The Aftershock Of the Lahore Terror Attack, Its Ramifications For the Future Of Cricket And Whether Or Not it Could Have Been Prevented!

Sunny ~ Sightscreens Unlimited For LankaWeb

March 4th 2009
The theories will be endless and the post mortems will continue ad infinitum but the indelible reality as much as it is painful to suggest has to be, that Pakistan is partly a nation of sick puppies politically enmeshed in turmoil, nationally disoriented where armed and dangerous packs of terrorists roam freely ranging from the Taliban to Al Quaeda and plethora of rabid Fundamental Islamic zealots to whom dangerous weapons are as easily accessible as a pair of sandals from a local bazaar and to top it all up the Nation is also nuclear capable! Sends shivers up the spines of those who could translate the ramifications of this awareness towards what may be envisioned (despite the pun) as something which could take on global proportions!

Sri Lanka ever the magnanimous moderator perhaps with a touch of the traditional Sri Lankan Ahimsa at heart rather than taking a cue from the perceptions of what has now turned out to be beyond paranoia as exhibited by England, Australia, South Africa, The West Indies and New Zealand perhaps even lowly Zimbabwe from many perspectives in avoiding Pakistan as a playing venue has had to pay a heavy price for taking lightly the apprehensions of these perceptive nations and has emerged scathed albeit marginally in the foolhardy venture of agreeing to be the stop gap team to supplement Pakistan's drying oasis of cricket. One which has now turned red with the blood that has been shed and a shame from which the Nation is going to take a very long time to recover.

To fan the fears of all the apprehensions of the teams avoiding Pakistan there has been a very recent revelation by Pakistani officials as reported in the English Guardian News that they received specific warnings that militants were planning to ambush the Sri Lankan cricket squad, but were unable to prevent today's deadly attack because of the country's spiralling political crisis, as opposition MPs claimed tonight.This has to be a huge embarassment to the Pakistani Authorities if proven true as their professed assurances about the security measures taken to ensure the safety of visiting teams seemed rock solid.

What sounds like a credible revelation by the Pakistani Police leaves a sick feeling in the stomach combined with a growing fury within the the minds of all Sri Lankans as well as the international cricketing community encompassing fans and administrators alike that this horrendous attack might have been avoided and that perhaps The Sri Lankans were pawns in a deadly game of Administrative chess translating also to rank mismanagement which could however have been far worse had the Gods not been kind to them relatively speaking! The timing which prevented a teeming mass of humanity gathering in the location of the attack being a shopping area and the incredible savvy of the driver of the bus who drove the cricketers through a hail of bullets and grenades some rocket propelled have had a huge bearing of what might have been a far greater disaster!.

It also shows an apathetic neglect as well as a terribly lax security system within Pakistan where at least a dozen heavily armed gunmen have perpetrated a horrendous terrorist attack yet remain at large after launching the commando-style assault on the Sri Lankan team, killing six policemen and two bystanders, and injuring seven players and officials. The driver of one of the buses in the team's convoy was also killed tragically while a Pakistani umpire lies in critical condition in a hospital where it is hoped and prayed for that he will recover.

So who is to blame? Not the Talibam, not Al Quaeda , nor the fanatic Islamic fundamentalists running amok in Pakistan but the Pakistani Authorities themselves who carry the sole responsibility for the shameful attack! on the basis that it could have been prevented had the right preventive measures been taken rather than the all too familiar tale of posturing for political power and a jockeying for control as the track record of Pakistan shows going back decades perhaps generations.

This truism has now been attested to by many Opposition politicians in Pakistan including the magnanimous and much respected Imran Khan, himself a giant in International cricket now turned politician so what more needs to be asked but for the Pakistani authorities to make amends for their huge lapses and atone for the wrong done if that could be accomplished in any appreciable measure in all fairness to the decent cricket loving public of Pakistan and all the gracious cricketers past and present who have consoled the Sri Lankans and the officials of the game with their words of encouragenment and expressions of anger at the criminals who carried out the attack!

Former cricketer and Pakistani politician Imran Khan in a statement to the international media has said "It is the Government of Punjab which is responsible for this, because it is shocking – the sort of security they provided the Sri Lankan team after having given them guarantees that all the security concerns would be taken care of. A normal minister in Pakistan … would have got better security than was provided to the Sri Lankans." much food for thought!

