By Saif M. Hussain, Woodland Hills, CA
I read with interest President General Musharraf’s comments at his recent Iftar party for the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) ambassadors, where he stated that the main problem with the OIC is that “we are disunited”. With due respect to the esteemed President General I beg to differ with his diagnosis of the problem. In fact, when it comes to critical issues, including matters of life and death for Muslims, the OIC is actually very united and extremely unified.
Let us take an objective look at some cold, hard facts of the present situation and the recent past. As death, destruction and havoc rain on Muslims in Afghanistan, the OIC is unified in its support of that exclusively US guided campaign “against terror”.
As Israel, with full US support, continues to escalate its devastating and deadly attacks against essentially unarmed Palestinians in Occupied Palestine, the OIC, just like its sister organization the “Arab League”, remains united in its inaction and silence except for occasional empty rhetoric. As Russian forces continue to brutalize Muslims in Chechnya the OIC is unified in all but ignoring the whole issue and maintaining very cordial relations with the Putin government.
As India continues its deadly oppression of Muslims in Kashmir, the OIC is fully united in a state of self-paralysis, except for empty rhetoric again.
When the 20 million Muslims of Iraq were subjected to devastating attacks exceeding in aggregate the explosive power of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atom bombs, ostensibly to remove [sic] Saddam from Kuwait, the OIC unanimously cheered and participated eagerly. Now when Iraqi Muslims continue to be subjected to a cruel 10-year sanctions regime resulting in countless deaths and untold suffering of Muslims, the OIC is again united in its silent inaction.
And as this war on terrorism continues we can expect the OIC to remain faithfully united in its acquiescence and even willing participation when uncounted innocent Muslims fall victim to the grand campaign.
The OIC is comprised of member countries that, with a few exceptions, are ruled by authoritarian, unrepresentative and mostly corrupt regimes, obviously protecting and covering for each other in a very unified manner. Quite unsurprisingly the OIC is also united in its opposition to or lack of implementation of the popular will of the majority of the Muslim masses that it purports to represent. So Mr. President General Sir, I contend that it is not disunity but in fact the solid unity of the OIC and its ruler-members that plagues the Muslim Ummah. That is what the facts clearly suggest, no matter what we might hear to the contrary from its mostly unrepresentative ruler-members.