Each time Musharraf claims to have broken the back of terrorism, the terrorists strike - with a vengeance. As if to mock him and to remind him that they are alive, proliferating and raring to have a go at him.

            End May saw the return of the suicide-bomber. Just when a group of clerics had given a fatwa declaring suicide bombings to be 'haram,' ostensibly at the government's prodding, a suicide-bomber ripped through a religious congregation at Bari Imam near Islamabad, killing 20 and injuring 80, and a second blew himself up at Karachi's Madinatul Ilm mosque, killing seven. In the frenzied mob violence that ensued, six employees of KFC were burnt alive as a volatile group set fire to the fast food chain's Gulshan-e-Iqbal outlet and refused to allow police or Edhi volunteers to enter the premises to rescue them. Barbarism was the order of the day as vehicles, gas stations and private property were also torched.

          According to the police, one of the injured suspects in the Madinatul Ilm incident was a card-carrying member of the banned sectarian outfit, Jaish Mohammad. Which goes to prove that simply banning extremist organisations will not make the problem go away. The banned outfits go underground, reappear under a different name and carry on, regardless.

          There has to be a multi-pronged and sustained approach to tackle the spectre of sectarianism. Either General Musharraf goes the whole hog or not at all. Banning sectarian organisations, while allowing madrassahs that preach religious hatred to operate with impunity, makes little sense. Why, the general has even spoken out in favour of madrassahs. What's more, they continue to draw funds from the zakat kitty, but resist any attempt by the government to monitor their curriculum or make registration a mandatory requirement. The question is: why are they being allowed to call the shots? Given his own tenuous position in the current dispensation, and the army's relations with their erstwhile comrades-in-arms, does the general need the mullah brigade to keep secular, mainstream forces at bay?

          On occasions, he seems to have looked the other way in a bid to humour them. With all his lectures on "enlightened moderation," one would have expected Musharraf to, at least, condemn the lathi-wielding mullahs who were chasing after women (Is this Islamic according to the shariah?) for a harmless act like running alongside men in a marathon. On the contrary, he is reported to have said that a liberal 'minority' should respect the majority's conservative viewpoint.

           Apparently the general's mind is preoccupied with other thoughts. Such as the split in the PML(Q) ranks and which way the vote will swing in the forthcoming local bodies elections. Trouble is brewing on that front, too.

           Karachi was witness to the killing of two Jamaat activists, among them JI's naib amir. In a scene reminiscent of the last bye-elections to one Sindh Assembly and two National Assembly seats, when the MMA, PPP and MQM traded fire and hurled accusations, this time round, too, the JI has accused the MQM of the killings.

           If legislators resort to killing each other in order to grab power, how can one expect sanity to prevail in the house?

           One desires an assembly of statesmen, not murderers.