S.M
Many people have been writing here about how the emergency (readmartial law) impacts your life as a citizen of Pakistan. If you lookedat the headlines today (Sunday 11th November), you'll see just onemore way in which it does - 'Civilians can be court-martialled'.
What this means is that any one can be charged with treason,terrorism, sedition, attacking the president and even 'giving statements conducive to public mischief'. Some of these are 'new crimes' that have been added to the Pakistan Penal Code. According tothe DAWN report, this has been done since it is felt that the terrorism courts can not hold 'proper or speedy trials' of captured'terrorists'.
How is a military court different from a civilian court? In most countries, such as the US, a military court does not require aunanimous decision to convict the person on trial. A two-thirds majority is sufficient. These trials are held in secret and the rules for admission of evidence are not as strict as those for civiliantrials. Since the trials are secret, it is obvious that the jurors are not civilians (or peers of the civilian who is charged), but militaryofficials.*
One has to admit that the timing of this change in the Army Act (1952)is significant. At the moment thousands of lawyers and human rights activists are being held in jails, government schools and anywhere else available, for raising their voice against the brutality and injustice perpetrated by our government. God only knows what their fate will be.
When President Bush tried to get military tribunals to try suspected terrorists, the US Supreme Court overruled him. Our Supreme Court "judges" are not going to do that. The onus is on you, on us to overrule Musharraf. Be careful, stay safe, BUT, do not let him think that we will stand for this!
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Judicial Travesty...
The Power of the Pen resonates
The Emergency Times is making waves around the world! This is cut out of 2 articles from the Emergency Times first issue. Let this be an encouragement to all of you who want to make a difference. Do not underestimate the power of the pen. Write as much as you can; to lawyers, judges, newspapers, foreign media outlets, politicians, human rights activists and ofcourse to the emergency times. Let people know about what has been happening at this end. Remember some of the greatest revolutionaries were great writers too. So pick up the pen and write away!
Saturday, November 10, 2007
IMP! New York Times calls for eye witness accounts!
The following is an excerpt from the New York times:
A Call for Eyewitness Photos, Video and Text From Pakistan
By Robert Mackey
With opposition protests blocked by the authorities in Pakistan, NYTimes.com is asking readers in Pakistan to help us report on events in the country by sending us eyewitness accounts of protests in photographs, video or text.
To submit a picture, please send it by e-mail to the following address: world.nyt@gmail.com — and let us know when and where the photograph was taken and what it depicts. Please also include your name, but if you would prefer not to be identified, let us know that as well.
To submit written descriptions of events, please use the comments field at the foot of this page. To submit video, please use the form below and provide the same information.
(The emergency times- Eds The for is available on the website the link of which is given below. Please do send all videos pictures and accounts to NYT, it would make a world of difference.)
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/09/a-call-for-eyewitness-photos-video-and-text-from-pakistan/index.html
CNN hails students bloggers!
Bloggers have played such a key role in this current crisis that CNN has produced a special report on this today.
http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2007/11/10/sesay.pakistan.blogs.cnn
pakistanmartiallaw.blogspot.com has been shown as a frontrunner in creating awareness, among others.
(The emergency times eds- We will be trying our level best to upload the video among others at the blog as soon as possible mean while please use the links)
Student Bloggers on ABC News!
Following are excerpts from the ABC News website which has lauded the student mobilisation efforts here in Pakistan. The link is:
http://abcnews.go.com/International/Story?id=3844733&page=1
Resisting Martial Law (Just Don't Tell Mom)
Under Media Blackout, Young Pakistani Bloggers Spread News on the Web
Pakistan's fastest-growing guerrilla force is less worried about getting jailed by President Pervez Musharraf than getting in trouble with mom and dad.
Amid a media crackdown that has knocked TV news off the air and threatened journalists who criticize Musharraf with jail terms, Pakistani students have come together over the Internet. But please don't tell their parents.
They're finding new ways to meet virtually in a country where police are brutally putting down street protests.
"I can't talk on this line. It's probably under surveillance," Rashid, a leading student activist at Lahore University of Management Sciences tells me when I reach him on his mobile phone. He calls back a minute later from another line. Like other students interviewed, he only wanted to be identified by one name.
Rashid and a group of friends have launched the Emergency Times (pakistanmartiallaw.blogspot.com), a daily newsletter that provides legal explanation, commentary and regular updates of Pakistan's widening political crisis.
"When martial law was imposed, we decided we had to do something," he explains.
The first edition set out to analyze Musharraf's legal explanation for suspending the Constitution. It started getting passed around by e-mail, and before long, students all over the country were getting in contact, wanting more information. Pakistanis studying abroad also got in, flooding Rashid with requests for news.
