Posts
Pervez Iqbal Cheema
A report recently published in a leading national daily (The Nation) on 27th July unambiguously stated that after receiving intelligence reports indicating links between RAW (Research and Analysis Wing) and militant organizations nation’s top security brass has ordered a thorough probe into the involvement of India in the growing militancy in Waziristan and other tribal areas.
Not only the intelligence reports show the involvement of India’s main spy agency RAW in fomenting anti-Pakistan feelings there but also the information extracted from the arrested militants during Hangu operation also supported the contention. While the source stressed that the reports were credible enough to be accepted, it was decided to have a joint probe involving country’s main security agencies in order to ascertain the nature and cooperation between the militants and Indian spy agency.
While RAW is commonly known to dabble into nefarious acts inside Pakistan, yet it not appropriate to put the blame on RAW unless a definite and convincing proof is provided by the above mentioned probe. To put the blame just like that is no different than what the Indian have been doing so regularly and so consistently after any adverse event that had taken place inside India only to realize that those were undertaken by the Indians or India based groups.
Admittedly there exist sufficient circumstantial evidences to point a finger at the Indian agency and past, both recent and distant, is studded with innumerable instances in which RAW was known to be involved. Compared to India, Pakistan has never indulged in the blame game unless it has some evidence where as Indian practice has been to put the blame first and then try to either collect the evidence or manufacture it.
It needs to be mentioned here that lately even the Afghan government is demonstrating the techniques it learnt from India. Following the recent Kabul bomb blast in the Indian embassy, the Afghan officials including the President whose writ is known to be confined to Kabul, in their indecent haste did not hesitate to quickly pin the blame on Pakistan based agency without advancing any evidence.
Many eminent non Pakistani scholars who are familiar with the complex nature of the area have written about Taliban stressed that not only the US intelligence community is well aware about this problem which is exacerbated by Taliban alliance with Al Qaeda moving into Pakistani territories but also because of covert support by the Indian government and its intelligence services-principally RAW for the Jihadist movement.
A cursory review of India-Pakistan relations over the last sixty years clearly point towards the fact that both countries’ intelligence agencies have been exploiting situations in one form or the other with one major difference between them. The Indian agencies would immediately point the finger at Pakistan almost immediately after the incident whereas the Pakistanis would first search for some piece of evidence and then build the case against India. Being a large country and having a large network of intelligence agencies with close connections with agencies Israeli Mossad, the Indian agencies also operate from Afghanistan with the active support of the incumbent Afghan government.
It is not too far fetched to assume that the American intelligence agencies are well aware of RAW’s activities in the region especially in Afghanistan, yet they have opted to avoid criticizing their activities against Pakistan. Again no Pakistani would be agitated as they are well familiar about India’s over projection of the notion of cross border terrorism with regard to Kashmir situation and the American ready acceptance of Indian interpretation of the Kashmir situation.
Pakistan appears to be easily available punching bag which not only the Indians and Afghans but even the Americans do not hesitate to throw punches. However compared to the Indians and Afghans, the Americans appear to be relatively sophisticated in their approach. The Afghans and Indians throw punches at will.
The American problem is that they do not want to annoy India and at the same time would like to have Pakistan on their right side. Not only they have been building India at the cost of even destroying NPT regime but also feel convinced that a strong India would be able to counter the increasing Chinese influence in Asia. Admittedly India is advancing at a much rapid pace in terms of development but to play the role of a regional influential it may have to demonstrate qualities deemed necessary for a great power’s role.
A further complicating factor is the American commitment to Afghanistan. Judged by any yardstick the Americans along with NATO forces have not yet been able to extend incumbent Afghan regime’s writ beyond a limited area. The foreign forces have certain met limited success. Undoubtedly it appears that foreign forces may have to stay for a much longer time than what they initially anticipated.
Unable to deliver the augured outcome, one finds that the notion of do more is frequently aired. Most objective analysis invariably concluded that the notion of do more is part of the diversionary tactics. Inability to keep pace with anticipated outcomes often compels them to employ such tactics to buy time.
However this does not mean that both the Taliban and Al Qaeda have not been illegally using parts of Tribal areas. In fact the illegal use of Pakistani Tribal territory has caused many undesired problems for Pakistan. The Pakistani government is making efforts to stamp out the militancy and to plug the illegal cross border movements in the Pak-Afghan border region.
In this connection, the Americans should not only provide necessary help to government of Pakistan and strengthen its hands to deal with the problem effectively but should also effective prevent the Indians and the Afghans support to the militants in the tribal areas.
Showing posts with label pakistan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pakistan. Show all posts
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Friday, August 15, 2008
The national neurosis
By DR A. H. KHAYAL
Almost every part of the country is infected with neurosis. Almost every citizen is mentally sick. Unfortunately, we don't have the resources for establishing a mental hospital of the size of Pakistan.
The current political turmoil is the mother of the people's mental manfully upheaval. Some of the sick keep manfully for their survival. But most of the Pakistanis are living dead-bodies. There is utter uncertainty about the very survival of the country.
Any moment could be the last moment of its life. If, God forbid, the country were to collapse, only the masses would be the real sufferers.
The rulers would be absolutely unaffected. The tragedy would not dare to even touch the rulers. The rulers are a mysterious species. They rule the country mysteriously. For them neither the survival nor the extinction of the country is of any significance whatsoever. Actually, for them the country is a 5-star hotel which they use for picnicking. It is not their motherland. Their motherland lies far beyond the seas.
The government has failed to deliver to the masses what it had promised to deliver. Our skies are overcast with national depression. Rumours are rife that new elections are round the corner.
In the past, we have had numerous general elections and numerous governments. All the governments were utter fiascos. Would the new election breed something radically different from what the elections bred in the past? Only a miracle can do so. But our past history warns us that we have banned the entry of miracles in our country.
General elections are a very expensive affair. So far we have spent billions upon billions of rupees on our elections in the past. Actually, we have burnt this gigantic amount of money. We love electioneering because we love burning the national money. And for us there are no fireworks more entertaining than burning the people's money recklessly.
We love electioneering. But we detest reforming our political, economic and social chooses. The election periods are our orgiastic periods. When elections are over, we become depressed. We keep passionately waiting for the next elections. Elections have followed elections. But not an iota of change for the better has ever followed the elections.
Presidents have come and gone. prime ministers have come and gone. But when the economic misery of the masses came it came with a determination never to go. And it has stuck to its determination. What a determination!
Our political affairs have been regularly declining. Our economic affairs have been regularly declining. Our social affairs have been regularly declining. Almost everything has been regularly declining. But there is a mighty exception. It is the misery of the masses. This misery has been incessantly growing and growing. If we are ashamed of the regular general decline, we must be proud of the regular growth of the misery of the masses.
A poor man has only one problem. It is his stomach. On the contrary, the rich man has as many problems as he has external and internal bodily organs. Each organ is a very demanding creature. If the demands of an organ are not met, it makes the life of the rich man extremely miserable perhaps more miserable than the miserable life of the extremely poor man. The rich man's survival depends upon a regular increase in his wealth. A regular increase is his very oxygen. The moment an increase becomes impossible, his heart starts missing beats. Actually, Pakistan is inhabited by two nations the phenomenally rich and the phenomenally poor.
The president's impeachment is in the balance. There is a rumour that if the impeachment turned out to be a victory for the coalition, the coalition would celebrate the victory by distributing lots and lots of peaches amongst the masses.
For a long time, the masses have been asking the president to surrender power. The masses are ignorant. They just don't know that the president doesn't have power. Actually, it is power which is holding him. One has power only when one can surrender it and capture it again. If one cannot recapture it then it is not he who holds it but it is the power which holds him. . If the president were to surrender power, would he be able to recapture it? Thus the masses are asking him to surrender what he doesn't have. Poor ignorant masses!
When the president was a soldier, most probably he was not ambitious to become the country's president. It was Destiny which flung Pakistan into his pocket. He did not have the courage to offend Destiny. But he could have used Destiny's gift for the well-being of the masses. He did not. Perhaps Destiny has got offended. Perhaps it is destiny which is now infuriating the masses against the president.
Almost every part of the country is infected with neurosis. Almost every citizen is mentally sick. Unfortunately, we don't have the resources for establishing a mental hospital of the size of Pakistan.
The current political turmoil is the mother of the people's mental manfully upheaval. Some of the sick keep manfully for their survival. But most of the Pakistanis are living dead-bodies. There is utter uncertainty about the very survival of the country.
Any moment could be the last moment of its life. If, God forbid, the country were to collapse, only the masses would be the real sufferers.
The rulers would be absolutely unaffected. The tragedy would not dare to even touch the rulers. The rulers are a mysterious species. They rule the country mysteriously. For them neither the survival nor the extinction of the country is of any significance whatsoever. Actually, for them the country is a 5-star hotel which they use for picnicking. It is not their motherland. Their motherland lies far beyond the seas.
The government has failed to deliver to the masses what it had promised to deliver. Our skies are overcast with national depression. Rumours are rife that new elections are round the corner.
In the past, we have had numerous general elections and numerous governments. All the governments were utter fiascos. Would the new election breed something radically different from what the elections bred in the past? Only a miracle can do so. But our past history warns us that we have banned the entry of miracles in our country.
General elections are a very expensive affair. So far we have spent billions upon billions of rupees on our elections in the past. Actually, we have burnt this gigantic amount of money. We love electioneering because we love burning the national money. And for us there are no fireworks more entertaining than burning the people's money recklessly.
We love electioneering. But we detest reforming our political, economic and social chooses. The election periods are our orgiastic periods. When elections are over, we become depressed. We keep passionately waiting for the next elections. Elections have followed elections. But not an iota of change for the better has ever followed the elections.
Presidents have come and gone. prime ministers have come and gone. But when the economic misery of the masses came it came with a determination never to go. And it has stuck to its determination. What a determination!
Our political affairs have been regularly declining. Our economic affairs have been regularly declining. Our social affairs have been regularly declining. Almost everything has been regularly declining. But there is a mighty exception. It is the misery of the masses. This misery has been incessantly growing and growing. If we are ashamed of the regular general decline, we must be proud of the regular growth of the misery of the masses.
A poor man has only one problem. It is his stomach. On the contrary, the rich man has as many problems as he has external and internal bodily organs. Each organ is a very demanding creature. If the demands of an organ are not met, it makes the life of the rich man extremely miserable perhaps more miserable than the miserable life of the extremely poor man. The rich man's survival depends upon a regular increase in his wealth. A regular increase is his very oxygen. The moment an increase becomes impossible, his heart starts missing beats. Actually, Pakistan is inhabited by two nations the phenomenally rich and the phenomenally poor.
The president's impeachment is in the balance. There is a rumour that if the impeachment turned out to be a victory for the coalition, the coalition would celebrate the victory by distributing lots and lots of peaches amongst the masses.
For a long time, the masses have been asking the president to surrender power. The masses are ignorant. They just don't know that the president doesn't have power. Actually, it is power which is holding him. One has power only when one can surrender it and capture it again. If one cannot recapture it then it is not he who holds it but it is the power which holds him. . If the president were to surrender power, would he be able to recapture it? Thus the masses are asking him to surrender what he doesn't have. Poor ignorant masses!
When the president was a soldier, most probably he was not ambitious to become the country's president. It was Destiny which flung Pakistan into his pocket. He did not have the courage to offend Destiny. But he could have used Destiny's gift for the well-being of the masses. He did not. Perhaps Destiny has got offended. Perhaps it is destiny which is now infuriating the masses against the president.
Corruption and inefficiency
By Dr Ijaz Ahsan
I have just read that Chief Minister has ordered a crackdown on hoarders of wheat. As a farmer who grows wheat, I would like to Mr CM that the primary responsibility for the wheat crisis rests not with hoarders. They are certainly a part of the problem. However, the most important cause of the wheat shortage in the country has to do with inefficiency and corruption in different government departments, as I shall now explain. Some time ago I decided to sell my wheat to the government - to PASSCO in fact - and I shall never forget what I went through. If one takes a few hundred maunds of wheat to the grain market, they fill it into bags, weigh it, and within an hour or two, hand you the cash and send you home. But dealing with the concerned government officials was an extended nightmare.
I was told to take the following actions, at almost every one of which I had to grease palms: Firstly, provide proof of ownership of land. Secondly, apply for permission to sell to them the precise quantity of wheat I desired to dispose of. Thirdly, buy from them empty bags, whose price would be refunded to me after they had received my wheat. Fourthly, take my wheat to Minichinabad Centre, forty kilometres away, rather than Bahawalnagar, which was close to my land. Fifthly, open an account at a bank in Minchinabad. Sixthly, deliver my wheat to them and receive a chit. Seventhly, come all the way to the Minchinabad Centre once again and receive a pay order in payment. Now I ask Chief Minister: why would a person sell to PASSCO unless he was out of his mind? The result, over the years, has been that the government departments fail to procure enough wheat. And new another sad story starts.
Punjab produces 85 percent of the country's wheat. It, therefore, has the responsibility of keeping adequate reserve of this staple food. Because of the incompetence and corruption of the procuring departments, not enough reserves are built up. On the other hand, because of incompetence and corruption in the department meant to prevent smuggling, hundreds of thousands of tons is smuggled to Afghanistan from NWFP, creating food shortage in that province. When Punjab fails to give them more and more wheat because its reserves are insufficient, then the ministers of the NWFP government hold out threats that they will come to Punjab, lift wheat by force, and will see who can prevent them. Please note how corruption and inefficiency in government departments leads to strained relations between provinces, destroying national integration and cohesion.
This year the situation has reached such a nadir that for the first time in my life, the police has been raiding farmers' residences to snatch wheat. These people are not hoarders. The small farmers always have to sell all their wheat at once. The somewhat bigger farmers sell some, and keep some, in order to sell it later at a better price. No government department in the past has been raiding farmers' residences, certainly not within a couple of months of the wheat harvest having come in. This shows the horrendous stage that has been reached due to the incompetence and corruption in the departments.
Another important reason for the wheat shortage is the failure of the Planned Parenthood department to check the increasingly rapid growth of our population. In 1947, the population of the Pakistan was not more than 3 crores. In the last sixty years, this has been allowed to increase to sixteen crores. The bellies of the five times greater number of people on the same area of land are a bottomless pit, which is impossible to fill. The people believe our religion forbids family planning, and hence shy away from it. Faced with such a situation, the Bangladeshis sent their biggest religious leaders abroad to attend international conferences on family planning. There they discovered that not only the Bangladesh government, but other governments were also worried about the rate at which the population was increasing in their countries. When the religious leaders returned to Bangladesh, they stopped opposing family planning programmes, and advised their followers in the villages and towns to do likewise. This helped immensely, and therefore the population of Bangladesh has been controlled.
Dear Mr CM, you are occupying a very high post in the government. Kindly try to have our top maulanas also sent to Planned Parenthood conferences. You wil1 be pleasantly surprised by the results. Further, force the wheat procurement agencies to put their act together or else face the axe. God bless you.
The writer is a former principal of King Edward Medical College, and president of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Pakistan
E-mail: drijaz@nation.com.pk
I have just read that Chief Minister has ordered a crackdown on hoarders of wheat. As a farmer who grows wheat, I would like to Mr CM that the primary responsibility for the wheat crisis rests not with hoarders. They are certainly a part of the problem. However, the most important cause of the wheat shortage in the country has to do with inefficiency and corruption in different government departments, as I shall now explain. Some time ago I decided to sell my wheat to the government - to PASSCO in fact - and I shall never forget what I went through. If one takes a few hundred maunds of wheat to the grain market, they fill it into bags, weigh it, and within an hour or two, hand you the cash and send you home. But dealing with the concerned government officials was an extended nightmare.
I was told to take the following actions, at almost every one of which I had to grease palms: Firstly, provide proof of ownership of land. Secondly, apply for permission to sell to them the precise quantity of wheat I desired to dispose of. Thirdly, buy from them empty bags, whose price would be refunded to me after they had received my wheat. Fourthly, take my wheat to Minichinabad Centre, forty kilometres away, rather than Bahawalnagar, which was close to my land. Fifthly, open an account at a bank in Minchinabad. Sixthly, deliver my wheat to them and receive a chit. Seventhly, come all the way to the Minchinabad Centre once again and receive a pay order in payment. Now I ask Chief Minister: why would a person sell to PASSCO unless he was out of his mind? The result, over the years, has been that the government departments fail to procure enough wheat. And new another sad story starts.
Punjab produces 85 percent of the country's wheat. It, therefore, has the responsibility of keeping adequate reserve of this staple food. Because of the incompetence and corruption of the procuring departments, not enough reserves are built up. On the other hand, because of incompetence and corruption in the department meant to prevent smuggling, hundreds of thousands of tons is smuggled to Afghanistan from NWFP, creating food shortage in that province. When Punjab fails to give them more and more wheat because its reserves are insufficient, then the ministers of the NWFP government hold out threats that they will come to Punjab, lift wheat by force, and will see who can prevent them. Please note how corruption and inefficiency in government departments leads to strained relations between provinces, destroying national integration and cohesion.
This year the situation has reached such a nadir that for the first time in my life, the police has been raiding farmers' residences to snatch wheat. These people are not hoarders. The small farmers always have to sell all their wheat at once. The somewhat bigger farmers sell some, and keep some, in order to sell it later at a better price. No government department in the past has been raiding farmers' residences, certainly not within a couple of months of the wheat harvest having come in. This shows the horrendous stage that has been reached due to the incompetence and corruption in the departments.
Another important reason for the wheat shortage is the failure of the Planned Parenthood department to check the increasingly rapid growth of our population. In 1947, the population of the Pakistan was not more than 3 crores. In the last sixty years, this has been allowed to increase to sixteen crores. The bellies of the five times greater number of people on the same area of land are a bottomless pit, which is impossible to fill. The people believe our religion forbids family planning, and hence shy away from it. Faced with such a situation, the Bangladeshis sent their biggest religious leaders abroad to attend international conferences on family planning. There they discovered that not only the Bangladesh government, but other governments were also worried about the rate at which the population was increasing in their countries. When the religious leaders returned to Bangladesh, they stopped opposing family planning programmes, and advised their followers in the villages and towns to do likewise. This helped immensely, and therefore the population of Bangladesh has been controlled.
Dear Mr CM, you are occupying a very high post in the government. Kindly try to have our top maulanas also sent to Planned Parenthood conferences. You wil1 be pleasantly surprised by the results. Further, force the wheat procurement agencies to put their act together or else face the axe. God bless you.