While it is common knowledge that Pakistan has come under sustained attack from Jihadists from the Punjab province and the border region near Afghanistan since 2007 these assaults have been mainly of a suicidal nature together with other bombings rather than concerted ambushes towards hostage taking. The use of gunmen is a new tactic. Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistani militant group believed to have carried out the Mumbai operation, has no history of such attacks within Pakistan described in the Guardian as follows:-
"Amidst scenes reminiscent of the terror attacks on Mumbai in November, the gunmen opened fire with AK-47s, grenades and a rocket-launcher, spraying the team's bus with bullets as it drove to the 60,000-seater Gaddafi stadium in Lahore. Television footage showed the assailants running through the streets, firing towards police lines.

US President Barack Obama has said the United States was deeply concerned by what the US state department called a "vicious attack on innocent civilians".

There comes a twinge of sardonic soul searching at this point in the minds of those asking the questions where a frightening spectre surfaces of what transpires almost on a daily basis within Pakistan of lawlesness, chauvinistic rampages and disregard for authority has seen the demise of many leaders cut down by an assasins bullet or strung up by a hangman's noose in a comical circus of Administrative mismanagement as well as the grinding of dictatorial powers that have ruled with authority whether legitimate or not where the law is what one or a pathetic handful of self acclaimed idealogues administer through the dictates of military power and decide what is best for the country. At some stage this suddenly spills into an awareness of pseudo democracy which the masses beleive is for real and expectations carry forth on a huge wave of national symbolism but alas a far cry from reality as in the end the intellectuals by far are outnumbered by the illiterates and the spawning of an uncontrollable population of desperately deprived and needy some of whom in the end resort to the viles of armed insurrection and have become the scourge of the entire region!

The head of Pakistan's interior ministry, Rehman Malik, said the country was "in a state of war" and the authorities were investigating whether the attackers had intended to take hostages. "The way they came prepared and in large numbers indicates such a plan," he said.
But tonight attention was focusing on the apparently lax security arrangements, after a document emerged in the Pakistani media showing that local police had warned in writing of the possibility of the Sri Lankan team being targeted.

The Guardian bulletin quoted suggests that~( refering to Pakistani Officials ) "A letter, dated 22 January this year, from a member of the criminal investigation branch to the then provincial police chief, said he had 'learnt' that an attack was planned on the Sri Lankan team, either at their hotel or between the hotel and the sports stadium.
Police and administration officials met on 23 January to assess the threat, but before action could be taken, the government of Punjab province – of which Lahore is the capital – run by the party of the former prime minister, Mr.Nawaz Sharif, was dismissed, following a court ruling .
The federal government, led by Asif Zardari, then installed its own administration, and the upper ranks of the police and administration were replaced." Case in point for the lax security and an indifferent attitude towards high priorities which in all probabilities consequent to this shoved under the carpet.

Opposition politicians taking up the issue at this point have accused the Government of ignoring specific warnings. "Intelligence reports said there might be an attack on the cricket team," said Pervez Rashid, a senior member of the sacked Punjab government. "They made no appropriate security arrangements."
It appeared that no police had been deployed along the 5km route.

Mr Nawaz Sharif's brother, Shahbaz,has said somewhat incriminatingly towards many credibilities pointing to neglect that if Zardari's replacement administration "had not spent all their time planning how to buy up enough MPs to form their own government in Punjab, this might never have happened". Further grist for the mill that this has indeed been neglect by the Pakistani Administration.

The Central Administration in Islamabad however has reportedly dismissed accusations of negligence insisting that. "It is disturbing that a major Pakistani political party would attempt to score cheap domestic points during such a serious incident," according to a spokesperson for President Zardari. "This was the Pakistani police at their finest. These Officers gave their lives." at which point the issue becomes debatable where even a lax security system would not be devoid of personally dedicated officers who have now laid down their lives and to whose families prayers and condolences go out!
As for Pakistani Cricket the words of former cricketer and now commentator Rameez Raja best sums it all up that it will take Pakistan a very long time so set right what has happened in Lahore today!

The turbulence and shock waves this attack has caused within the global cricketing community has left a frightening awareness that this could happen again very easily if global terrorism is not wiped out in its entirety!At the present time it has strains of the story "about Belling The Cat "