By IANS
Islamabad : The Pakistani media has reacted angrily to attacks on lawyers protesting President Prevez Musharraf’s re-election bid and journalists covering the event, saying it sullied the country’s image.
Saturday’s violence in the heart of the capital is “a matter of unadulterated shame for the government”, The News said in a stinging editorial titled “A Police State”.
“Ominously, Pakistan once again proved true the observation that all ‘decisions’ – electoral or judicial – tend to result in disorder rather than the pacification known in other normally functional states,” the Daily Times added.
“The fault-lines are on the move,” Dawn maintained in an editorial captioned “Why fall from grace?”
“The ugly scenes shown of policemen dressed in riot gear mercilessly beating unarmed lawyers and broadcast all over national television channels are a matter of unadulterated shame for the government,” The News said, drawing a parallel between similar anti-government protests in Myanmar.
“The brutal use of state force was not much different than what has been seen in another Asian country – Myanmar – though in the latter case the police used live rounds,” the newspaper said, lamenting that a Supreme Court decision permitting Musharraf’s re-election bid had only “exacerbated” the country’s polarization.
“As one had predicted, (the court decision) instead of settling the ongoing political uncertainty and polarization between some segments of society and the government, only exacerbated it,” The News said.
“The scenes witnessed (Saturday) would make most people… think we were living in some kind of police state. Unfortunately, some brutal tactics to squash any protest or opposition have been used before as well.
“Instead of realising that it is being unnecessarily overbearing and that such a strong show of violent force does its own image – domestic as well as overseas – no good, the government refuses to learn from its mistakes,” The News said.
“Does the government not know or understand that actions such as these will tend to expose its own weaknesses and further lower its credibility in the eyes of ordinary Pakistanis?” it wondered.
Daily Times, however, also faulted the lawyers for the violence.
“Unfortunately, too, on the side of the lawyers there were clear words of provocation pronounced by some of their leaders, especially the firebrand vice chairman of the Pakistan Bar Council, Ali Ahmad Kurd, who is well known in the country by now as an intemperate man,” the newspaper noted.
“As if to confirm the police’s worst apprehensions, he had pledged that the lawyers would enter the Election Commission and tear up the nomination papers of President Musharraf. Unfortunately, but not unsurprisingly, he was among those who received the brunt of the lathi-charge,” the editorial added.
According to the Daily Times, there were three streams of opposition to Musharraf in Pakistan.
“The political parties are arrayed against him partly because of his inability to negotiate with them. The lawyers’ community wants to use his ‘moment of weakness’ to correct the balance between the military and civilian forces in the country. The third stream is the process of Talibanisation under Al Qaeda that is gradually undermining the ability of the state to enforce its writ.
“Unfortunately, all three streams are feeding upon one another despite their clearly separate agendas. As the post-verdict disorder spreads, violence might take the upper hand,” the newspaper noted.
According to Dawn: “Musharraf may have won the day at the Supreme Court on Friday, and again at the Election Commission on Saturday when the latter accepted his nomination papers, but the battle for the presidency is far from over. Even greater is the issue of legitimacy that the president so craves.
“Outside the courtroom, the fault-lines are on the move, as witnessed in the mindless resort to violence in Islamabad and other places (Saturday) by all sides,” Dawn added.
“It is time the security agencies stopped their highhanded attempts at intimidating the government’s opponents by erecting roadblocks, baton-charging and tear-gassing the protesters.
“Protests and street marches are integral parts of the democratic, especially the electoral, process. Such street battles have a long way to go between now and Oct 6 (the day of the presidential election), and beyond,” Dawn maintained.