The writer is a former principal of King Edward Medical College, and president of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Pakistan
E-mail: drijaz@nation.com.pk
Impeaching the president
By M.A. Niazi
The coalition partners finally seem to have reconciled their positions, as is supposed to be done in all good coalitions. The PML-N insisted that its core position included the restoration of the judiciary to its pre-Emergency position.
The PPP did not spell out, but made clear from its behaviour, that it did not want the president to suffer any embarrassment, which he insisted he would suffer in the event of a full restoration, so it avoided the restoration, leaving the PML-N to do its second worst and leave the Federal Cabinet (the worst was leaving the Punjab government, which it did not do).
The solution was to impeach the president, which has not just been announced, but has been recommended by three provincial assemblies, and will be recommended by the fourth. The equation was simple: find a president who will not be embarrassed by the restoration of the judiciary. For that, it was necessary to create a vacancy in the office, which meant the removal of the incumbent.
Since the incumbent had been re-elected only last year and thus had virtually the whole of the five years of his second term to run, this meant impeaching him. The PPP decided purely according to the logic of the situation, and there is no malignity towards the president visible in the move, at least from the PPP.
This is not the case with the PML-N, which on the other hand, saw an opportunity to fulfil another of its agenda items. The removal of the president is actually on the PPP to-do list, and after the February 18 election, which was more or less a referendum against Musharraf, it probably made sense to the PPP to place itself at the head of the movement for his removal.
It appears that the foreign powers and the military have decided to remain neutral, but the president is determined to tough it out. He has to ensure the semblance of support from them, not necessarily actual support, if he hopes to defeat the move.
The foreign powers have a historical record of letting down their Third-World allies when they lose support among their own people, and thus the number of American surveys appearing, that showed Musharraf as enjoying little support, assume significance, as does Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani's meeting both with the British PM and the US President. The Americans in particular will not support anyone who does not enjoy a plurality in a survey after being in power and office since 1999, yet it is American support that Musharraf has been courting ever since 9/11.
The president appears determined to go through with the impeachment, which follows a quasi-judicial procedure, as in the American model on which it is based. The big difference is in the voting. In the USA, an impeachment's framing is done by the lower House of Congress, the House of Representatives, but the impeachment itself is heard by the Upper House, the Senate, with the Chief Justice of the United States presiding.
In Pakistan, there is no role for the chief justice, and the charges are determined by the federal government, or the movers of the motion of impeachment, in the shape of the motion itself. The joint committee tasked with drafting is working on this motion, and once their work reaches the House, the 'bill of impeachment' becomes public property, just as does any bill in the USA.
Unlike the USA, where there is a clear Representatives-Senate division, Pakistan allows the impeachment to originate in either House moved by half of that House, and then for it to come before a joint sitting for consideration.
At the joint sitting, there may be an investigation, but only if there is, will the president get the right to legal representation. The motion of impeachment must be passed by two-thirds of the senate (in the USA, and the chief justice does not have a vote) or two-thirds of the total membership of the joint sitting (in Pakistan).
In short, considering that American senators and Pakistani members of parliament (both MNAs and senators) are both political animals, this vote is devoted to whether they like the face of the president or not. They are supposed to apply their minds to whether the incumbent violated the constitution or not, but they will not bother. In the USA, they will vote according to how it will sound in their next election, and in Pakistan, according to the party whip, which is crucial for the National Assembly and all-important for the senate.
Yet Musharraf has a way out, though only if the agency chiefs cooperate. If members abstain, they are voting for the sitting president.
The motion does not require a majority-against to be defeated, but will be defeated if it fails to attract the requisite number of votes, which is two-thirds of the total membership. Since the agencies have ensured the election of many of those on the Treasury benches (at least, to them), the agencies can make them abstain, and thus vote for the president.
Such a presidency would be double-edged. Already, Pervez Musharraf is going to set a record, as a president who was the first to be impeached. Both of the presidential impeachment's in the USA that went to the senate, that of President Andrew Johnson in 1868 and of Bill Clinton in 1998, failed, while Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 rather than face impeachment, in which he was a virtual certainty to be convicted, not because he was guilty (which he was), but because the senators were under constituency pressures.
Impeachment is no defence against further trial, and it is not clear in Pakistan what the status is of the evidence adduced. The pension rights of the president are sacrificed, though it is hoped that Musharraf would avoid this loss of what is a generous package, including free accommodation and transport by resigning. However, even if he loses these rights because he has been impeached, as a former chief of army staff, he gives up nothing, and this is a sufficiency for him.
It must be said that the nation is going through a trauma as severe as the president, who is a mere channel. Just as a president is impeached only once, a nation witnesses a presidential impeachment for the first time only once. Pakistan is undergoing a stressful time, and it is to be hoped that it comes through successfully.
E-mail: maniazi@nation.com.pk
The coalition partners finally seem to have reconciled their positions, as is supposed to be done in all good coalitions. The PML-N insisted that its core position included the restoration of the judiciary to its pre-Emergency position.
The PPP did not spell out, but made clear from its behaviour, that it did not want the president to suffer any embarrassment, which he insisted he would suffer in the event of a full restoration, so it avoided the restoration, leaving the PML-N to do its second worst and leave the Federal Cabinet (the worst was leaving the Punjab government, which it did not do).
The solution was to impeach the president, which has not just been announced, but has been recommended by three provincial assemblies, and will be recommended by the fourth. The equation was simple: find a president who will not be embarrassed by the restoration of the judiciary. For that, it was necessary to create a vacancy in the office, which meant the removal of the incumbent.
Since the incumbent had been re-elected only last year and thus had virtually the whole of the five years of his second term to run, this meant impeaching him. The PPP decided purely according to the logic of the situation, and there is no malignity towards the president visible in the move, at least from the PPP.
This is not the case with the PML-N, which on the other hand, saw an opportunity to fulfil another of its agenda items. The removal of the president is actually on the PPP to-do list, and after the February 18 election, which was more or less a referendum against Musharraf, it probably made sense to the PPP to place itself at the head of the movement for his removal.
It appears that the foreign powers and the military have decided to remain neutral, but the president is determined to tough it out. He has to ensure the semblance of support from them, not necessarily actual support, if he hopes to defeat the move.
The foreign powers have a historical record of letting down their Third-World allies when they lose support among their own people, and thus the number of American surveys appearing, that showed Musharraf as enjoying little support, assume significance, as does Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani's meeting both with the British PM and the US President. The Americans in particular will not support anyone who does not enjoy a plurality in a survey after being in power and office since 1999, yet it is American support that Musharraf has been courting ever since 9/11.
The president appears determined to go through with the impeachment, which follows a quasi-judicial procedure, as in the American model on which it is based. The big difference is in the voting. In the USA, an impeachment's framing is done by the lower House of Congress, the House of Representatives, but the impeachment itself is heard by the Upper House, the Senate, with the Chief Justice of the United States presiding.
In Pakistan, there is no role for the chief justice, and the charges are determined by the federal government, or the movers of the motion of impeachment, in the shape of the motion itself. The joint committee tasked with drafting is working on this motion, and once their work reaches the House, the 'bill of impeachment' becomes public property, just as does any bill in the USA.
Unlike the USA, where there is a clear Representatives-Senate division, Pakistan allows the impeachment to originate in either House moved by half of that House, and then for it to come before a joint sitting for consideration.
At the joint sitting, there may be an investigation, but only if there is, will the president get the right to legal representation. The motion of impeachment must be passed by two-thirds of the senate (in the USA, and the chief justice does not have a vote) or two-thirds of the total membership of the joint sitting (in Pakistan).
In short, considering that American senators and Pakistani members of parliament (both MNAs and senators) are both political animals, this vote is devoted to whether they like the face of the president or not. They are supposed to apply their minds to whether the incumbent violated the constitution or not, but they will not bother. In the USA, they will vote according to how it will sound in their next election, and in Pakistan, according to the party whip, which is crucial for the National Assembly and all-important for the senate.
Yet Musharraf has a way out, though only if the agency chiefs cooperate. If members abstain, they are voting for the sitting president.
The motion does not require a majority-against to be defeated, but will be defeated if it fails to attract the requisite number of votes, which is two-thirds of the total membership. Since the agencies have ensured the election of many of those on the Treasury benches (at least, to them), the agencies can make them abstain, and thus vote for the president.
Such a presidency would be double-edged. Already, Pervez Musharraf is going to set a record, as a president who was the first to be impeached. Both of the presidential impeachment's in the USA that went to the senate, that of President Andrew Johnson in 1868 and of Bill Clinton in 1998, failed, while Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 rather than face impeachment, in which he was a virtual certainty to be convicted, not because he was guilty (which he was), but because the senators were under constituency pressures.
Impeachment is no defence against further trial, and it is not clear in Pakistan what the status is of the evidence adduced. The pension rights of the president are sacrificed, though it is hoped that Musharraf would avoid this loss of what is a generous package, including free accommodation and transport by resigning. However, even if he loses these rights because he has been impeached, as a former chief of army staff, he gives up nothing, and this is a sufficiency for him.
It must be said that the nation is going through a trauma as severe as the president, who is a mere channel. Just as a president is impeached only once, a nation witnesses a presidential impeachment for the first time only once. Pakistan is undergoing a stressful time, and it is to be hoped that it comes through successfully.
E-mail: maniazi@nation.com.pk
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Understanding Iqbal's 'dream' of Pakistan
By DR RIFFAT HASSAN
Allama Muhammad Iqbal is the spiritual and intellectual founder of Pakistan. No poet or philosopher in the history of the world has inspired and energised millions of people as Iqbal did. He was the last and greatest thinker of the historic Aligarh Movement which brought about a paradigm shift in the consciousness of the Muslims of India, and transformed their destiny. But Iqbal's place in history is not limited to his role as a modernist, reformist Muslim thinker in India. He is the most outstanding poet-philosopher of the world of Islam, and of the world in general, since the death of Jalaluddin Rumi in 1273.
Poet, philosopher, educationist, lawyer, political activist, social reformer, Iqbal is unmatched in his versatility and the breadth of his knowledge and vision. His message is more relevant and important to contemporary Muslims than the message of any other Muslim thinker of the past or present. This is due not only to the fact that Iqbal faced the challenges of both traditionalism and modernity fearlessly, but also - and more importantly - because he had a profound understanding of the integrated vision of the Qur'an which he made the basis of his philosophy.
What is unique about Iqbal's philosophy is that it offers concrete guidance about how a Muslim can attain "the good life" which is the goal set before humanity whom God has created "in the best of moulds" (Surah 95: At-Tin: 4). The opening line of Iqbal's Preface to his famous Lectures on The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam points out that "The Qur'an is a book which emphasises 'deed' rather than 'idea'." Likewise, Iqbal's philosophy, rich as it is in ideas and concepts, is fundamentally action-oriented.
It is often proclaimed by Pakistanis that Pakistan was Iqbal's "dream" but few know that this "dream" was the outcome of a lifetime of deep thinking and feeling, of study, of creativity, and of prayer. Iqbal died in 1938, nine years before the creation of Pakistan, but his role in the Pakistan Movement was so pivotal that it is not an exaggeration to say that if there had been no Iqbal, there might well have been no Pakistan.
The influence that Iqbal wielded was phenomenal. His personal reputation - not only as an outstanding poet and philosopher - but also as a person of unswerving conviction and incorruptible honesty, had contributed greatly to the rallying of Muslims under the banner upheld by the Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah. All these facts notwithstanding it must be kept in mind that Iqbal was a visionary philosopher and not a politician. Politics constitutes the primary interest of many politicians who are often driven by motives of political expediency. However, Iqbal's interest in politics was secondary, not primary. He explained his reasons for becoming involved in politics, in his Presidential Address delivered at the Annual Session of the All-India Muslim Conference at Lahore in 1932: "Politics have their roots in the spiritual life of man. It is my belief that Islam is not a matter of private opinion. It is a society, or if you like, a civic Church. It is because present day political ideals as they appear to be shaping themselves in India, may affect its original structure and character that I find myself interested in politics."
Iqbal's "dream" was that the Muslims of India have a State in which they could preserve "the culture of Islam inspired by a specific ethical ideal." It is important to note here that to Iqbal "the culture of Islam" was not the cultural practices of Muslims. To him it was an ideal value-system, "a system of life and conduct," which was based upon the ethical principles of normative Islam.
In his memorable Presidential Address at the All-India Muslim League at Allahabad in 1930, Iqbal reiterated that Islam was "an ethical ideal plus a certain kind of polity," and said, "I would like to see the Punjab, North West Frontier Province, Sindh and Balochistan amalgamated into a single State. Self-government within the British Empire or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated North West Indian Muslim State appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of North West India."
Deeply conscious of the multi-faceted challenges and difficulties with which Indian Muslims were faced at that time, Iqbal pointed out in the Allahabad Address, "Never in our history has Islam had to stand a greater trial than the one which confronts it today." However, his faith in the efficacy of his faith remained steadfast amid this grim realisation and he affirmed that he was "a man who is not despaired of Islam as a living force...who believes that religion is a power of the utmost importance in the life of individuals as well as States, and finally who believes that Islam is itself Destiny and will not suffer a destiny."
Refuting the idea that religion is "a private affair" of an individual, Iqbal went on to put some rhetorical questions to the Muslim Assembly that he was addressing. "Would you like to see Islam, as a moral and political ideal, meeting the same fate in the world of Islam as Christianity has already met in Europe? Is it possible to retain Islam as an ethical ideal and to reject it as a polity in favour of national polities, in which religious attitude is not permitted to play any part?"
Iqbal believed that in Islam it was not possible to bifurcate ethics and politics and he contrasted the separation of the spiritual and the temporal that he saw in Christianity with "the nature of the Prophet's religious experience, as disclosed in the Qur'an." Referring to this experience, Iqbal said that it was "creative of a social order. Its immediate outcome is the fundamentals of a polity with implicit legal concepts whose civic significance cannot be belittled merely because their origin is revelational. The religious ideal of Islam, therefore, is organically related to the social order which it has created. The rejection of the one will eventually involve the rejection of the other. Therefore, the construction of a polity on national lines, if it means a displacement of the Islamic principle of solidarity, is simply unthinkable to a Muslim."
Here it is useful to note that the failed rebellion of 1857 had made the Muslims the particular target of the wrath of the British rulers who instituted openly discriminatory policies against them. This resulted in Muslim fortunes reaching their lowest ebb in the 1860s and 1870s. The disturbing events of 1857-58 were a turning point not only in the thought and life of Sayyid Ahmad Khan who founded the Aligarh Movement, but also of many other Muslims who became wary of associating Islam with politics and limited it to a practice of personal piety and righteous behaviour.
Iqbal was deeply concerned about this state of affairs and considered it extremely important to demonstrate to his fellow Muslims that Islam could not be limited in such a way, and that its religious and ethical teachings necessitated the emergence of a social and political order which was based upon them. Ironically, if Iqbal was alive today his challenge would be to persuade many Pakistanis that Islam cannot be limited to politics which is disconnected from the religious and ethical principles of their faith.
In the light of Iqbal's views stated in the above-quoted passages, it is clear that his "dream" of Pakistan was of a Muslim State in which there would be an integral or organic relationship between the religious and ethical foundational principles of Islam and the political system which derived from them. If the latter was not an outcome of the former, it would lead to unbridled injustice and brutal oppression, as Iqbal pointed out in his well-known lines from Bal-e-Jibril: "Whether it is the pomp of monarchy or democracy's show, if religion is separated from politics, what results is the tyranny of Changez!"
Concluding his Presidential Address at the All-India Muslim League Annual Session at Allahabad, Iqbal said, "One lesson I have learnt from the history of Muslims. In critical times in their history it is Islam that has saved Muslims and not vice versa. If today you focus your vision on Islam and seek inspiration from the ever-vitalising idea embodied in it, you will be only reassembling your scattered forces, regaining your lost integrity, and thereby saving yourself from total destruction."
Iqbal's words spoken in 1930 are profoundly relevant to contemporary Pakistanis who refer to Pakistan as Iqbal's "dream." The first step toward actualising this "dream" is to understand Iqbal's vision of Islam which gave birth to this "dream."
His message to us today would be the same as the one he delivered to the Allahabad Assembly. The only way that Iqbal's "dream" can be made a reality is by striving to live up to the highest ethical ideals and the best ethical practices of Islam."
The writer is a leading hyperlink "/wiki/Islamic_feminist"Islamic feminist scholar, professor of Religious Studies in USA, and president of The Iqbal International Leadership Institute (Lahore)
Allama Muhammad Iqbal is the spiritual and intellectual founder of Pakistan. No poet or philosopher in the history of the world has inspired and energised millions of people as Iqbal did. He was the last and greatest thinker of the historic Aligarh Movement which brought about a paradigm shift in the consciousness of the Muslims of India, and transformed their destiny. But Iqbal's place in history is not limited to his role as a modernist, reformist Muslim thinker in India. He is the most outstanding poet-philosopher of the world of Islam, and of the world in general, since the death of Jalaluddin Rumi in 1273.
Poet, philosopher, educationist, lawyer, political activist, social reformer, Iqbal is unmatched in his versatility and the breadth of his knowledge and vision. His message is more relevant and important to contemporary Muslims than the message of any other Muslim thinker of the past or present. This is due not only to the fact that Iqbal faced the challenges of both traditionalism and modernity fearlessly, but also - and more importantly - because he had a profound understanding of the integrated vision of the Qur'an which he made the basis of his philosophy.
What is unique about Iqbal's philosophy is that it offers concrete guidance about how a Muslim can attain "the good life" which is the goal set before humanity whom God has created "in the best of moulds" (Surah 95: At-Tin: 4). The opening line of Iqbal's Preface to his famous Lectures on The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam points out that "The Qur'an is a book which emphasises 'deed' rather than 'idea'." Likewise, Iqbal's philosophy, rich as it is in ideas and concepts, is fundamentally action-oriented.
It is often proclaimed by Pakistanis that Pakistan was Iqbal's "dream" but few know that this "dream" was the outcome of a lifetime of deep thinking and feeling, of study, of creativity, and of prayer. Iqbal died in 1938, nine years before the creation of Pakistan, but his role in the Pakistan Movement was so pivotal that it is not an exaggeration to say that if there had been no Iqbal, there might well have been no Pakistan.
The influence that Iqbal wielded was phenomenal. His personal reputation - not only as an outstanding poet and philosopher - but also as a person of unswerving conviction and incorruptible honesty, had contributed greatly to the rallying of Muslims under the banner upheld by the Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah. All these facts notwithstanding it must be kept in mind that Iqbal was a visionary philosopher and not a politician. Politics constitutes the primary interest of many politicians who are often driven by motives of political expediency. However, Iqbal's interest in politics was secondary, not primary. He explained his reasons for becoming involved in politics, in his Presidential Address delivered at the Annual Session of the All-India Muslim Conference at Lahore in 1932: "Politics have their roots in the spiritual life of man. It is my belief that Islam is not a matter of private opinion. It is a society, or if you like, a civic Church. It is because present day political ideals as they appear to be shaping themselves in India, may affect its original structure and character that I find myself interested in politics."
