Re: CM Punjab asks Rana Sanaullah to resign
An honourable damage control by Shahbaz, but the buck stops with him - thenews.com.pk
DUBAI: Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif has acted honourably after the Model Town massacre, but in a piecemeal manner, apparently under pressure.
By firing his high-profile law minister and key bureaucrat, by offering to resign on the first day, by suspending police officers, by ordering the arrest of all those involved in attacking the protesters, by ordering a judicial commission, by accepting a Supreme Court ordered commission or a suo moto action by the apex court, he has sent enough messages that he personally, I repeat personally, thinks and believes he is not responsible and would like the truth to come out.
But as the chief executive of the province, the buck stops with him, no matter what. Whatever happened was under his watch, planned, ordered and executed by people he had appointed and he controls. He has to take the ultimate responsibility.
His defensive actions and his submissive demeanor hints at some grave issues in the chain of command, the political alignments within his party and the governments, both at the provincial and the federal level.
There are scores of questions that need to be answered before the CM or his party can be completely exonerated of the blame for killings that could have been completely avoided.The main questions that have been raised at many forums, both on and off the media, include:
-What was the threat posed by the PAT secretariat now that the barriers were to be removed at such a heavy cost?
-Was there a realization that Dr Qadri and his secretariat could be a target of the Taliban militants as he has been a strong critic of these terrorists?
-Who took the decision to start the action to remove the barriers and what was the chain of orders that followed for hours culminating in the deaths and the tragedy?
-What does it mean that both the principal secretary to the CM and his law minister have been sacked? Were they acting on their own and is not the CM responsible for their actions?
-If the CM was kept in the dark, is the punishment of resignations enough?
-When the CM had ordered that police should disengage, as revealed by Mr. Najam Sethi, who violated or refused to follow his orders and what has he done to punish them?
-Which meetings took place to plan, discuss and decide that the PAT Secretariat should be cleared of barriers and ultimately attacked with guns and armoured vehicles?
-What was the role of the Federal Government in all this planning as Najam Sethi has informed us that at least three top officials of FIA, FBR and IB were present in the meetings that took the decisions?
-Will the entire record of telephone calls made by the police officials, other officials, PAT workers inside and outside the crime seen be ordered just like it was done in Hamid Mir case in Karachi? These could be hundreds of calls and conversations and it may take days and a lot of manpower to decipher and transcribe these calls.
-Where are the weapons that were claimed to have been confiscated by the police from the crime scene?
-Where are the bodies, if any, of those who were shot and then removed by the police as Dr Qadri has claimed at least 12 persons are missing besides the 14 already dead and identified.
-What was the hurry and who is responsible for registration of FIRs by the police side, including the one that named the son of Dr Qadri. It was later removed on orders of the chief minister though.
-What has been the role of Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan in this whole episode?
-Will all the officers of civil service and police as well as politicians asked to submit affidavits to the commission to narrate the events as they saw it?
- Who were the officials who tried to tamper with the police and medical reports in the hospital, as captured by the media?
Have they been suspended and booked?
- How many of the policemen who fired at PAT members been arrested as ordered by the Chief Minister at his Press conference on Friday night.
A one-man commission cannot, obviously, handle all these questions, and many more, in any urgent time frame. The honourable judge may need months to sift through the evidence, record statements, cross-examine and cross-check facts.
The best option will be for the Supreme Court to order a 3 or 5-member bench to hear the case suo moto as well as set up an inquiry commission with known officers, both federal, provincial (from other provinces preferably) or even retired people like Shoaib Suddle, to investigate this and present the report to the SC within 2-3 weeks.
The investigation has to be separated from the Punjab police and the government if it has to be credible.
Finally if the Punjab government or its senior political and bureaucratic functionaries and party militants like Gullu Butt are found guilty of mass murder, the Punjab chief minister will have to take the blame and resign.
