Expatriate
Journalists: A Critical Look
By G. Mujtaba
Canada
It is ironic that Pakistan
is often expected to be ‘proud’ of
its many sons and daughters in their roles of
intellectuals and leaders who are waging ‘ideological
war’ to cajole Pakistan and other Muslim
countries to adopt policies that suit foreign
interests only.
Pakistani journalist Husain Haqqani is one such
person. Presently, he is a visiting scholar of
the Carnegie Endowment Foundation with alleged
expertise in Islam, Pakistan and South Asia, and
writes for a selective cross-section of the international
press from one end of the Muslim world to the
other. But more so he is quite popular with the
readers in India where he is also a ‘syndicated
columnist’ for the Indian Express. Often
his criticism is taken as a credible source of
‘opinion and evidence’ to build up
a case for opposing Pakistan for its stand on
the regional conflicts.
In one such column dated December 13 in the Indian
Express, he has resentfully criticized President
Bush for not ta king Pakistan to task for its
flop and mockery to deliver the ‘desired’
results in the ‘war on terrorism’
despite a heavy financial support from the US.
But to make his appeal appeasable to Muslim readership,
he builds up a case criticizing the US for relying
unnecessarily on the ‘authoritarian rulers’
in the Muslim world and characterizes the lack
of ‘democracy and pluralism’ to be
the fundamental cause of the rise of ‘terrorism.’
Strangely enough Haqqani’s same column is
published in Urdu by the Jang in its December
14 issue but the portion in which he has detailed
the chronology of the failings of Pakistan to
capture Osama bin Laden is hypocritically omitted,
probably to avoid enraging the Pakistani readership.
In his English version of the column, he has vehemently
tried to prove the complicity of the Pakistani
leadership in not fulfilling the commitment to
eradicate the sources of terrorism in Pakistan
and only giving a lip service in this regard.
Haqqani has miserably failed to tell his readers
how the invasion and occupation of other countries
is justified in the name of bringing ‘democratic
rules’ to these countries. He is clearly
justifying the current global approach to harass
and coerce other nations into accepting strategic
and economic policies of the West.
In order to appear sympathetic to the cause of
the Muslim world, he cleverly attributes the marked
absence of anti-Iraq-war protests in the Muslim
cosmopolitan cities to the repressive atmosphere
there but quickly reminds his neo-con masters
that wherever such protest marches occurred it
was because the Muslim dictators wanted to use
them for blackmailing the West. Clearly, he wants
to have it both ways. The end goal is to arouse
and justify imperial wrath against any country
that lets its people protest US aggression and
occupation of Muslim countries, war crimes, prisoner
abuse, and illicit takeover of oil fields and
other resources.
We all know that the recent ‘terrorism’
is a product of the organized militancy generated
by the US in Afghanistan during the 1980s when
it gathered volunteers from all over the Muslim
world. It was the US that had recruited, trained,
armed, and financed these “Mujahideen”
to fight the Soviet Union.
We also know that the Palestinian state has not
been allowed to come into existence not because
it was going to establish a non-democratic rule
but because the Palestinians have not agreed to
surrender large tracts of their land including
Jerusalem and the right of return of the Palestinians
refugees. But Haqqani has taken Bush’s vague
and conditional promise to allow a crippled Palestinian
authority on the remaining and besieged lands
as a standard for the visionary rulers in other
Muslim states.
Haqqani is a journalist who rose to prominence
as a skilled public relations expert. He made
his debut in politics in the 1980s as a member
of Islami Jamiat-e-Tulaba, a student organization,
but soon abandoned it to join the Muslim League.
I remember the occasion when he acted as a stage
secretary at the Liaqat Bagh public gathering
in Rawalpindi organized by the newly-emerging
Nawaz faction of the Muslim League to mourn the
tragic death of General Ziaul Haq and where he
repeatedly described the late dictator as a hero
of the Muslim Ummah. During the 1980s he was supporting
the fundamentalist policies of the Zia regime
in Afghanistan but during the 1990s he joined
the successive civilian governments just to build
up his career as a ‘liberal’ but shrewd
advisor.
Haqqani has shown incredible capacity to change
his ideology overnight and adopt that of the party
in power. He has no difficulty supporting a dictator,
a right-winger, a leftist, an imperialist, a Pakistani,
an Indian, or an American stance, as long as the
price is right. So far the price has been right.
He has served Zia, Benazir, and Nawaz in a rapid
succession, always jumping the sinking ship and
always turning against his previous master. How
does he do that? Well, he has accomplished this
feat by selling “inside” information
about his outgoing master to his incoming master.
Presently, he is serving both the Indian and American
masters at the same time.
Surprisingly, his metamorphoses occurred at a
time when Pakistan was facing serious regional
and international challenges over three strategic
issues: acquiring nuclear deterrence capability,
maintaining stability in Afghanistan, and supporting
the struggle in Kashmir. Haqqani has sought to
undermine Pakistan’s interest in each of
these realms.
For a brief period in 1992 Haqqani managed to
become Pakistan’s envoy to Sri Lanka. It
is worth noting that many among his foreign office
colleagues opposed his appointment because they
considered him unfit for the job and never trusted
him in the wake of his changing loyalties. One
veteran Pakistan ambassador doubts the ‘veracity’
of his name and terms him as ‘a turncoat
and a phony intellectual with a hired pen always
available to the highest bidder.’
Opposing the conduct of rulers and criticizing
the policies of governments is one thing but undermining
the overall interest of Pakistan and its people
is a professional misconduct. Husain Haqqani has
never advocated the true causes of the Muslim
world, such as, resolution of the Palestine and
Kashmir issues, right of each nation to maintain
its sovereignty over its resources, choose its
own governments, and pursue its independent policies.
Today, Husain Haqqani is a mouthpiece for the
American neo-cons. As a member of the latest breed
of Muslim liberals-turned-neo-con bandwagon, his
assignment is to find clever and creative ways
to attack the vital interests of the Muslim world,
undermine Pakistan’s nuclear deterrence,
support Indian position on Kashmir and Line of
Control, justify Western aggression, support long-term
occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, set the stage
for aggressive policies against Iran and Syria,
and shrewdly use Musharraf’s questionable
conduct to call for pressure and penalties against
Pakistan. During a discussion on the day of last
US elections about its possible impact on the
Pak-US relatio ns, he repeatedly commented in
a TV channel talk show that Pakistan was not producing
the ‘desired results’ despite heavy
payments for capturing the ‘leading terrorists.’
Husain Haqqani is not at all serving the cause
of Pakistan or of the Muslim community; rather
he is representing the policy-makers in Washington,
Tel Aviv and New Delhi, who may have assured him
of a “Tumgha-e-Khidmat” at an appropriate
time in future. But for Pakistanis and Pakistani-Americans
he will remain a sell-out.
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