IMRAN KHAN : Basically what we have is a westernized elite which, on the whole, has no idea about Islam, and they look upon Islam through western lenses. Their Islam is like General Musharraf ’s Islam. It is not original. It is how the West perceives Islam. That is unfortunately why we have a situation where we are so defensive about Islam. Our westernized elite are defensive about Islam. Why do you invent a ridiculous term like “enlightened moderation?” What is it supposed to mean? Every human society has its fanatics, its liberals, its moderates, its fundamentalists. Why should Muslims always be saying “we are moderates”? Why this defensive attitude? Look at the Hindu fanatics in India. Look at the United States, the Christian fanatics. Look at Israel, the Jewish fanatics. But you do not see their heads of state going on and on about how they are moderates and how they are enlightened. The biggest problem the Muslim world faces today is that we have not been able to project, in our states, what a truly enlightened Islamic state should be. That is the biggest problem here. Unfortunately, no great examples … maybe Malaysia? We could say that Malaysia is sort of developing into a modern Islamic state. 

ISLAMICA : Pakistan spends a much smaller fraction of its budget than many other countries on social sector services like health care and education. How do you think this trend has impacted the country and what do you think is necessary to generate the political will to change it? 

IMRAN KHAN : The problem is that we have a parasitical ruling elite. Their whole object of coming into power is not to help the people. The whole object is to actually grab power and pander to certain interests. It is a country where, in fact, you could say that it is totally contrary to the principles of Islam the way the country is run. We have selective justice. One for the “mega crooks”, one for the elite, and one for the common people. Our economic system is such that because of indirect taxation the poor subsidize the rich in this country rather than the rich subsidizing the poor. The transfer of resources is actually going from the poor to the rich and hence the gap between the poor and the rich is increasing by the day. You have Musharraf talking about 6% growth rates, but actually poverty is increasing and people are committing suicide because they do not have enough to eat. Prices are going up and we are dictated to by the Washingtonbased IMF which tells us how to run our economy. And it is all in favor of a tiny elite. There is neither justice nor welfare for the people. 

ISLAMICA : What are the sources of extremism that have riddled the country over the last twenty years? Why is there so much inter-religious and sectarian conflict in a region where historically people generally lived quite peaceably?  

IMRAN KHAN : We have to thank the CIA-sponsored Afghan jihad for it. These militant groups were developed to fight in Afghanistan which most people here believe was a just war because it was against a foreign occupation. But after that, I am sad to say, our establishment patronized certain groups, which were militant groups, which were clearly extremist groups. And these were officially patronized by our establishment for their own motives. And these groups, unfortunately, are responsible for all these killings. Before that we never had this sort of extremism. So we are responsible because it started these groups that were supposed to fight in Afghanistan, but once the war was over these groups were then used by the establishment for whatever ends they wanted to use.

ISLAMICA : In the last 20 years we have seen a number of key American and European Muslim scholars such as Sheikh Hamza Yusuf, Sheikh Abdal Hakim Winter and Sheikh Nuh Keller make a strong impact on promoting traditional Islam, and curbing the spread of Wahhabism. How do you see Pakistan confronting the challenge of Wahhabism?