Iqbal's "dream" was that the Muslims of India have a State in which they could preserve "the culture of Islam inspired by a specific ethical ideal." It is important to note here that to Iqbal "the culture of Islam" was not the cultural practices of Muslims. To him it was an ideal value-system, "a system of life and conduct," which was based upon the ethical principles of normative Islam.
In his memorable Presidential Address at the All-India Muslim League at Allahabad in 1930, Iqbal reiterated that Islam was "an ethical ideal plus a certain kind of polity," and said, "I would like to see the Punjab, North West Frontier Province, Sindh and Balochistan amalgamated into a single State. Self-government within the British Empire or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated North West Indian Muslim State appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of North West India."
Deeply conscious of the multi-faceted challenges and difficulties with which Indian Muslims were faced at that time, Iqbal pointed out in the Allahabad Address, "Never in our history has Islam had to stand a greater trial than the one which confronts it today." However, his faith in the efficacy of his faith remained steadfast amid this grim realisation and he affirmed that he was "a man who is not despaired of Islam as a living force...who believes that religion is a power of the utmost importance in the life of individuals as well as States, and finally who believes that Islam is itself Destiny and will not suffer a destiny."
Refuting the idea that religion is "a private affair" of an individual, Iqbal went on to put some rhetorical questions to the Muslim Assembly that he was addressing. "Would you like to see Islam, as a moral and political ideal, meeting the same fate in the world of Islam as Christianity has already met in Europe? Is it possible to retain Islam as an ethical ideal and to reject it as a polity in favour of national polities, in which religious attitude is not permitted to play any part?"
Iqbal believed that in Islam it was not possible to bifurcate ethics and politics and he contrasted the separation of the spiritual and the temporal that he saw in Christianity with "the nature of the Prophet's religious experience, as disclosed in the Qur'an." Referring to this experience, Iqbal said that it was "creative of a social order. Its immediate outcome is the fundamentals of a polity with implicit legal concepts whose civic significance cannot be belittled merely because their origin is revelational. The religious ideal of Islam, therefore, is organically related to the social order which it has created. The rejection of the one will eventually involve the rejection of the other. Therefore, the construction of a polity on national lines, if it means a displacement of the Islamic principle of solidarity, is simply unthinkable to a Muslim."
Here it is useful to note that the failed rebellion of 1857 had made the Muslims the particular target of the wrath of the British rulers who instituted openly discriminatory policies against them. This resulted in Muslim fortunes reaching their lowest ebb in the 1860s and 1870s. The disturbing events of 1857-58 were a turning point not only in the thought and life of Sayyid Ahmad Khan who founded the Aligarh Movement, but also of many other Muslims who became wary of associating Islam with politics and limited it to a practice of personal piety and righteous behaviour.
Iqbal was deeply concerned about this state of affairs and considered it extremely important to demonstrate to his fellow Muslims that Islam could not be limited in such a way, and that its religious and ethical teachings necessitated the emergence of a social and political order which was based upon them. Ironically, if Iqbal was alive today his challenge would be to persuade many Pakistanis that Islam cannot be limited to politics which is disconnected from the religious and ethical principles of their faith.
In the light of Iqbal's views stated in the above-quoted passages, it is clear that his "dream" of Pakistan was of a Muslim State in which there would be an integral or organic relationship between the religious and ethical foundational principles of Islam and the political system which derived from them. If the latter was not an outcome of the former, it would lead to unbridled injustice and brutal oppression, as Iqbal pointed out in his well-known lines from Bal-e-Jibril: "Whether it is the pomp of monarchy or democracy's show, if religion is separated from politics, what results is the tyranny of Changez!"
Concluding his Presidential Address at the All-India Muslim League Annual Session at Allahabad, Iqbal said, "One lesson I have learnt from the history of Muslims. In critical times in their history it is Islam that has saved Muslims and not vice versa. If today you focus your vision on Islam and seek inspiration from the ever-vitalising idea embodied in it, you will be only reassembling your scattered forces, regaining your lost integrity, and thereby saving yourself from total destruction."
Iqbal's words spoken in 1930 are profoundly relevant to contemporary Pakistanis who refer to Pakistan as Iqbal's "dream." The first step toward actualising this "dream" is to understand Iqbal's vision of Islam which gave birth to this "dream."
His message to us today would be the same as the one he delivered to the Allahabad Assembly. The only way that Iqbal's "dream" can be made a reality is by striving to live up to the highest ethical ideals and the best ethical practices of Islam."
The writer is a leading hyperlink "/wiki/Islamic_feminist"Islamic feminist scholar, professor of Religious Studies in USA, and president of The Iqbal International Leadership Institute (Lahore)
61st Independence Day: the Hindu mindset
By R.A. KHAN
This year Pakistan's 61st Independence Day has come at a time when the country is faced with a number of challenging issues: restoration of judiciary, good governance, galloping inflation, energy crisis, militancy in FATA, NATO threats, US demands and Indo-US nuclear deals. While the issues cited above will be resolved in the foreseeable future, there is one issue that defies resolution; The Kashmir Issue. And all because of the hostility, fear and distrust that lie buried deep in the psyche of the Hindu community. No wonder Bharat has always failed to reach an understanding with Pakistan. All Pak- Bharat summits - General Ayub Khan: Jawaharlal Nehru, Benazir Bhutto: Rajiv Gandhi, Nawaz: I K Gujral, General Musharraf: Atal Behari Vajpayee - have failed or remained inconclusive.
Pakistan's 61st Independence Day should remind us that the Hindu mindset has not changed. Hindus bitterly opposed the Pakistan idea when it was first enunciated. They called it a " vivisection of their motherland." They refused to acknowledge that the Muslims of South Asia constituted a nation. Gandhi said, "I find no parallel in history for a body of converts and their descendants claiming to be a nation apart from their parent stock. If India was one nation before the advent of Islam, it must remain one in spite of the change of faith of a very large body of her children."
The Congress also gave ample evidence of its hostility towards the Muslims. The excesses of the Congress provincial governments of 1937-39, the Pirpur Report and Fazlul Haq's "Muslims suffering under Congress rule" unveiled the true face of this so-called national party. Quaid-e-Azam saw through the malice and duplicity of the Congress." The Congress", he said, "is a Hindu organisation and wanted the Muslims to come within the ken of the Congress and Hindu Raj."
Most Hindu leaders spoke publicly of driving the Muslims from India as the Spaniards have driven the Moors from Spain. Such threats aroused feelings of deep insecurity among the Muslims and were convinced that they would never get a fair deal at the hands of Hindus.
The arrogance of the Congress, its rapport with the militant forces of Hindu revivalism and its deep animus towards Muslim history and culture compelled the Quaid to take a fresh look at the Hindu- Muslim question. He was convinced that in a United India, Hindu philosophy would reduce the Muslims to an abject state of slavery. He was convinced that the Muslims could save themselves from Hindu domination only by establishing an Independent and sovereign state.
It was hoped that with the division of the sub-continent things would fall into place and the legacy of hatred would fade away. But that was not to be. The Hindu psyche remains as twisted today as it was yesterday. The Hindu leadership has not reconciled itself to the creation of Pakistan .As a big neighbour and as a senior partner in SAARC, it is Bharat's task to remove past suspicions and give credible evidence of its good intentions. But Bharat's record in this respect is not very inspiring. It has repeatedly flouted UN Declarations and refused to recognize the legality of Pakistan's stand. It has waged three wars against Pakistan and spared no means to destroy the very existence of this country. In 1971, it succeeded in mutilating Pakistan and separating its eastern wing. Even today it is trying to crush the defenceless Kashmiris and deprive them of their right to self-determination. Of late, especially after the INDO-US deal, Hindu leadership has become more arrogant and pontifical in its tone.
Behind Bharat's inflated self-assessment lie its ago-old dreams of a Greater Bharat, the revival of the ancient Hindu civilisation and its emergence as a dominant country on the political horizon of the world. That these dreams have not faded and are very much alive can be gauged from a book Defending India, written not long ago by Jaswant Singh. In his view, the South Asian subcontinent-minus China is a distinct strategic unity, comprising countries, as far apart from Delhi as Afghanistan, Tibet and Myanamar. Pakistan and Bangladesh need not be mentioned, as they are two sons of the same soil. In fact, Pakistan is only technically foreign.
Bharat subscribes to a double-faced policy; on the one hand it goes through the motions of negotiating with Pakistan while on the other hand it pursues anti-Pakistan polices and foments trouble in Balochistan and FATA. With its delusion of grandeur, hegemonic ambitions and craving for regional supremacy, Bharat will not descend from its pedestal to parley as an equal with Pakistan. Bharat's syndrome is not new. The Quaid had spotted it 60 years ago. To a question by a Swiss journalist on whether there was any hope of India and Pakistan coming to a peaceful settlement, the Quaid replied, " Yes, provided the Indian government will shed the superiority complex and will deal with Pakistan on an equal footing."
The crucial question is: will Pak-Bharat relations ever become friendly? No, not in the true sense. There may be a semblance of normalcy, a veneer of cordiality but nothing more. The psychic chasm is too wide to be bridged. The Kashmir stalemate will persist. Bharat will continue to drag its feet and offer the flimsiest justification for doing so. Recall its knee-jerk reaction to last months attack on its embassy in Kabul. It promptly accused Pakistan of the crime and warned that provocations could scuttle the peace process. Bharat, in fact, wants Pakistan to freeze the issue! But Pakistan cannot do so. Kashmir is etched on its heart. It cannot erase it at will.
This year Pakistan's 61st Independence Day has come at a time when the country is faced with a number of challenging issues: restoration of judiciary, good governance, galloping inflation, energy crisis, militancy in FATA, NATO threats, US demands and Indo-US nuclear deals. While the issues cited above will be resolved in the foreseeable future, there is one issue that defies resolution; The Kashmir Issue. And all because of the hostility, fear and distrust that lie buried deep in the psyche of the Hindu community. No wonder Bharat has always failed to reach an understanding with Pakistan. All Pak- Bharat summits - General Ayub Khan: Jawaharlal Nehru, Benazir Bhutto: Rajiv Gandhi, Nawaz: I K Gujral, General Musharraf: Atal Behari Vajpayee - have failed or remained inconclusive.
Pakistan's 61st Independence Day should remind us that the Hindu mindset has not changed. Hindus bitterly opposed the Pakistan idea when it was first enunciated. They called it a " vivisection of their motherland." They refused to acknowledge that the Muslims of South Asia constituted a nation. Gandhi said, "I find no parallel in history for a body of converts and their descendants claiming to be a nation apart from their parent stock. If India was one nation before the advent of Islam, it must remain one in spite of the change of faith of a very large body of her children."
The Congress also gave ample evidence of its hostility towards the Muslims. The excesses of the Congress provincial governments of 1937-39, the Pirpur Report and Fazlul Haq's "Muslims suffering under Congress rule" unveiled the true face of this so-called national party. Quaid-e-Azam saw through the malice and duplicity of the Congress." The Congress", he said, "is a Hindu organisation and wanted the Muslims to come within the ken of the Congress and Hindu Raj."
Most Hindu leaders spoke publicly of driving the Muslims from India as the Spaniards have driven the Moors from Spain. Such threats aroused feelings of deep insecurity among the Muslims and were convinced that they would never get a fair deal at the hands of Hindus.
The arrogance of the Congress, its rapport with the militant forces of Hindu revivalism and its deep animus towards Muslim history and culture compelled the Quaid to take a fresh look at the Hindu- Muslim question. He was convinced that in a United India, Hindu philosophy would reduce the Muslims to an abject state of slavery. He was convinced that the Muslims could save themselves from Hindu domination only by establishing an Independent and sovereign state.
It was hoped that with the division of the sub-continent things would fall into place and the legacy of hatred would fade away. But that was not to be. The Hindu psyche remains as twisted today as it was yesterday. The Hindu leadership has not reconciled itself to the creation of Pakistan .As a big neighbour and as a senior partner in SAARC, it is Bharat's task to remove past suspicions and give credible evidence of its good intentions. But Bharat's record in this respect is not very inspiring. It has repeatedly flouted UN Declarations and refused to recognize the legality of Pakistan's stand. It has waged three wars against Pakistan and spared no means to destroy the very existence of this country. In 1971, it succeeded in mutilating Pakistan and separating its eastern wing. Even today it is trying to crush the defenceless Kashmiris and deprive them of their right to self-determination. Of late, especially after the INDO-US deal, Hindu leadership has become more arrogant and pontifical in its tone.
Behind Bharat's inflated self-assessment lie its ago-old dreams of a Greater Bharat, the revival of the ancient Hindu civilisation and its emergence as a dominant country on the political horizon of the world. That these dreams have not faded and are very much alive can be gauged from a book Defending India, written not long ago by Jaswant Singh. In his view, the South Asian subcontinent-minus China is a distinct strategic unity, comprising countries, as far apart from Delhi as Afghanistan, Tibet and Myanamar. Pakistan and Bangladesh need not be mentioned, as they are two sons of the same soil. In fact, Pakistan is only technically foreign.
Bharat subscribes to a double-faced policy; on the one hand it goes through the motions of negotiating with Pakistan while on the other hand it pursues anti-Pakistan polices and foments trouble in Balochistan and FATA. With its delusion of grandeur, hegemonic ambitions and craving for regional supremacy, Bharat will not descend from its pedestal to parley as an equal with Pakistan. Bharat's syndrome is not new. The Quaid had spotted it 60 years ago. To a question by a Swiss journalist on whether there was any hope of India and Pakistan coming to a peaceful settlement, the Quaid replied, " Yes, provided the Indian government will shed the superiority complex and will deal with Pakistan on an equal footing."
The crucial question is: will Pak-Bharat relations ever become friendly? No, not in the true sense. There may be a semblance of normalcy, a veneer of cordiality but nothing more. The psychic chasm is too wide to be bridged. The Kashmir stalemate will persist. Bharat will continue to drag its feet and offer the flimsiest justification for doing so. Recall its knee-jerk reaction to last months attack on its embassy in Kabul. It promptly accused Pakistan of the crime and warned that provocations could scuttle the peace process. Bharat, in fact, wants Pakistan to freeze the issue! But Pakistan cannot do so. Kashmir is etched on its heart. It cannot erase it at will.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
A right jolly mess, what
A right jolly mess, what
By Kamran Shafi
SO then, the Commando has got us into all sorts of trouble, what, by continuing to hang on to the President’s Lodge (née Army House) by his manicured fingernails! Well, what did you expect of someone who wrote (allegedly, for the authorship of that absurd farce seems to rest more on someone else’s shoulders according to Musharraf himself — stand up Humayun Gohar) In the Line of Fire!?
Throughout the debate that has raged between the transitionists and the transformationists (among the latter’s number I proudly count myself) I have begged people to please, please read the book. “Please read the book to really know the extent of the trouble we are in,” I begged everyone.
For in it you see an adolescent in a full general’s uniform — I detest this new Americanism of one-star, three-star and so on — still proud of once being a 12-year-old young thug leading a gang of other urchins and beating people up on the streets of Karachi.
Or, indeed, of doubling up with laughter (alongside his cousins and brothers) when his “Uncle Haider”, allegedly once-upon-a-time an Air Force Academy “sword-carrier” i.e. a cadet under officer, slapped a bald man on the head, not once but twice in Frere Gardens pretending it was someone else. As an Indian reader informed me this was one of the scenes in an Indian film of the day!
Or indeed, in later years being proud of not giving a damn about the rules of behaviour under which gentlemen cadets at the Pakistan Military Academy conducted themselves, the very first being the honour system under which you ensured you did the right thing by yourself.
The instances the man quotes are gob-smacking to say the least. He even congratulates himself for having got away with cheating and taking a shortcut on the infamous nine-mile endurance test in which you had to run/walk nine miles in light FSMO (Field Service Marching Order) in under 90 minutes.
It was a cardinal sin to cheat at PMA, yet he felicitates himself for having been spared relegation to the next lower term, or indeed, being dishonourably discharged from the PMA for the very great crime he committed.
I write this on the early morning of Monday and have already seen some very interesting stories in this same newspaper; exactly the kind of stories you would expect in matters Musharraf. The first is that Rashid Qureshi, his press secretary, has said he is not resigning; no way. Vintage Macho Musharraf!
On the same page there is a long story on how the Americans want him to stay in the country in an “honourable” way after he resigns/is thrown out of office. Now, whilst the Americans are much practised in protecting their stooges who do their bidding — Nuri Al-Maliki in Iraq and Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan, both of whom rely on American security contractors, read under-cover CIA operatives, to provide them close security — why in God’s name should the Americans be concerned about where in the world Musharraf lives after he is made to relinquish his vice-like hold on Pakistan’s jugular?
Could it be possible that the request for “honourable” stay in Pakistan was made by Musharraf himself to his tight buddy Dubya and that the Americans were demanding of the Pakistanis to provide the man the same level of security comprising regular army troops, three diversionary motorcades and so on, as a price of his leaving office? So he can play ‘president, president’ with his buddies forever?
That is, to continue being ‘presidential’ without the responsibility?! Is this Dubya’s parting gift to his “tight” buddy whose “tightness” became ever tighter as more and more Pakistanis (and poor Afghans as reports HRW, one of them a farmer who had a dispute with his neighbour) were sold to the Americans for bounty money at $5000 per?
But why should we the people allow that? Have we forgotten how every single elected leader was seen out of office by the establishment with the active support of the Pakistan army? Have we forgotten that every single time the “bloody civilian” leaders went home they went home via jail, even the hangman’s noose? If they weren’t assassinated and the whole thing shoved under the rather humungous Pakistani carpet, that is?
Why should we forget Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan’s murder in Liaquat Bagh; then Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s judicial murder in Rawalpindi jail; then Nawaz Sharif’s incarceration in Attock Fort and trial in an anti-terrorism court and then exile under the pressure of those whose $s are so valuable to any Pakistani dictator; then Benazir Bhutto’s cruel murder in Liaquat Bagh again with the crime scene being so carefully sanitised within minutes of her killing?
Which reminds me. Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist Ron Suskind’s just-published book The Way of the World: A Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of Extremism says President Musharraf phoned Benazir in Dubai and told her, “Your security is based on the state of our relationship.”
