Usama Qassim Al-Jamali, Consul-General of Oman, was playing the role of doyen of the consular corps in the city again. He was bidding farewell to the popular Bangladesh Deputy High Commissioner Nasima Haider, who had been in the city for 16 months, and the well-liked Swiss Consul-General Roland Fischer and his lovely wife Iris, who had been here for over three years.
Usama, who is teasingly called Osama by his friends, was also presenting silver salvers to the departing diplomats on behalf of the consular corps with their signatures on them. Usama, who has studied international relations at the Boston University, US, and previously had a posting in Japan, was also welcoming the new Iraqi Consul-General Raas F. Taufiq and the South Korean Consul-General In Pil Chun and his wife. He also presented the new Deputy Chief of Protocol of the Federal Government in the city Amjad Hussain B. Sial, who has succeeded Mohammad Ali Siddiqui, who has been transferred to the Foreign Office in Islamabad. Young Sial will look after the diplomats in the city.
The arrival of Raas Taufiq marks the reopening of the Iraqi Consulate in the city after a long time. But he has a problem — the large consular premises has been under illegal occupation of some Pakistanis for sometime and he has been trying to get that vacated.
Usama had quite a crowd at the reception, arranged at a local hotel, where the security arrangements are as tight as ever. It was understandable as the imperilled US consulate, which is closed to the public since the bomb attack of June, was nearby.
There were not only the consuls-general but also many honorary consuls and friends of Usama there. US Consul-General John Bauman was there with his daughter Patricia. They were back after a visit to Islamabad to see her friends. And she was introduced to the guests by Usama. The British Deputy High Commissioner David Pearey was seen discussing the elections with several persons.
The Arab consuls-general were in full strength. They are more regular in attending such ceremonies after Usama became the doyen. That practice is likely to continue after Usama returns home as he is to be succeeded as doyen by the Kuwaiti Consul-General Abdul Karim Abugaith who, unlike reported earlier, is not leaving the city soon.
The Consul-General of Turkey Fevzi Uslubas was there arranging for tennis and badminton matches among the diplomats. He is, in fact, a football fan, but he is game for any game, or so he says. He is always in great spirit. He is also trying to arrange for an exhibition of the work of Gulgee and Shahla Rahman in Turkey. That will be quite a mix of the senior and young talents. Gulgee’s canvases will be very large, while Shahla’s will be small.
Saudi Consul-General Mohammad Abdullah Tasji was there. He is being transferred to Libya as ambassador. His predecessor, the popular Baqr Gazzaz, went to Algeria as ambassador, and having lived over ten years in Pakistan he visits Karachi at intervals. Tasji’s assignment in the city has been brief. The doyen of the honorary consular corps, Ahmad Mahmud of Finland, was there, along with M.I. Akbar, of Spain, Aziz Memon, of Surname, and Anwar Saleh Mohammad, of Chile. Akbar Liaquat, younger son of the first prime minister of Pakistan, was there with his wife Durrah, who hails from Bangladesh.
Nasima Haider, who was much earlier counsellor in the Bangladesh High Commission in Islamabad is going back home as Director General of the Foreign Office in Dhaka. She spoke of how happy she was here and how helpful the people were to her. First of all, they were surprised to see a lady representing Bangladesh as deputy high commissioner, and were then very cooperative. The diplomatic community gave her special treatment as she was only lady consul-general in the city. She made many friends here, she said.
Ronald Fischer was on the ninth assignment of his career in Pakistan. He enjoyed every moment of his stay here, he said, and he would miss the many friends he had made here. His successor will arrive here in November. Usama was happy that while some of his colleagues were leaving, new heads of missions were arriving despite some upsets here.
Vital book
Ameena Saiyid, the tireless Chief Executive of Oxford University Press, is having a very busy time. She is coming up with new titles, arranging for launching ceremonies for some of them and planning for more publications.
A new OUP publication is White House and Pakistan — containing secret declassified documents from 1969 to 1974 — which covers the traumatic separation of East Pakistan from the mainland. The 660-page publication has been edited and compiled by F.S. Aijazuddin, who went over to the US to get the documents as they were released for the public.
