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April 28, 2002 Sunday Safar 14, 1423 Possession is still nine tenths of law Bureaucracy runs to govt’s rescue More said than done Shah Latif — a source of history Possession is still nine tenths of law THE Supreme Court has held valid the presidential order calling for a referendum to seek his election to the office for a five-year term. The verdict has cleared the way for polling on April 30. Considering that nobody is campaigning for a ‘No’ vote, the president is bound to win irrespective of the turnout. Considering that the court consists of judges who took the oath under the Provisional Constitutional Order, a fact pointed out during the arguments, the verdict should shock nobody. Had not, Hamid Khan, the Supreme Court Bar Association president, already said not much was expected of the court and that the petition was being filed as a matter of principle? The issue, according to the court, was whether under the PCO and the proclamation of emergency the president could validly order the referendum. Assisted by some of the nation’s best legal minds it decided that he could. But legal issues are not always the same as the political issues. To the layman, the issue in the Zafar Ali Shah case was whether the chief of army staff, who claimed that the prime minister had tried to hijack the plane he was travelling in, could be allowed more than 90 days to hold the polls. The court chose to ask the COAS and granted him the three years he had asked for. The issue, in the present case was whether he could be allowed to extend his term by five years. The court decided that it was again up to him. While people might entertain varied expectations of an SC hearing, the most realistic perhaps is hoping for some great quips and quotes. The best, in the present case, probably came from Abdul Hafiz Pirzada. The 1973 constitution, he said, had ‘survived’ and would continue to survive great upheavals on account of its ‘flexibility.’ Interesting, but does not the maxim that possession is nine tenths of law, go further back? * * * * * * * IS somebody counting? Or do we, the people, have to be content with private estimates of expenditure on the presidential referendum? First, of course, there is the administrative cost of the exercise. This includes the cost of printing ballot papers, voters’ lists(?) and stationery and hiring, training and transporting the polling staff. Fortunately, all the products and services involved are to be handled by the Election Commission which has an above average record of accounting. This makes the cost quite transparent. The initial projection of around Rs2 billion is not even a significant fraction of the GNP. Interestingly, a good Samaritan actually moved the Supreme Court to order postponement of the referendum so that it could be held simultaneously with the general elections to save some of the cost. The court has since allowed the petition to be withdrawn. Next, there is the twofold cost of the referendum campaign. The federal as well as the provincial and district governments have had to pay the transportation cost of not just the president and his campaign entourage but also the audiences. The provincial government was said to have provided Rs20 million for the purpose for the Lahore rally alone. How many rallies have there been since? Add to this the honoraria the government servants must be paid for working beyond the call of duty. Then there is the patronage on the campaign trail — the written off loans, mark-up and revenue, the land distributed among the landless, the grants to local institutions. There are also commitments of future spending, mostly, but not entirely, on development. The private sector contribution to the campaign, too, has been significant. While it does not create a direct financial liability for the state, there is little doubt that the government has to return the favour with more than a smile. And shouldn’t some of the less tangible costs also be reckoned. First off, there is the obstruction and delay in policy decisions. This was most dramatic in the case of water resource development and allocation and most bizarre in the case of the Punjab boards of education which had to indefinitely postpone the intermediate examinations on account of an unresolved pay dispute. Next, there was the ambiguity about certain campaign promises bound to be interpreted differently by various interests. A newspaper, for example, quoted the president as saying he would see to it that Sindh got more than its due. Really? Also, there was loss of face and high moral ground in what were seen as intimidation of district governments (most blatantly in Multan, but also elsewhere); an attack on the press (beating up of reporters, harassment of a publisher and a bid to remove a columnist from government service after another had chosen early retirement); and attempts to bribe and divide the bar by creating more High Court benches. The privatization minister’s reported conversation with textile mills owners sounded like thinly veiled blackmail. Like bankruptcy, there should probably by some legislation against another presidential referendum for at least three decades after one has been held. * * * * * * * IMRAN Khan, cricket icon, and by newspaper accounts President Musharraf’s most favourite politician, was reported to have been heckled during a campaign appearance. A former MNA and a former senator were shot in Karachi and twelve participants of a religious gathering died in an explosion in Bhakkar. Police suspected Al Qaeda and RAW involvement. The president, meanwhile, told a TV interviewer that law and order had improved. In support of the assertion, he quoted some district Nazims. * * * * * * * JUNOON, the pop music group, has joined the proverbial bandwagon. It is now celebrating the prestige the country has come to enjoy under President Musharraf. When governments of both India and Pakistan were talking of their new found ‘prestige’ as a result of tit-for-tat nuclear explosions, the group had surprised many by siding with the pacifists and singing of peace to the visible annoyance of a hawkish establishment. The PTV, which had then banned Juno