Malala Yousafzai, a 14-year-old campaigner for human rights,was shot in the head by Taliban militants on Tuesday while she was returninghome from school in a van in the Swat area of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province. Theentire nation is in shock. Everyone is condemning the Taliban and praying forMalala. She has become a role model for her country’s young generation. She haswon.
Malala is the victim of Talibanisation, the radical mindsetspawned from a theocratic and obscurantist interpretation of Islam.Talibanisation is about forcefully imposing a theocratic agenda on the people.It is about radicalizing them. It is about creating more and more suicide-bombsquads in the name of jihad against liberals and moderates, Muslims andnon-Muslims. The attack on Malala liberated many shackled and Talibanisedminds. She has won.
Malala was advocating the ideology of love. She was a youngambassador of peace. By attacking her, the Taliban attempted to warn all theyoungsters not to follow her ideology. But after the attack, Malala’s followershave multiplied across the country. She has won.
The attack exposed the brutal face of the Taliban. It alsoraises questions about even holding talks with a group that plays with thelives of innocent citizens and does not spare anyone “ it even targets kids.
There is not just one Malala but thousands of Malalas whohave fallen victim to this ideology of hate. The Taliban, projecting a campaignagainst polio as a cover for espionage, has put hundreds of thousands ofchildren at risk by banning polio vaccinations in its strongholds in North andSouth Waziristan.
In their former stronghold of Swat, the Taliban bannededucation for girls, condemned the state judicial system and ran a paralleljustice system until 2009, when Islamabad launched a full-fledged militaryoperation to quell a Taliban-led insurgency there. While the Taliban wereattacking and destroying girls’ schools, Malala posted her diary on the BBC’swebsite, exposing the Taliban’s atrocities against women, its excesses, and itsobscurantist approach to interpretation of Islamic laws. Last year, she wasnominated for the International Children’s Peace Prize by the advocacy groupKids Rights Foundation. She has won.
But the Pakistan Taliban’s version of Islam and the agendathey want to forcibly impose remains a threat. The group deems democraticelections part of the “secular” system and has announced that any politicalleader who plans to contest elections will be attacked if he visits the tribalareas.
The Taliban’s declaration that the democratic system inPakistan is un-Islamic and its criticism of Imran Khan, the former Pakistanicricketer-turned politician, as a liberal infidel exposes the peril of violentradicalism that surrounds Pakistan. Yet Khan, the leader of theTehreek-e-Insaf, or the Movement for Justice, is widely criticized for being“too soft” on the Taliban. To protest drone strikes, he recently led a peacemarch to the border of South Waziristan, where it was halted by the Pakistanmilitary for security reasons. Instead of appreciating his move, the Talibancondemned his “liberal” politics and threatened to kill him.
The Pakistan Taliban recently distributed pamphlets in themarkets in tribal areas threatening shopkeepers who sell mobile phones to giveup that business or face dire consequences. Mobile-phone dealers were told tostop uploading songs, movies and pictures, which the Taliban says promote“un-Islamic acts.”
The Pakistan Taliban’s plan to remake our nuclear-armedcountry according to its vision of an Islamic state raises internationalconcerns about proliferating Islamist violence and its threat to regional andworld stability. But the attack on Malala revived and resurrected the trueIslamic ideology of peace across the country. She has won.
Malala was fighting for the right to education “ the highestlong-term investment in containing Talibanisation. Only education can bringabout a change in the radical mindset. Malala has become a beacon of light. Shehas won.
Syed Fazl-e-Haider is a development analyst in Pakistan anda columnist for Pakistan's Dawn newspaper