In doing that, he has become a competitor to Roedad Khan who had, in 1999, brought out The American Papers — secret and confidential India, Pakistan, Bangladesh documents from 1965 to 1973 — which covers a crucial eight-year period in our tumultuous history. Roedad Khan also came out with The British Papers — secret and confidential India, Pakistan Bangladesh documents from 1958 to 1969 — published by the OUP.
The OUP has also published a book on Kashmir, Danger in Kashmir by Joseph Korbel, a member of the UN Commission on India and Pakistan written in 1954. Korbel, a Czech diplomat, was father of the former US Secretary of State, Madeline Albright, who also tried to resolve the Kashmir issue. The book has a Foreword by Admiral Chester Nimitz, who headed the UNCIP mission and suffered many frustrations in trying to solve the bitter dispute. It is an important book on the dispute.
OUP had a launching ceremony as well as a seminar to discuss the book The Post-Colonial State and Social Transformation in India and Pakistan edited by S.M. Naseem and Khalid Naqvi, which is a review of the state of the economy and society since independence. But OUP’s more interesting launching ceremony was to present M.S. Korejo’s Testament of Sindh — ethnic and religious extremism in perspective.
Korejo, a forester-turned-diplomat, has a penchant for controversy. He produces books with the speed with which he produced trees as a forester. In nine years, he has published three books and is planning for more, moving from one area of controversy to another, undeterred by the opinion of others. His first book was Frontier Gandhi, on Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, whom he had never met. The second book was on G.M. Syed, whom he had hardly known personally. And his third book is on the rise of MQM and religious extremism in Sindh with its Sufi saints.
Ameena had three speakers at the launching ceremony. Justice Shaiq Usmani made a fine analysis of the book. Dr Shafquat Ali Jamote had fears with regards to the reactions to the book. He referred to the German writer who challenged the contention that Hitler had wiped out seven million Jews, and said at first the writer lost his job and then disappeared. Ali Ahmed Brohi was truly hilarious. He wondered why Korejo preferred such outlandish people and explosive subjects to write on.
Brohi told an anecdote about the Indian writer Khushwant Singh, while he was flying in Texas. A tall Texan sitting next to Khushwant noticed his big turban and ample beard in a net and asked him who he was. “I am a Sikh” he replied. “I am sorry, I hope you recover quick,” said the Texan sympathetically. “No. No, I am sick by religion,” said Kushwant. “I am also sick of religion,” said the Texan. Kushwant kept quiet.
Korejo will soon be coming out with another book on Sindh. I hope that will be a true testament of Sindh instead of the present one which deals with explosive developments in contravention of that testament.
Not content with ceremonies to launch her books, Ameena is having a ceremony to sign in major writers of books. She recently had Dr Ishrat Husain, governor of the State Bank of Pakistan, to sign a contract to write a book on Macroeconomic Management in Pakistan — something he has been dealing with during this last three years as governor of the Central Bank of Pakistan. His earlier book published by OUP was the well-publicised Pakistan — Economy of an Elitist State. How soon the new book will be out is not clear now, but it will not be at a far-off date. He said his well-publicised book earlier was on the debt crisis in the 1999.
Dr Ishrat has been mentioned in the currently explosive book Globalization and its Discontents by Joseph Stiglitz. “He was my boss in the World Bank” as chief economist, he said.
The State Bank of Pakistan is setting up special chairs in economics in the universities, he says. He is offering Rs100,000 a month for the professor of economics in the Karachi University to attract the right talent. He wants economic faculties in the universities to be strengthened to produce enough competent students to face the challenge of modern economy which Pakistan faces, as do other developing countries. But good professors may not only need good pay-scales but also less disturbed conditions in the universities to give their best and produce far better economist.
Usama Qassim Al-Jamali, Consul-General of Oman, was playing the role of doyen of the consular corps in the city again. He was bidding farewell to the popular Bangladesh Deputy High Commissioner Nasima Haider, who had been in the city for 16 months, and the well-liked Swiss Consul-General Roland Fischer and his lovely wife Iris, who had been here for over three years.
