Bad apples, good bombs?

Benazir Bhutto is gearing herself up for a battle with the country’s most powerful institutions, and it is not going to be easy. She knows too well the ISI cobweb of military democracy in what is called a ‘Failed State’

Sonya Fatah Karachi

The fight for democracy will be waged at any cost, though her life is at stake, a defiant Benazir Bhutto told reporters at her heavily fortified Karachi residence a day after alleged suicide bombers killed at least 140 people in an attack on her motorcade. Since then, Bhutto has relentlessly targeted the country's intelligence agencies and government officials, saying that terror attacks will continue as long as the system is not purged of its bad apples.

Bhutto's aggressive stance comes after the October 18 bombings and a series of continued threats preventing her free movement within Pakistan. Standing at virtual crossroads in Pakistan, she will have to do more than 'speechify' on the merits of a civilian democracy. She is gearing herself up for a battle with the country's most powerful institutions, and it is not going to be easy.

The next elected government of Pakistan will have to address the issue: whether it wants a civilian democracy or will it continue to remain under the military's thumb. A blame game is underway with a host of political figures and former intelligence officials rubbishing Bhutto's claims. Pakistan's military and intelligence agencies are part of a complex dynamic in a country struggling to assert its version of democracy. But the rising spectre of terrorist attacks calls for reform in virtually every sector of the government.

It is premature to judge whether Bhutto, a twice-before prime minister whose two governments were dismissed, is up for the unenviable job. She managed to draw more than one million people on the streets of Karachi for a welcome-back-home rally but will have to translate that support into a movement to transcend the institutional caste system prevailing in Pakistan.

For now, it seems, Bhutto is taking on Pakistan's power structures.

While it its impossible to assess the veracity of the charges as a mud-slinging campaign is underway, Bhutto has long accused parts of the government, namely Pakistan's premier military intelligence agency, the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), of working against her and her party because they oppose her liberal, secular agenda. She said the military thugs of the 1970s, who terrorised her family, and today's Islamic militants, share the same thirst "to kill and maim innocent people and deny them the right to a representative government”.

Bhutto also announced that in a letter addressed to Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf (October 16, 2007) she had revealed the names of three individuals who she suggested had reason to want her dead. In an indirect message to Musharraf, she suggested that these people "should be investigated".

Former intelligence officers, who have served at the highest levels within the intelligence agencies, are quick to quash her hypotheses. “Individuals (within intelligence organisations) can have their own sympathies…but there is only one policy,” says (Retd) Lt Gen Asad Durrani, who retired from the ISI in 1992. “If one were to assume that someone acted differently, it would either not be effective or he would be taken care of.”

The Pakistan government has suggested that the attacks on Bhutto's cavalcade seem to carry a likely signature of the Taliban or Al Qaeda. Analysts, however, say that there are sympathisers within the system. “There isn't a monolith out there that has embedded itself within the intelligence or government structures,” says Kamran Bokhari, an analyst with Stratfor, a US-based intelligence-gathering company. “The system needs to be cleansed; it needs to be purged of people who are batting for different sides. This is a complex confluence of different interests.”

Purging that which cannot be seen is likely to be more than an uphill task for Bhutto who has her own history with the country's military and intelligence services. Zia-ul-Haq, a military dictator, hung her father Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, founder of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP). The official charged with the responsibility of investigating the October 18 suicide attacks allegedly tortured her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, who spent eight years in prison sans a conviction. After protests from the PPP, the official has stepped down. "We need a security service that is professional in its approach, which rises above ties of religious or political sentiment,” Bhutto said in an interview with a UK newspaper. "I have strong reservations about some of the people still operating within the intelligence services, and we need reforms to get rid of them."

“There is no legal framework that imposes any civilian oversight over the agency,” says Samina Ahmed, Director (South Asia), of the International Crisis Group which has repeatedly argued that the alliance between the military and the Islamists in Pakistan is a dangerous one. “The central issue here is civilian control over the military.” A reformation of intelligence agencies isn't all that is needed. Bhutto will have to be far more introspective about her past governments' failings. In a post-9/11 environment, ground realities in Pakistan are even more challenging.

Ayesha Siddiqa, author of Military Inc: Inside Pakistan's Military Economy, said the root of her country's problems is the "feudal structure" that has encouraged virtual political serfdoms in provincial backwater towns. Some analysts say this is a result of unfair capitalism. “The problem is not feudal,” says Samina Ahmed, “It's structural. It's about the rule of law and it goes beyond judges and lawyers. It is about fixing the entire system. The main question is this: can you have accountability through representative systems?”

Elected governments don't hand over power to people, Ahmed says, which is one reason why Pakistan is battling to fend off a 'Failed State' stamp. Pakistan's elite caste, Ahmed says, is not cut along traditional caste lines but ethnic lines. It's not feudal fiefdoms but the corrupt caste of bureaucrats that dominate Pakistan's government. “The Pakistani government received $16m to create a voter's list,” says Ahmed, “They were supposed to go door-to-door to enroll every citizen…What they did with that is that in areas of opposition constituencies they over-registered people and in their own constituencies they under-registered people.”

A completely free and fair election is unlikely but Bhutto is still expected to carry the popular vote. But the Pakistan she takes over today is very different from the Pakistan of eight years ago. “A lot of soul-searching needs to be done now and not just at the micro level. They need to figure out what went wrong, not just as a government but as a nation,” says Ahmed.

If she wants to don the robes of power, Benazir Bhutto will have to do much more than make impressive speeches advertising the importance of free political will. This is a vicious and deathly cobweb and she knows this

too well.