have burnt all his bridges with the army also. Sp, why keep him at all, especially when his greatest quality – an instinctive subservience to the ends of others – has become redundant?
(From News International)
© 2011, Mehreen Zahra-Malik. This article may not be reproduced in any form without providing an active attribution link/ reference to The Pakistan Forum. All attribution links within the article must also be retained.
Posted on 30 December 2011 by Tea Server
It is an outrage and a violation of freedom of expression that Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) continues to block Baloch Hal in Pakistan at a time when this voice needs to be heard across the country now, more than ever. Reproduced below, BH editorial pegged on the target killing of Dr Baqir Shah (emphasis added):
Balochistan: Doctors sit in protest at the murder of their colleagues. Photo: Baloch Hal
The late police surgeon was somewhat an easy target for terrorists for a host of reasons. His situation could enable any murderer to immediately vanish in thin air because of the circumstances that shrouded the late doctor. He gained enormous national and international media attention after conducting the postmortem of five foreigners who were killed on May 17 in what is now remembered as the infamous and tragic Kharotabad incident.
Dr. Shah impressed everyone with his absolute honesty and professionalism when he contested the unconvincing official description of what had actually happened in Kharotabad. He contradicted the version of the events as narrated by the Frontier Corps (FC) and the police.
Police in Quetta say it is premature to say whether or not Dr. Shah’s murder was a case of targeted killing. Such assertions are simply meant either to delay investigations or exempt the government from its accountability. What have the law enforcement agencies been doing in the past two months regarding the murder cases of two other Baloch doctors? It is not a coincident that all doctors being killed in Balochistan are Balochs. While we do recognize the government’s limitations given its poor and slow investigation apparatus but does it mean that the law enforcement authorities have utterly failed to make an inch of progress in chasing elements who killed Dr. Mazhar Baloch, the provincial president of Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) on October 15? Whether these killers linked to each other and share a common hit-list of Baloch doctors and professionals remains unknown but still guessable.
In another similar case two weeks ago, on December 16th to be precise, Dr. Naseem Baloch, the chief medical officer of Gwadar’s District Headquarters Hospital, was shot dead by unidentified persons.
These killings have triggered a wave of insecurity among Baloch doctors and also tremendously infuriated the already enraged Baloch population. Besides the common Baloch in the streets even professional doctors and seasoned politicians are holding the government and its certain shadowy wings responsible for this wave of fatal violence. Even some Baloch members of the the provincial cabinet have criticized their own government.
During a session of the Balochistan Assembly on December 17th, one could see the level of legislators’ powerlessness that they walked out the assembly session against the killing of Dr. Naseem Baloch.
“The provincial government allocates Rs11 billion for the maintenance of law and order, but still police and other law enforcing agencies have failed to give an output or a positive result,” said Asadullah Baloch, minister for agriculture who is also the secretary general of the Balochistan National Party (BNP-Awami), “The senior police officers must be held accountable for their failure to protect the life and property of the people”
The Pakistan Medical Association and Baloch Doctors’ Forum (BDF) have jointly announced three days of mourning and a strike in Quetta’s Bolan Medical College Complex and the Civil Hospital. Yet, the strike is likely to have a deeper impact in the Bloch-dominated districts where it may prolong for more than three days. The BDF has also highlighted the cases of two disappeared Baloch doctors, Dr. Din Mohammad Marri and Dr. Akbar Marri whose families hold the state intelligence agencies responsible for their disappearance.
Doctors in any society deserve profound respect for their commitment to serving the humanity. In a backward area like Balochistan, where the health indicators are extremely murky, very few young men and women manage to accomplish their medical education. They strive tirelessly for at least seven years to get a degree in medicine. The first thing most of the non-local medical students (do) who study on reserved seats at the province’s lone medical college, Bolan, quit Balochistan as soon as they complete their eduction. Only some professionally committed doctors, who surely receive a number of better offers and opportunities to go to Europe and USA for a better personal and professional life, turn down these attractions and agree to serve in the conflict-stricken province of Balochistan.
Hence, it is total senselessness to subject doctors to enforced disappearance for several months and deny him the primary human right of free trial. International human rights groups and Doctors Without Borders should quickly take up the issue with the provincial and federal authorities to ensure the recovery of the missing Baloch doctors.
Doctors like Mr. Shah are role models for our society because they selflessly cure the ailing humanity and also firmly and professionally stand against all pressures intended to urge them to compromise on their professional integrity.
Chief Minister Raisani’s intervention and approval of an inquiry into the murder is a welcome decision although dozens of such investigation committees formed in the past have culminated into stark failure. Yet, we wonder what apologies to Balochistan from leaders like President Zardari or Imran Khan mean when elements responsible for Baloch genocide are not exposed and brought to justice.
(MALIK SIRAJ AKBAR)
Editor-in-Chief
The Baloch Hal
Posted on 27 December 2011 by Tea Server
The Terrorland Report
However, this thing is not acceptable to the almighty military establishment which has lost wars but still believes that it’s the so-called custodian of the country’s so-called idialogical borders. That is why Army Chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani has allegedly given Shia-dominated Gilgit-Baltistan, a region under the control of the federal government of Pakistan, to the neighboring communist China, to bring down the current Shia-dominated government. It seems a story of getting rid of a Shia region and Shia regime in Pakistan!
