Spotlight: President must move urgently to redeem his credibility: Ship of State floundering in the quicksands of its own making

One may be excused for feeling nervous about the future of the present elected government because of the way it appears to be blundering its way from one bad situation of its own making to another, under the all-powerful President Zardari, who not only continues to hold all the powers held by Musharraf but is also the chief of the ruling party. Therefore there is no one to pass the buck to!
The credibility of the government is at an all time low. The latest blow it has had to suffer is publication of a report in American press (Washington Post, for one) that a tacit agreement is in place between the governments of USA and Pakistan whereby America will continue to attack "targets" on Pakistani soil and Pakistan will continue to protest against the aggression and to vow to take vague steps against it.
This is climb down from the very first reaction to American intrusions from the armed forces, when the Air Force Chief stated that his force had the ability to effectively thwart American forays into Pakistan but that orders for such action had to come from civilian authority. The "civilian authority" had nothing to say except to make some half-hearted noises.
It was thus left to our Army Chief to declare that coalition (read American) forces were not allowed to conduct any operation inside Pakistan which was the sole responsibility of Pakistan armed forces and that the country's sovereignty and territorial integrity would be defended "at all costs".
The ISPR Chief Major General Athar Abbas declared even more categorically that if US forces in Afghanistan continued to carry out attacks inside Pakistan, they would be retaliated against. To add to the confusion Condoleezza Rice had claimed immediately after the first two American attacks in early September that America was in touch with Pakistan's civilian leaders, implying that there was an "understanding".
We still await a rebuttal or confirmation of this from our civilian leaders. Next, with much fanfare the parliament entered (or was rather allowed to enter) the scene and a resolution was drafted and passed unanimously on 22nd October 08, vowing to safeguard the country's sovereignty and asking the government to deal with the aggressor effectively.
None of these things bothered America which continued its attacks while keeping up its celebrated refrain asking Pakistan "to do more". Now "fast forward" to the formation of a special committee of the parliament on 10 November 08, to "monitor" implementation of the resolution on security passed way back (19 days back to be more exact) on 22 October 08. Will the monitoring now begin at last? By no means! What is the point in rushing things?
The monitoring committee has been very generously given a full month "from the date of its notification" for "framing its own rules". Assuming that the notification itself may take another week or so, the implementation committee will be able to start its work not earlier than the third week of December 08, ie not before three months from the date the security resolution was passed in the parliament.
If this is a measure of things to come, the committee could be a case of still birth! What is this if not an object lesson in how not to do any thing? While our government has been "preoccupied" with doing nothing in the matter, half a dozen more attacks by American missiles have taken place on Pakistani territory.
President must move urgently to redeem his credibility. The other matter making Pakistanis nervous about the state of our governance is the credibility of the government or rather its almost total absence, which has affected its ability to tackle multitudinous problems facing the country.
Even before PPP became the main party in power at Islamabad (after ML-N opted out of power at the federal level), Zardari was already carrying a lot of unsavoury baggage in the shape of solemn promises not honoured and sworn words not kept, not once but on at least three high profile occasions. Murree (30 April 08), Dubai (12 May 08), Islamabad (7 August and 22 August 08) are all painful reminders of the sordid reneging on promises by him, too well recorded and reported to need any reiteration here.
What is even more disturbing is the fact the President has done almost nothing to control or reduce the damage. Consider: During the election campaign for President, Mushahid Hussein, the ML-Q candidate had challenged Zardari to disclose his assets after putting his own on record. Zardari chose to ignore the challenge.
Similarly on matters of the withdrawn Swiss case (which reportedly resulted in return of $60 million to him) and Surrey Palace, he has chosen to keep mum. Imran Khan's repeated references (during panel discussions over several TV channels) to Benazir's assets (reported by foreign media at $1.3 billion or over Rs 100 billion) have also not evoked any reaction or response from him.
The latest scandal hurting his already damaged credibility is yet another promise he made before and to the entire nation which he appears in no hurry to fulfil. Even before his election as President, he had said repeatedly that the first thing the President would do after his election would be to give up his power under 58(2)b through repeal of the 17th amendment to the constitution.
More than two months after President Zardari was sworn in on 9 September 08, the promise remains unfulfilled. Even the first steps towards that have not been taken. So much so that Nawaz Sharif has hinted at the possibility that ML-N might move the required resolution in the parliament instead. It is imperative that Zardari moves without further delay to establish his credibility. He would otherwise find that no one takes him or his word seriously any more. ([email protected])