Martial Law Not Emergency

I have just congratulated myself in keeping myself awake during the oratory performance of the army Chief of Pakistan, mighty Gen. Pervez Musharraf; one and only savior of Pakistan. The first thing that came in my mind was the shock at the self centered nature of whole episode. It seemed that apart from him, there exists no Pakistan and there is no one who is able to steer Pakistan out of current situation. Bear with me as I try to go through his speech and this act of emergency declaration.

First thing that we should understand is that this is not emergency as is portrayed by the Musharraf, because the imposition of emergency as contained in the constitution of Pakistan is the exclusive domain of President of Pakistan while the current emergency order has come from Gen. Pervez Musharraf in the capacity of army chief, and not as President of Pakistan. Hence, for all practical purposes, this is martial law and not emergency. Only precedent that I know of such martial law in the guise of emergency is the declaration of emergency in Egypt since 1981 that has the sole purpose of keeping Hosni Mubarak as president. As I have not been able to infer any timeframe from the speech of Musharraf nor from the text of declaration of emergency, there is quite a chance that he is acquired a new ideal in the person of Egyptian president and has discarded his old ideal, Father of Turkish nation.

Now coming to the speech; Well; I have never heard any speech that is more incoherent and insult to the faculties of logic and intellect than this one delivered by Musharraf. His whole speech rested on following premises:

1. Writ of government is challenged by terrorists
2. Legislature, executive and judiciary are not working in unison because of judicial activism
3. Judiciary is hindering the economic progress due to judicial activism
4. Establishment and bureaucracy has become inactive because of fear of judiciary
5. Media and vested interests are hampering the growth of Pakistan

And then came the master stroke. Due to all the above factors, constitution of Pakistan is held in abeyance along with basic rights of citizens. However, very interestingly the parliament will remain intact. So, following will be the effects of this emergency:

1. Parliament will remain intact, though hard to imagine under what capacity as the document giving it authority is no more applicable
2. Establishment will remain the same
3. Political activity will be forbidden
4. Freedom of expression is forbidden
5. Anyone can be held without any charge
6. Army chief is the boss

However, in no. 2 above judiciary will be exception, and they are asked to show there conformity to new order by taking new oaths. If this is not martial law, then what is it? If this is not martial law then it has already been declared null and void by the alienated judges of Supreme Court, and if it is declaration of emergency, then army head is not authorized to declare it. So are the norms of our country and minds of Musharraf and his cronies; nothing but supreme stupidity is the word that comes to mind.

Now let us go at each of the premise of the whole rationale of declaring emergency. The first premise is that writ of government has been challenged. I think for this those should be held responsible who were running the state machinery for the last eight years. So instead of declaring emergency, the untouchables in intelligence agencies should be held accountable under whose very nose the situation in Lal Masjid and Swat developed, but who were more concerned in apprising themselves with perhaps the toilet habits of judges and politicians than with their real job. But this requires a trait called moral uprightness, which is always in short supplies among the dictators; further, no one wants to kick his own arse.

The second argument was that judiciary, executive and legislature were not working in unison. Well, Musharraf is right here as one of the pillars of state was trying to stick to the constitution of Pakistan while others were not. So this argument effectively means that as constitution was being upheld by judiciary, chaos emerged in the executive branch of the government who in the past sixty years has forgotten all the norms of law and fair play.

The third argument was that the judiciary was interfering in the economic progress of the country. Frankly speaking, I am speechless here. Rightly said by elders that a man is known by the company he keeps. This argument seems to be directly coming from the unpublished treasures of Bushism. If by interfering means overturning the privatization of steel mill and taking suo moto notices against horders, then I think Musharraf is right.

The next argument is that establishment and bureaucracy has become inactive because of fear of judiciary. If such is the case then I think it is not the fault of judiciary and it only shows incompetence of officials of establishment and bureaucracy who cannot work within the given domain of their powers as given in the laws. They should fear the judiciary in case they step outside it, as this is what is exactly required from judiciary in civil societies; but Musharraf on his quest to slowly and steadily catching down the IQ level of his best friend Mr. Bush, blames this on judiciary. Zindabad Musharraf, Zindabad.

In the last the media and political motives are not spared. I cannot attribute it to anything else but to the mental delusions of a schizophrenic patient. As far as media is concerned, they are trying to portray the reality and if the reality is not the liking of our great leader then what can be done. As far as the political motives are concerned, I think that in this world of blood and flesh, everyone has his own agenda and people work out their differences by working around it.

Now considering the effects of the declaration, I would like to point out one thing that is missing in the declaration although implied in it i.e the name of Pakistan should be changed to Sultanat -e- Pakistan barayay Imarat-e-Afwaj-e-Pakistan (Sultanat of Pakistan to be ruled by Armies of Pakistan). I am sure Justice Muneer would be proud of this name as nothing depicts his doctrine of necessity more correctly than this.