Who is the TARGET: Pakistan’s Nuclear Weapons or President?

Guest Post by Silence from Islamabad Observer

We have not forgotten the debate which centered on the Saddam Husain’s weapons of mass destruction, his quest to destroy the world and duties of ‘civilized world’ to act before the dooms day takes place. The ‘civilized world” acted with unprecedented might and fire power, leaving 500,000 Iraqi’s dead, 4 million displaced and entire infrastructure of the country destroyed. The weapons of mass destruction were never found, however United States successfully got controls over world’s second largest oil reserves. Iraq is going through a civil war but the world is safe, not a bad achievement for ‘civilized world’.

We have witnessed another era of false propaganda being peddled by Western media when former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, recognized the Taliban government. Once, the ‘darling of the west’, overnight became a ‘Princess’ and her husband, a ‘play boy’. All sort of allegations were leveled against the couple and circulated as cover stories by Western and local media. Her misery ended with her assassination followed by a nationwide mourning, which sent a strong message to ‘intelligentsia-at-war’ against her, that people do people do have their own perceptions.

The same is true with regards to the vicious propaganda being embarked upon by USA and Western Media against Asif Ali Zardair, world is being told to believe that people of Pakistan are going to be ruled by an evil, corrupt and merciless ‘mafia chief’ who is suffering from mental sickness and emotional problems. The saga began with a report of ‘Financial Times’ times publishing the details of a medical certificate, which was used by Asif Ali Zardari, to successfully argue the postponement of a case in English Court. According to the report, he was suffering through emotional stress, could not remember birthdates of his wife and children, ‘thought’ of suicide and was apprehensive due to his eleven years of imprisonment.

Mr. Hussain Haqani gave an explanation of the medical certificate submitted in court by Mr. Zardari, “You have got to understand that while he was in prison on charges that were never proven, there were attempts to kill him. At that time, he was surrounded by fear all the time. Any human being living in such a condition will of course suffer from the effects of continuous fear. But that is all history.“Mr. Haqanni’s explanation did not put an end to debate; the powerful hand behind the campaign has spread thousands of stories so far, as to comments made by some one, “Even if half of the allegations against Zardari are correct, he truly qualifies to be head of Mafia”.

Apart from the explanation by Mr. Haqani, in my legal career, I have personally seen hundreds of ‘medical certificates’ produced by all sorts of clients to seek postponements of court cases. In several cases, the person said to be suffering from serious sickness and unable to move and attend the court proceedings, as such being hospitalized, was sitting right in front of me and handing me over his certificate of medical disability.

A number of doctors have been convicted by courts for issuing such medical certificate. A claver attorney in any part of the world can easily arrange a ‘certificate of medical disability‘ for his client to seek a postponement. Many, in legal circles regarded Zardari’s medical diagnoses as a legal ploy designed to stall the case against him, as he was going through a difficult time and unable to rush from court to court and country to country to appear in proceedings of countless cases.

The agenda behind this campaign became known when Pete Hoekstra, ranking Republican on the US House Intelligence Committee told to a news paper, “Typically (the US) would not want that kind of person involved in a nuclear chain of command.” The aim of ‘hidden hand’ which is no more hidden is to breed public hatred and distrust towards state and its organs. This is not a secret, of the world’s nine declared and undeclared nuclear arsenals; none provokes as much concern in Washington as Pakistan’s. Those who made the world believe that Sadam Hussain possess weapons of mass destruction, through a media campaign are once again, trying to prove that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are a danger to world peace.

We have to be aware of conspiracies of our enemies, who are surrounding us from all corners, they are breeding hatred amongst us; they are sponsoring those who carry suicide attacks in our cities and on our defense forces. They are violating our sovereignty, our borders and killing our innocent women and children. We are the only problem for US in getting access to energy resources of Central Asia; they need a control over supply route which includes FATA and Baluchistan. For that purpose, our enemy needs to disintegrate us in to smaller pieces controlled by war lords on their payroll. That is impossible without taking control over our nuclear assets.

They want rest of the world to believe that our nuclear assets are either in control of an insane and emotionally disturbed head of state or in a danger to go in to hands of militants. Pakistan’s local media, intelligentsia and those who have to settle scores with Mr. Zardari, has taken the enemy propaganda as an opportunity. All sorts of stories, analysis and doomsday scenarios are actively being nourished to public to develop an unfavorable public opinion about him. Some of those ‘intelligentsia-at-war’ are working for ‘hidden hand’, the others took it as a sensitization event and some even tried to get back as they were not able to get certain favors from him in past or present government. Every TV Show, News Paper, Blog and chatter on internet forums is trying to prove his insanity, corruption, incompetence and emotional disturbance.

Politicians in Pakistan, who were always regarded as opportunists and unwilling to see beyond their political goals, have show maturity and recognized the threats to our national security. Mian Nawaz Sharif, Asfand Yar, Altaf Hussian and Qazi Hussain Ahmad have made it clear that they will unconditionally support present regime on matters of national security. Obviously, there is anger and frustration in media, civil society and lawyers on broken promises of Mr. Zardari. The ‘people’s chief justice’ and honorable judges sacked by dictator are still waiting restoration. People who started the movement of ‘awakening’ against dictatorship are justified in their feeling of being betrayed by PPP’s leadership. But at the same time, the fine line between criticism and propaganda (which is a campaign of our enemies with ulterior motives) must always be regarded.

We like it or not, Mr. Zardari is our elected President, he has shown his emotional strength while sitting beside dead body of his wife and our former Prime Minister by raising the slogan of ‘Pakistan Khapay’. He has proved his political maturity by taking on board his worst political rivals. He has shown his wisdom to keep Pakistan People’s Party united when every intellectual amongst us was predicting disintegration in party which represents the federations and enjoys unanimous support in all provinces.

Mr. Zardari is a head of state and needs to be a role model for an average citizen. But he is not a saint and we must not expect him free from the human weaknesses, which all of us posses. We have to keep him under microscope for his actions and his responsibilities and criticize him in a constructive manner. Undoubtedly, he has been elected through a democratic process with majority support from Electoral College, especially from the smaller provinces and will of the people be respected. He deserves support of the nation so that he can deliver better governance and stand firmly against challenges posed to our national security and economy.

Soon we are going to witness another round of dirty campaign against our national assets and our civil and military leadership. How our intelligentsia, media and civil society is going to defend our national interests in future, while today, we are using all our energies to prove that our enemies are right. Lies will perpetuate themselves unless are countered, and by identifying our enemy and his goals, we can defeat the lies with the truth and make the challenges our opportunities.