What sort of threat was that? And are we to read into it that Benazir was murdered precisely because she had become distanced from Musharraf in so many ways, even telling friends that she was a marked woman and had been “betrayed”, not only by Musharraf but by the Americans too?
Why then are they asking Musharraf be allowed to have an “honourable” stay in Pakistan? Shouldn’t the charges enumerated above not form part of the 100-page chargesheet the coalition is preparing against the man? Charges ranging from cheating as a so-called ‘gentleman cadet’ to threatening a murdered leader that she would be murdered if she strayed too far from the straight and narrow?
Stop press: on a TV programme called ‘Such to Yeh Hai’ on Monday one of the participants said that parliamentarians would vote according to their zameer on Musharraf’s impeachment motion, and another asked if they would not vote according to ‘General’ Zameer, referring to the infamous former director general of the ISI’s internal wing who was instrumental in manufacturing the PPP Patriots and other such dastardly stuff.
When it came my turn I asked a question of the present government that if it was serious about the impeachment why was it that the chief of the ISI, a man considered close to the general’s family, was still in his job. Especially when it was more than well known that the ISI buys/threatens people to change their political loyalties. The entire reference to the ISI was edited out of the programme.
So much for a free media.
P.S. What was the bounty on Dr Afia Siddqui’s head and who pocketed it please? Could someone tell us?
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
By Kamran Shafi
SO then, the Commando has got us into all sorts of trouble, what, by continuing to hang on to the President’s Lodge (née Army House) by his manicured fingernails! Well, what did you expect of someone who wrote (allegedly, for the authorship of that absurd farce seems to rest more on someone else’s shoulders according to Musharraf himself — stand up Humayun Gohar) In the Line of Fire!?
Throughout the debate that has raged between the transitionists and the transformationists (among the latter’s number I proudly count myself) I have begged people to please, please read the book. “Please read the book to really know the extent of the trouble we are in,” I begged everyone.
For in it you see an adolescent in a full general’s uniform — I detest this new Americanism of one-star, three-star and so on — still proud of once being a 12-year-old young thug leading a gang of other urchins and beating people up on the streets of Karachi.
Or, indeed, of doubling up with laughter (alongside his cousins and brothers) when his “Uncle Haider”, allegedly once-upon-a-time an Air Force Academy “sword-carrier” i.e. a cadet under officer, slapped a bald man on the head, not once but twice in Frere Gardens pretending it was someone else. As an Indian reader informed me this was one of the scenes in an Indian film of the day!
Or indeed, in later years being proud of not giving a damn about the rules of behaviour under which gentlemen cadets at the Pakistan Military Academy conducted themselves, the very first being the honour system under which you ensured you did the right thing by yourself.
The instances the man quotes are gob-smacking to say the least. He even congratulates himself for having got away with cheating and taking a shortcut on the infamous nine-mile endurance test in which you had to run/walk nine miles in light FSMO (Field Service Marching Order) in under 90 minutes.
It was a cardinal sin to cheat at PMA, yet he felicitates himself for having been spared relegation to the next lower term, or indeed, being dishonourably discharged from the PMA for the very great crime he committed.
I write this on the early morning of Monday and have already seen some very interesting stories in this same newspaper; exactly the kind of stories you would expect in matters Musharraf. The first is that Rashid Qureshi, his press secretary, has said he is not resigning; no way. Vintage Macho Musharraf!
On the same page there is a long story on how the Americans want him to stay in the country in an “honourable” way after he resigns/is thrown out of office. Now, whilst the Americans are much practised in protecting their stooges who do their bidding — Nuri Al-Maliki in Iraq and Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan, both of whom rely on American security contractors, read under-cover CIA operatives, to provide them close security — why in God’s name should the Americans be concerned about where in the world Musharraf lives after he is made to relinquish his vice-like hold on Pakistan’s jugular?
Could it be possible that the request for “honourable” stay in Pakistan was made by Musharraf himself to his tight buddy Dubya and that the Americans were demanding of the Pakistanis to provide the man the same level of security comprising regular army troops, three diversionary motorcades and so on, as a price of his leaving office? So he can play ‘president, president’ with his buddies forever?
That is, to continue being ‘presidential’ without the responsibility?! Is this Dubya’s parting gift to his “tight” buddy whose “tightness” became ever tighter as more and more Pakistanis (and poor Afghans as reports HRW, one of them a farmer who had a dispute with his neighbour) were sold to the Americans for bounty money at $5000 per?
But why should we the people allow that? Have we forgotten how every single elected leader was seen out of office by the establishment with the active support of the Pakistan army? Have we forgotten that every single time the “bloody civilian” leaders went home they went home via jail, even the hangman’s noose? If they weren’t assassinated and the whole thing shoved under the rather humungous Pakistani carpet, that is?
Why should we forget Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan’s murder in Liaquat Bagh; then Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s judicial murder in Rawalpindi jail; then Nawaz Sharif’s incarceration in Attock Fort and trial in an anti-terrorism court and then exile under the pressure of those whose $s are so valuable to any Pakistani dictator; then Benazir Bhutto’s cruel murder in Liaquat Bagh again with the crime scene being so carefully sanitised within minutes of her killing?
Which reminds me. Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist Ron Suskind’s just-published book The Way of the World: A Story of Truth and Hope in an Age of Extremism says President Musharraf phoned Benazir in Dubai and told her, “Your security is based on the state of our relationship.”
What sort of threat was that? And are we to read into it that Benazir was murdered precisely because she had become distanced from Musharraf in so many ways, even telling friends that she was a marked woman and had been “betrayed”, not only by Musharraf but by the Americans too?
Why then are they asking Musharraf be allowed to have an “honourable” stay in Pakistan? Shouldn’t the charges enumerated above not form part of the 100-page chargesheet the coalition is preparing against the man? Charges ranging from cheating as a so-called ‘gentleman cadet’ to threatening a murdered leader that she would be murdered if she strayed too far from the straight and narrow?
Stop press: on a TV programme called ‘Such to Yeh Hai’ on Monday one of the participants said that parliamentarians would vote according to their zameer on Musharraf’s impeachment motion, and another asked if they would not vote according to ‘General’ Zameer, referring to the infamous former director general of the ISI’s internal wing who was instrumental in manufacturing the PPP Patriots and other such dastardly stuff.
When it came my turn I asked a question of the present government that if it was serious about the impeachment why was it that the chief of the ISI, a man considered close to the general’s family, was still in his job. Especially when it was more than well known that the ISI buys/threatens people to change their political loyalties. The entire reference to the ISI was edited out of the programme.
So much for a free media.
P.S. What was the bounty on Dr Afia Siddqui’s head and who pocketed it please? Could someone tell us?
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Go for it, Gents
By Kamran Shafi
WHY in God’s name should Asif Zardari go to the White House to beg Dubya’s indulgence to impeach Musharraf?
And why in heaven’s name should Nawaz Sharif accompany him so that Dubya is moved enough to allow the elected government of Pakistan to impeach Musharraf?
If Asif Zardari’s ‘aides’ are to be believed — they leaked such stories to the press two days running last week — Asif had asked Nawaz Sharif to accompany him to DC so that they could, the both of them, stand in The Presence of possibly the most inept, most dangerous leader the US has ever had, and ask his permission to impeach Musharraf.
If the ‘aides’ are to be believed, NS has refused to go. Well, bully for him. What does Dubya have to do with this matter anyway? The ‘aides’ also let slip that Asif Zardari is upset that Nawaz Sharif let him down in the past too: that when Asif Zardari asked him to accompany him to Saudi Arabia to plead for oil on deferred payment, Nawaz Sharif said he would go but refused at the last minute.
Hang on a minute though. A source extremely close to Raiwind told me a month ago that whilst Asif Zardari had mentioned to Nawaz Sharif that they would go to Saudi Arabia together, when the time came Asif Zardari marched off on his own. I believe this version of events because my source is more than impeccable.
This is not the way to do business, sirs, it just is not. The coalition will simply not be able to take the pressures being put on it by irresponsible ‘leaks’ to the press by ‘aides’. As it is, the coalition that most Pakistanis including I fervently hope will stay together and defeat the dictatorship once and for all is already under huge pressure, especially, you guessed it, because of the PPP’s one step forward, five back approach to the impeachment and the judges issue.
Critically, this wishy-washy, neither here nor there, approach by the PPP is hurting itself far more than it is hurting the coalition. A little anecdote: walking three days ago in the Bagh-i-Jinnah, even now known to most Lahoris as Lawrence Gardens, a group of walkers stopped me and asked if I was I.
When told that it was indeed, one of them suggested a live DawnNews show about what they called the ‘retired hurt’ members of the PPP — a group of middle-aged and ageing gentlemen sitting under one of the gazebos in the gardens cooling off after their walk. I walked across to them and talked of this and that and it wasn’t long before it all came spilling out.
It broke my heart to see these 60- and 70-year-old men literally cry tears for what they thought was entirely the wrong path their party was taking. Their anguish was heightened by the publication just that day of the survey by the IRI that told us that fully 86 per cent of Pakistanis thought the country was headed in the wrong direction; 85 per cent demanded the ouster of Pervez Musharraf and 83 per cent wanted the restoration of the judiciary.
“Why can’t Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto’s party do what the people of Pakistan want it to do and move the country forward,” they asked almost in unison. They were a forlorn lot, those good men, but the one positive that came out was that they still had time for democracy and said so too. There was another: a grudging respect for Nawaz Sharif and his sticking by his word. For those who remember that the PPP and the PML-N were daggers drawn in the past this is a refreshing change.
But back to Yousuf Raza Gilani’s trip to the mecca of all Pakistani ‘leaders’, Washington DC (wasn’t China always the first port of call for ‘new’ occupants of our highest offices in the past?): why is Asif Zardari tagging along? Well, if he is going, it will be Gilani who will be tagging along.
But why? After all Yousuf Raza Gilani is the purported prime minister of this luckless country. Is there no thought at all that because Asif is the real power behind Gilani’s chair, Gilani might be completely overshadowed? Also, governments work with governments, not with political party leaders.
Look at India where whilst Sardar Manmohan Singh sits where he does only because Sonia Gandhi wants him to sit there, Sonia Gandhi does not sit in on meetings of Mr Singh with the representatives of foreign governments. Neither does she accompany the prime minister on his foreign tours.
Critically, the Americans have shown their teeth, as it were, where the Commando is concerned. They want him right where he is, if only they can cajole and wheedle Nawaz Sharif from his firm stand that the man be impeached and tried in a court of law. So what is the point of genuflecting to them on this count? Shouldn’t the PPP do the right thing and be done with it?
If the PPP knows what is good for the country and for itself, it will immediately do what the people of Pakistan want it to do. The bells are tolling for democracy one more time, which by the way is fine and dandy as far as I am concerned because that will be the last foray of the Pakistan Army-led venal Establishment into politics.
So go on, Gents, go for it. An important aside: my pal, the good Tahira Abdullah, berated me just last evening, despite the fact that she knows me so well, for using the term ‘Sirs’ — indeed ‘Gents’ — when I refer to the Establishment. She says this is “sexist” of me.
No, not at all. I use the terms with extreme prejudice, because it is men who have brought the country to near ruin, not women. Which woman heads a corps of the Pakistan Army, Tahira? Which woman was ever military dictator of Pakistan?
So, Gents, go for it.
Bushism of the Week: “Throughout our history, the words of the Declaration have inspired immigrants from around the world to set sail to our shores. These immigrants have helped transform 13 small colonies into a great and growing nation of more than 300 people” — President George W. Bush; Charlottesville, Virginia, July 4, 2008
P.S. And, Sirs, be hugely ashamed at what My Lord Ramday said about you on live TV two nights ago.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
WHY in God’s name should Asif Zardari go to the White House to beg Dubya’s indulgence to impeach Musharraf?
And why in heaven’s name should Nawaz Sharif accompany him so that Dubya is moved enough to allow the elected government of Pakistan to impeach Musharraf?
If Asif Zardari’s ‘aides’ are to be believed — they leaked such stories to the press two days running last week — Asif had asked Nawaz Sharif to accompany him to DC so that they could, the both of them, stand in The Presence of possibly the most inept, most dangerous leader the US has ever had, and ask his permission to impeach Musharraf.
If the ‘aides’ are to be believed, NS has refused to go. Well, bully for him. What does Dubya have to do with this matter anyway? The ‘aides’ also let slip that Asif Zardari is upset that Nawaz Sharif let him down in the past too: that when Asif Zardari asked him to accompany him to Saudi Arabia to plead for oil on deferred payment, Nawaz Sharif said he would go but refused at the last minute.
Hang on a minute though. A source extremely close to Raiwind told me a month ago that whilst Asif Zardari had mentioned to Nawaz Sharif that they would go to Saudi Arabia together, when the time came Asif Zardari marched off on his own. I believe this version of events because my source is more than impeccable.
This is not the way to do business, sirs, it just is not. The coalition will simply not be able to take the pressures being put on it by irresponsible ‘leaks’ to the press by ‘aides’. As it is, the coalition that most Pakistanis including I fervently hope will stay together and defeat the dictatorship once and for all is already under huge pressure, especially, you guessed it, because of the PPP’s one step forward, five back approach to the impeachment and the judges issue.
Critically, this wishy-washy, neither here nor there, approach by the PPP is hurting itself far more than it is hurting the coalition. A little anecdote: walking three days ago in the Bagh-i-Jinnah, even now known to most Lahoris as Lawrence Gardens, a group of walkers stopped me and asked if I was I.
When told that it was indeed, one of them suggested a live DawnNews show about what they called the ‘retired hurt’ members of the PPP — a group of middle-aged and ageing gentlemen sitting under one of the gazebos in the gardens cooling off after their walk. I walked across to them and talked of this and that and it wasn’t long before it all came spilling out.
It broke my heart to see these 60- and 70-year-old men literally cry tears for what they thought was entirely the wrong path their party was taking. Their anguish was heightened by the publication just that day of the survey by the IRI that told us that fully 86 per cent of Pakistanis thought the country was headed in the wrong direction; 85 per cent demanded the ouster of Pervez Musharraf and 83 per cent wanted the restoration of the judiciary.
“Why can’t Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto’s party do what the people of Pakistan want it to do and move the country forward,” they asked almost in unison. They were a forlorn lot, those good men, but the one positive that came out was that they still had time for democracy and said so too. There was another: a grudging respect for Nawaz Sharif and his sticking by his word. For those who remember that the PPP and the PML-N were daggers drawn in the past this is a refreshing change.
But back to Yousuf Raza Gilani’s trip to the mecca of all Pakistani ‘leaders’, Washington DC (wasn’t China always the first port of call for ‘new’ occupants of our highest offices in the past?): why is Asif Zardari tagging along? Well, if he is going, it will be Gilani who will be tagging along.
But why? After all Yousuf Raza Gilani is the purported prime minister of this luckless country. Is there no thought at all that because Asif is the real power behind Gilani’s chair, Gilani might be completely overshadowed? Also, governments work with governments, not with political party leaders.
Look at India where whilst Sardar Manmohan Singh sits where he does only because Sonia Gandhi wants him to sit there, Sonia Gandhi does not sit in on meetings of Mr Singh with the representatives of foreign governments. Neither does she accompany the prime minister on his foreign tours.
Critically, the Americans have shown their teeth, as it were, where the Commando is concerned. They want him right where he is, if only they can cajole and wheedle Nawaz Sharif from his firm stand that the man be impeached and tried in a court of law. So what is the point of genuflecting to them on this count? Shouldn’t the PPP do the right thing and be done with it?
If the PPP knows what is good for the country and for itself, it will immediately do what the people of Pakistan want it to do. The bells are tolling for democracy one more time, which by the way is fine and dandy as far as I am concerned because that will be the last foray of the Pakistan Army-led venal Establishment into politics.
So go on, Gents, go for it. An important aside: my pal, the good Tahira Abdullah, berated me just last evening, despite the fact that she knows me so well, for using the term ‘Sirs’ — indeed ‘Gents’ — when I refer to the Establishment. She says this is “sexist” of me.
No, not at all. I use the terms with extreme prejudice, because it is men who have brought the country to near ruin, not women. Which woman heads a corps of the Pakistan Army, Tahira? Which woman was ever military dictator of Pakistan?
So, Gents, go for it.
Bushism of the Week: “Throughout our history, the words of the Declaration have inspired immigrants from around the world to set sail to our shores. These immigrants have helped transform 13 small colonies into a great and growing nation of more than 300 people” — President George W. Bush; Charlottesville, Virginia, July 4, 2008
P.S. And, Sirs, be hugely ashamed at what My Lord Ramday said about you on live TV two nights ago.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Getting away
By Kamran Shafi
HOW absolutely lovely London was in the two weeks that I have been away from the Fatherland visiting my younger boy who lives and works there.
The sun shone almost all of my time there; the thrilling polo final for the Queen’s Cup kept us on the edge of our seats; God was in his heaven, and all seemed well with the world.
Until, that is, out of force of habit, you switched on one of the Pakistani television channels and saw the usual bad news pouring out of the box. Quite apart from the domestic scene, reeks as it does with ill-intent and chicanery and lies and deception and intrigue, what really took the cake was the hairy situation on our Afghan border.
Let me add here that there was a time when we did not have any satellite channels beaming bad news from the Citadel of Islam across the world, when the BBC was the only television channel that carried some news some of the time. One could relax a lot more in those days than one can now. Especially someone like me, who simply cannot cut himself off from what goes on in our country no matter where I am.
But back to the bad news. Leave the stupid ‘Nato’ action that Admiral Mike Mullen, Chief of Joint Staff of the United States, no less, says was “very much by the book” (so much for your ‘protest’ to Nato, Shah Mahmood!) and which killed 11 Pakistani soldiers aside, even little old Karzai, the one with the chogha, a man who hires American contractors to protect himself, has threatened Pakistan with war!
Could this little man have the gumption to challenge his far mightier neighbour (we may be a basket case but compared to Afghanistan even we are a mighty military power) by his lonesome self? Especially when the mass of the people of Afghanistan stand against him and his policies? By golly, we had to see this day too!
This is what the Commando, who clings to the “President’s Lodge” aka Army House by his fingernails, defying the laws of gravity itself(!), has brought this country to, that even refugee Karzai, who and whose family was given succour by this country when they fled Afghanistan 30 years ago, has the temerity to talk down to his great benefactor.
I suppose, however, that Karzai’s gall and supreme confidence grows from the same seed from which grows the Commando’s impudence, nay cheek, too: that of unstinted American (read Dubya administration) support. What a lovely pair, the two of them: both shaming Afghans and Pakistanis by zealously toeing the American line.
