Justice Qazi Faez Isa of the Supreme Court (SC) has damned the “law enforcement agencies” in general and the federal interior minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, in particular for the dismal state of counter terrorism operations in the country. The one-judge Inquiry Commission was set up by CJP Anwar Jamali following lawyers’ outrage at the terrorist attack on a hospital in Quetta last August that wiped out the top lawyers of the province. Chaudhry Nisar has hit back, claiming the judge is unfairly targeting him for the failings of other departments and agencies. Inevitably, some uneasy questions have arisen.
After the tragic incident, angry, grief-stricken lawyers across the country demanded that negligent agencies and governments ought to be held accountable for not preventing such terrorist attacks by beefing up security and apprehending terrorists. When pressure from peer groups mounted on the CJP to do something about it, he wrote to the Inspector General Police and Chief Secretary of Balochistan seeking answers. When they didn’t respond in any satisfactory manner, the SC Registrar was nudged to write to the CJP noting the ‘dismal state of governance in the country and miserable failure of the government and LEAs in countering terrorism’, upon which the CJP duly took suo motu notice to set up a commission of inquiry under Justice Qazi Faez Isa. It may be noted that Justice Isa was thought to be suitable for the job at hand for two reasons. First, he had served as Chief Justice of the Balochistan High Court and was therefore knowledgeable about the state of affairs in the province; second, he was also directly affected by the death of several close friends from the legal community and had poured out his rage and grief in a personal letter to the stricken families of the deceased.
It did not occur to the CJP that perhaps, precisely because of Justice Isa’s personal anger and anguish, a more dispassionate judge might have delivered a more relevant report touching on all aspects of the civil-military structures created to combat terrorism without seeming to focus on one civilian minister alone and provoking an unseemly controversy. Certainly, the abject failure to interrogate military agencies that are primarily tasked to combat terrorism and to instead tilt like Don Quixote at NACTA, which is a non-functioning body under the Interior Minister, points to a gaping hole in the Commission Report.
Justice Isa charges Chaudhry Nisar for a “monumental failure” in not providing “clear leadership and direction” to implement internal security policies. It castigates him for not acting against banned terror outfits and for molly-coddling their leaders. It berates him for not energizing NACTA. And so on. But the Report might have made more sense if it had instead been directed at the military leadership that makes and implements core national security and counter-terrorism policy. Indeed, the Report might have proved more useful if the good judge had interrogated Chaudhry Nisar and asked him to explain the civil-military pressures on the PMLN government not to crack down on certain specified non-state outfits and their leaders that are considered strategic or tactical “assets” of the national security establishment. Equally, it is moot whether the scope of the report was restricted to one tragic incident in Quetta or whether Justice Isa’s writ covered an examination of the National Action Plan against terrorism on which the army chief, the prime minister, the ISPR and others have regularly dilated and whose successes and failures are constantly commented upon by the media.
Other disquieting issues come to mind. When a terrorist attack on the legal community takes place, an inquiry commission is promptly set up by the SC to rap the interior ministry. When the Army Public School is attacked, the army is quick to attack the Taliban in Waziristan. But when the media is attacked – Pakistan is the most dangerous place in the world for journalists – no such thing happens. In the case of the killing of Saleem Shezad, the Commission steered clear of incriminating evidence; in the case of the attack on Hamid Mir, the ‘sensitive’ complaint was quietly buried in the SC. In the case of the Abbottabad Commission, there was visible reluctance to indict the national security establishment for incompetence or complicity, with the result that there are three versions of the Report and it has not been made public. It may also be recalled that the Hamood ur Rahman Commission report was only made public after Indian media published an abridged version of it. And so on.
To be sure, Justice Qazi Faez Isa has asked many relevant questions. His outrage at the failure of certain dimensions of our national counter terrorism policy is also justified. But a blanket condemnation of civilian stewardship of NAP by picking on Chaudhry Nisar alone is not fair. Nor is it factual to deny that significant progress has been made in putting terrorism down and making our lives safer.
After the tragic incident, angry, grief-stricken lawyers across the country demanded that negligent agencies and governments ought to be held accountable for not preventing such terrorist attacks by beefing up security and apprehending terrorists. When pressure from peer groups mounted on the CJP to do something about it, he wrote to the Inspector General Police and Chief Secretary of Balochistan seeking answers. When they didn’t respond in any satisfactory manner, the SC Registrar was nudged to write to the CJP noting the ‘dismal state of governance in the country and miserable failure of the government and LEAs in countering terrorism’, upon which the CJP duly took suo motu notice to set up a commission of inquiry under Justice Qazi Faez Isa. It may be noted that Justice Isa was thought to be suitable for the job at hand for two reasons. First, he had served as Chief Justice of the Balochistan High Court and was therefore knowledgeable about the state of affairs in the province; second, he was also directly affected by the death of several close friends from the legal community and had poured out his rage and grief in a personal letter to the stricken families of the deceased.
It did not occur to the CJP that perhaps, precisely because of Justice Isa’s personal anger and anguish, a more dispassionate judge might have delivered a more relevant report touching on all aspects of the civil-military structures created to combat terrorism without seeming to focus on one civilian minister alone and provoking an unseemly controversy. Certainly, the abject failure to interrogate military agencies that are primarily tasked to combat terrorism and to instead tilt like Don Quixote at NACTA, which is a non-functioning body under the Interior Minister, points to a gaping hole in the Commission Report.
Justice Isa charges Chaudhry Nisar for a “monumental failure” in not providing “clear leadership and direction” to implement internal security policies. It castigates him for not acting against banned terror outfits and for molly-coddling their leaders. It berates him for not energizing NACTA. And so on. But the Report might have made more sense if it had instead been directed at the military leadership that makes and implements core national security and counter-terrorism policy. Indeed, the Report might have proved more useful if the good judge had interrogated Chaudhry Nisar and asked him to explain the civil-military pressures on the PMLN government not to crack down on certain specified non-state outfits and their leaders that are considered strategic or tactical “assets” of the national security establishment. Equally, it is moot whether the scope of the report was restricted to one tragic incident in Quetta or whether Justice Isa’s writ covered an examination of the National Action Plan against terrorism on which the army chief, the prime minister, the ISPR and others have regularly dilated and whose successes and failures are constantly commented upon by the media.
Other disquieting issues come to mind. When a terrorist attack on the legal community takes place, an inquiry commission is promptly set up by the SC to rap the interior ministry. When the Army Public School is attacked, the army is quick to attack the Taliban in Waziristan. But when the media is attacked – Pakistan is the most dangerous place in the world for journalists – no such thing happens. In the case of the killing of Saleem Shezad, the Commission steered clear of incriminating evidence; in the case of the attack on Hamid Mir, the ‘sensitive’ complaint was quietly buried in the SC. In the case of the Abbottabad Commission, there was visible reluctance to indict the national security establishment for incompetence or complicity, with the result that there are three versions of the Report and it has not been made public. It may also be recalled that the Hamood ur Rahman Commission report was only made public after Indian media published an abridged version of it. And so on.
To be sure, Justice Qazi Faez Isa has asked many relevant questions. His outrage at the failure of certain dimensions of our national counter terrorism policy is also justified. But a blanket condemnation of civilian stewardship of NAP by picking on Chaudhry Nisar alone is not fair. Nor is it factual to deny that significant progress has been made in putting terrorism down and making our lives safer.