What is Asif Zardari up to? By Usman Khalid, Chairman Rifah Party

From Agartala to Ajmer – the Plans of RAW continue to be ignored at great cost to Pakistan

07 April 2012

Asif Zardari (President) and son Bilawal (Party Chairman) engaged in full fledged onslaught on the military and the judiciary. Are they ready to play the Sindh card to create an insurrection? The forthcoming visit of President Asif Zardari (on 8 April) to the shrine of Hazrat Khawaja Gharib Nawaz in Ajmer (India) has raised many brows. Since he is well known for ‘deals’ on national aspirations and interests, almost every one is suspicious what is he up to? India is as jubilant as Pakistanis are in fear. He went to the USA and was openly auctioning the nuclear deterrent of Pakistan. The starting price for bidding was 100 billion Dollars. No one took any notice or interest. The Israeli newspaper HAAR’TZ was the only one to comment. It said in an editorial that the price was not too steep. But there were no bidders for two reasons: 1) Pakistan was not Libya and Zardari is not Gadhafi; he could not deliver on the deal because it was the military that was guarding the ‘strategic assets’ of Pakistan, 2) Pakistan’s nuclear deterrent is India specific and it has kept peace in the sub-continent – the only place where wars have been fought again and again with some regularity. The ‘auction’ did not bring any money but it did reinforce the perception that Zardari may really be suffering from dementia as doctors has certified during his trial for money laundering in Switzerland.

