Headlines:
- Change of Faces is Not Enough, Abolish Democracy
- Armed Forces Opinion is Obstacle to American Occupation of Afghanistan
- Only the Khilafah (Caliphate) on the Method of Prophethood can End Dynastic Politics
- Cyber-Crime Bill is to Prevent Anti-American, Islamic Expression
Change of Faces is Not Enough, Abolish Democracy
Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan has demanded resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in the wake of his family’s link to offshore companies revealed in the Panama Papers. In an around 45-minute televised speech (which the PTI described as address to the nation) from the sprawling lawns of his Banni Gala residence on 10 April, Mr Khan set the deadline of April 24 for the government to respond to his demand for a judicial commission headed by the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) to investigate the prime minister’s alleged link to offshore companies which according to the Panama Papers are owned by the Sharif family. He added, “On behalf of the people of Pakistan I demand your resignation because after the Panama Papers, you have lost the moral authority to run the government.”
PTI is increasingly becoming detached from the people. People have sensed that as long as Democracy remains, faces may change but there is no real change. The dominant discussion amongst the people is the need for Islam and people are yearning for the era of the Khilafah Rashidah upon the method of the Prophethood. Indeed, we can never have hope in Democracy, regardless of who comes to govern by it. Any such hope is like striking a hammer on our own feet, crippling us from any movement for real change. Democracy ensures that its leadership never feels responsibility to the people nor does it fear the accountability of Allah سبحانه وتعالى in the Hereafter. The basis of Democracy is the rejection of the Deen of Allah سبحانه وتعالى as a complete way of life. It commands what Allah سبحانه وتعالى and His Messenger ﷺ have forbidden and forbids that which they commanded. Democracy can only increase our problems and hardships, bringing us harm in this life and the Hereafter. Allah سبحانه وتعالى said,
وَمَنْ أَعْرَضَ عَنْ ذِكْرِي فَإِنَّ لَهُ مَعِيشَةً ضَنكًا وَنَحْشُرُهُ يَوْمَ الْقِيَامَةِ أَعْمَى
“Whosoever turns away from My Reminder, verily, for him is a life of hardship, and We shall raise him blind on the Day of Resurrection.”
(Surah Ta-Ha: 124)
There is only one solution to Democracy, which is its immediate abolition and replacement by the ruling system of Islam, the Khilafah. Throughout the era of ruling by Islam, Muslims lived in justice and security, from the time of the Messenger ﷺ in Madinah, through the period of the Khulafaa Rashideen and then throughout the eras of the succeeding Khilafah until the British colonialists abolished the Uthmani Khilafah in Turkey in 1924 with the help of some traitors within the Arab and Turks. The Khilafah state provided its citizens, Muslims and non-Muslims, with security and prosperity domestically and status and honor in the international arena.
Armed Forces Opinion is Obstacle to American Occupation of Afghanistan
Taliban announced the start of their spring offensive on 12 April, pledging to launch large-scale offensives against government strongholds backed by suicide and guerrilla attacks to drive Afghanistan’s Western-backed government from power. The announcement of the start of “Operation Omari”, named after the late Taliban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar, came just days after Secretary of State John Kerry visited Kabul and reaffirmed US support for a national unity government led by President Ashraf Ghani. “Jihad against the aggressive and usurping infidel army is a holy obligation upon our necks and our only recourse for re-establishing an Islamic system and regaining our independence,” the Taliban said in a statement. “The present operation will also employ all means at our disposal to bog the enemy down in a war of attrition that lowers the morale of the foreign invaders,” they said.
Regarding Pakistan’s stance to the Taleban anti-American offensive, it is imperative to understand that the military is the most important institution of Pakistan and relations between it and the US span several years. During this period the military has undergone many changes and the most dramatic of these changes occurred during the era of Zia-ul-Haq. Under Zia’s command the military was Islamicized to support America’s proxy war against the Soviets in Afghanistan. The changes introduced by Zia have left a strong impression on the military because they resonated with the over the centuries of deep attachment to Islam. To this day there is widespread sympathy for those who are fighting the American occupation of Afghanistan, within serving officers and the wider armed forces platform, the retired officers. It is this opinion which is the major obstacle to the continued American presence in Afghanistan/
Thus, after September 11, 2001, America reversed its policy of Islamicization of Pakistan and in collusion with Musharraf began de-Islamicize the army, Pakistani society and other institutions such as madrassas. Musharraf hounded the Islamists in the army as much as he could. He sought early retirement of some, others he deployed to far afield posts and a few he court martialled. He also changed the curriculum to give it a new secular emphasis and promoted likeminded secularists to important positions. This is the policy that Raheel has inherited and is engaged in as a loyal service to Washington.
It is expected that Raheel will fail in this endeavour, as Kayani and Musharraf did before him. Islam is deeply entrenched within the society in general and this also permeates into the Raheel has been unsuccessful at eradicating the influence of Islam in the armed forces and he has also failed to change military concepts related to Pakistan’s security, especially defending Pakistan against India and having a Pushtun friendly government in Afghanistan. Such ideas also find strong support amongst the nationalists and it has become difficult for any COAS – no matter how loyal he is to the US – to suppress these traits within the army. The time is ripe for sincere in the armed forces to grant Nussrah to Hizb ut Tahrir for the immediate resumption of Islam as a way of life and state.
