Memogate on a Judicial Ventilator
By Dr Mohammad Taqi
Florida
The so-called ‘memogate’ scandal is effectively dead. It has been for a while. But apparently the honorable Commission appointed by the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SC) to probe into the veracity of the alleged memo wishes to keep it alive on a judicial ventilator.
At the height of the scandal when pundits were busy writing President Asif Ali Zardari and the Pakistan People’s Party’s (PPP’s) political obituary, I had noted in this space: “If the recent slew of ISPR press releases is anything to go by, the Pakistani brass is one frustrated lot. What they thought would be a slam dunk is turning out to be a drawn-out battle of nerves in which there are few, if any, legal and constitutional options for them to achieve their desired goal of sending President Asif Zardari packing. In the so-called ‘memogate’ saga, the odds are even now” (“Memogate: the odds are even now” — Daily Times, December 29, 2011).
That President Zardari survived the first blow — intended to be a knockout punch — by the military establishment, gave away the ending. I also noted in the same piece, “The PPP has survived the last couple of months thanks to the sheer grit of President Zardari, matched only by a resolute Husain H Haqqani. Clearly, both men have decided that they will sink or swim together, and rightly so.” Indeed, no effort to flip one against the other was to succeed.
The only wild card could have been the vacillating Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani. But while reinforcement by the president was the major factor that kept him from swaying, an extremely shabby hand played by the establishment that bruised his ego, cemented his resolve. This whole alignment practically took the political wind out of the memogate’s sails. And the PPP’s cruising past the finish line in the Senate elections earlier this month has turned the whole thing into a political non-issue.
But the political orphan that the memo matter subsequently became was left at the doorstep of the superior judiciary — or did they actually adopt it? Going by the difficulty the lordships are having in letting go of a political matter, which they should not have seized themselves with in the first place, is a tad concerning. According to this newspaper of record, the judicial investigation commission has now approached the SC for yet another extension in its term, beyond March 31 this time, to finish its task.
The commission reportedly has ordered the Deputy Attorney General of Pakistan Tariq Jehangeri to submit Haqqani’s employment contract, the Foreign Ministry’s 2011 annual report regarding the US, transcripts/details of the telegrams sent by the former ambassador to the foreign office, an ambassador’s code of conduct and special briefings held in the year 2011. The former foreign secretary Salman Bashir and the Director General US division, Dr Sohail Khan have also been summoned before the commission on a yet to be determined date. Thank goodness that the track record of the ambassadors before Haqqani was not requisitioned to be used as a benchmark in this fishing expedition. Clearly the commission is not going to rush to any judgment — no pun intended.
Well, let the wheels of justice grind at whatever pace the lordships deem appropriate. But what is troublesome is the use of different yardsticks for the drama queen Mansoor Ijaz, who stood the court up on no less than three occasions, and Haqqani. The latter has pleaded with the commission to be excused from appearing in person, as serious threats exist to his life in Pakistan. He has asked to be allowed to depose via videoconferencing. Given that Ijaz was granted a similar request without much ado, fairness demanded equal treatment for Haqqani. But honorable Justice Qazi Faez Isa and his brother judges denied Haqqani’s prayer and have turfed the matter over to the SC. In Ijaz’s case, the commission not only had granted the permission itself but, per newspaper reports, had also declared “that videoconferencing would create a ‘win-win situation’ for all the stakeholders”!
My lordship Justice Isa is reported to have asked Haqqani’s attorney: “Why Haqqani has not appeared before the commission? Whom does Haqqani fear? We will provide security to him...I wonder that he is willing to come to London from United States but not to Pakistan. If so, he is then unsafe anywhere on the globe...he is a Pakistani citizen and bound to follow the law and Constitution.”
There are some fundamental issues with the honorable judge’s observations. Just by the sheer nature of the charges against him and the media lynching he has already gone through, the danger to Haqqani’s life is of much higher magnitude and of most immediate nature inside Pakistan, not anywhere else in the world. In a land where the governor of the largest province was assassinated by his own elite police guard due to a wrong perception created by some malicious sections of the media, the risk to Haqqani, who has been blamed for ‘seditious’ activity by no less than the army and intelligence service chiefs, is imminent not imaginary.
Let me reiterate that upon his arrival in Islamabad on November 20, 2011, Haqqani’s passport was snatched away by the people who, though Pakistani, were, let’s just say, not exactly working under the court’s orders, law and the constitution. He subsequently remained besieged first in the presidential and then in the prime ministerial compounds, with shadows lurking right outside his door. The SC did not for once inquire into who had confiscated Haqqani’s passport. But, interestingly, when the SC restored his fundamental right to movement, the passport mysteriously reappeared on the table in the dining room of the PM house’s guest annexe! Not exactly an episode that inspires confidence in the legal system or its control over certain elements within the state.
As to the security against the non-state actors that the honorable judges may be promising, one may humbly submit that the law-abiding and constitution-upholding Justice Syed Pervez Ali Shah, the anti-terrorism court judge who sentenced Governor Salmaan Taseer’s killer, had to flee Pakistan fearing for his life. One is not saying that the superior judiciary could not provide security to one of its own but if Haqqani is not reassured by the commission’s pledge, one can hardly blame him.
Memogate was not a political slam dunk — it will not be a judicial one either. It may be prudent to switch off the ventilator.
( The writer can be reached at mazdaki@me.com. He tweets at http://twitter.com/mazdaki)
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