The writer is a retired army officer and a freelance columnist

kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk

I was greatly saddened at the news of GA's very tragic, very sudden death. Not for the reason that he was a great friend of mine, us having met just twice in adulthood not too long ago (when he recalled me as being a rather tough - read nasty! - senior Cadet at the Academy too many years ago), but because he was such a gentleman. Far more important than that, he was one of the best people around General Musharraf. The country has lost one of the few good men who could have made a difference. Rest in peace, GA.

While it is good to hear that NAB is hauling up many more crooks, and alleged crooks, every single day more and more names being bandied about in the press, and on the electronic media, none of the PML (L's) are on the hit list. There was a mention of one former MPA from this gallant band, and something about Pervez Elahi being asked to return some hundreds of millions in bank loans that he had allegedly gobbled up, but that is all. Indeed, whilst there has been some progress in returning some of the money to some of the people who were cheated in The Great Co-ops Theft, there is nothing to show that the government is even half-way serious about pursuing those that killed the Cooperative movement in our country. The Co-ops, if we care to recall, were a great help and support to small farmers - the little people, and the sooner the government gets it's act together on this one, the better for everyone.

There is also the matter of the well-known, and oft written about sons (two, and no prizes for guessing who they are) of late, and for some, lamented Generals, who are wallowing in such immense wealth that it becomes extremely hard for any one to believe that the money was not pilfered from somewhere or the other. The government must realise that all of its efforts to provide "good governance" will fall by the wayside (are falling, actually) if these people are not investigated. It is quite simple, really: just look at their respective fathers' PAFY 1975s (the form on which all army officers have to declare their worth, movable and immovable, at the time that they join up, and at regular intervals thereafter), and there it will be!

Meanwhile, back in the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave, the good ole US of A, there is much in the press about our country, all of it (what else?) negative, and oh so condescending. A respected paper like the New York Times has editorially castigated Pakistan twice in two days. First, while fully supporting the lifting of US sanctions on India, it suggests that those imposed on Pakistan not be lifted. In its own words: "India is the world's largest democracy and second most populous country. During the cold war, New Delhi looked to Moscow as a strategic counter-weight to China and to an American-supported Pakistan. More recently, it has shifted its diplomacy toward Washington, while instituting economic reforms that have made it more receptive to American trade and investment. In this improved climate, India may be more willing to consider American appeals (Italics mine, and please note the word) to restrain its weapons program". It goes on: "At this point, Congress ought not to ease nuclear sanctions against Pakistan. The military government there led by Gen Pervez Musharraf has followed less responsible weapons export policies, has refused to sever its links with international terrorist groups and has not yet taken adequate steps to restore electoral democracy. But while it is appropriate for Washington to develop more cordial relations with New Delhi than with Islamabad, it must be careful not to be so punitive that it drives Pakistan's military leaders into even more destructive policies" - August 28th.

The piece in the NYT that triggered the editorial went over the moves the US has been making over the past few years in wooing India. Like almost everything coming out of America vis-a-vis its relations with Pakistan these days, that too was condescending in the extreme a la the sumo-like Mr Armitage. The piece was factually incorrect too, in asserting that Pakistan and the US had been friends since the '80s. Quite obviously the writer hasn't heard of the U-2 incident, and the "Pakistan is the corner-stone of US foreign policy" nonsense. The time when our successive rulers sold our country down the river, an apt phrase, for it has deep connotations of slavery when slaves were "sold down the river". Obviously the writer of the NYT piece has no idea whatever that Pakistan was shoved into the American lap as early as 1948 when the nascent Pakistani establishment chose to align the country with America. Due, mainly, to American blandishments.

But why carp about the Americans saying this or that about our country? Surely the party to blame is ourselves, wholly and squarely. If, only if, our rulers had been half as mindful about the country's future than they were for their own pockets; if, only if, they had the country's interests at heart we would not be in the hole we find ourselves in.

The second editorial that appeared two days later on August 30th, is titled "Pakistan's cruel blasphemy law", and mentions the case of Dr Younas Shiekh who has been sentenced to death by a criminal court in Islamabad. It recalled that whilst General Musharraf had proposed that blasphemy cases would be investigated by the District Magistrate (now deceased, poor chap) before the registration of the case, he "dropped the proposal to avoid offending fundamentalist groups". Well now, here is the atypical face of Pakistan that the West sees: intolerant, hard, cruel. But, what was so bad about the proposed change in the blasphemy law? Was the District Magistrate not a functionary of the State, just as the police is? Wouldn't a senior District official be a better judge about whether the accused had blasphemed or not than the half-literate moharrir of a police station who actually registers the case, and who, because of his "experience in the field" knows more about the law and how to use it against the accused (to extort more money from him of course) than the half-literate thanedar?

Surely, the time is here when the blasphemy law is revised to this extent. Surely, if General Musharraf can (quite rightly too) scold our clerics for going over the top, he has the gumption to do this too.

And now (with apologies to Mr Khalid Hasan), a bit of advice to the government. The signals coming out of the Hotel Schehrezade are dangerous to say the very least. It seems that Herculean efforts are being made to get our President to meet President George Bush on the fringes of the UN General Assembly. Please don't, O' Ye core-professionals, please don't. Kindly recall the kick in the teeth delivered by President Clinton when we literally forced him to visit Pakistan. What a shameful episode that was, when juxtaposed with his visit to India. Please don't go into paroxysms, don't turn cartwheels, only to get a "photo-opportunity" meeting.

All that we need to do is to get our own act together, and do the right thing by our country. If that means that we have to rein in the Taliban, so be it; if that means that we must put an effective muzzle on the lunatic fringe, so be it; if that means that we must rid ourselves of the hateful sectarian and ethnic strife, then so be it. Getting a five (or fifteen!) minute meeting with George Bush is neither here nor there. And please remember that the American establishment makes the policy, not Mr Bush.