There were other matters that upset one no end too: reports that the democratic government had taken a leaf out of the MQM’s book word for word and brought in 40-foot containers to ‘seal off’ parts of Islamabad the Beautiful from the attentions of the long-marchers. Most people who saw that sight immediately said that the government itself had made the long march a success by over-reacting in this way.
‘Super’ Advisor Rehman Malik aka The One Man Demolition Squad was not only credited with the fiasco of the containers which Sherry Rehman told us had been removed but which were brought right back a few hours later showing like nothing else the Super Advisor’s clout.
He also announced that the peace deal painstakingly negotiated by the Frontier government with the Swat militants was no more, for the second time leaving that government reacting with ire to his shenanigans. The first, we remember, was when he machinated an EC announcement that the by-elections had been postponed. One wonders just when the PPP leadership will put a halter on Mister Malik.
If you think that was all that bothered a person such as I, minding his own business in salubrious London Town, you are mistaken. Far more upsetting than any of Mister Malik’s handiwork were reports in the press that the Governor, Punjab, is about to press the boy Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari into service, politicking in the Punjab come August and the young man comes home on leave from his college at Oxford.
Whilst there is no shortage of foolishness and self-serving nonsense that one comes across in the Fatherland on a daily basis, I have not heard of a worse idea in decades. I mean this one absolutely reeks of a hard-heartedness and selfishness and outright cruelty such as few ideas before it.
Bilawal, from all that one knows about him, is a gentle and intelligent young man who is intent on studying further. He is only in his first year at university, and from what we hear, is doing well at his studies. More than this, he comes from a long line of well-read politicians on his maternal side: his grand-father, the ever-popular and iconic Zulfikar Ali Bhutto excelling at studies in two of the finest universities in the world: Berkeley and Oxford and his mother, another Pakistani icon, following in her father’s footsteps by attending Radcliffe and Oxford.
Both went on to achieve the highest honour a people can bestow on any one. The father founded the Pakistan Peoples Party and took it to victory in the elections in West Pakistan, sweeping all before it. He became the country’s leader after East Pakistan broke away as a result of decades of mistrust and bad treatment at the hands of the West Pakistani ruling elite.
What a leader he was too, picking up the pieces of a truncated Pakistan and giving it some little respect after negotiating a quite impossible deal with India which had steamrolled our forces in 1971 and taken 90,000 prisoners of war, mainly army; and vast tracts of land in the West too.
The daughter too became prime minister in her own right, the first time ten years after her father was judicially murdered; and when she was criminally removed from office, once again five years later for another three, when her own friends stabbed her in the back.
Bilawal, therefore, has a rich heritage to look after. But, Laat Sahib Punjab Bahadur, let the kid be. For God’s sake. Let him get on with college and complete his studies so that he can better prepare himself for the long struggle against dictatorship which is not about to let go of real power in our country in a hurry.
Bushism of the Week: “And so the fact that they purchased the machine meant somebody had to make the machine. And when somebody makes a machine, it means there’s jobs at the machine-making place” — President George W Bush, visiting the Silverado Cable Co., Mesa, Ariz., May 27, 2008.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
HOW absolutely lovely London was in the two weeks that I have been away from the Fatherland visiting my younger boy who lives and works there.
The sun shone almost all of my time there; the thrilling polo final for the Queen’s Cup kept us on the edge of our seats; God was in his heaven, and all seemed well with the world.
Until, that is, out of force of habit, you switched on one of the Pakistani television channels and saw the usual bad news pouring out of the box. Quite apart from the domestic scene, reeks as it does with ill-intent and chicanery and lies and deception and intrigue, what really took the cake was the hairy situation on our Afghan border.
Let me add here that there was a time when we did not have any satellite channels beaming bad news from the Citadel of Islam across the world, when the BBC was the only television channel that carried some news some of the time. One could relax a lot more in those days than one can now. Especially someone like me, who simply cannot cut himself off from what goes on in our country no matter where I am.
But back to the bad news. Leave the stupid ‘Nato’ action that Admiral Mike Mullen, Chief of Joint Staff of the United States, no less, says was “very much by the book” (so much for your ‘protest’ to Nato, Shah Mahmood!) and which killed 11 Pakistani soldiers aside, even little old Karzai, the one with the chogha, a man who hires American contractors to protect himself, has threatened Pakistan with war!
Could this little man have the gumption to challenge his far mightier neighbour (we may be a basket case but compared to Afghanistan even we are a mighty military power) by his lonesome self? Especially when the mass of the people of Afghanistan stand against him and his policies? By golly, we had to see this day too!
This is what the Commando, who clings to the “President’s Lodge” aka Army House by his fingernails, defying the laws of gravity itself(!), has brought this country to, that even refugee Karzai, who and whose family was given succour by this country when they fled Afghanistan 30 years ago, has the temerity to talk down to his great benefactor.
I suppose, however, that Karzai’s gall and supreme confidence grows from the same seed from which grows the Commando’s impudence, nay cheek, too: that of unstinted American (read Dubya administration) support. What a lovely pair, the two of them: both shaming Afghans and Pakistanis by zealously toeing the American line.
There were other matters that upset one no end too: reports that the democratic government had taken a leaf out of the MQM’s book word for word and brought in 40-foot containers to ‘seal off’ parts of Islamabad the Beautiful from the attentions of the long-marchers. Most people who saw that sight immediately said that the government itself had made the long march a success by over-reacting in this way.
‘Super’ Advisor Rehman Malik aka The One Man Demolition Squad was not only credited with the fiasco of the containers which Sherry Rehman told us had been removed but which were brought right back a few hours later showing like nothing else the Super Advisor’s clout.
He also announced that the peace deal painstakingly negotiated by the Frontier government with the Swat militants was no more, for the second time leaving that government reacting with ire to his shenanigans. The first, we remember, was when he machinated an EC announcement that the by-elections had been postponed. One wonders just when the PPP leadership will put a halter on Mister Malik.
If you think that was all that bothered a person such as I, minding his own business in salubrious London Town, you are mistaken. Far more upsetting than any of Mister Malik’s handiwork were reports in the press that the Governor, Punjab, is about to press the boy Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari into service, politicking in the Punjab come August and the young man comes home on leave from his college at Oxford.
Whilst there is no shortage of foolishness and self-serving nonsense that one comes across in the Fatherland on a daily basis, I have not heard of a worse idea in decades. I mean this one absolutely reeks of a hard-heartedness and selfishness and outright cruelty such as few ideas before it.
Bilawal, from all that one knows about him, is a gentle and intelligent young man who is intent on studying further. He is only in his first year at university, and from what we hear, is doing well at his studies. More than this, he comes from a long line of well-read politicians on his maternal side: his grand-father, the ever-popular and iconic Zulfikar Ali Bhutto excelling at studies in two of the finest universities in the world: Berkeley and Oxford and his mother, another Pakistani icon, following in her father’s footsteps by attending Radcliffe and Oxford.
Both went on to achieve the highest honour a people can bestow on any one. The father founded the Pakistan Peoples Party and took it to victory in the elections in West Pakistan, sweeping all before it. He became the country’s leader after East Pakistan broke away as a result of decades of mistrust and bad treatment at the hands of the West Pakistani ruling elite.
What a leader he was too, picking up the pieces of a truncated Pakistan and giving it some little respect after negotiating a quite impossible deal with India which had steamrolled our forces in 1971 and taken 90,000 prisoners of war, mainly army; and vast tracts of land in the West too.
The daughter too became prime minister in her own right, the first time ten years after her father was judicially murdered; and when she was criminally removed from office, once again five years later for another three, when her own friends stabbed her in the back.
Bilawal, therefore, has a rich heritage to look after. But, Laat Sahib Punjab Bahadur, let the kid be. For God’s sake. Let him get on with college and complete his studies so that he can better prepare himself for the long struggle against dictatorship which is not about to let go of real power in our country in a hurry.
Bushism of the Week: “And so the fact that they purchased the machine meant somebody had to make the machine. And when somebody makes a machine, it means there’s jobs at the machine-making place” — President George W Bush, visiting the Silverado Cable Co., Mesa, Ariz., May 27, 2008.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Really, sirs!
By Kamran Shafi
I mean, really sirs! What is all this about the whole shebang being in imminent danger of collapse through another intervention by the men on horseback, some would say in our case, on donkey back? Several op-ed writers are going blue in the face reminding us of the ‘danger’ that lurks.
Some of them, aghast at our stupidity, ask if we did not know that the Pakistan Army considers Pervez Musharraf the legitimately elected President of Pakistan! And that it would therefore do what it had to do to ensure that he stays president for all of his (so-called) term! They do not explain, of course, why the army should be in so exalted a position, and if indeed it is, why it should be allowed to maintain it so that it is the arbiter of what is constitutional or not, legitimate or not.
Others tell us that if there was any move at impeaching the man/hauling him up before a court of law, the army would consider it was being tried as an institution, and would therefore, ‘act’! They leave the rest to our imagination as Pakistanis who have seen army intervention all of our miserable lives. They do not explain how the army would have the gall to go against as clear a verdict as that delivered against Musharraf on Feb 18, 2008.
What utter tripe and nonsense! In so many ways, that it isn’t even funny. For, just look at the four army interventions and what state the country was left in after respective dictators left the scene. Ayub Khan laid the foundation stone of corruption and of the break-up of Pakistan; Yahya Khan saw the job through — boy did he! — in the process making it convenient for the army to be humiliated as few armed forces have been humiliated.
Then came the beauty Ziaul Haq who brought the country drugs and the Kalashnikov and obscurantism and sectarianism and hate and strife; followed by the general who drove a knife into the very heart of Pakistan by his macho and swaggering attitude towards the smaller provinces: “They won’t know what hit them”, when he engineered, say, the murder of Nawab Bugti and the tamasha in Fata.
And towards politics in general, speaking down to the main political parties and their leaders and putting in his lot with what he thought would be more pliable partners, the Chaudhrys. In view of the above, how many times should one have to say that the sooner the army acts and overthrows our emerging democracy the better for democracy and by extension, for the people of the country? For we shall then be rid of any last vestiges of respect some Pakistanis still have for the army.
For, quite apart from the fact that martial laws in Pakistan have always been dismal failures in every way and in every single department of governance, this last experiment takes the cake for being The Mother of Inept Governance. As our American friends would say, Gen (retd) Musharraf spectacularly failed, ‘every which way’, to provide the country even a semblance of governance.
Whether it is the food crisis with flour virtually unavailable, and when it is, at exorbitant prices; to the lies told to the nation re: its economic health by shamelessly massaging the figures; to not one new electricity generating plant set up in the nine very long years that he held the country by its throat; to delaying a hike in POL products and therefore in every consumer item just to help the King’s party in the elections, his rule was an unmitigated disaster.
Indeed, reflect upon the disastrous way in which Pakistan’s relations with America were/are going if only because of his thoughtless and self-serving subservience to American dictates in virtually every department of statecraft.
Indeed, many of us writing in the press cautioned Musharraf repeatedly that America would not stand as a silent spectator while he went about running with the hare and hunting with the hounds as re: the way he was handling Fata: now running hot, now running cold, and standing the whole political system there, on its head.
But wait. Did one of the ‘official sources’, read the President’s Lodge (once Army House), not say as recently as April 6, that Musharraf was only staying on in the President’s Lodge because if he were to leave office the Americans would attack Fata?! So what was this attack all about then? Could it have been a warning from Dubya that his buddy should be let alone, or else?
No sirs, no. If the English, under orders of parliament could dig the corpses of Oliver Cromwell who overthrew parliament in his coup as a warning to other wannabe dictators, why can we not try Musharraf in a court of law?
To the matter of the judges restoration now: how is it that Aitzaz Ahsan is now being vilified by op-ed writers mentioned above, and who side openly and subjectively with the dying (or is it?) dictatorship and its henchmen? I thought Aitzaz stood up for what is right and moral and constitutional when he opposed the acts of a uniformed general to sack the superior judiciary! A general, mark, who admits he acted illegally and unconstitutionally!
I have oft said, in these very pages, that Pakistan is indeed a ‘unique’ country, and we a very ‘unique’ people. I must be right!
As to the behaviour of the People’s Party, silly constitutional package and all, all one can say is that it is shameful beyond words; and that unless its downward spiral is halted immediately if not sooner the party will simply disintegrate.
Finally, even if you take Sherry Rehman’s assurances that the government of the Citadel of Islam had nothing in the world to do with the re-banning of two talk shows as the truth, shame on the federal government for allowing the Dubai authorities to do what they have done, and therefore giving the PPP a bad name.
What sort of government is it that, unbeknownst to it, any Tom, Dick or Harry can get up and telephone someone in Dubai and two popular shows go off the air?
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
I mean, really sirs! What is all this about the whole shebang being in imminent danger of collapse through another intervention by the men on horseback, some would say in our case, on donkey back? Several op-ed writers are going blue in the face reminding us of the ‘danger’ that lurks.
Some of them, aghast at our stupidity, ask if we did not know that the Pakistan Army considers Pervez Musharraf the legitimately elected President of Pakistan! And that it would therefore do what it had to do to ensure that he stays president for all of his (so-called) term! They do not explain, of course, why the army should be in so exalted a position, and if indeed it is, why it should be allowed to maintain it so that it is the arbiter of what is constitutional or not, legitimate or not.
Others tell us that if there was any move at impeaching the man/hauling him up before a court of law, the army would consider it was being tried as an institution, and would therefore, ‘act’! They leave the rest to our imagination as Pakistanis who have seen army intervention all of our miserable lives. They do not explain how the army would have the gall to go against as clear a verdict as that delivered against Musharraf on Feb 18, 2008.
What utter tripe and nonsense! In so many ways, that it isn’t even funny. For, just look at the four army interventions and what state the country was left in after respective dictators left the scene. Ayub Khan laid the foundation stone of corruption and of the break-up of Pakistan; Yahya Khan saw the job through — boy did he! — in the process making it convenient for the army to be humiliated as few armed forces have been humiliated.
Then came the beauty Ziaul Haq who brought the country drugs and the Kalashnikov and obscurantism and sectarianism and hate and strife; followed by the general who drove a knife into the very heart of Pakistan by his macho and swaggering attitude towards the smaller provinces: “They won’t know what hit them”, when he engineered, say, the murder of Nawab Bugti and the tamasha in Fata.
And towards politics in general, speaking down to the main political parties and their leaders and putting in his lot with what he thought would be more pliable partners, the Chaudhrys. In view of the above, how many times should one have to say that the sooner the army acts and overthrows our emerging democracy the better for democracy and by extension, for the people of the country? For we shall then be rid of any last vestiges of respect some Pakistanis still have for the army.
For, quite apart from the fact that martial laws in Pakistan have always been dismal failures in every way and in every single department of governance, this last experiment takes the cake for being The Mother of Inept Governance. As our American friends would say, Gen (retd) Musharraf spectacularly failed, ‘every which way’, to provide the country even a semblance of governance.
Whether it is the food crisis with flour virtually unavailable, and when it is, at exorbitant prices; to the lies told to the nation re: its economic health by shamelessly massaging the figures; to not one new electricity generating plant set up in the nine very long years that he held the country by its throat; to delaying a hike in POL products and therefore in every consumer item just to help the King’s party in the elections, his rule was an unmitigated disaster.
Indeed, reflect upon the disastrous way in which Pakistan’s relations with America were/are going if only because of his thoughtless and self-serving subservience to American dictates in virtually every department of statecraft.
Indeed, many of us writing in the press cautioned Musharraf repeatedly that America would not stand as a silent spectator while he went about running with the hare and hunting with the hounds as re: the way he was handling Fata: now running hot, now running cold, and standing the whole political system there, on its head.
But wait. Did one of the ‘official sources’, read the President’s Lodge (once Army House), not say as recently as April 6, that Musharraf was only staying on in the President’s Lodge because if he were to leave office the Americans would attack Fata?! So what was this attack all about then? Could it have been a warning from Dubya that his buddy should be let alone, or else?
No sirs, no. If the English, under orders of parliament could dig the corpses of Oliver Cromwell who overthrew parliament in his coup as a warning to other wannabe dictators, why can we not try Musharraf in a court of law?
To the matter of the judges restoration now: how is it that Aitzaz Ahsan is now being vilified by op-ed writers mentioned above, and who side openly and subjectively with the dying (or is it?) dictatorship and its henchmen? I thought Aitzaz stood up for what is right and moral and constitutional when he opposed the acts of a uniformed general to sack the superior judiciary! A general, mark, who admits he acted illegally and unconstitutionally!
I have oft said, in these very pages, that Pakistan is indeed a ‘unique’ country, and we a very ‘unique’ people. I must be right!
As to the behaviour of the People’s Party, silly constitutional package and all, all one can say is that it is shameful beyond words; and that unless its downward spiral is halted immediately if not sooner the party will simply disintegrate.
Finally, even if you take Sherry Rehman’s assurances that the government of the Citadel of Islam had nothing in the world to do with the re-banning of two talk shows as the truth, shame on the federal government for allowing the Dubai authorities to do what they have done, and therefore giving the PPP a bad name.
What sort of government is it that, unbeknownst to it, any Tom, Dick or Harry can get up and telephone someone in Dubai and two popular shows go off the air?
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Politicians must stand by their word
Politicians must stand by their word
By Kamran Shafi
SEVERAL readers have sent me emails asking what I meant by the term ‘Shamelessness Quotient’ in an earlier article. Let me clarify. Just as there is an Intelligence Quotient (IQ) in every being, denoting his or her or its intelligence, there is a Shamelessness Quotient (SQ) too, denoting the degree of his or her or its shamelessness. More about which later.
Straight to the establishment now and to its new mantra, mouthed ever shrilly by its agents and many good people too. And that is that there are matters other than the restoration of the judiciary (that was dismissed by a chief of army staff after he suspended the constitution, mark) that need the politicians’ attention. An action, mark again, the man himself said was “illegal and unconstitutional”.
These agents and almost-agents among whose number the largest political party in the country, a political party that spans the federation and which is considered by many including myself a national asset might soon be counted, also pour scorn on the PML-N and particularly its leader Nawaz Sharif for its/his ‘stubbornness’ in insisting on the resolution of the judges’ issue before anything else.
While it is absolutely right that the country has been left in such an unholy mess by the Commando and Friends (Pvt.) Ltd., that there is much wrong with it which demands immediate attention, why is sticking to one’s word now a matter of denigration? Are we that changed because of repeated interventions by the army that we no longer have any sense of right and wrong, honour and dishonour?
Or are we to think that it is correct for politicians to say one thing and do entirely another? Are we to consider, then, that the shifting stand of the PPP is correct and beyond reproach? That Asif Zardari was right when he said that the PPP had merely signed a political statement in the Bhurban Accord, not written Ahadees? And that Nawaz Sharif was wrong in standing by his word?