Less than a week since emergency rule was imposed, they are handing out hundreds of copies of Emergency Times a day on the Lahore campus. The Web edition is e-mailed to thousands -- no one knows exactly how many. "Now we are updating it constantly," says Rashid.
In a country where half the population is illiterate and only 12 percent have access to the Internet, Rashid now wants to get their daily report into the Urdu print and radio media. "We believe we have a role, as students, to play in all of this," he says.
Under martial law, there's no freedom of speech or right to gather. Young Pakistanis who fear arrest if they meet in person are coming together in a host of chat rooms to discuss the political crisis --
Bleak news from Pindi
Message from Aasim Sajjad in Pindi:
situation in pindi/isb is very bleak. they have shut down pindi completely
and people are in hiding. make sure you make mention of this escalation in
the repression in your press releases today.
As you can see form the above posted pictures, things are going form bad to worse. PPP protesters were literally stranded and police brutalities seem to know no limits.
For the legitimate Supreme Court
The government has taken down the names and bios of the SC judges from
the official website of the Supreme Court of Pakistan. I have acquired
the domain name http://www.supremecourtpakistan.org/ which I plan to
maintain as the website for the constitutional Supreme Court. I would
appreciate if someone can give me the names and the bios of the
Honorable Justices. You might have it cached with Google Desktop.
Please forward to relevant people if you can. I
Let's make History
Will it work this time? All these protests, with all the risk they are taking – will it mean something? Will it be different this time?
The short answer is, "I don't know," but I am going to tell you this:
I am too busy resisting all day and coordinating online to waste time thinking "What if?"
In fact, I have stopped trying to pick arguments online. If the person is receptive, fine, else move on and do something useful elsewhere. Time is valuable. And quite frankly even if this does not succeed, it will have changed the face of the top universities of our country. THAT won’t go away easily. It will have changed the upper middle class! THAT wont go away easily either. It's a paradigm shift, what is happening today. It's like a communal memory. People will remember this time and use it as a precedent for further resistances. It doesn't matter if this one fails! It will become a symbol and a teacher for the next one! It will be a thorn in the side of corrupt politicians and general for a long long time - this attitude of ours that we are spreading. Every time someone tries to kill the media or the judiciary or play soccer with the constitution, THESE memories will rise up
Our sweet little la la land slumbers are over.
If you have read any history you will realize that we have already sown the seeds of resistance for DECADES to come. Pakistani political landscape has been changed forever. It might take a long time, but it has started. It begins, nay it BEGAN here. And we are the focus, the originators, and the center.
We are making history. (Good God!)
Even BB, who was all set to join up with Mush, with Amreeka behind her, has had to come out and say, we will protest and have rallies. You think she would have done that without the international outcry? Without the lawyer's rallies? Without the students rising up on their campuses?
And now, whether she likes it or not, looks like her party and all the political leverage it has, has been allied to the cause of the lawyers. (Hopefully!)
It is time.
Let's make history.
Why I protest
Denial of political space under any form of government, whether it is
a dictatorship or under the guise of democracy must never be tolerated
and is to be rejected. To protest against it is necessary, even if it
is futile to do so. To register that one is against such an action is
imperative, otherwise you are simply chunked in with the so-called
"silent" majority that apparently approves of everything.
I know that my protesting will not bring about change and I know the
risks involved, but I also know that if I do not speak up, if I do not
ask for my rights, I do not ask for the proper checks and balances and
the choice to stand up and shout, shout and inform the world that I
dissent, I disagree , that this right will be taken away from me and I
will be made forever silent.
I know my protests will not bear fruit, but if we all protest I can at
least hope that we may be able to beat the odds and bring change.
No leader is "socially benevolent", let us all be very clear about
that. They will all seek to exploit us and deny us our God-given
rights. It is therefore our duty, not towards this land we call our
country, not to towards the spirits of a few good dead men we call our
our founding fathers, it is a duty towards ourselves to stand up and
be heard. If we don't demand our rights, no one will give them to us
in charity. This is why I protest, this is why we should all protest.
We MUST speak up...
They first came
for the Communists
I didn't speak up
because I wasn't
a Communist
Then they came
for the Jews
I didn't speak up
because I wasn't a Jew
Then they came
for the homosexuals
and I didn't speak up
because I wasn't
a homosexual
Then they came
for the Catholics
and I didn't speak up
because I was
a Protestant
Then they came
for me
but by that time
there was no one
left to speak up
- Martin Niemoller, detainee at a Nazi Germany concentration camp.
