The recent gulf between Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Ahl-Sunnah-Wal-Jamaat (ASWJ), a hardliner Deoband faction formerly known as Sipah-e-Sahaba-Pakistan (SSP), has almost brought their reported agreement to support each other in the 2013 polls to an end.
The reported alliance between the PML-N and ASWJ stalled soon after Sheikh Waqas Akram, a PML-Q minister in the outgoing setup, who was twice elected to the National Assembly from the base constituency of ASWJ, joined the PML-N, surprising all.
Akram, who defeated Maulana Muhammad Ahmed Ludhianvi, the sitting chief of ASWJ, in the general elections of 2008, with a slight margin of around 5,000 votes, was being seen in the dock, politically, what with the declining graph of PML-Q and its coalition partner, the Pakistan People’s Party.
The ASWJ, a hardliner Deoband faction, whose prime platform is the anti-Shiite Muslims sentiment, with its open demand to declare them as a minority in Pakistan, has a significant vote bank in NA-89, Jhang IV. They secured this NA seat when Isarul Qasmi and Azam Tariq were heading the SSP. Mr. Tariq won this seat in general elections 2002 but he was killed in 2003. Later, in the by-elections, Mr. Akram managed victory from that constituency.
The SSP was founded by a lower middle-class cleric Haq Nawaz Jhangvi in 1985 as a reaction to the Iranian Revolution of 1979, which had resulted in the emergence of first Shiite Muslim state in the world. The neighboring Iranian revolution somehow inspired the Shiite organizations in Pakistan. They organized themselves in a better manner for their rights. The anti-Shiite groups started planning of a similar revolution in Pakistan, dreaming to make Pakistan an ultimate first Sunni Muslim state of the world.
“Our prime political goal is to reach assemblies and declare Pakistan as a Sunni Muslim state,” Mr. Ludhianvi says, adding, “If Shiites can have their own state why not the majority Sunni Muslim in Pakistan?”
Shiites, according to decrees issued by more than a thousand Sunni clerics and Muftis, are not Muslims, he said. They should be declared a minority in Pakistan and there should be strict legislation on uttering derogatory remarks against the companions of Prophet Muhammad, which, he said, the Shiites generally do.
The SSP, which was deeply involved in sectarian killings in late 1980s and early 90s, had comprised of the jihadis who fought against the Soviets at America’s behest during military dictator General Ziaul Haq regime.
In the 1990s, when local and international pressure emerged on Pakistan to counter these sectarian groups, there had been efforts for unity and political alliance between different sects. In the mid-1990s, all major Islamic religious groups apparently gathered on one platform and formed Milli Yakjehti Council (National Solidarity Council), which comprised of main Islamic parties, including Shiite and anti-Shiite sects.
However, some key activists of the SSP at that time, including Malik Ishaq, Riaz Basra, Ghulam Rasool Shah, Akram Lahori and others, after having differences with the SSP leadership on joining the Milli Yakjehti Council, a political alliance of the country’s religious parties and groups including Shia groups, formed another hardline group within the SSP, which emerged as the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi. The LeJ was against the inclusion of Shiites in the council and maintained that it would continue with its Shiite mission on the lines of Haq Nawaz Jhangvi.
Mr. Ishaq, the sitting chief of the LeJ, by that time had also developed links with the militant wings of Harkat-ul-Ansar, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen etc. In 1996, he managed to escape along with his aides from police custody, but was again arrested in 1997.
“We are ready to lay down our lives for the honour of the companions of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) and we will never withdraw from our mission,” Mr. Ishaq, had been repeating from time to time on his releases from jail. He was released from jail after 14 years in 2011.
Key police officials say that LeJ has deep links with Al-Qaeda and the Tehrik-e-Taliban-Pakistan. The LeJ is considered to be the most violent militant organisation operating in Pakistan. As with most of the Sunni sectarian and militant groups, almost the entire LeJ leadership is made up of people who fought in Afghan jihad. They want to achieve their targets even through violence. Currently, the LeJ splinter groups are involved in all sectarian attacks in Pakistan including Quetta, Karachi and parts of Punjab.
“They are united and working under the umbrella of Al-Qaeda. Their prime objective is to have a Sunni state in the world ever since the Iranian revolution,” observed Shaukat Javed, former Punjab police chief. They want to obtain these goals by lining up with the mainstream like-minded or right-wing political parties.
Though the ASWJ ‘disassociates’ itself from the LeJ but there are clips on You Tube (banned in Pakistan these days) where Mr. Ishaq and Mr. Ludhianvi are making hate speeches in southern Punjab, urging the state to declare Shiites as non-Muslims and assuring each other cooperation for the broader goals of both the parties.
The ASWJ contacts started with the PML-N a couple of years ago through the then Punjab law minister Rana Sanaullah, who belongs to Faisalabad, a district adjacent to Jhang, in central Punjab. Following those backdoor meetings, Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif also met with Mr. Ludhianvi a few months ago in a meeting where they sought each other’s political support. The talks, which were reported in some sections of press, led to criticism of the PML-N for joining hands with a sectarian and alleged hardliner group.
“Such religious groups, with their hard stance, always need the support of mainstream political groups to achieve their goals,” observed Prof Hasan Askari Rizvi, a top political analyst of the country, adding, “However, it seems unlikely that they would be able to achieve their objectives.” They want to be in the assemblies and power to continue to propagate their mission. Democracy is not their goal but a medium to achieve their ultimate goals. However, he said, they would not be able to get this goal, because Pakistan has a diversity of the Muslim factions. You cannot impose one type of Islam this way. He said their struggle, however, would continue through political means because this is the way they will further propagate their point of view and will be in the limelight.
He observes that the situation in Jhang, where they have their base camp and huge vote bank, have put them in tough situation. They will have to give PML-N tough time now.
Such Islamist factions, with their ideological support, have also been going for seat adjustments at the local levels where they have sizable vote banks. They support candidates with certain conditions and agreements based on their support in promoting their ideology. According to the ASWJ claims, they supported PPP and PML-N on various seats in the previous elections.
“We have decided to field candidates on about 20 seats. Currently, we are aiming to contest elections in Jhang, Khanewal, Muzaffargarh, Bahawalpur in Punjab; Tando Allah Yar, Mirpur Khas, Karachi, and Khairpur in Sindh; Peshawar, Dera Ismail Khan, Batagram, and Kohat in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. We have decided our candidates for these areas. From Jhang, I will be the candidate for the National Assembly seat against Sheikh Waqas Akram,” Mr. Ludhianvi said in a recent interview.
Whether the ASWJ manages an alliance with any mainstream political party or continues to go for local adjustments to achieve its political goals, remains to be the question to be answered in the coming weeks. The chances of local adjustments are high, political pundits say, because no mainstream party would like to be tainted as a result of open alliances with such notorious religious-political factions with purely sectarian designs.
The writer is a journalist based in Lahore.
