According to a Business Recorder exclusive any attempt by the government of Pakistan to adopt a confrontational stance with respect to the United States decision to continue drone strikes as a counter-terrorism tool, would have serious negative implications on our ability to access foreign assistance. There is no doubt that the Obama administration is firmly committed to the drone programme and President Obama himself took centre stage in defending it only a while ago whilst delivering a speech on counter-terrorism at the National Defence University in Washington DC.
The President defended his decision to order a drone strike against US national Anwar al Awlaki in Yemen by stating that "he was continuously trying to kill people" and added that "for the record, I do not believe it would be constitutional for the government to target and kill any US citizen - with a drone, or with a shotgun - without due process. Nor should any president deploy armed drones over US soil." Before any strike Obama said "there must be near-certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured - the highest standard we can set. Days before Pakistan's new Prime Minister was to be elected by parliament and sworn in by the President the US carried out a drone strike that killed Waliur Rehman, number two in the Tehreek-e-Taliban hierarchy, an action that was vigorously defended by John Kerry. "Our actions are legal we were attacked on 9/11."
There is no doubt that Pakistan like Iran has the capacity to down a drone easily, however, the new Pakistan government has been placed between the rock and a hard place: the rock is as much the demand of its people to give talks yet another chance, backed by some political parties notably the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf, as is some TTP groups recalcitrance in reneging on past agreements; while US epitomizes the hard place because without its active support the government of Pakistan will be unable to either access International Monetary Fund programme, Sherry Rehman is on record as having said five years ago that the head of the IMF does not even come on the phone when our State Bank Governor calls him without prodding from the State Department, or access bilateral assistance. Pakistan's current state of the economy indicates that tax collections are extremely low, the budget deficit is expected to escalate to the unsustainable level of 9.5 to 10 percent of GDP, IMF repayments are scheduled till the end of the current calendar year and an energy crisis continues to compromise productivity gains. In this scenario, external inflows will be required for balance of payment support and this requirement would remain even if the government does succeed in raising the tax-to-GDP ratio to around 12 to 13 percent in the forthcoming fiscal year. One can only hope that our parliamentarians stay their anger against drone strikes till our economic morass that affects millions of Pakistanis is dealt with.
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