At the moment, it may seem like this 'emergency plus' has no impact on
your lives. You go to school or work, you do your job, you get your
pay, you go home, have dinner, and the day is over. Somewhere in the
middle, you watch some TV or read the paper and notice that people are
protesting and being beaten up or tear gassed. Some of you will think
it's the right thing to do but you wouldn't do it yourself. Others
will think those protesting are crazy and stupid; nothing is going to
change anyway. Others will just change the channel or turn to the
sports page in the paper.
Why are people bothered about this emergency business? Let's think
about that, almost a week since it was declared. The reason is
actually very simple. The Provisional Constitutional Order issued by
Musharraf takes away every right you could claim to have had a week
ago. You can be arrested for anything or nothing at all. You can be
charged with treason because you happened to say, 'I don't like
Musharraf'. If arrested, you could be held without trial. You would
not be tried by a jury of your peers. You would not have the right of
habeas corpus. You can not assemble, you can not speak your mind, you
have no right to property or even to life.
No one has the right to tell you that you are incapable of democracy.
No one has the right to tell you who your next Prime Minister will be.
No one has the right to tell you that you can not dissent. And no one
ever has the right to hurt innocent people.
This affects you every day. You may not see it, but tomorrow, it
MIGHT. Ten years form now, it MIGHT affect your children. Maybe in 20
years, your children will ask you, 'What's voting? Why didn't you do
something to stop this man from taking away your rights?' How will you
answer them? Would you rather they asked, 'What is martial law?' Would
you rather be able to tell them that you'll take them voting the next
time?
This is our country, a part of our identity. We owe it a great deal
and it is about time we gave something back. It is time to come out of
the shell and make an effort, an extraordinary one. And not just for
the end of this 'emergency' but also for the long term, to bring an
end to injustice, to guarantee our rights, and to keep the army where
it belongs - protecting our country.
What good will this do?
Bol kay lab azaad hain teray…
As our state-apparatus crumbles and clouds of despairing dust rise from its remains, many turn a skeptical gaze at the groups of students, lawyers, academicians and journalists who refuse to be blind, dumb and deaf, and question what good is their war of words against brutal force, their voice of reason against a regime drugged on power and demand for justice against those unaware of its meaning?
A moment of reflection will reveal that this doubt and skepticism in itself traces the roots of the quagmire in which we stand today and vividly reveals the reasons for our arrested development, passivity and inability to fight the forces that brutally snatch our rights. It’s a product of our enslaved minds furnished in suffocated political environments, tuned to submit to powers that intimidate us.
Is it just good enough to recognize our inabilities and silently recoil in our futile comfort zones? Certainly not… this very recognition is the signal that the time is ripe to bring about a meaningful change. This martial law has hurled before us our weaknesses and incapacities as a nation (after all it is said that we get rulers that we deserve); and at a time when our present like a crystal ball spells out the mistakes of the past and presents a future teeming with numerous possibilities to undo those mistakes, we should grab the opportunity to contribute a little part of ourselves for our collective dreams and visions that define (the Real and True) Pakistan. And the courageous protests of our, lawyers, academicians and journalists should be seen as an inchoate struggle ripe with potentials to grow into a movement that will win us our rights, freedoms, and opportunities to grow as wholesome individuals.
As pointed out by Mehreen Zahra Malik (a graduate of LUMS and News Editor of Friday Times) in her exemplary article “Speak now or forever hold your peace” (Daily Times, Nov, 9th issue) that the purpose of these trans-national protests is not strategic but expressive. They should not be evaluated on the basis of capitalistic and materialistic “rational calculus”(qtd. from the aforementioned article) but on their moral force, giving opportunities to ambitious individuals to unite their ideas, intellectualism and vision into a dynamic force possessing the potential to overturn an impending crisis and become a universal symbol of unity, peace and justice. In times of phenomenal technological and global communication possibilities each of us has a chance to contribute and change. So let’s shed off our corroding pessimism and rise up for action… the New World Order gives us all a chance to become heroes!!
Friday, November 9, 2007
LUMS - Iqbal Day rally
The LUMS student body, in keeping with the spirit of Iqbal day, organized yet another protest rally, their 4th this week, to express their collective disapproval of Musharraf's declaration of emergency, and his outright subversion of the Judiciary. Even with the final exams beginning the next day, the student participation in the event was commendably substantial, around 300 people being present. The rally started with speeches by students, who all stressed the importance of continuing the dedicated protest, in whatever manner or form against the Executive's unjustified actions. Some students recited poetry written by the national poet – Allama Iqbal – to show how his poetry reflects youth awakening, and its crucial role in the country's future. It was also decided that a hunger strike would commence from Monday; students participating in the hunger strike will be on the LUMS campus, studying for their exams yet stressing their continued protest against the President's outrageous escapades.
