| 19 November 1999 | Friday | 10 Shaban 1420 |
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Cynicism takes a thrashing
I have drunk deep of joy and shall taste no other wine tonight. -Shelley
I can scarcely believe it. The clouds have lifted and sunny uplands beckon from afar. And although only the gods can tell whether enough will happen to prolong this mood, while it lasts it is exhilarating.
Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive,
But to be young was very heaven.
As I scan in the papers the mug shot of the Reverend Nawaz Khokhar - formerly a PML(N) grandee, now lately of the PPP (what exalted company our political parties keep) - being led away by an army posse, and as I read the names of the sleek cats caught in the first flush of the army's crackdown on those of the good and the great who have brought the country to its present sorry pass, and indeed down to its very knees, my heart, withered and woebegone till yesterday, cracks with joy even if I do not have Shelley's excuse (methinks a pair of comely arms) for being intoxicated.
Play on Vajpayee and to the flourish of fife and drum come out more stoutly in defence of your co-signatory to the Lahore Declaration (whither has that piece of parchment gone?), the sadly incarcerated Mian Nawaz Sharif who slipped while trying to read new meaning into the Leninist concept of the balance of forces. The Muslim League, its wits still befuddled, has yet to catch on to Vajpayee's tune. With friends like the Indian prime minister, Nawaz Sharif will stand in need of no enemies.
Consider the transformation worked by a mere 24 hours. Cynicism and despair entrenched so deeply in the Republic. And yet what it takes dissipate their malevolent influence is just a show of unabashed will and sincerity which have been vouchsafed by the dramatic swoop against the first batch of well-heeled conmen who have rooked the nation's finances. Who are amongst the first caught? Two Saigols, a Leghari, a Saifullah, an air marshal (no less) and several others of the same ilk. To ears used to hearing weak porridge being churned in the name of accountability this is thundering music. There is also a list of distinguished absconders, including our shrill princess, Ms Bhutto, and Grand Admiral Mansoor-ul-Haq. Again music to jaded ears. The Grand Admiral was the counterpoint to that civilian admiral, Amer Lodhi, who reportedly swung the famous submarine deal during the time shrill princess was inflicting herself for the second time on the country. When will the veil be lifted on that game of high-class poker? Only the oracles can say.
Meanwhile, it will be no small cause for rejoicing if as a result of the latest events we see the last of Ms Bhutto as a political redeemer. If there is one exit this country needs, it is hers. If it's any consolation to her, the greatest beneficiary of this will be her own party which may possibly breathe again if rid of her iron dictatorship. There will of course remain the matter of Ms Bhutto's articles in the press. But after being declared an absconder I think even from those there should be some relief.
Is it not a sign of the times that even the Chaudries - of Gujrat, that is - have begun to bleat? Even if I may not want to lay it on too thick as far as they are concerned (since the Chaudries include my former speaker, Ch Pervez Ellahi), it is hard not to notice that when they say, as they said vociferously at a press conference in Islamabad the other day, that they are not defaulters, they want the entire nation to plunge into a bout of amnesia and forget that after the Sharifs they profited the most from the industrial revolution that got going when that commander of the faithful, General Zia-ul-Haq, came to power.
If nothing else, their role in the famous cooperatives's scandal of 1991 is enough to condemn them and keep them out of politics forever. It was the huge loans which the Sharifs and Chaudries took (65 crores or thereabouts apiece) which well and truly sunk the cooperatives ship although, and this is a tribute to the majesty and flexibility of the law in Pakistan, His Lordship Justice Lone of the Supreme Court, asked to look into this matter, gave both the Sharifs and the Chaudries a certificate of outstanding probity. Anyway, I bet my last rupee that nothing will happen to the Chaudries. Even in the present set-up they have their defenders who think that they are unjustly maligned and that apart from one or two loans too many, they are basically clean. I should say no more.
But to return to the main story. The accountability ordinance just signed by the Sharif's own President (how times change) His Holiness the Pakistani Pope is the law that these past 25 years the people of Pakistan have been crying out for. Comprehensive in its sweep, unambiguous in its meaning, it is the perfect instrument - one, moreover, which puts the onus of proving innocence on the shoulders of the accused - for pursuing the battle against corruption and wrongdoing. Those responsible for drafting this law deserve the nation's thanks. If Mr Sharifuddin Pirzada has had anything to do with it then all is forgiven. Although I doubt very much this would have been the case since Mr Pirzada has made a career out of equivocation while this law is a model of clarity.
For all the wrong selections made by the Great Chief in the early stages of excitement, a forgivable lapse considering all the things crowding in on his mind (although that still does not stop me from wondering how Akbar Ahmed has made it to London and the Boy Sarfraz, you have to see him to believe me, into the cabinet), the Chief has redeemed himself by picking Lt Gen Amjad Hussain as the Chairman of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB). Amjad is a Gallian (alumnus of Lawrence College) in the same way that Lt-Gen Mahmud Ahmed, formerly of 10 Corps and now ISI, and Sahibzada Imtiaz of the NSC are. What is more, he scored well in his Senior Cambridge exams, scarcely a trifling matter since at that time Lawrence College was more known for producing (how gingerly can I put this?) dunces than scholars.
Being a year senior to me in college I say this from personal knowledge that a cleaner and more suitable man for this sensitive position could not have been chosen. If anyone can make NAB work it is Gen Amjad and if he falters or fails, or even if the pace of his offensive slackens, General Musharraf can say goodbye to the public goodwill that still remains strong for his coup - sorry, counter-coup - and all its works. There should be no mistake about this: as far as the public perception is concerned, more rests on accountability than any of the other items in the Chief's agenda.
That is why it is important not to be distracted by cries that the drive just started to nab defaulting and crooked fat cats will ruin business confidence and trigger a flight of capital out of the country. No heed should be paid to these feeble-minded reservations for what is at stake is not the confidence of the business community but the last remaining shreds and tatters of the nation's faith in itself and its ability to pull itself out of the swamp in which it is caught. Nothing has done so much to revive the nation's hopes as the arrest of big-name defaulters. Nothing will more cruelly shatter these hopes than if this drive fails or comes to a premature end.
The money recovered in this drive is not important. A 100 or 200 billion rupees will not make this country sink or swim. What was important was to send a message, not so much to defaulters as to ordinary people, that at long last those guilty of pillaging the country were being called to account. The message therefore is ultimately political and not simply financial and that should be kept in mind even as the cacophony rises that the rule of law should be respected. It should indeed, but for once in 52 years let the rule of law work against and not, as it always has, in favour of the nation's plundering oligarchy. March on in this fashion Great Chief and troops of angels will speed you on your way. Falter or make exceptions and may then purgatory be your reward.
Tailpiece: Good Punjab cabinet for which Governor Safdar deserves all praise. Compared to the other provinces it clearly stands out. But then from a son of Chakwal - General Safdar being from Dulmial in the Choa Saidan Shah hills - I would have expected no less.
I am particularly glad for my friend Chaudry Shafqat Mahmood whose cries (audible to the initiated in his recent columns) that he was available to serve the people have been given the notice they deserved. Seriously though, his presence should bring intelligence and depth to cabinet discussions as should the voice of my friend, Shahid Kardar.
A word in the Governor's ear, however: making haste slowly is all right but when is he going to turn his attention to the rot in the districts? As long as the symbols of that rot remain, and he need go no further than his own district in this regard, no amount of monitoring mechanism is going to make a difference.
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