According to people, whatever the Army Chief and his “gang of rogue generals” is doing in the country, falls in the category of “high treason” but the generals never consider themselves accountable to anyone. Every day, they violate the Constitution a thousand times, and still they are praised in the mainstream media as the most ‘patriot’ people on land.
The military establishment has got help of some Shia media persons and politicians in the war against the Shia-dominated government. Sources claim that creating Sunni-Shia tension in Balochistan, Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan and other parts of the country is actually a part of the military establishment’s strategy, and some Shia people are involved in it as well. “They want to get personal benifit from the criminal army generals. The generals are also cashing presence of Shias in their ranks especially in the mainstream media.”
Sources say, being a Shia Muslim himself, military spokesperson and Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) chief Maj-Gen. Athar Abbas along his journalist brothers is leading Pakistan Army’s Media War front against President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani. “Gen. Abbas is dreaming to become Army Chief after installing his boss Gen. Kayani in the Presidency, but Zardari has put a tough fight so far,” said an insider.
Besides the influential Abbas Brothers, the military establishment is using other Shia Muslim journalists and politicians as well. “Some have been bribed, and others may be really against the PPP-led government,” the source added.
The ruling party-sponsored blog, LUBP, has declared those “Opportunist Kufi Shias” who are killing their own Shia brothers and sisters to get benefits. It has criticized the Abbas Brothers and others. In a post, Shias enabling Shia killings in Pakistan, it says:
“This is all too familiar. kul yom ashura, kul arz karbala, kul opportunists kufi shia! (every day is Ashura, every land is Karbala and every opportunist is a Kufi Shia). Kufi Shias were those who assured Imam Hussain (AS) for support but instead participated in his slaughter in Karbala on the day of Ashura or looked the other way.”
People say when President Zardari tried to give constitutional status to Gilgit-Baltistan, the military establishment opposed it because it’s against their policy to have a Shia-dominated province in the Sunni-dominated country. “It’ll cost them greatly,” says a political worker from Skardu.
Here are two conversations that shed light on the plight of Shia citizens in Pakistan.
a delegation of the local journalists was meeting the chief minister mehdi shah in gilgit. the delegation had only one sunni journalist while the rest were shias and by fate the sunni journalist somehow sat in the last row.
Posted on 23 December 2011 by Tea Server
Mehran bank scandal also known as “Mehrangate” was a major political scandal in Pakistan between 1990-1994 in which senior politicians and political parties were found to have been bribed by military and intelligence officers to prevent the re-election and destabilize the government of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP).
Initiated by Chief of Army Staff Mirza Aslam Beg with the alleged support of President Ghulam Ishaq Khan payments of up to 140 million Rupees were done by the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Chief Asad Durrani and Javed Nasir via the owner of Mehran Bank Yunus Habib. Intelligence funds were deposited in Mehran bank in 1992 propping up what was an insolvent bank as a favour for its owners help in loaning money to the Inter-Services Intelligence in 1990 that was used in the creation of the right wing alliance Islami Jamhoori-Ittehad and bankrolling the campaigns of many opponents of the PPP.
The scandal subsequently broke after the new ISI Chief Lt. Gen Javed Ashraf Qazi decided to transfer the intelligence fund back to state owned banks as per official rules. Mehran Bank was unable to return the money due to its poor financial state and collapsed. It was later discovered that large sums had been siphoned of to 39 fictitious parties.
In 1995, Mehran Bank was amalgamated with the National Bank of Pakistan and in 1996 the NBP had to make full provision for Mehran’s liabilities which resulted in a net loss that year to the bank of Rs 1.260 billion. .
A Supreme Court Petition was lodged by Air Marshal Asghar Khan with the bank transfer details. I wonder as to if Chief Justice of Pakistan could actually take up the case or not?
On April 20, 1994, giving details about the payments made by Mr Habib to generals, politicians and political parties, the then Interior Minister, Naseerullah Babar, told the National Assembly that the main beneficiary of his largesse was former army chief General Mirza Aslam Beg who received Rs140 million.
Key politicians named as recipients of ISI funds included Jam Sadiq Ali (Rs70 million from Habib Bank and Rs150 million from Mehran Bank), Journalist Altaf Hussein Qureshi (Rs.20 million); Yousuf Memon for Ijaz-ul Haq and Javed Hashmi (Rs.50 million); Nawaz Sharif (Rs6 million); former Sindh chief minister Muzaffar Hussain Shah through his secretary (Rs13 million), MQM Haqiqi (Rs5 million), former Sports Minister Ajmal Khan (Rs1.4 million), Jam Mashooq Ali (Rs3.5 million), Liaqat Jatoi (Rs1 million), Dost Mohammad Faizi (Rs1 million), and Jam Haider (Rs 2 million).
Yunus Habib was arrested on April 7, 1994 for misappropriation in the sale proceeds of the Dollar Bearer Certificates. On Dec 14, 1995, Younus Habib was convicted of fraud and embezzlement and given a sentence of 10 years rigorous imprisonment by the Special Court for Offences in Banks in Sindh.
