The Old City of Gates
By Syed Kamran Hashmi
Westfield, IN
For some people, names carry esoteric implications but for others, they are just syllables without any hidden meanings. Shakespeare belonged to the second group when he declared, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose; by any other name would smell as sweet.”
We, on the other hand, belong to the first group as we yearn for eminence in every aspect of our ostentatious lives, even the dirty ones. That is why we add the suffix ‘gate’ to all our scandals in order to identify our political misconduct with the iconic Watergate scandal of the early 1970s. We label our misdemeanors as ‘memogate’; sometimes, we call them ‘mediagate’ and refer to them as ‘familygate’ scandals. The objective is the same: to build their association with the world renowned political debacle of the United States of America. In this process, we not only intend to deny the paltriness of our state of affairs, but we also attempt to exaggerate the political impact of these stories that are usually iced with some colorful conspiracy theories.
We have to remember that the reason for the notoriety of the Watergate scandal in the USA is the loss of its president; while we have only sacrificed our Ambassador to the USA in the memogate scandal. The ‘judicialgate’ has brought some inconsequential public embarrassment for the billionaire business tycoon and mediagate has so far barely taken down one anchor and has been unable to make any meaningful indentation.
For Americans, the Watergate scandal demonstrates the triumph of justice; it confirms the stability of the system and the transparency of their judicial process. It also reinforces the audacity of investigative journalism and establishes its importance as the fourth estate. But for us, the lessons from Watergate are entirely different. It teaches us the power of video recordings as a tool to coerce political opponents; it educates us about all the conceivable possibilities for the obstruction of justice and it encourages us to destroy every form of evidence that can potentially be used in a court of law.
We can recall that the Watergate scandal emerged after the headquarters of the Democratic National committee (DNC) was burglarized in the middle of the election campaign of 1972. After the break in, five suspects were immediately arrested and an extensive investigation was launched to identify the secret involvement of the rival political party — the Republican Party — in the incident. It was a remarkably hard task to accomplish since the rival was Richard Nixon and he had won the elections during the inquiry. Nevertheless, the investigation never stopped; it continued to amass all evidence and eventually, it exposed the dirty truth. It disclosed the connection of the presidential campaign with the burglars and unfolded their complicity with the White House. After the president was exposed, he was certainly going to be impeached if he had not decided to step down from office. As a result, in the August of 1974, under a storm of public pressure, Nixon resigned from the Oval Office.
On that account, Nixon is the first and the only president of the USA who has relinquished his presidency in the nation’s history. The moral of the story for the Americans was that even the president could not get away with a crime. For us, unfortunately, the moral of that story yet again was just the opposite; it was that even a criminal could be the president.
It is true that we do not have modern architectural monuments like the Watergate building complex (the building where the burglary took place and from where the scandal took its name) in Pakistan. It is also true that our public office holders have not set the precedent to succumb to public pressure; but we are still rich in our cultural heritage and our local edifices share similar suffixes as well. It is therefore our responsibility to honor our history and utilize their names to refer to our transgressions. We should be mindful that patriotism is our top priority, and the old day adage about Pakistani protectionism should be modified to — be Pakistani, buy Pakistani and use only Pakistani epithets.
I am alluding to the old Walled City of Lahore that was fortified by its numerous entry checkpoints. On the western wall, there was the oldest access to the city known as the Bhaati Gate and was named after the Rajput tribes of Punjab. Then, we had the Lohari Gate on the northern wall; Delhi gate was located on the east, Kashmiri gate was facing Kashmir, Mochi gate was situated in the old cobblers market and so on. There were a total of thirteen and each one carried its own historical significance. As the city has burgeoned outside the walled district, and as the affluent areas have positioned themselves at a distance from the old city — both literally and figuratively — the prestige of these gates has dwindled tremendously. For the sake of patriotism, we are obliged to revive their old hegemony and the first step would be to name the next Pakistani scandal after the Yakki or the Sheranwala gates of Lahore.
(The writer is a US-based freelance columnist and can be reached at skamranhashmi@gmail.com )