Why cannot those who criticise the politicians that stand by their promise to see to it that the judiciary is restored to its Nov 2, 2007, position, appreciate the fact that the real problem is the almost decade-long dictatorship that has to be got rid of in very many more ways than one? And that the real culprit in this whole drama is the Commando and his foreign masters aided and abetted by certain politicians and wannabe politicians, led ably by those that today lead the People’s Party’s leadership by the nose?
But what a tamasha has been made of our country, seen on YouTube too, that an official as high as the chairman of the Federal Bureau of Revenue, a former federal secretary, should be dancing nautch-girl style for his boss, the Commando, and an assemblage of upwards of 100 people including the Private Banker with the smarmy smile.
Whilst I agree absolutely with those who hold that people can do as they please in their private time and that it is not right to show their acts to the public, I have to say that when you are partying at government expense, it can’t be a private matter.
Which brings me to ask, when the agony of this country will end? What a sigh of relief many heaved last week when rumours of the president’s imminent departure were heard — it was as if a huge weight had been lifted off one’s shoulders.
Yet here we are still saddled with him, with the quite sorry-looking George Dubya Bush phoning his tight buddy and assuring him of his undying love and support. While Dubya himself is embattled and disgraced like never before as all of his lies and half-truths are caught out, the latest knife in his side coming from none other than his own former press secretary, he still has the gall to telephone the Commando and interfere so blatantly in Pakistan’s internal affairs.
We talked about the Shamelessness Quotient (SQ) earlier on, and while I had remarked some weeks ago that the Commando’s seemed higher than we thought, I have to say now that it must be very high indeed. The people of Pakistan want him out and yet he clings to his illegally attained (as admitted by himself) office.
More than which, he is now seen as more of a Bush stooge than ever before.Bushism of the week: “You know, when you give a man more money in his pocket — in this case, a woman more money in her pocket to expand a business, it — they build new buildings. And when somebody builds a new building somebody has got to come and build the building. And when the building expanded it prevented additional opportunities for people to work.” — President George W Bush; Lancaster, Pa., Oct. 3, 2007.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
By Kamran Shafi
SEVERAL readers have sent me emails asking what I meant by the term ‘Shamelessness Quotient’ in an earlier article. Let me clarify. Just as there is an Intelligence Quotient (IQ) in every being, denoting his or her or its intelligence, there is a Shamelessness Quotient (SQ) too, denoting the degree of his or her or its shamelessness. More about which later.
Straight to the establishment now and to its new mantra, mouthed ever shrilly by its agents and many good people too. And that is that there are matters other than the restoration of the judiciary (that was dismissed by a chief of army staff after he suspended the constitution, mark) that need the politicians’ attention. An action, mark again, the man himself said was “illegal and unconstitutional”.
These agents and almost-agents among whose number the largest political party in the country, a political party that spans the federation and which is considered by many including myself a national asset might soon be counted, also pour scorn on the PML-N and particularly its leader Nawaz Sharif for its/his ‘stubbornness’ in insisting on the resolution of the judges’ issue before anything else.
While it is absolutely right that the country has been left in such an unholy mess by the Commando and Friends (Pvt.) Ltd., that there is much wrong with it which demands immediate attention, why is sticking to one’s word now a matter of denigration? Are we that changed because of repeated interventions by the army that we no longer have any sense of right and wrong, honour and dishonour?
Or are we to think that it is correct for politicians to say one thing and do entirely another? Are we to consider, then, that the shifting stand of the PPP is correct and beyond reproach? That Asif Zardari was right when he said that the PPP had merely signed a political statement in the Bhurban Accord, not written Ahadees? And that Nawaz Sharif was wrong in standing by his word?
Why cannot those who criticise the politicians that stand by their promise to see to it that the judiciary is restored to its Nov 2, 2007, position, appreciate the fact that the real problem is the almost decade-long dictatorship that has to be got rid of in very many more ways than one? And that the real culprit in this whole drama is the Commando and his foreign masters aided and abetted by certain politicians and wannabe politicians, led ably by those that today lead the People’s Party’s leadership by the nose?
But what a tamasha has been made of our country, seen on YouTube too, that an official as high as the chairman of the Federal Bureau of Revenue, a former federal secretary, should be dancing nautch-girl style for his boss, the Commando, and an assemblage of upwards of 100 people including the Private Banker with the smarmy smile.
Whilst I agree absolutely with those who hold that people can do as they please in their private time and that it is not right to show their acts to the public, I have to say that when you are partying at government expense, it can’t be a private matter.
Which brings me to ask, when the agony of this country will end? What a sigh of relief many heaved last week when rumours of the president’s imminent departure were heard — it was as if a huge weight had been lifted off one’s shoulders.
Yet here we are still saddled with him, with the quite sorry-looking George Dubya Bush phoning his tight buddy and assuring him of his undying love and support. While Dubya himself is embattled and disgraced like never before as all of his lies and half-truths are caught out, the latest knife in his side coming from none other than his own former press secretary, he still has the gall to telephone the Commando and interfere so blatantly in Pakistan’s internal affairs.
We talked about the Shamelessness Quotient (SQ) earlier on, and while I had remarked some weeks ago that the Commando’s seemed higher than we thought, I have to say now that it must be very high indeed. The people of Pakistan want him out and yet he clings to his illegally attained (as admitted by himself) office.
More than which, he is now seen as more of a Bush stooge than ever before.Bushism of the week: “You know, when you give a man more money in his pocket — in this case, a woman more money in her pocket to expand a business, it — they build new buildings. And when somebody builds a new building somebody has got to come and build the building. And when the building expanded it prevented additional opportunities for people to work.” — President George W Bush; Lancaster, Pa., Oct. 3, 2007.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Now for the transformation
By Kamran Shafi
I HAVE to start this week’s piece by alluding to the reaction to last week’s article in which I had criticised the army’s indulging in the retail business. A correspondent writing in the letters’ section even accused me of ‘army-bashing’.
Not true, not even remotely. I have been writing in the national press for over 25 years now, and have always acknowledged the army as my second mother: I did join it as a very young boy of 19 after all, and spent some of the best years of my life in it, learning some great lessons that made officers and, hopefully, gentlemen of us.
I hasten to add that I was always in thrall to the Pakistan Army Act unlike the Commando; I always had the utmost respect for my commanding officers unlike the Commando; I was in no way as macho as the Commando. I was just a run-of-the-mill officer who tried to follow the dictates of good order and military discipline at all times. And when I failed I jolly well said sorry, again unlike the Commando.
That is why old soldiers like I get saddened and dismayed, indeed enraged when we see the army running real estate agencies and marriage halls, and bakeries and tikka and fast-food joints out of army officers’ messes. We are ashamed when we see officers’ messes renting out part of their premises to commercial organisations like banks, and when we see poultry and fish farms within unit lines.
We are astonished at the extent of the all-pervasive greed, for what else can one call it, and the free-for-all way in which the army high command has allowed it to grow. Go to the local flyblown bazaar at Marala Headworks near Sialkot and you will see a shop run by the local unit selling biscuits and toothpaste and what have you, a uniformed soldier standing behind the counter; go to Skardu and you will find a pastry and cake shop run by the Northern Light Infantry (once upon a time the Gilgit Scouts of legend, and the courageous Karakoram Scouts), a havaldar and two sepoys serving the customers.
As to the criticism that I wrote about the Mardan tragedy so close to its happening, the whole point was to bring into stark relief the fact that if the army was not into the retail business in such a big way that it was running its own marketplace where all comers were welcome and the more the merrier, mayhap the bombers would have found it slightly more difficult to do their dastardly act.
The point has to be made that all over the world, the armed forces stay within their own barracks and forts and, in the case of the subcontinent, cantonments. The United States; the United Kingdom; China; Russia; India; you name it, and units of the armed forces live and work within a secure environment. They do not sell merchandise in open markets and expose themselves to easy attack.
Just outside Washington DC is Fort Myers, among hundreds of other defence installations across the country, which you enter after only the most stringent checks. In the UK, there is the area of Salisbury Plain with its no-go areas for non-military persons. Even the Chelsea Barracks in the heart of London are off-limits to all except defence personnel, as are the Horse Guards and Household Cavalry. I must add here too that none of the above lend their premises for wedding receptions; none of their messes serve burgers and fries and fish and chips to the general public.
No army in the world sells state-owned land to its officers at throwaway prices, who then make a killing selling it to civilians in so-called Defence Housing and ‘General’ colonies. No army in the world runs banks (with the sole exception of the Thai Army which too is a state within a state) and travel agencies and security companies either.
It simply is not enough that the army withdraw some of its senior officers from high-profile civilian jobs. It must disengage itself from all commercial activities, particularly at this dangerous time when it is in the vanguard of the so-called war on terror, and is consequently the target of those that feel wronged by America’s not-so-sensitive attitude towards collateral damage.
A word about the leak in the papers about the possible sacking of Ashfaq Kayani. No one takes it as merely ‘malicious gossip’ please, for it comes from a ‘renowned defence analyst’, my old friend Ikram Sehgal. Ikram does not write carelessly, especially about such high-profile matters. There simply has to be some fire there somewhere. Perhaps set by an increasingly beleaguered Commando, thinking there was no harm in testing the wind by indulging in a little kite-flying.
For we are in the middle of sorting ourselves out: the political forces are trying to chart their way through the maze put into place by the Commando, a maze that has his own agents hidden within it. There are implied threats being made by the Commando and said agents, and so on. Why can the Americans not leave us in peace at this time so we can try and salvage whatever we can of this blessed country in our own way?
As to the threats, I am one of those that want the Commando to act NOW, not tomorrow. Let him dismiss the assemblies for all I care; let him sack the army chief and appoint his own relative (as ‘maliciously’ rumoured) for all I care: let the Commando do whatever he wants. For therein lies our salvation. For it is only then that the true and very ugly face of the state of Pakistan will really stare the people in the eye. And it is only then that we shall truly transform this country from a dictatorship to a true democracy.
Some weeks ago, I had counselled the Pakistan People’s Party to keep it simple and to do what it had promised to do, not once, but twice, both times going back on its word: restore the judges wrongly removed by a chief of army staff. It is imperative that this be done in accord with advice from the best legal brains in the country, through a simple executive order. The party will hurt itself very deeply if it continues to obfuscate matters.
Bushism of the week: “The folks who conducted to act on our country on Sept 11 made a big mistake. They underestimated America. They underestimated our resolve, our determination, our love for freedom. The misunderestimated the fact that we love a neighbour in need. They misunderestimated the compassion of our country. I think they misunderestimated the will and determination of the commander-in-chief, too.” — President George W Bush, Langley, Virginia, Sept 26, 2001.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
I HAVE to start this week’s piece by alluding to the reaction to last week’s article in which I had criticised the army’s indulging in the retail business. A correspondent writing in the letters’ section even accused me of ‘army-bashing’.
Not true, not even remotely. I have been writing in the national press for over 25 years now, and have always acknowledged the army as my second mother: I did join it as a very young boy of 19 after all, and spent some of the best years of my life in it, learning some great lessons that made officers and, hopefully, gentlemen of us.
I hasten to add that I was always in thrall to the Pakistan Army Act unlike the Commando; I always had the utmost respect for my commanding officers unlike the Commando; I was in no way as macho as the Commando. I was just a run-of-the-mill officer who tried to follow the dictates of good order and military discipline at all times. And when I failed I jolly well said sorry, again unlike the Commando.
That is why old soldiers like I get saddened and dismayed, indeed enraged when we see the army running real estate agencies and marriage halls, and bakeries and tikka and fast-food joints out of army officers’ messes. We are ashamed when we see officers’ messes renting out part of their premises to commercial organisations like banks, and when we see poultry and fish farms within unit lines.
We are astonished at the extent of the all-pervasive greed, for what else can one call it, and the free-for-all way in which the army high command has allowed it to grow. Go to the local flyblown bazaar at Marala Headworks near Sialkot and you will see a shop run by the local unit selling biscuits and toothpaste and what have you, a uniformed soldier standing behind the counter; go to Skardu and you will find a pastry and cake shop run by the Northern Light Infantry (once upon a time the Gilgit Scouts of legend, and the courageous Karakoram Scouts), a havaldar and two sepoys serving the customers.
As to the criticism that I wrote about the Mardan tragedy so close to its happening, the whole point was to bring into stark relief the fact that if the army was not into the retail business in such a big way that it was running its own marketplace where all comers were welcome and the more the merrier, mayhap the bombers would have found it slightly more difficult to do their dastardly act.
The point has to be made that all over the world, the armed forces stay within their own barracks and forts and, in the case of the subcontinent, cantonments. The United States; the United Kingdom; China; Russia; India; you name it, and units of the armed forces live and work within a secure environment. They do not sell merchandise in open markets and expose themselves to easy attack.
Just outside Washington DC is Fort Myers, among hundreds of other defence installations across the country, which you enter after only the most stringent checks. In the UK, there is the area of Salisbury Plain with its no-go areas for non-military persons. Even the Chelsea Barracks in the heart of London are off-limits to all except defence personnel, as are the Horse Guards and Household Cavalry. I must add here too that none of the above lend their premises for wedding receptions; none of their messes serve burgers and fries and fish and chips to the general public.
No army in the world sells state-owned land to its officers at throwaway prices, who then make a killing selling it to civilians in so-called Defence Housing and ‘General’ colonies. No army in the world runs banks (with the sole exception of the Thai Army which too is a state within a state) and travel agencies and security companies either.
It simply is not enough that the army withdraw some of its senior officers from high-profile civilian jobs. It must disengage itself from all commercial activities, particularly at this dangerous time when it is in the vanguard of the so-called war on terror, and is consequently the target of those that feel wronged by America’s not-so-sensitive attitude towards collateral damage.
A word about the leak in the papers about the possible sacking of Ashfaq Kayani. No one takes it as merely ‘malicious gossip’ please, for it comes from a ‘renowned defence analyst’, my old friend Ikram Sehgal. Ikram does not write carelessly, especially about such high-profile matters. There simply has to be some fire there somewhere. Perhaps set by an increasingly beleaguered Commando, thinking there was no harm in testing the wind by indulging in a little kite-flying.
For we are in the middle of sorting ourselves out: the political forces are trying to chart their way through the maze put into place by the Commando, a maze that has his own agents hidden within it. There are implied threats being made by the Commando and said agents, and so on. Why can the Americans not leave us in peace at this time so we can try and salvage whatever we can of this blessed country in our own way?
As to the threats, I am one of those that want the Commando to act NOW, not tomorrow. Let him dismiss the assemblies for all I care; let him sack the army chief and appoint his own relative (as ‘maliciously’ rumoured) for all I care: let the Commando do whatever he wants. For therein lies our salvation. For it is only then that the true and very ugly face of the state of Pakistan will really stare the people in the eye. And it is only then that we shall truly transform this country from a dictatorship to a true democracy.
Some weeks ago, I had counselled the Pakistan People’s Party to keep it simple and to do what it had promised to do, not once, but twice, both times going back on its word: restore the judges wrongly removed by a chief of army staff. It is imperative that this be done in accord with advice from the best legal brains in the country, through a simple executive order. The party will hurt itself very deeply if it continues to obfuscate matters.
Bushism of the week: “The folks who conducted to act on our country on Sept 11 made a big mistake. They underestimated America. They underestimated our resolve, our determination, our love for freedom. The misunderestimated the fact that we love a neighbour in need. They misunderestimated the compassion of our country. I think they misunderestimated the will and determination of the commander-in-chief, too.” — President George W Bush, Langley, Virginia, Sept 26, 2001.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Shame, all around
By Kamran Shafi
Sadly, a suicide bombing targeted the Punjab Regimental Centre bakery in the PRC market in Mardan, killing upwards of 14 people, most of them soldiers, and leaving many injured seriously, some maimed for life.
How many reams have been written about the complete inappropriateness of the army indulging in the retail business? What in heaven’s name have we made of this army? Rather than making political statements might one ask Ashfaq Kayani to please shake it awake, pull it out of the shops and the bakeries and the tikka joints and the real-estate agencies, and train it to do the job the nation pays it for? And while he is at it, to please initiate the shelving of the grand plans to build a new GHQ in Islamabad, an utter and huge waste of the country’s very meagre resources?
While we are on the subject of the army, may one ask the Punjab government to reclaim Birdwood Barracks in Lahore, which are up for auction by the Military Estates Officer for a reserve price of Rs500m being of no further use to the army, and turn it into a park for the citizens of the congested city of Lahore?
And may one ask the cabinet division to immediately issue a notification to the effect that no ministry can do as it pleases with lands under its present use. That all lands in the use of the various ministries are lands belonging to the GOVERNMENT of the country/of the province concerned, merely lent to the particular ministry for use. When that use is over it is the government that must decide what to do with the land, e.g., sell it for providing clean drinking water to, say, Karachi city.
It is preposterous that such lands are considered the ownership of the service concerned particularly of the all-powerful army. As an aside, when pressure built up on the Commando not to go ahead with the new GHQ, he had the gall to say the army would finance the costs by selling ‘land of the army’ (such as Birdwood Barracks)! He even had the effrontery to say that the army would give 25 per cent of the sale price to the government! I ask you! Is the Pakistan Army a department of the GOP or is the GOP a department of the Pakistan Army?
Let’s go elsewhere and spread the shame about. Shame, too, on those who have been advocating for some time, even before the coalition was formed at the centre, that the PPP make a compact with the PML-Q — or ‘Qatil’ League, as it was named by Asif Zardari after Benazir’s horrific murder — and such other independents and odds and you-know-whats who are amenable to pressure, and cobble together a government in the Punjab to the exclusion of the majority PML-N.
And on those that advocate the forming of a coalition between the PML-Q, the MQM, the ANP and the JUI-F at the centre too, to the exclusion of the PML-N which is the second-largest party in the National Assembly. In both enterprises, the dirty hands of the former Army House, now the President’s Lodge, and of the Mother of All Agencies are more than visible.
Well, much shame on them, and if the People’s Party is even thinking of such an arrangement, on it, too. For, does it not remember how it and its workers felt when its majority in the 2002 Sindh Assembly was stolen by the Commando and his sidekicks and a government of odds and you-know-whats was imposed on the people of Sindh?
Has the People’s Party forgotten so soon the travails visited upon its workers by the criminal enterprise that was rudely cobbled together, and which ruled Sindh for well on five years, ignoring the mandate of the people? Does it so easily forget its own democratic roots just because the Commando and his underwriters want it to travel on the undemocratic course?
