VIEWPOINT: Army versus civilians

In his comments made at a senior officers meeting on Monday and released to the media, CoAS General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani let it be known in no uncertain terms that the Army is very, very angry at the civilians for sullying its self-image.
He was careful enough not to name any names, but it is more than obvious that the top-brass is unhappy with the judiciary because of the way it has been pursuing the missing persons case and Balochistan unrest; and at the media for the manner it covers some retired generals' involvement in two alleged cases of corruption, a 16-year-old case of political engineering, and alleged murder of Baloch leader Akbar Bugti.
General Kayani's statement also raised two questions: "One, are we promoting the rule of law and the Constitution? Two, are we strengthening or weakening the institutions?" Considering the background of our current problems, the answer to the first question is an emphatic yes, and to the second one a big no.
Clearly, the Army chief had the judiciary in mind when he said, "no individual or institution has the monopoly to decide what is right or wrong in defining the ultimate national interest." And further that "weakening of the institutions and trying to assume more than one's due role will set us back." And to the media he told, "conspiracy theories, based on rumours which create doubts about the very intent, are unacceptable. ... Equally important is the trust between the leader and the led in the armed force. Any effort to create a distinction between the two undermines the very basis of the concept and is not tolerated."
Admittedly, national interest is a relative term. But as per the Constitution, state institutions have their designated roles, and all players and participants in national affairs rules and guiding principles to abide by. Only the Parliament, in addition to its legislative functions, enjoys the right to decide whether or not the executive is right or wrong in pursuing a certain policy. And the judiciary, aside from administering justice, has the sole prerogative to interpret the Constitution, and help enforce fundamental rights that include safeguards against arbitrary arrest and detention. It is hardly a secret that a major source of the military's discomfort with the judiciary are the apex court's attempts to address the issue of enforced disappearances and extra judicial killings in various parts of the country, particularly in the insurgency-affected Balochistan, demanding production of the missing and advising the powers-that-be not to transgress limits set by the law and the Constitution.
Indeed, a section of the media has been acting irresponsibly some of the time. The target of its unfair criticism though has not only been the Army but also higher judiciary, both of which, unlike politicians, do not have any direct means to answer back, (the court has, and does, use the contempt law to deal with what it considers media transgressions). The issue, therefore, is not the Army chief's getting back at detractors but that the reaction, perhaps, has been rather excessive.
What drives criticism of the military is not just the Balochistan operation (which it denies), but accumulated resentment caused by past interventions in the political process. It is no coincident that all the cases in which retired senior generals are being held accountable for one or the other alleged wrongdoing pertain to civilian affairs. Since the military functions, for obvious reasons, on the principle of 'Unity of Command' that places responsibility of any acts of omission or commission squarely on the shoulders of top commanders, it should not be surprising if critics separate senior officers from the Army as an organisation in discussions of the ongoing legal cases involving nine generals, two of them former Army chiefs and two ISI heads. It has nothing to do with the trust between the armed forces' present leaders and the led. In fact, any criticism of the retired generals is usually balanced with praise for the present CoAS for his sustained policy to stay out of politics.
The quarrel arises from clash of military and political cultures. The two do not, cannot, mix. Military discipline demands that decisions of the superiors not be questioned, whereas the essence of democratic politics is accountability. The ruled constantly question plans and policies of the rulers.
The media as society's watchdog holds public leaders to account, asking pleasant and unpleasant, even rude, questions, but those being questioned rarely fly off the handle like the former DG-ISI Lieutenant General Ashraf Qazi (Retd) and former Army chief General Aslam Beg did reacting to reporters pestering them with difficult questions. It would be unthinkable for a politician to tell a reporter, as did General Qazi: "Shut up! ... Idiot!" Or to act like General Beg when he told a journalist that he had first to seek permission to ask a question, and then went on to smash, helped by an anxious aide, the questioner's microphone.
These scenes, apparently, have been seen by serving brother generals as an assault on the collective military honour, and are included in the reasons at the back of what CoAS Kayani had to say to the media. But they have had a reverse impact, too, on the civilised sensibilities of other sections of society.
No one should associate honour with one or the other player/participant in national affairs. We all deserve to be treated as honourable citizens as long as we respect the law of the land. The retired generals facing accountability must display restraint while confronting the media, and earn respect for themselves and the organisation to which they once belonged. For its part, the media ought to defer to the all-important legal principle 'innocent until proving guilty' as they cover cases related to those retired officers.
We all need to realise that the country is passing through a defining phase in the realisation of its democratic aspirations. Recovering from long spells of suppression under military dictatorships the state institutions are trying to claim their respective space, and the media asserting its new-found freedom. There may be excesses committed here and there, but democracy is a self-correcting system. With the passage of time, all will learn to play by the rules and respect the limits of one another's rights and freedoms.
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