Time Immortal

This is a damn hopeful sign:

Peshawar, Pakistan - Fed up with violence and broken promises, voters in Pakistan’s conservative northwest have thrown out the Islamist parties that ruled the province for five years - a sign that Pakistanis rejected religious extremism in a region where al-Qaeda and the Taliban have sought refuge.

Instead, voters in North West Frontier Province, which borders Afghanistan, gave their support in Monday’s national election to secular parties that promised to pave the streets, create jobs and bring peace to the turbulent province through dialogue and economic incentives to the extremists.

“They didn’t do anything for the people,” Bokhari Shah, 65, said of the religious parties. “They have done nothing to help the people, and we are afraid to even come out from our homes because of all these bomb blasts.”

…

Vast areas of the northwest were transformed into a war zone, where more than 80,000 Pakistani soldiers sought to crush a burgeoning Islamic insurgency. U.S. officials say al-Qaida has regrouped in the lawless area and extended its reach into the rest of the province and beyond.

Much of the trouble occurred in the autonomous tribal areas, which are administered from Islamabad rather than by the provincial government.

But the religious parties headquartered elsewhere in the northwest wield considerable influence in the tribal region, in part through funding religious schools linked to extremist groups.

Powerless to stop the militants, local police stood by as tribal leaders opposed to the Taliban were assassinated and owners of video and music stores received threats to close their businesses or face death.

“They made false promises. They said they would give us education, food and jobs, but they didn’t give us anything. They were all lies,” said retired soldier Mohammed Akram Shah. “I am from a village of more than 30 homes and we don’t have any electricity even after five years.”

On election day, voters showed they had had enough.

Pakistan was shaping up to be a major flashpoint in the global war against terrorism. Weakened by assassinations and the mistakes of its rulers, it became a place where Islamist parties and jihadists had almost free reign, where bombings, honour killings, and Taliban-strict sharia were becoming the norm. It looked very much like Pakistan might well and truly be headed for the dubious and dangerous distinction of being the first truly nuclear-armed Islamist state, especially in the wake of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination.

And to be fair, Pakistan is not out of the woods yet. The Islamists will not take kindly to this defeat, and there will likely be many more acts of terrible violence perpetrated against the people and politicians of northern Pakistan. But it is still a step — a major step — in the right direction, and deserves nothing less than the full and enthusiastic support of Western nations and the people thereof.