http://thenews.jang.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=60865
By Masood Hasan
There are three stories that over the years haven’t lost their relevance. Although it is hard to determine if any of them were true, they sound credible. We all have known that those bright sparks which pocket top government jobs are pretty wobbly in the upstairs department. How they rise to positions of such eminence remains a bit of a mystery. Experts believe that a mixture of flattery, sycophancy, intriguing and sliminess are great virtues in Pakistan and can catapult the most stupid bags to the top. Add to it that priceless quote that ‘Success in Pakistan is relative. Depends who the relative is’.
A minister when called upon to address guests at a state banquet in Istanbul opened his speech with the immortal lines, ‘My dear Turks and Turkeys.’ One hears that the Turks were not particularly amused. A second story relates to the time when Governor Khar and Chief Minister Ramay were the heavyweights in Punjab. A freshly sworn-in minister confided to a close friend that although he was now the minister for information, he was damned if he knew whose information he was supposed to give – the governor’s to the CM or the other way round. A third bright light on arrival at the civil secretariat in Lahore panicked when he saw the huge pile of files he was supposed to read. A helpful aide waved away his fears. He advised that all the minister had to do was open each file and simply write ‘Seen’, affix his initials and send the file on its futile, unending journey. Much relieved the minister sat down, opened the first file and slowly and very carefully wrote ‘Seen’ in Urdu (the letter ‘C’). Pleased as punch, he then triumphantly placed his initials below that and continued to demolish the files much to the amazement of the on-lookers. He was a great success.
One recalls these stories because it seems that grey matter is still something of a mystery item up there in Islamabad and in terribly short supply. We all accuse the government of a lack of vision or commitment but they should be forgiven if they are unable to perform because it is clear they can’t add two plus two without making a complete hash of it. What else can explain the much touted arrival of the government affidavits which threatened to lay bare the truth and blow into a billion smithereens all the murky events of that fateful day in March. What they have achieved is the distinction of being the most ludicrous and pathetic exercise mounted in defence of a government that can’t seem to recall if it is standing upside down or downside up. Banish the thought of putting together a document that might be incisive, intelligent or credible.
All that the tainted affidavits have established is that there is no line that separates truth from falsehood. While all men have a price, in Pakistan there is a permanent loot sale on. Shaukat Aziz can wander in carefully orchestrated ‘surprise’ visits to all the utility stores of Islamabad he likes, crowing over the fallen prices of articles, but what he should rejoice over is that anyone’s conscience can be purchased cheap. No need for a song either. One infamous affidavit shared with the nation, piously intones that the ‘truth’ has been put on paper because for the writer, it is a matter of ‘conscious’. Understandably the gentleman doesn’t know the spelling and surely hasn’t run into the attribute ever in his illustrious career. In a way, it sort of sums up the sordid drama that has been unveiling. It seems to be a favoured policy. When faced with any difficulty, brazenly lie. If dates get muddled, facts contradict one another in bewildering numbers, maintain a straight face and lie. If the past and the present are interwoven stupidly, it’s acceptable because the nation is stupid and only the rulers have brains.
Aitzaz Ahsan on whom this government would love to pour a truck full of malicious and raunchy stories but are unable to find a shred of anything that will stick, has already said that at least six of the affidavits submitted by the highest government officials are signed pre-March 9th. Three are fictitious and fabricated. In common language, they are called lies. The difference being that these are sworn affidavits, at the highest levels of the country’s affairs and signed by people who occupy the top most pinnacles of success and stature. One affidavit that refers to the chief justice as ‘ineffective’ is dated 8th March. The honour of being declared ‘ineffective’ was conferred upon the CJ a day later. Obviously the official had powers of prophecy and was able to visualise with great clarity events that were yet to unfold. Or the gentleman has a serious counting problem and needs to go back to kindergarten. Mr Khalid Bilal, deputy director, PID in his quest to save the government, signed the affidavit on 8th March. He obviously knew that the CJ was going to get marching orders and he would be required to file an affidavit. By 5:30 pm on 8th March, he was already giving final touches to the document at hand. Perhaps his powers of clairvoyance can be put to good use in the foreign office. Maybe he can tell us when Shoaib Akhtar will finally get that nasty drug out of his system. We don’t want dear PCB to go on lying. Mr Bilal’s affidavit also establishes that a full 24 hours earlier he already knew that the ‘ineffective’ CJ must not address bar councils, public rallies or the media since the matter being in the hands of the Supreme Judicial Council would be sub judice.
However, IG Police Sindh, Mr Jahangir Mirza is the undisputed guru of the clairvoyants. His affidavit that he painstakingly put together on 1st March a full eight days before the CJ ‘asked’ to be invited to the president’s camp office, is a document that could put most magicians of the world out of business. The IG who can probably read through steel walls, predict events that will take place 20 years from now and see visions where mortals such as us see nothing, resorted to the past tense to convey the impression that these were indeed ‘emotions recollected in tranquillity,’ as Wordsworth once put it. The affidavit of the Establishment Secretary Syed Tariq Ali Bukhari is dated 6th March, which is three days before the filing of the reference and – wonders will never cease, three days after Mr Bukhari received a highly controversial third consecutive extension in service. Who says three is not a magical number and that hard work doesn’t pay in Pakistan?
Another distinguished officer, the former IG Punjab, undoubtedly now rewarded suitably for his admirable loyalty, actually made quite a mess of his affidavit. Because the police routinely tamper with all documents, the IG’s pristine testimony has a rather embarrassing amount of clumsy erasure of words and cover ups, but then what else would a genuine police document contain? As for the small matter of whether the document contains truth or not, it is hardly the issue. Maybe this government believes that it is not what the documents contain but how many that can be cooked in the official pot. Perhaps if they can notch up say 50 kilos of ‘truth’, written, understood and signed by this nation’s top officials, that is all that matters. Admirable goal but this is not a Matric examination where kilos of garbage scrawled at will over page after page will garner a first since those who write it don’t know anything and neither those who examine it. Weight, therefore, becomes an important factor. While Islamabad continues to inflict grievous injuries on itself, we can only watch in growing bewilderment the pathetic ‘tamasha’.
Lord! what a gem