Then Asif Zardari turned his attention to Pakistan’s ‘best friend’ China. He started turning up in China every three months. Directed to outlying regions, received by minor officials, taken on pointless sightseeing trips, and given a cold shoulder everywhere, it took him a long time to take the hint. In the process he got to be shunned in China as much as in Pakistan which dampened – if not destroyed – the hopes for better relations. He did not give up. He turned his attention to Iran which resulted in Iran increasing the price of gas negotiated earlier. He annoyed Saudi Arabia in the process scuttling any prospects for subsidised oil. Then he turned his attention back towards his favourite targets – the military and the judiciary. He continues to demonise the Supreme Court replacing Babar Awan in his team – who specialised in acts of contempt of court – with Aitzaz Ahsen who specialises in pointless points to prolong court proceedings. Now Zardari has been joined by his son – Bilwal – who devoted his entire maiden speech at Garhi Khuda Bakhsh on the death anniversary of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto on 4 April demonising the judiciary. He criticised the Supreme Court for ‘double standards’ favouring the Punjab and submitting to the military. That is the politics of ‘Sindh Card’; Zardari is preparing for the likely event of his party losing the next elections in all provinces except Sindh.
He is following in the footsteps of Sheikh Mujib, who had no hope for building a constituency of support in any province of West Pakistan. The PPP has been the only party with a solid constituency in all the provinces of Pakistan. It is Zardari’s politics which has robbed it of support in the Punjab. But he is already blaming the Punjab and courting disaster with agenda is perpetual strife and eventual disintegration. Asif Zardari feels cornered because he has not been able to ‘tame’ the military or the judiciary. While his defiance of the judiciary is put on display every day in the national and international media, one gets only an occasional glimpse of his plans for ‘taming’ the military as it entails alternation of a charm offensive and seeking support of ostensible enemies of Pakistan. At one time he put Rehman Malik (his Interior Minister) in charge of even military intelligence – the ISI. But his most sinister plan became public when the Memo-gate scandal got the attention of the world media. It was revealed that President Zardari had asked his close confidant Hussain Haqqani, who was his Ambassador in the USA, contacted Admiral Mullen through a US citizen of Pakistani descent –Mansoor Ijaz – writing a Memorandum (Memo) to seek US help to remove General Kiani (COAS) and Lieut. General Pasha (DGISI) in exchange for accommodating the US interests in ‘nuclear assets’ of Pakistan and forming a new ‘national security team’ of US approved officials. The USA found that level of treason by a Head of the State hard to accommodate; the blowback would have damaged not just Pakistan but undermined the entire US strategy in South and Central Asia. The USA informed Kiani and Pasha. Mansoor Ijaz spilled the beans and revealed the plot in an article in the Financial Times of London.
The matter is now before the Supreme Court and Hussain Haqqani, who was allowed to go abroad on written undertaking to return at short notice, is using all the tricks to avoid returning to Pakistan to record his statement. After all, his boss – Asif Zardari – did escape trial for 11 years after indictment, until his wife was killed and he became the President thus enjoying immunity from prosecution. The Memo written to Admiral Mullen is not the only proof of high treason by the Head of the State against the State of Pakistan. It was revealed during public investigation by a Commission appointed by the Supreme Court which comprises three Chief Justices of High Courts that President Zardari okayed the raid on Abbotabad on 2 May the target of which was Osama bin Laden. It transpired that he omitted to tell the military. That also constitutes ‘treason’; this could have started an air war between the USA and Pakistan. Such decisions (to permit a foreign country to mount a raid within the country) are institutional – not a personal – decisions On this occasion, a war was narrowly avoided but the President has not come clean. The danger of state decisions, including those affecting war and peace, being taken by the President without institutional input continues to exist. Is President Asif Zardari really suffering from dementia, or is it something else? His visit to Ajmer might give a clue as to what afflicts him. While doctors alone can diagnose and treat his dementia; the hallucinations and paranoia on which his decisions are based, are evident from his decisions.
sudden decision to visit Ajmer is one such decision. Although his chief apologist in the media – Najam Sethi – often succeeds in giving a spin to events that the actions which strike fear and awe in the public begin to appear to be credible even admirable. According to Najam Sethi, there has been a ‘break-through’ in Indo- Pakistan relations with Pakistan having given unconditional MFN status to India. He conceded that Pakistan’s stand had always been ‘no trade until the Kashmir Dispute is resolved’. He also conceded that the balance of trade is in favour of India and that it would become worse after MFN rules come into play by the end of the year. He said that Zardari would urge Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for quid pro quo by approving agreements of Sir Creek and Siachin Glacier, the drafts of which had been agreed years ago. But President Zardari is not taking the Foreign Minister and a high defence official with him. The only minister in the President’s party is Rehman Malik – one of the two foreign national (others being Salman Farooki) who are still the members of his ‘kitchen cabinet’. These two along with Hussain Haqqani and Farahnaz Isphahani, have been privy to the secret deals made with the USA and the MQM. The similarities between the visit of Sheikh Mujib to Agartala and Zardari visit to Ajmer are too striking to ignore.
At Agartala, it was agreed that India would help in rigging elections in East Pakistan fought on the basis of ‘Six Points’ approved by RAW; recruit Hindu Bengalis to raise Mukti Bahini infiltrate East Pakistan at the appropriate time: provide offices and housing near Calcutta to set up Bangladesh Government in Exile; carry out propaganda worldwide to demonise Pakistan’s ‘military rulers’; provide safe haven, weapons and support to insurgents; and invade East Pakistan when both parties – India and Awami League – agreed it was opportune to do so. If Asif Zardari and his allies win elections only in Sindh the situation would be very similar to that of East Pakistan in 1970. Having sharpened his Sindh Card and appointed a successor – his son Bilawal – he believes an insurgency would begin if he is incarcerated. His son would sustain the insurgency from the UK joining hands with . Harbiar Marri and erstwhile Khan of Kalat. Other surrogates of India – the MQM, ANP and ‘nationalist’ elements in Sindh and Baluchistan – he hopes, would join in. Asif Zardari is going to India to ask if he would be offered the same level of support as was given to Sheikh Mujib.
The Americans are aware of Zardari’s plans, if they are not the ones to have made the plans in the first place. They are offering India every inducement to go along. But India is wary. Conquest of East Pakistan has been more of a lodestone exacerbating its ‘Muslim problem’; Kashmir is far from being integrated into the India Empire even after 64 years of occupation; whatever little success India has achieved in Afghanistan, KPK and Balochistan is dependent on American goodwill. And America is on its way out. Will India buy into Zardari hallucinatory goals? The chances are that Manmohan Singh would not even offer to treat his dementia.

Posted on Apr 13, 12 | 8:12 am