Does the People’s Party forget that, again in 2002, when the Commando and his handmaiden, the corrupt and venal state of Pakistan, conspired to steal the slot of leader of the opposition from it and gift it to the then mullah-military alliance, a whole lot of us protested repeatedly, that the dictator and the ISI should stay out of the National Assembly such as it was?
Does it not recall that at the time, it was fully supported by most of us who write on politics in the national press, and that the Commando was criticised for the ill-intentioned dictator that he was, keeping the people he could not abide out, by hook or by crook, and bringing in his buddies in their place?
The PPP should remember its own travails, and always do the right, not the expedient, thing, if it is to survive — and be respected — as the national asset that it is. It must set an example for others to follow, not do things that have been done by autocrats and which have failed those that did them. Witness the 2008 referendum against the Commando and buddies please.
To end I have to say that to explain a matter in the simplest terms is to understand it in a flash. A reader who calls himself simply Ali explains the judicial tamasha (for what else can one call it?) thus:
“The dismissal of judges is like a dacoit occupying a house on gunpoint which has no legal or constitutional status. The PPP’s formula of restoring the genuine judges and keeping PCO judges is like the government saying that while it wants to give the house back to the real owner, it doesn’t want to disturb the dacoit and that the real owner should show flexibility and share the house with the dacoit.”
Are you listening Asif Zardari and Farooq Naek?
Bushism of the week: “I’ll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office” — President George W. Bush; Washington, DC, May 12, 2008
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Sadly, a suicide bombing targeted the Punjab Regimental Centre bakery in the PRC market in Mardan, killing upwards of 14 people, most of them soldiers, and leaving many injured seriously, some maimed for life.
How many reams have been written about the complete inappropriateness of the army indulging in the retail business? What in heaven’s name have we made of this army? Rather than making political statements might one ask Ashfaq Kayani to please shake it awake, pull it out of the shops and the bakeries and the tikka joints and the real-estate agencies, and train it to do the job the nation pays it for? And while he is at it, to please initiate the shelving of the grand plans to build a new GHQ in Islamabad, an utter and huge waste of the country’s very meagre resources?
While we are on the subject of the army, may one ask the Punjab government to reclaim Birdwood Barracks in Lahore, which are up for auction by the Military Estates Officer for a reserve price of Rs500m being of no further use to the army, and turn it into a park for the citizens of the congested city of Lahore?
And may one ask the cabinet division to immediately issue a notification to the effect that no ministry can do as it pleases with lands under its present use. That all lands in the use of the various ministries are lands belonging to the GOVERNMENT of the country/of the province concerned, merely lent to the particular ministry for use. When that use is over it is the government that must decide what to do with the land, e.g., sell it for providing clean drinking water to, say, Karachi city.
It is preposterous that such lands are considered the ownership of the service concerned particularly of the all-powerful army. As an aside, when pressure built up on the Commando not to go ahead with the new GHQ, he had the gall to say the army would finance the costs by selling ‘land of the army’ (such as Birdwood Barracks)! He even had the effrontery to say that the army would give 25 per cent of the sale price to the government! I ask you! Is the Pakistan Army a department of the GOP or is the GOP a department of the Pakistan Army?
Let’s go elsewhere and spread the shame about. Shame, too, on those who have been advocating for some time, even before the coalition was formed at the centre, that the PPP make a compact with the PML-Q — or ‘Qatil’ League, as it was named by Asif Zardari after Benazir’s horrific murder — and such other independents and odds and you-know-whats who are amenable to pressure, and cobble together a government in the Punjab to the exclusion of the majority PML-N.
And on those that advocate the forming of a coalition between the PML-Q, the MQM, the ANP and the JUI-F at the centre too, to the exclusion of the PML-N which is the second-largest party in the National Assembly. In both enterprises, the dirty hands of the former Army House, now the President’s Lodge, and of the Mother of All Agencies are more than visible.
Well, much shame on them, and if the People’s Party is even thinking of such an arrangement, on it, too. For, does it not remember how it and its workers felt when its majority in the 2002 Sindh Assembly was stolen by the Commando and his sidekicks and a government of odds and you-know-whats was imposed on the people of Sindh?
Has the People’s Party forgotten so soon the travails visited upon its workers by the criminal enterprise that was rudely cobbled together, and which ruled Sindh for well on five years, ignoring the mandate of the people? Does it so easily forget its own democratic roots just because the Commando and his underwriters want it to travel on the undemocratic course?
Does the People’s Party forget that, again in 2002, when the Commando and his handmaiden, the corrupt and venal state of Pakistan, conspired to steal the slot of leader of the opposition from it and gift it to the then mullah-military alliance, a whole lot of us protested repeatedly, that the dictator and the ISI should stay out of the National Assembly such as it was?
Does it not recall that at the time, it was fully supported by most of us who write on politics in the national press, and that the Commando was criticised for the ill-intentioned dictator that he was, keeping the people he could not abide out, by hook or by crook, and bringing in his buddies in their place?
The PPP should remember its own travails, and always do the right, not the expedient, thing, if it is to survive — and be respected — as the national asset that it is. It must set an example for others to follow, not do things that have been done by autocrats and which have failed those that did them. Witness the 2008 referendum against the Commando and buddies please.
To end I have to say that to explain a matter in the simplest terms is to understand it in a flash. A reader who calls himself simply Ali explains the judicial tamasha (for what else can one call it?) thus:
“The dismissal of judges is like a dacoit occupying a house on gunpoint which has no legal or constitutional status. The PPP’s formula of restoring the genuine judges and keeping PCO judges is like the government saying that while it wants to give the house back to the real owner, it doesn’t want to disturb the dacoit and that the real owner should show flexibility and share the house with the dacoit.”
Are you listening Asif Zardari and Farooq Naek?
Bushism of the week: “I’ll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office” — President George W. Bush; Washington, DC, May 12, 2008
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Despair and despondency
By Kamran Shafi
YES, yes I know. But first something that I wrote on the spur of the moment last week, on the day that the by-elections were postponed, and saved for this column:
“How in God’s name did Rehman Malik even dare to, on his own, think up a scheme such as the one he smacked the country in the face with just today? How the devil did the secretary of the Election Commission dare to order a postponement in the by-elections for two months on his own? Why, for goodness sake, did the collective leadership of the Pakistan People’s Party not know what its interior czar and de facto interior minister, pizzazz and all, was up to? But wait. Where, pray, was the chief election commissioner; where were the members of the Commission while all this argy bargy went on?
“Whilst we are well aware of the man’s extreme audacity already, could Rehman Malik have been as impudent and as presumptuous to, on his own, cook up what he did: lying to the Frontier chief minister about the other three provinces requesting a delay on grounds of bad law and order, and then instructing the Frontier government to write to the Election Commission to request a postponement too? And asking the federal interior secretary to follow up with telephone calls to the chief secretary, Frontier?
“Asif Zardari says he did not know about the bolt out of the blue that hit the country. Could Rehman Malik be so impertinent as to not even tell his benefactor that he was about to turn everything on its head, most particularly something that concerned very critically the chief minister of Punjab-in-waiting, Shahbaz Sharif, who too was participating in very same by-elections? And who had actually submitted his nomination papers from constituencies in Sialkot and Lahore on the very day that Master Malik was turning his tricks?
“And remember, Shahbaz Sharif, more than anything else, is the president of the Pakistan Muslim League-N which is in a coalition with the PPP (of which Rehman Malik is now considered a ‘central leader’, mark), both in the Punjab and in the centre. Indeed, in a strong coalition in both governments, particularly in the centre where its Ishaq Dar is finance minister at this very fraught time.
“So, what the blazes was Rehman Malik thinking when he went on his one-man demolition spree? Was he not aware that the coalition was already under extreme stress on the judges’ restoration issue, made worse by the vacillating and shifting stands of the, you guessed it, his very own PPP of which he is now, let us repeat, a ‘central leader’?
“Or was it, simply, a back-handed slap to the PML-N, warning it to stay within its boots, that the final arbiter on all matters was the People’s Party? For if it was, the coalition does not have much time.
“To show that it was nothing of the kind, that it was simply a case of an arrogant little man out of his wits in the giddying heights he occupies, Asif Zardari should take the most stringent action against Rehman Malik (such as despatching him back to London from whence he came, and where Malik, reportedly, sits atop a personal business empire worth gazillions), remembering that even Mushahid ‘Mandela’ Hussain who joint-led his party to a crushing defeat only three months ago, even he is laughing up his sleeve. To say nothing of the loud-mouthed Sheikh Rashid ‘Tulli’ who even lost his security deposit in the last elections; even one such as he is laughing up his sleeve!
“Save the coalition to save the party, Mr Zardari. And do it immediately if not sooner. Otherwise ‘THEY’ will devour you one by one.
“Let me add that tears well out of my eyes as I write this. I am heartbroken as I write this. For I have seen the establishment-driven politics of the late eighties and the early nineties up close and personal. What a sad, sad time it was, when two promising political leaders in the prime of youth were pitted against one another by those same forces that are doing their all to derail democracy once again.”
This, ladies and gentlemen, is what I wrote on the day that Rehman Malik did what he did. A week later, negotiations between the PPP and PML-N concerning the restoration of the judges sacked by the then COAS of the Pakistan Army, now retired General Pervez Musharraf, have broken down spreading despondency and despair across the land.
Was Rehman Malik’s crude action a precursor to this? Had the PPP already made up its mind that rather than going along with political forces opposed to military dictatorship, it preferred to follow the dictates of the former Army House, now the President’s Lodge, Rawalpindi Cantonment? More so because the illegal occupant of the Lodge is underwritten by the US government? And that a slap had to be administered to the PML-N so that it got the message?
It is most critical to note too, that of all the very good, bright people the party has, elected representatives all of them, people like Raza Rabbani and Khurshid Shah and Naveed Qamar and Qamaruzzaman Kaira among a host of others, who does Asif Zardari take to London for final talks with Nawaz and Shahbaz Sharif? You guessed it. The self-same Rehman Malik, bolstered by none other than that rather well-known personality Hussain Haqqani, the Islamic Republic’s ambassador-designate to the Land of the Free and The Home of the Brave.
While the PPP leader was assisted by these non-elected factotums, the PML-N leaders were in the company of the good Khawaja Asif and the very bright Ishaq Dar, one of whom sits in the National Assembly and the other in the Senate. Both are also ministers in the federal cabinet.
What was the message here then? That far from Rehman Malik getting sacked he was still the most important advisor to the PPP co-chairman? And that the PPP is metamorphosing into a more undemocratic entity so watch out everyone? Everyone should jolly well watch out if Rehman Malik was even halfway serious when he allegedly told a TV presenter that he’d match the media “punch for punch”.
It is ironical in the extreme, nay a tragedy of unimaginable proportions, that the Pakistan People’s Party which has suffered by far the most at the hands of the establishment — its founder cruelly murdered on the gallows, his daughter cruelly assassinated in broad daylight, Asif Zardari himself locked up for years on end, its workers lashed mercilessly — is playing right into the hands of its mortal enemy. Ours is an ill-starred country, folks. Mainly because so few of us stand up to be counted. So serve us right I suppose.
PS. It will be a wonder if the PPP can weather, on its own, the storm about to be unleashed by a newly rampant (because of the establishment’s, read the PPP’s, arrogance towards My Lord Iftikhar?) Supreme Court’s locking horns with the media. The fun begins, everyone, so hold on to your seats.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
YES, yes I know. But first something that I wrote on the spur of the moment last week, on the day that the by-elections were postponed, and saved for this column:
“How in God’s name did Rehman Malik even dare to, on his own, think up a scheme such as the one he smacked the country in the face with just today? How the devil did the secretary of the Election Commission dare to order a postponement in the by-elections for two months on his own? Why, for goodness sake, did the collective leadership of the Pakistan People’s Party not know what its interior czar and de facto interior minister, pizzazz and all, was up to? But wait. Where, pray, was the chief election commissioner; where were the members of the Commission while all this argy bargy went on?
“Whilst we are well aware of the man’s extreme audacity already, could Rehman Malik have been as impudent and as presumptuous to, on his own, cook up what he did: lying to the Frontier chief minister about the other three provinces requesting a delay on grounds of bad law and order, and then instructing the Frontier government to write to the Election Commission to request a postponement too? And asking the federal interior secretary to follow up with telephone calls to the chief secretary, Frontier?
“Asif Zardari says he did not know about the bolt out of the blue that hit the country. Could Rehman Malik be so impertinent as to not even tell his benefactor that he was about to turn everything on its head, most particularly something that concerned very critically the chief minister of Punjab-in-waiting, Shahbaz Sharif, who too was participating in very same by-elections? And who had actually submitted his nomination papers from constituencies in Sialkot and Lahore on the very day that Master Malik was turning his tricks?
“And remember, Shahbaz Sharif, more than anything else, is the president of the Pakistan Muslim League-N which is in a coalition with the PPP (of which Rehman Malik is now considered a ‘central leader’, mark), both in the Punjab and in the centre. Indeed, in a strong coalition in both governments, particularly in the centre where its Ishaq Dar is finance minister at this very fraught time.
“So, what the blazes was Rehman Malik thinking when he went on his one-man demolition spree? Was he not aware that the coalition was already under extreme stress on the judges’ restoration issue, made worse by the vacillating and shifting stands of the, you guessed it, his very own PPP of which he is now, let us repeat, a ‘central leader’?
“Or was it, simply, a back-handed slap to the PML-N, warning it to stay within its boots, that the final arbiter on all matters was the People’s Party? For if it was, the coalition does not have much time.
“To show that it was nothing of the kind, that it was simply a case of an arrogant little man out of his wits in the giddying heights he occupies, Asif Zardari should take the most stringent action against Rehman Malik (such as despatching him back to London from whence he came, and where Malik, reportedly, sits atop a personal business empire worth gazillions), remembering that even Mushahid ‘Mandela’ Hussain who joint-led his party to a crushing defeat only three months ago, even he is laughing up his sleeve. To say nothing of the loud-mouthed Sheikh Rashid ‘Tulli’ who even lost his security deposit in the last elections; even one such as he is laughing up his sleeve!
“Save the coalition to save the party, Mr Zardari. And do it immediately if not sooner. Otherwise ‘THEY’ will devour you one by one.
“Let me add that tears well out of my eyes as I write this. I am heartbroken as I write this. For I have seen the establishment-driven politics of the late eighties and the early nineties up close and personal. What a sad, sad time it was, when two promising political leaders in the prime of youth were pitted against one another by those same forces that are doing their all to derail democracy once again.”
This, ladies and gentlemen, is what I wrote on the day that Rehman Malik did what he did. A week later, negotiations between the PPP and PML-N concerning the restoration of the judges sacked by the then COAS of the Pakistan Army, now retired General Pervez Musharraf, have broken down spreading despondency and despair across the land.
Was Rehman Malik’s crude action a precursor to this? Had the PPP already made up its mind that rather than going along with political forces opposed to military dictatorship, it preferred to follow the dictates of the former Army House, now the President’s Lodge, Rawalpindi Cantonment? More so because the illegal occupant of the Lodge is underwritten by the US government? And that a slap had to be administered to the PML-N so that it got the message?
It is most critical to note too, that of all the very good, bright people the party has, elected representatives all of them, people like Raza Rabbani and Khurshid Shah and Naveed Qamar and Qamaruzzaman Kaira among a host of others, who does Asif Zardari take to London for final talks with Nawaz and Shahbaz Sharif? You guessed it. The self-same Rehman Malik, bolstered by none other than that rather well-known personality Hussain Haqqani, the Islamic Republic’s ambassador-designate to the Land of the Free and The Home of the Brave.
While the PPP leader was assisted by these non-elected factotums, the PML-N leaders were in the company of the good Khawaja Asif and the very bright Ishaq Dar, one of whom sits in the National Assembly and the other in the Senate. Both are also ministers in the federal cabinet.
What was the message here then? That far from Rehman Malik getting sacked he was still the most important advisor to the PPP co-chairman? And that the PPP is metamorphosing into a more undemocratic entity so watch out everyone? Everyone should jolly well watch out if Rehman Malik was even halfway serious when he allegedly told a TV presenter that he’d match the media “punch for punch”.
It is ironical in the extreme, nay a tragedy of unimaginable proportions, that the Pakistan People’s Party which has suffered by far the most at the hands of the establishment — its founder cruelly murdered on the gallows, his daughter cruelly assassinated in broad daylight, Asif Zardari himself locked up for years on end, its workers lashed mercilessly — is playing right into the hands of its mortal enemy. Ours is an ill-starred country, folks. Mainly because so few of us stand up to be counted. So serve us right I suppose.
PS. It will be a wonder if the PPP can weather, on its own, the storm about to be unleashed by a newly rampant (because of the establishment’s, read the PPP’s, arrogance towards My Lord Iftikhar?) Supreme Court’s locking horns with the media. The fun begins, everyone, so hold on to your seats.
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Do the right thing
By Kamran Shafi
SO where’s the problem? You want to get rid of about five dozen what you consider ‘troublesome judges’ including the chief justice, and elevate your buddies’ buddies in their stead?
All you’ve got to do is to seek an appointment with the chief of army staff, go see him at his pleasure, be very nice to him and ask him politely like the good boy (or girl) you are, and abracadabra! Where’s the problem?
He will, at his pleasure, declare emergency in the country; suspend the Constitution; forcibly evict the unwanted judges and lock them up in their residences along with their families; oversee the swearing-in of the new judges, and then give the president of the country, probably himself considering the precedent set by the Commando, the authority to lift the emergency. The president will do so in short order and life will go on as theretofore. So where’s the problem?
No problem at all, sirs, none whatsoever. Is this why we see the shenanigans we see: the ‘elected’ government cosying up to the establishment; much bonhomie and camaraderie as our various Guderians and Rommels are feted by the elected prime minister in the salubrious environs of Islamabad the Beautiful? The sounds of music and singing wafting through the cool of the evening, even reaching the dark hovels of the desperately poor, barely a kilometre from the PM’s palace’s backside?
This is good and well as my friend Ashraf Khan Afridi used to say, keeping everyone and Charlie’s aunt happy, never forgetting Her Excellency the US ambassador who is keeping close tabs on what goes on in the Land of the Pure. Why, she even deigned to call on Asif Zardari at his own residence instead of summoning him to her deputy’s villa as heretofore. How delighted must Her Excellency be with what’s going on!
As more proof that all is well in the Citadel of Islam for them, yet again have the Americans called for an independent judiciary in Pakistan whilst quite absurdly saying, again, that the restoration of the sacked judges is an internal matter for Pakistanis to decide. And making it clear that come what may the American administration is adamant that the judges, particularly My Lord the Chief Justice, are not restored.
