Despite Sharif, Pak remains a threat

I first met Nawaz Sharif personally in 1982 when he hosted, what he had earlier said was to be a “small lunch” for the visiting Indian Cricket team. There were an estimated 2,000 guests at his small lunch in his palatial mansion in Raiwind near Lahore.

Sharif, the son of an industrial magnate, was then Finance Minister of Punjab. He belonged to a group of young politicians being groomed by the country’s military ruler General Zia ul Haq, to give a civilian façade to military rule and confront Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party. Sharif showed early promise as a political organiser and able administrator, to rise to the higher rungs of the army-backed Pakistan Muslim League. He became Prime Minister in 1990, after the army destabilised the People’s Party Government led by Benazir Bhutto.

Sharif’s honeymoon with the army was short-lived. The army acted to remove two of its erstwhile protégés in 1993 — the then President Ghulam Ishaq Khan and Nawaz Sharif — after bickering between the President and Prime Minister paralysed the Government. Returning to power with a massive mandate in 1997, Sharif gained immense popularity when he matched India’s nuclear tests in 1998. But, there was an authoritarian streak in Sharif, which led to an ugly confrontation with the Supreme Court and his efforts to introduce Sharia Law in Pakistan, undermining the democratic foundations of the country.

Given his fondness for high living and Bollywood music and films of the 1950s, Sharif could not, by any stretch of imagination, be labelled a religious fundamentalist, or a bigot. He has also been an ardent cricket fan and played club-level cricket quite proficiently.

Islamist causes

Despite these attributes, Sharif has a propensity for supporting Islamist causes within Pakistan and beyond its borders. He is deeply distrusted in the US. He was reluctant to meet US demands to act against the Taliban and Al Qaeda bases in Afghanistan.

Within Pakistan, Sharif bought insurance from being targeted while campaigning during the recent elections, by colluding with Taliban-affiliated groups such as the Sipah-e-Sahaba and the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi. He enjoys a close familial relationship with the Lashkar-e-Taiba Chief Hafeez Mohammed Saeed. It remains to be seen if the perpetrators of 26/11 outrage will be brought to justice.

It will be difficult for Sharif’s party and for him personally to discard their erstwhile jihadi assets, which they have patronised for years. A factor playing on their minds could well be that if they discard assets such as Hafiz Mohammed Saeed, they could well drive erstwhile allies and assets into the arms of the military establishment and political rivals, like the army-backed Imran Khan.

Low intensity conflict

Sharif knows that while the Indian border will remain tension-free if he halts cross-border terrorist attacks , the same cannot be said of Pakistan’s porous western borders with Afghanistan. It is not going to be possible for his Government to halt infiltration into Afghanistan by the Taliban, the Haqqani network, the Al Qaeda and their affiliates, especially given the strength of the ISI-Taliban-Haqqani-Al Qaeda nexus. Moreover, with Imran Khan becoming politically influential in the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan, the challenge that the Tehriq-e-Taliban Pakistan poses to the writ of the Sharif Government will be formidable.

While both General Kayani and Chief Justice Iftikhar Ali Chaudhury would be out of office by the end of this year, the real challenge that Sharif will face is from a Pakistani army leadership tutored in an era of Pakistan-sponsored “jihad” in Afghanistan and India. Sharif will have to deliver on his promises to set the economy right and promote growth if he is to consolidate his position.

For this, he will need the goodwill of and assistance from Western donors, the World Bank and IMF. Saudi Arabia’s rulers, will, however, be friendlier toward Sharif than they have been towards Zardari, regarded as an Iranian-inclined Shia.

It remains to be seen if he can moderate the army’s ambitions to establish a compliant Taliban-dominated Government in Afghanistan. “Low intensity conflict” may continue in Jammu and Kashmir and elsewhere, in a manner that inconveniences, but does not infuriate, India.

Terrorism links

While ill-prepared and hastily organised Summits are best avoided, New Delhi should respond positively if Sharif chooses to seek Indian cooperation in areas such as extending its power grid to the Pakistan border in Punjab and providing the power-starved Punjab Province of Pakistan with much-needed electrical power. Moreover, if Pakistan so chooses, India could quite easily extend its existing oil pipelines to the Pakistan border, for supply of petroleum products.

In the ultimate analysis, oil pipelines and electric transmission towers, across borders, provide more abiding security than tanks and artillery! It would likewise serve us well to relax restrictions on pilgrims and other bona fide visitors from Pakistan. But, at the same time, India cannot afford to lower its guard on terrorism.

American journalist Max Boot perceptively remarked after the recent elections in Pakistan: “Pakistan’s state apparatus is deeply dysfunctional and is unlikely to fundamentally change for the better under Nawaz Sharif”.

(The author is a former High Commissioner to Pakistan.)

COMMENT NOW