Eggs Laid by Tigers
Saturday, March 14, 2009
"Everything not prohibited is required," is alive and well in the world
My eyes are not good enough to study this Daily Times editorial, but it looks as if Pakistan has made a bad bargain in Swat, and that will certainly affect the women and men of Chiral in time. Read it with care, please, and let me know if you agree.
The application of Shari'a's "munkir” (forbidden) and “maruf” (approved) rules governing life sound chillingly like E. B. White,s "Everything not prohibited is required," words that have frightened me since I first read The one and Future King. Can we allow ourselves, our brothers and sisters not more than six degrees of separation away, to be forced live like ants?
President Hussein must be very wise and careful in making alliances with "elements of the Taliban".
"Is life so dear ore peace so sweet" that we purchase it at the price of imposing the Afgan Talib's version Shari'a on peaceful places like Chitral? Will such a bargain even bring us peace? Can it ever bring peace? Can our souls rest at east with such a bargain?
EDITORIAL: Sharia “justice” comes to Swat again?
Shara’i Nizam-e-Adl Regulation is about to be applied to Swat once again. This time, one hopes, it will stick and not become a ruse for the Taliban behind which to gain reprieve from military attacks and regroup. The last time the ANP government wrote up an accord on the subject with the followers of Sufi Muhammad of the Tehreek Nifaz Shariat Muhammadi, (TNSM) the son-in-law of the great sufi warrior, Fazlullah, did not abide by it and the people of Swat, who are propagated to be relentlessly “demanding sharia”, suffered untold misery at the hands of his gunmen. The earlier agreement had the authority of the Sufi’s word not to destroy girls’ schools, but the schools had gone on being blown up.
This time, too, the NWFP government and the TNSM leader have agreed to the implementation of sharia justice in Malakand division. Under the agreement, Sufi Muhammad, through his public congregations in Matta, will be expected to “build consensus among his people”; His son-in-law, Fazlullah, will have to soon announce ceasefire in Swat; all the girls’ schools in the area would have to be reopened; and the great Sufi Muhammad would “help establish a strong administration in the area”, although that job is normally expected to be performed by the elected representatives of the people sitting in Peshawar.
The sharia bill will be finalised by the ANP government and subjected to a political consensus in the NWFP Assembly on Monday and the emerging document will be grandiosely called Shara’i Nizam-e-Adl Regulations. Many who will sign on the dotted line will be those who would sign anything if it remotely promised to bring a break in the cycle of Taliban violence in the region. Some will be sceptical about a blueprint of religious law that will stand only if it is not different from the law being enforced in the Tribal Areas. For instance, the blowing up of girls’ schools was a part of the jurisprudence of the Taliban government in Kabul, which was accepted as precedent in Pakistan’s Taliban-controlled Areas. The last time Sufi Muhammad promised not to destroy the schools he couldn’t enforce or abide by his pledge.
The people of Swat want quick justice, the kind enforced by the Wali of Swat, as if in a city-state utopia, but they are bound to get more than they have bargained for by rejecting the dilatory system obtaining in the rest of Pakistan. They will get the “munkir” (forbidden) part of the sharia dealing with forbidden acts plus the “maruf” (approved) part dealing with acts of piety. The “praiseworthy” acts of piety such as the saying of the nimaz five times a day in the mosque will be greatly approved, but those who don’t observe the ritual will suffer physical and financial pain. And the list of the “maruf” stretches endlessly, which means that you can be thrashed for a number of things you thought were not “penal”. It is probable that the scared people of Swat simply don’t know what they are in for.
The Sufi himself says he will help in setting up a judicial system. What if he doesn’t like the way the ANP lays down the law of the sharia? Will the ANP leaders get the Sufi to become a de facto arbiter on how the sharia has to be enforced? A chilling feeling is that the Sufi and his warlord son-in-law will preside over the establishment of the sharia law and will also interfere in the day to day implementation of it. The power of the Sufi will derive from the gun of the Taliban and he will not for long allow a sharia which is different from the one enforced by the Taliban elsewhere. This is very important because sharia is the order that will ensure longevity to the governance of the Taliban in the various territories they hold. Finally, if the Taliban win the war in Afghanistan and the Americans leave the region, it is the sharia that will ensure that the territories conquered in Pakistan stay with them.
Clearly, the problem sits at the cross-section of the internal dynamics and the politics of Sharia. While both are problematic in and of themselves, their meshing makes the issue even more troublesome. The state thinks it needs to ensure some semblance of peace in the area and this is perhaps the best way to go about it in the interim. But there are too many areas of friction here, not just because there is no exegetical consensus on sharia and its implementation but also because its politics, at this point, excludes all but the literalist ultra-orthodoxy of Taliban. There is also bad blood between Sufi Muhammad and his son-in-law and the former, so far, has proved ineffective in the face of the rising power of the latter. We fear that the terms of this agreement like the one before it may be flouted even before the ink on it dries. *
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Meanwhile, here on Queen's Beach in Waikiki, we loaf and enjoy such ease as our upbringing permits us to enjoy; oar as we chose to enjoy; or perhaps I've said the same thing twice. No one threatens us with Shari'a; no drones fly overhead; no one is snowbound; no girls' schools are destroyed; the legislature is poised to pass a Civil Union Bill; all our demons, if demons we have, live in our skulls.
Labels: Chitral, E. B.White shirtless, freedom, Obama, peace, Taliban
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