Pakistan’s failure to unite a nation

The remarks made by one of Pakistan’s political leaders who is considered a close associate of the Pakistan Muslim League PML(N)) leading his own political party and sitting in Pakistan’s parliament has been another glaring illustration about what is wrong in our country.

In an interview, the Afghanistan Time in its headline story had quoted Mahmood Achakzai saying: “If Afghans are harassed in other parts of Pakistan, they should come here to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) province, where no one can ask them for refugee cards, because KPK also belongs to Afghans.” He meant that the province inhabited by a majority of Pashtuns and that was why, according to his (false) understanding, that all Pashtuns are at home in KPK, including those from Afghanistan. But that is not true and he failed to understand the essence of the nation.

Achakzai failed to grasp that Pakistan belongs to Pakistanis only and it belongs to all Pakistanis equally. That means that all Pakistanis are at home in Pakistan and a Sindhi or Punjabi is at home in KPK as much as a Pashtun. But Pashtuns are equally at home in Karachi or any other place of our beautiful country.

Afghans, be they ethnic Pashtuns or Uzbeks or others, are not at home in KPK because they are not Pakistanis. They can’t understand that either. That is why they refuse to recognise the validity of Pakistan’s Western border.

When the news of Achakzai’s opinion broke, those who have a better understanding about our Pakistani nation were rightfully upset. Realising this, Achakzai, tried to help himself by claiming that he had been misquoted by the Afghan media and meant to have said that he had only stated that KPK was historically a part of Afghanistan. Well, that is a weak defence.

The territory that is Afghanistan today has been at times part of different empires. Just because Pashtun dynasties have ruled at times even Bengal, does not mean that Bengal has become their home. And the point about history is wrong in the other direction as well. Pakistan itself was, historically speaking, part of India – British-India and Moghul India and so on. Does that mean that all Indians are at home in Pakistan?

All this doesn’t mean that Pakistan has nothing to do with Afghanistan. All Pakistanis, not only the Pakistani Pashtuns, are aware of the close historical, tribal and cultural relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan. We’re also aware of the unfortunate heritage of the Durand Line that was not devised and handled as a national border by successive Pakistani governments due to their political expediency.

Enough is enough. We must unite and act together to secure peace for humanity. God bless Pakistan and humanity.

- The reader is a businessman based in Earley, UK.