Only the Khilafah (Caliphate) on the Method of Prophethood can End Dynastic Politics
After an extended weekend in Lahore, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif headed to London on 13 April for a three-day visit to undergo a pending medical check-up, the Prime Minister’s Office claimed. However, with the PM and his family becoming embroiled in the controversy surrounding the Panama Papers leak, his trip to London has created a lot of interest in political circles. In particular, PPP co-chairperson Asif Ali Zardari’s presence in London is being viewed meaningfully at home, with people again regretfully anticipating even more dynastic politics, with the Bhutto dominated PPP and the Sharif dominated PML-N taking turns to rule in Pakistan.
The political medium in Pakistan and other countries of the Indian sub-continent are dominated by rich families who have been involved in dynastic politics from the early days of independence from the British Raj. These families in collusion with major powers such as Britain and America have dominated the political life of Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, and view ruling these respective countries as their birth right. The political scene in India overshadowed by the fortunes of the Ghandi family, and the political life in Bangladesh governed by the antics of the families of Zia Rahman and Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. As for the political landscape in Pakistan, it is dominated by the Bhutto family in the case of the PPP or the Sharif brothers in the case of the ruling PML-N. In the sub-continent, foreign powers and their intelligence agencies spend a great deal of time and effort to cultivate and win over family members from these political dynasties to rule on their behalf. It is one of the preferred styles of major powers to dominate and control the political medium via political dynasties. And when a member of a political dynasty becomes no longer useful or they oppose the wishes of their master the person is quietly retired from active politics or even killed.
Currently, the two ruling dynasties are serving the US well, ensuring the implementation of every major economic and foreign affairs policy according to colonialists’ wishes. This pitiful situation will only ever come to end with the implementation of Islam because in Islam since the laws are derived from the Quran and Sunnah, they cannot be manipulated by the whims and desires of men, as they are in Democracy. Clearly, only the Khilafah (Caliphate) on the Method of Prophethood can end dynastic politics.
Cyber-Crime Bill is to Prevent Anti-American, Islamic Expression
The controversial Prevention of Electronic Crimes Bill 2015 was approved in the National Assembly (NA) on 13 April 2016. The bill must also be approved by Senate before it can be signed into law. The draconian bill ─ which has been criticised by the IT industry as well as civil society for curbing human rights and giving overreaching powers to law enforcement agencies ─ was submitted to the NA for voting in Jan 2015 by the Ministry of IT. Section 31, the most jarring of several examples. Under this section, the government could block access to any website “in the interest of the glory of Islam or the integrity, security or defence of Pakistan or any part thereof, friendly relations with foreign states, public order, decency or morality….” The bill provides for up to five-year imprisonment, Rs10 million fine or both for hate speech, or trying to create disputes and spread hatred on the basis of religion or sectarianism.
Using phrases such as protecting the glory of Islam and preventing sectarianism, the regime is hiding the actually agenda of its masters in Washington. The US wants all Islamic expression denouncing relations with America stamped out. The core concepts of the Cyber Crime Bill are the direct output of a major American initiative, the Pakistan-US Joint Working Group on Counter-Terrorism and Law Enforcement (JWG-CTLE). This body has a profound effect on Pakistan because the US Department of State, US Department of Justice and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), all contribute to it. Since the JWG-CTLE was announced in February 2002 by the US State Department, it has guided America’s agents regarding suppressing the call for Islam, Jihad and Khilafah, from the “Enlightened Moderation” of the Musharraf-Aziz regime to the current regime’s “National Action Plan.” With reference to the U.S.-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue Joint Statement of 13 January 2015, the US State Department emphasized the need to “share best practices towards developing a counter-narrative to militancy and violent extremism.” American officials and elected representatives repeatedly direct the key figures of the Raheel-Nawaz regime to prevent “hate speech,” “Islamism” and “radicalism”, cover words for Islam and its political expression.
The existence of the Cyber Crime Bill is an indication of how widespread Islamic political expression has become. The Americans and their servants in the Raheel-Nawaz regime have lost their minds and are moving to ridiculous levels of policing Islam. Such measures will fail for they will only serve to expose the regime’s pro-American and anti-Islam stance even more. Moreover, how can we be silent regarding the current rulers’ alliance with America, when Allah سبحانه وتعالى said,
إِنَّمَا يَنْهَاكُمْ اللَّهُ عَنْ الَّذِينَ قَاتَلُوكُمْ فِي الدِّينِ وَأَخْرَجُوكُمْ مِنْ دِيَارِكُمْ وَظَاهَرُوا عَلَى إِخْرَاجِكُمْ أَنْ تَوَلَّوْهُمْ وَمَنْ يَتَوَلَّهُمْ فَأُوْلَئِكَ هُمْ الظَّالِمُونَ
“Allah forbids your alliance with those who fight you because of your Deen, and drive you from your homelands, or aid others to do so: and as for those who turn to them in alliance, they are truly oppressors.”
(Surah al-Mumtahina 60:9)