October 22, 2021
Money Trap
Greed has felled many a good man. This was brought home when viewing the 2008 South African movie, “Hansie: A True Story”, chronicling the downfall of a champion South African cricketer and Test captain. It’s a tragic tale of a good man ensnared in a worldwide venal web.
Entangled in the net of quick cash, Hansie Cronje attributed his descent into the abyss due to the “unfortunate love of money.”
On June 1, 2002, at the age of 32, he was killed in an unsatisfactorily explained air crash, thereby silencing forever, to cite Alfred Hitchcock, “The Man Who Knew Too Much,” vide Guardian, “Was Hansie Cronje murdered?”, August 3, 2003.
The movie tracks the process of entrapping a God-fearing man having his better judgment clouded by avarice.
It started in India during a South African tour, when there were scant safeguard protocols in place, which could have inoculated Hansie on the pitfalls of playing in India, with its gambling syndicates. Because of its clout – due to multiplicity of factors – India has evaded withering scrutiny.
Pakistan has been visibly singled out, but the problem lies much deeper. Its 1999 World Cup loss to Bangladesh was inadequately probed, so the cancer metastasized, leading to the 2010 spot-fixing disaster in England.
Subcontinental set-up, as the Pandora Papers reveal, is particularly vulnerable and amenable to the short-cut lure of making quick easy money. Why? It is easier than hard toil. The May 2000 Justice Qayyum report investigating match-fixing implicated key members of the Pakistan cricket team, some of whom were later rewarded with sinecure posts and received high national decorations, sending the message loud and clear that integrity doesn’t matter.
Hansie played his last international game against Pakistan at Sharjah on March 31, 2000. His then coach, Bob Woolmer – later to become Pakistan’s coach – died on March 18, 2007, in disputed circumstances in Jamaica after Pakistan’s shock loss to Ireland in the 2007 World Cup in the Caribbean. Former South African captain Clive Rice went to his grave suspecting that the two deaths were connected.
But who is going to clean the Augean stables?
When judges are corrupt, generals are corrupt, journalists are corrupt, clergy is corrupt, and politicians are corrupt, one cannot expect sportsmen to be held to a higher standard and not to be similarly swayed and infected. Accountability, in effect, is for minnows and foes. Pandora disclosures reveal that proprietors of large media networks in Pakistan are known to have offshore accounts while at the same time presenting themselves as custodians of public ethics. It is a pattern recurring constantly in a culture and country where its founding father’s integrity and incorruptibility was beyond reproach and even vouched for by his foes.
Before Pakistan embarks on its T20 campaign, its world cup squad should be made to trudge to the modest dwelling of Fazal Mahmood in Garhi Shahu, Lahore. This was the man whose breakthrough exploits during the toddler years of Pakistan cricket enabled Pakistan to win Test status less than five years from its creation and then single-handedly go on to trounce India, England, Australia, and West Indies.
When Fazal first came to see me when I was serving in the Punjab Cabinet at Lahore, I left my office to see him off outside at the car park. But there was no car. At a distance, I saw a motorcycle and rider. Fazal, who sat at its back, had hitched a ride. Such is the stuff of legends. While addressing a youth rally in Lahore, I inquired how many had heard of Fazal Mahmood. No hands went up.
Rewarding dishonesty is an insult to honesty. And, also, a public rebuke to the ethic of Rizq-e-halal. Existing Subcontinental culture is steeped in showy piety and private pelf. The prevalence of this duality poses a threat to nationhood. Wealth can be a hidden curse.
“Knowledge is better than wealth: Knowledge protects you, whereas you have to protect wealth.” Such was the counsel of Hazrat Ali 14 centuries ago. The Pandora Papers vividly illustrate its enduring sagacity.
The super-rich are prone to be mired in perpetual anxiety and insecurity. Much wants more. But for the bloated cushion of big money, nobody would give a damn about them. It is the weaponization of dark money that enables this over-represented cabal to get access to the keys of the kingdom – effectively leaving the vast majority grossly unrepresented.
Under the hijab of democracy flourishes the dictatorship of the super-rich. To contain the pandemic of pelf requires a massive cultural reset.
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