Why else would she herself be going around making offers to his friends to get him to accept various jobs such as judge of the International Court of Justice; such as Pakistan’s ambassador to wherever? Since when did the plenipotentiary of the United States of America become an employment exchange working on behalf of a Pakistani dictator?
Yet again, the Americans, those great champions of democracy and freedom and equal rights for all, refuse to accept that the actions that the Commando took on November 2 were so unconstitutional and so illegal that they would have shaken the very foundations of a country less resilient, one less inured to shocks than the Land of the Pure. Yet again, they continue to help him destabilise the elected coalition government by repeated and highly visible statements and more statements in his favour.
Not to be left behind, and as if on cue from his tight buddies, the Commando cooks his witches’ brew, summoning the two stalwarts of the House of Zahoor just as soon as there was a sort of deadlock between the PPP and the PML-N on the judges’ restoration issue, and egging them on to jump onto the PPP bandwagon just as soon as the N left the cabinet.
None of the above is any good. But let’s leave the shenanigans of the dictator who clings to the President’s Lodge formerly Army House, for dictators will do as dictators do, and look closer to home. How good is the PPP’s vacillating and shifting stand on the restoration of the judiciary to the position of November 2, 2007? How right is it for its leader to say most nonchalantly that the Bhurban Accord was merely a political statement, not a hadith. Meaning what, sir? That it is quite alright to renege on political promises? That they are made to be broken?
What message is the leader of Pakistan’s largest political party, a great national asset, a party that is popular and has a following in all the provinces of this hapless land, sending out? That the People’s Party is an unreliable party that does not mean what it says, that its leaders say what they want at a particular time to fool other people for temporary gains? No sirs, not good at all.
While on the subject of the People’s Party let’s look elsewhere too: Makhdoom Amin Fahim certainly overdid his bid to become prime minister many times over, even saying uncomfortable things not only in the press but in parliament too. But it is time to make up with him as one who has stuck by the party through thick and thin. It is good to hear that the leadership’s contacts with him are ongoing and friendly.
Similarly for Aitzaz, who too has over the years fought a valiant battle not only for his own party, but also for the illegally and cruelly sacked judiciary. If anything, his spearheading the movement for the restoration of the judges and his brilliant handling of the case in court earned the party plaudits too. I have been closely linked to the movement to restore the judges and often came into contact with him. Not once have I heard him say anything detrimental to his party. And please, he has nothing to do with what I write here: I have not met or spoken to Aitzaz in at least three months.
In the end, for those who insist on retaining the PCO judges: they will far outnumber those who will be reinstated. The Commando’s friends have leaked the following through a rather large organ coming out of Lahore: “The sources said the president was likely to agree to a proposal to dilute his discretionary powers to dissolve the assemblies. However, they said Article 58-(2)(b) would stay.”
Specifically: “The president’s powers to use Article 58-(2)(b) would be made stringently subject to the approval of the SC and some guidelines may also be recommended for the apex court in case such a situation develops,” the sources said.
Well, what if judges beholden to the Commando for his illegal and unconstitutional steps are in a majority? What then? Just do the right thing! Right the grievous wrong done to our Constitution. Otherwise the country will simply implode.
PS. It is scandalous that bye-elections are being postponed for two whole months just because the Frontier chief secretary says that the law and order situation is bad. Well, was it ‘good’ when the general elections were held? Is this another conspiracy to derail democracy by keeping the leadership of the PML-N out of politics? Will the PPP now stop being cute and isolate the Commando before it gets ‘sorted out’ in its turn? Beware!
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
SO where’s the problem? You want to get rid of about five dozen what you consider ‘troublesome judges’ including the chief justice, and elevate your buddies’ buddies in their stead?
All you’ve got to do is to seek an appointment with the chief of army staff, go see him at his pleasure, be very nice to him and ask him politely like the good boy (or girl) you are, and abracadabra! Where’s the problem?
He will, at his pleasure, declare emergency in the country; suspend the Constitution; forcibly evict the unwanted judges and lock them up in their residences along with their families; oversee the swearing-in of the new judges, and then give the president of the country, probably himself considering the precedent set by the Commando, the authority to lift the emergency. The president will do so in short order and life will go on as theretofore. So where’s the problem?
No problem at all, sirs, none whatsoever. Is this why we see the shenanigans we see: the ‘elected’ government cosying up to the establishment; much bonhomie and camaraderie as our various Guderians and Rommels are feted by the elected prime minister in the salubrious environs of Islamabad the Beautiful? The sounds of music and singing wafting through the cool of the evening, even reaching the dark hovels of the desperately poor, barely a kilometre from the PM’s palace’s backside?
This is good and well as my friend Ashraf Khan Afridi used to say, keeping everyone and Charlie’s aunt happy, never forgetting Her Excellency the US ambassador who is keeping close tabs on what goes on in the Land of the Pure. Why, she even deigned to call on Asif Zardari at his own residence instead of summoning him to her deputy’s villa as heretofore. How delighted must Her Excellency be with what’s going on!
As more proof that all is well in the Citadel of Islam for them, yet again have the Americans called for an independent judiciary in Pakistan whilst quite absurdly saying, again, that the restoration of the sacked judges is an internal matter for Pakistanis to decide. And making it clear that come what may the American administration is adamant that the judges, particularly My Lord the Chief Justice, are not restored.
Why else would she herself be going around making offers to his friends to get him to accept various jobs such as judge of the International Court of Justice; such as Pakistan’s ambassador to wherever? Since when did the plenipotentiary of the United States of America become an employment exchange working on behalf of a Pakistani dictator?
Yet again, the Americans, those great champions of democracy and freedom and equal rights for all, refuse to accept that the actions that the Commando took on November 2 were so unconstitutional and so illegal that they would have shaken the very foundations of a country less resilient, one less inured to shocks than the Land of the Pure. Yet again, they continue to help him destabilise the elected coalition government by repeated and highly visible statements and more statements in his favour.
Not to be left behind, and as if on cue from his tight buddies, the Commando cooks his witches’ brew, summoning the two stalwarts of the House of Zahoor just as soon as there was a sort of deadlock between the PPP and the PML-N on the judges’ restoration issue, and egging them on to jump onto the PPP bandwagon just as soon as the N left the cabinet.
None of the above is any good. But let’s leave the shenanigans of the dictator who clings to the President’s Lodge formerly Army House, for dictators will do as dictators do, and look closer to home. How good is the PPP’s vacillating and shifting stand on the restoration of the judiciary to the position of November 2, 2007? How right is it for its leader to say most nonchalantly that the Bhurban Accord was merely a political statement, not a hadith. Meaning what, sir? That it is quite alright to renege on political promises? That they are made to be broken?
What message is the leader of Pakistan’s largest political party, a great national asset, a party that is popular and has a following in all the provinces of this hapless land, sending out? That the People’s Party is an unreliable party that does not mean what it says, that its leaders say what they want at a particular time to fool other people for temporary gains? No sirs, not good at all.
While on the subject of the People’s Party let’s look elsewhere too: Makhdoom Amin Fahim certainly overdid his bid to become prime minister many times over, even saying uncomfortable things not only in the press but in parliament too. But it is time to make up with him as one who has stuck by the party through thick and thin. It is good to hear that the leadership’s contacts with him are ongoing and friendly.
Similarly for Aitzaz, who too has over the years fought a valiant battle not only for his own party, but also for the illegally and cruelly sacked judiciary. If anything, his spearheading the movement for the restoration of the judges and his brilliant handling of the case in court earned the party plaudits too. I have been closely linked to the movement to restore the judges and often came into contact with him. Not once have I heard him say anything detrimental to his party. And please, he has nothing to do with what I write here: I have not met or spoken to Aitzaz in at least three months.
In the end, for those who insist on retaining the PCO judges: they will far outnumber those who will be reinstated. The Commando’s friends have leaked the following through a rather large organ coming out of Lahore: “The sources said the president was likely to agree to a proposal to dilute his discretionary powers to dissolve the assemblies. However, they said Article 58-(2)(b) would stay.”
Specifically: “The president’s powers to use Article 58-(2)(b) would be made stringently subject to the approval of the SC and some guidelines may also be recommended for the apex court in case such a situation develops,” the sources said.
Well, what if judges beholden to the Commando for his illegal and unconstitutional steps are in a majority? What then? Just do the right thing! Right the grievous wrong done to our Constitution. Otherwise the country will simply implode.
PS. It is scandalous that bye-elections are being postponed for two whole months just because the Frontier chief secretary says that the law and order situation is bad. Well, was it ‘good’ when the general elections were held? Is this another conspiracy to derail democracy by keeping the leadership of the PML-N out of politics? Will the PPP now stop being cute and isolate the Commando before it gets ‘sorted out’ in its turn? Beware!
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Benazir is no more: understand that
By Kamran Shafi
DID I say last week that I was on an up because the news was that the country was progressing towards the restoration of the illegally and unconstitutionally removed judiciary? This despite the fact that we Pakistanis were still strapped to the rickety roller-coaster that we have been tied to ever since the birth of our country? A roller-coaster that has given us the ride of our lives for every one of those 60 years, losing us half our country during its mad progress?
Well, one week later I am on a down because the roller-coaster is hurtling downwards so fast that it can only spell doom for all the hapless souls trapped in it. We must note that whilst the controls were in the hands of the establishment heretofore, they are today in the hands of the newly-discovered leadership of the PPP made up mainly of Ms Bhutto and Mr Zardari’s personal lawyers.
These people simply do not understand, and if they do they surprise one with their attitudes, that the astute politician Benazir Bhutto is no more. That there is not much time left for little pranks and littler too-clever-by-half moves. That if they let the Commando off the hook on which the people of Pakistan have strung him up the country would have lost and they will have won a very short-term, very Pyrrhic victory.
They simply must understand that the main aim and objective of the establishment for the last four decades has been, and remains to this blessed day, the destruction of the People’s Party. That it was only the popularity of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and of his beloved daughter that has thus far prevented its unravelling despite dictators doing their damnedest.
That by playing their foolish little games they are playing right into the hands of the Commando who retains the position of grand-daddy of the establishment (read army) because of overt American support. They simply do not realise that in the absence of the truly benazir Benazir they are sure to fall flat on their faces, taking the party down with them. That for them it will only be a short joyride enjoying government planes and plush limos and fragrant offices before they are kicked off/out of them.
They should be made to realise by those who have been with the party for far longer that the present time is a great time for the PPP with the second-largest party in the country, the PML-N, a former adversary, sincerely on its side. The parties together can get a lot done, especially with the country in the mess it is in. Just look at one aspect: the lies told by the previous government about the economy and the fact that subsidies granted just to win votes have now to be withdrawn. Is it not a boon for the PPP to have Ishaq Dar as finance minister who is not only a brilliant man but also has to take all the hard decisions?
Let’s see this another way: what happens if, say, the new brilliances of the People’s Party succeed in scuttling the judges’ full reinstatement according to the Murree/Bhurban accord? What happens if, as a consequence, Nawaz Sharif walks out of the coalition because he has a promise to keep? Does the PPP think it will be able to stay on in power by coming to an arrangement with the PML-Q and the MQM?
Think again, boys. Quite apart from the fact that it will be well nigh impossible to run any kind of halfway government with a large, and by then an even more popular party like the ‘N’ sitting outside the government, do the bright sparks who are taking the party to the edge think the PPP/PML-Q/MQM/Commando combine will last long? That the MQM will not demand its several kilograms of flesh in Sindh, to the chagrin of the majority, for support in Islamabad?
No sirs, no. Get off that cloud you are riding and realise that the brilliant Benazir who might have pulled the party out of the problems into which you are forcing it has departed this earth, she is no more. Don’t, for God’s sake, try and become cleverer than half. Keep the promise made in the Murree/Bhurban declaration; for, after all, you did sign it!
While all this argy-bargy goes on with new and ever newer PPP tamashas being reported every single day, the PML-N goes about doing the right thing. The Punjab government is already feeling energised: as you get off the motorway at Thokar Niazbeg you see the petrol and CNG stations being moved back from the land they had encroached upon.
Apparently, these encroachments prevented the contractor from working on the flyover that was to connect to the motorway. It took the new government just one night and one day to remove the encroachments and get the work going, but at a high cost to the exchequer. Construction delays cost more money due to escalating prices and Punjab will now have to fork out Rs800m more to complete the project just because of the corruption of the previous government. And yet the Commando has the gall to say things are bad because the present government is not giving the country good governance!
By the way, there was no earthly reason for Gilani throwing a lavish dinner for the army’s formation commanders, and then to add insult to injury, to regale his guests with a musical evening. Is this the time for fancy banquets and music when the poor are struggling to survive? Why, I bought flour for the house five days ago for Rs980 per 40 kg, up Rs340 inside of three months.
There was even less reason, or call, for Gilani to say that the army also had to defend the ‘ideological frontiers’ of the country. For God’s sake, prime minister! Fifty years have we tried to disabuse the army of its arrogating this duty to itself! And yet you go and do this! What the devil are ‘ideological frontiers’ anyway? Seeing the ugly, hateful place our country has become, hasn’t it had enough of ‘ideology’? An aside here. It appears Sharifuddin Pirzada is still a frequent visitor to the presidency. Asked quite recently why he represented military dictators, he replied that he was a lawyer (gun?) for hire, simple as that. So, who is paying the man now? Has the Commando apportioned massive funds for the presidency’s ‘secret fund’ of which there is no accountability? Or is one of Musharraf’s wealthy arms-dealer friends footing Sharifuddin’s surely considerable bills?
Bushism of the week: “The United States has suffered terrorist attacks on its soil, as have Russia” — President George W. Bush; Sochi, Russia; April 6, 2008
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
DID I say last week that I was on an up because the news was that the country was progressing towards the restoration of the illegally and unconstitutionally removed judiciary? This despite the fact that we Pakistanis were still strapped to the rickety roller-coaster that we have been tied to ever since the birth of our country? A roller-coaster that has given us the ride of our lives for every one of those 60 years, losing us half our country during its mad progress?
Well, one week later I am on a down because the roller-coaster is hurtling downwards so fast that it can only spell doom for all the hapless souls trapped in it. We must note that whilst the controls were in the hands of the establishment heretofore, they are today in the hands of the newly-discovered leadership of the PPP made up mainly of Ms Bhutto and Mr Zardari’s personal lawyers.
These people simply do not understand, and if they do they surprise one with their attitudes, that the astute politician Benazir Bhutto is no more. That there is not much time left for little pranks and littler too-clever-by-half moves. That if they let the Commando off the hook on which the people of Pakistan have strung him up the country would have lost and they will have won a very short-term, very Pyrrhic victory.
They simply must understand that the main aim and objective of the establishment for the last four decades has been, and remains to this blessed day, the destruction of the People’s Party. That it was only the popularity of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and of his beloved daughter that has thus far prevented its unravelling despite dictators doing their damnedest.
That by playing their foolish little games they are playing right into the hands of the Commando who retains the position of grand-daddy of the establishment (read army) because of overt American support. They simply do not realise that in the absence of the truly benazir Benazir they are sure to fall flat on their faces, taking the party down with them. That for them it will only be a short joyride enjoying government planes and plush limos and fragrant offices before they are kicked off/out of them.
They should be made to realise by those who have been with the party for far longer that the present time is a great time for the PPP with the second-largest party in the country, the PML-N, a former adversary, sincerely on its side. The parties together can get a lot done, especially with the country in the mess it is in. Just look at one aspect: the lies told by the previous government about the economy and the fact that subsidies granted just to win votes have now to be withdrawn. Is it not a boon for the PPP to have Ishaq Dar as finance minister who is not only a brilliant man but also has to take all the hard decisions?
Let’s see this another way: what happens if, say, the new brilliances of the People’s Party succeed in scuttling the judges’ full reinstatement according to the Murree/Bhurban accord? What happens if, as a consequence, Nawaz Sharif walks out of the coalition because he has a promise to keep? Does the PPP think it will be able to stay on in power by coming to an arrangement with the PML-Q and the MQM?
Think again, boys. Quite apart from the fact that it will be well nigh impossible to run any kind of halfway government with a large, and by then an even more popular party like the ‘N’ sitting outside the government, do the bright sparks who are taking the party to the edge think the PPP/PML-Q/MQM/Commando combine will last long? That the MQM will not demand its several kilograms of flesh in Sindh, to the chagrin of the majority, for support in Islamabad?
No sirs, no. Get off that cloud you are riding and realise that the brilliant Benazir who might have pulled the party out of the problems into which you are forcing it has departed this earth, she is no more. Don’t, for God’s sake, try and become cleverer than half. Keep the promise made in the Murree/Bhurban declaration; for, after all, you did sign it!
While all this argy-bargy goes on with new and ever newer PPP tamashas being reported every single day, the PML-N goes about doing the right thing. The Punjab government is already feeling energised: as you get off the motorway at Thokar Niazbeg you see the petrol and CNG stations being moved back from the land they had encroached upon.
Apparently, these encroachments prevented the contractor from working on the flyover that was to connect to the motorway. It took the new government just one night and one day to remove the encroachments and get the work going, but at a high cost to the exchequer. Construction delays cost more money due to escalating prices and Punjab will now have to fork out Rs800m more to complete the project just because of the corruption of the previous government. And yet the Commando has the gall to say things are bad because the present government is not giving the country good governance!
By the way, there was no earthly reason for Gilani throwing a lavish dinner for the army’s formation commanders, and then to add insult to injury, to regale his guests with a musical evening. Is this the time for fancy banquets and music when the poor are struggling to survive? Why, I bought flour for the house five days ago for Rs980 per 40 kg, up Rs340 inside of three months.
There was even less reason, or call, for Gilani to say that the army also had to defend the ‘ideological frontiers’ of the country. For God’s sake, prime minister! Fifty years have we tried to disabuse the army of its arrogating this duty to itself! And yet you go and do this! What the devil are ‘ideological frontiers’ anyway? Seeing the ugly, hateful place our country has become, hasn’t it had enough of ‘ideology’? An aside here. It appears Sharifuddin Pirzada is still a frequent visitor to the presidency. Asked quite recently why he represented military dictators, he replied that he was a lawyer (gun?) for hire, simple as that. So, who is paying the man now? Has the Commando apportioned massive funds for the presidency’s ‘secret fund’ of which there is no accountability? Or is one of Musharraf’s wealthy arms-dealer friends footing Sharifuddin’s surely considerable bills?
Bushism of the week: “The United States has suffered terrorist attacks on its soil, as have Russia” — President George W. Bush; Sochi, Russia; April 6, 2008
kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk
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