Salman Taseer Murder Justified

Since I have heard the news about Salman Taseer’s brutal murder I have been incessantly reading news and articles from Pakistan’s English language news sources which have been shedding light on this incident from all imaginable angles but one.

These English language journals, which are reputed to be leaning towards educated westernized public with very liberal tendencies, seem to be deliberately ignoring the root cause of this murder, elimination of which, if done on time, could have saved not only Mr. Taseer’s life but also the lives of so many other so-called liberals who were not news-worthy enough.

During more peaceful years in our country, the nation was, for the most part, preoccupied by a host of problems which could be summarized as corruption; which along with the resulting government incompetence has been costing Pakistanis lives in more ways than we can imagine. From roads to hospitals, from government offices to police constables on the street, from nursery classes in a government school to the offices of the prime minister and the president, the infusion and perpetuation of corruption and ignoring the problem as an inevitable part of living in Pakistan has been costing us lives. Do we have stats about how many Pakistanis are killed in easily preventable violent crimes? Do we have stats about how many Pakistanis are killed by police under the pressure from mafia, feudal lords and politicians? Do we have stats about how many Pakistanis are killed by the lack of health care, lack of medicines or counterfeit medicines? Do we have stats about how many Pakistanis are killed by unqualified doctors? Do we have stats about how many Pakistanis are killed by unhygienic water and food? Do we have stats about how many Pakistanis are killed by the lack of food because they can’t afford any?

Admit it or not, to most Pakistanis, Salman Taseer was nothing more than another stooge of corrupt, Mr. 10 Percent Zardari. Revelations about his affluent lifestyle outraged so many Pakistanis who are on the verge of suicides because of their economic and financial direness. Apathy towards the general public and swiftness of efforts to appease western powers in order to perpetuate their reign has been a signature of virtually all of Pakistani governments including the current one.

For decades, mullahs have been blaming the lack of Islamization for all the problems facing the country and have been attempting to present themselves as the ones who are able to bring about a utopian Islamic society. Until such a society is established, murder of anyone and everyone, according to theses contractors of religion, is perfectly justified. What if innocents are killed along with the “guilty”? You get three answers depending on the religious school of thought of the responder. They are guilty otherwise they must have survived; they are shaheed because their death was accidental; or no one is innocent. Pick one that suits your sectarian leaning. These mullahs and maulanas conveniently ignore the fact that the West has been dominating the entire world for about half a millennium now without any Islamization.

We Pakistanis have a mob mentality and this mob is tired of looking at the governments for the relief. Far too many heads are turning towards the imams of religious fanaticism, who seem to have a very simplistic but brutal worldview which bodes well with the decades of frustration and resentment boiling in the hearts of the public. The lava oozing from this volcano of the public is being streamed by the will of the venomous ulamas; for whom punishment for any disagreement is nothing short of murder.

This mob of turning heads is suicidal. By killing Mr. Salman Taseer they have merely stabbed themselves once more. In a society, where corruption and nepotism is a norm, where ruling elites have no roots in the very nation they are supposed to lead, where short term benefits for selected few always get preference over wider interests of the public, no leader can safely say that he is not going to be hit by the same boomerang with which he has been victimizing so many.

Taseer’s murder was justified not by any secular or Sharia law but by the lawlessness resulting from the corruption and incompetence in every rank and file of government. The very fact that a fanatic like Mumtaz Qadri was able to slip through the gapping holes in government's security apparatus and approach such a VVIP justifies the murder of Salman Taseer, late Governor of the Punjab.