Two LUMS Faculty members also spoke at the rally, once again stressing the need for continued action against the Executive, and giving the students a perspective on how to strategize for the future. Pamphlets were distributed and placards were raised against the state's actions. The rally then took to the streets of LUMS, with the students walking in a circle around the academic block. This was, once again, a silent protest – to signify the way in which the media is being treated, and
to signify the attempt to silence the entire society through the suspension of their fundamental right to peacefully assemble. At the end of the march, a student passionately recited original poetry about the Hobbesian state of affairs prevailing the country, to great applause..
The LUMS student body pledged to continue to express its vehement disapproval of the illegal and oppressive way in which the Executive has dismissed the judiciary, imposed martial law, and suppressed the fundamental rights of the citizens of Pakistan.
FAST Protest Continues
The Students of FAST-Lahore continued their protest today, with around 3-400 students gathering on their campus after Juma prayers, and staging a peaceful rally. A number of students and faculty members spoke at the meeting and spoke about the emergency and martial law enforcement. The Police presence outside their campus remains..
We salute our fellow students, who remain steadfast in their defiance..
Thoughts on the situation..
Sana
Lawyers being pushed, shoved, brutally beaten up; journalists being manhandled, dragged by their hair for doing the job they are meant to do; students protesting peacefully yet being threatened by police brigades via silent, deadly stares – what have we been reduced to? This is what the ‘Emergency’ was designed to do; under the veil of ‘fighting terrorism’ in the country, the President has managed to create a more unstable, violent situation – all so his access to self-created unlimited power remains untouched. A friend of mine very aptly described this situation – the Head of State is acting like a young child, throwing tantrums if someone comes anywhere near his precious toys.
It is marvelous how students of this nation have managed to unite and put across a brave front in this grave situation. Strangely enough, being a student, I always thought our generation lacked the initiative and drive to bring about any sort of change. Most of us have led sheltered existences and would find it impossible to imagine spending a night in a cell. Apart from that, the population largely seemed to be too involved in their own daily activities to worry about the big picture. But this event has changed my perspective; thankfully, for the better. Students of LUMS and other universities have done a tremendous job of, at the very least, creating a stir; making international news was just the cherry on the cake! We, as a nation, (or on a smaller scale) as LUMS family, strongly oppose the current state of affairs in Pakistan since it has been created for the benefit of one man, with the rights of millions of people as the opportunity cost. Unfortunately, it is too large a cost.
Having declared that students and lawyers are working towards a better future of the country, it is important to understand that more people need to join this movement. It is essential for us to realize that this is not one person’s agenda; it is the problem of every citizen of Pakistan. It is not only the students whose rights have been abrogated – it is each and every one of us. And that is what makes our current circumstances so distressing. Where are the other elements of society? Where are the opposition parties? Where are the professionals? Where are the masses? Is this too trivial a condition that we do not need to be bothered by it? This apathy is the direct consequence of our erratic political past. Whenever the army wants, it takes over, holds the constitution in abeyance and creates an environment of instability. And makes us mortals think, “Why should we bother? Not like it would make a difference.” It may even be true that whatever we do would not topple the present government over, or miraculously create a leader out of thin air who would be just, considerate and, for once, stick to the laws of the country. But it is definitely worth making the effort. It is definitely something to strive for, to hope for. What would be even worse is if we just sit like lame ducks, causing us to be a part of this entire fiasco. No problem has ever been solved without working towards a solution; and determining the failure or success before even trying is the worst mistake one can make. Agreed, it is difficult to raise your voice in a climate of such great insecurity; with people being arrested all over. But protesting against a tyrannical government does not only mean participating in rallies and shouting slogans. It may be a more active, effective way, but smaller steps are just as significant. With the international focus on us right now, it has become much easier to voice our opinions.
This is not what this country was meant to be like. There were bigger, better hopes attached to our generation and those before us. And great fervor is required of us as this moment. Needless to say, all of us feel sorrow as we look around. It may seem abysmal but a dictator can not bring this country down; or better yet, we will not let him bring the country down! We have so much more to offer and this is not how it is going to end. I hope it ends with people reaching their full potential, realizing what great things they are capable of achieving; I hope it ends with the destruction of this one-man show, a man who is a sad excuse of a leader, along with his troupe of blind-folded followers.
The Clock starts Ticking..
V
The unashamed façade is crumbling… The delicate veneer of lies is being shattered… Even as the military declares war on civil society, it has set in motion its own demise. The response of the police-state to the various student protests around the country has laid bare its own cowardice; they are scared of the students. They will try to suppress us further, to intimidate us into timid obedience. But we will not be silenced. In Complete Unity, we will lay bare the sins of the oppressors; In Complete Unity, we will voice ourselves against them; In Complete Unity, we will bring them down.
March on, my friends…
