While poor madrasa students in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were taking to the streets under the MMA banner in 2005, chanting slogans against America, their leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman was carrying bags stuffed with US dollars from Tripoli to Dubai. Reports of his alleged arrest at Dubai Airport have raised serious questions about the contradiction between his public anti-American rhetoric and his reported dealings behind closed doors.
On August 1, 2005, UAE authorities reportedly detained Fazlur Rehman at Dubai Airport after discovering a substantial amount of US dollars he had brought from Tripoli, Libya, en route to Pakistan. He was allegedly stopped from entering the terminal despite having received a visa stamp on his passport. UAE authorities reportedly ordered his deportation, and Pakistani Embassy officials subsequently arrived to negotiate the terms of his release.
According to sources, the intervention of then-ISI Director General Lieutenant General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani secured his release.
The revelations raise a troubling question for ordinary JUI-F workers in Peshawar and Dera Ismail Khan: while poor madrasa students were being mobilised against America in the name of the MMA, what was their leader allegedly doing with bags full of American dollars in Dubai?
The questions do not end there. What was the source and intended purpose of the money? What was the nature of Fazlur Rehman’s financial and political connections with Libya? And why has this alleged incident never been subjected to transparent scrutiny?
