September 11, 2009
To Try or Not to Try: That Is the Question
It now appears that Musharraf’s exit was a surreptitious multinational orchestration. Pakistan represented by Asfandyar Wali Khan, Asif Ali Zardari, Yusuf Raza Gilani and General Kiyani, the United States represented by Dick Cheney and Condoleeza Rice, the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Saudi Arabia’s Abdullah all engineered a dignified transfer of military power to General Kiyani and then complete indemnity, apparently indefinitely. All this is supposedly verbal.
Reaction to socio-political situations has become reflexive and ingrained in Pakistan. Predictable as though it was in our DNA. The most egregious event could happen and one could accurately predict a lukewarm response.
And so it is with the Musharraf fiasco. Spontaneously one feels that it would be terrible for an already struggling nation to put its former absolutist on trial, now that the Supreme Court has judged his November 3 rd 2007 acts as unconstitutional. Realizing that this was a gut reaction, helped by the chorus of scores of other gut reactions, I went on an informal survey of sorts, posing a simple question: should Musharraf be tried for treason?
If nothing else the question screeches lazy conversations to whiplash halts, at least till the subject gains composure. Always amusing.
After many blinks and a few circumspect look-arounds, the subject goes into major philosophical mode, with a touch of condescension at times. There were too many bohraans (crises) in the country, the electricity shortage, the flour shortage, the gas shortage and now the sugar shortage. Skyrocketing prices, unemployment and terrorism all created a terrible environment; certainly not one that would allow Pakistan to withstand this new load.
My response to this mutually exclusive or “let’s put on blinders” argument is whether all these economic crises, corruption and terrorism would disappear if all governmental energies were focused on them and no trial is there to divert or digress. Governmental excuses just need hooks to hang their hats on.
Another subject says that all this was just revenge politics and Pakistan really needed to get past all this pettiness. Well, what about the time that a civilian elected leader Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was hanged by a military junta led by the outwardly soft-spoken Gen. Ziaul Haq?
Only a couple of people out of the many that I spoke with brought out the vital point of accountability of military leaders. In Pakistan’s checkered political history the impunity enjoyed by the army has reached genomic levels. And that is a serious issue that needs national examination. We have rightfully decorated our valiant heroes for their sacrifice of life and limb for the motherland. Despite a democracy that currently rules, military power in politics is a given; its abuse should not be tolerated nor condoned. And framing it in the form of a trial is the ideal modus to shatter this pedestal that only seems to get stronger and taller by the day.
According to a recent poll Zardari is the least popular political leader in the country, Yusuf Raza Gilani somewhere in the middle and Nawaz Sharif the most. That is another reflection of our psyche: we love the underdog and always the one that is not in power. By some strange twist of events we have cobbled together a democracy, however lame and corrupt it is, and by an even stranger turn of events have an independent judiciary. The monumental socio-economic issues notwithstanding, Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani stands in that particular moment that Shakespeare spoke of in “there’s a tide in the affairs of men, which when taken at its flood leads on to fortune”. This is a test of whether this government can really develop processes and build institutions. This is a test of his mettle, resolve and vision.
And as I write this he displays how sold he is to his party and his myopia. After all as that infamous Urdu verse translates “in this bath everyone is disrobed”; as soon as the Supreme Court passed judgment about Musharraf’s November 3 rd acts and sent the decision to the parliament, Gilani promised to act if there was a unanimous decision in Parliament. Now, with reins tightened by those that stand to fall with Musharraf, Gilani has wimped out. No good reason given other than “we should do what is doable”. Excuse me?
The United States has just introduced legislation to prosecute 4400 of its legal residents and citizens that have hidden their assets in Swiss banks to evade taxes. The Swiss banking system, for the first time in its history, has promised to cooperate, when previously it would send out its agents to recruit the wealthy in the US to place assets in the Swiss banking system. The United States, loaded by Pakistani standards, wants its money back; Pakistan’s leaders plunder Pakistan and enable others to keep up this part of our culture, lest we falter or desist.
Questions arise about the NRO, National Reconciliation Ordinance, and the fallout for Zardari if Musharraf is tried. Another arises for Iftikhar Chaudhry signing off as a PCO judge and enabling Musharraf’s rule and later on having a historic epiphany which should, because it created an independent judiciary, wipe out the earlier indiscretion.
“The trial is a terrible waste of time and money for the government”, is another criticism. So when will the waste of Pakistan’s time and money stop? Not only was Musharraf a wolf in sheep’s clothing in that he mangled the Constitution to satisfy his lust for power, he raked it in then and is still running gleefully to the bank. The shameless promotion of a terribly mediocre book on taxpayer money, including stints on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart among others, and post-power lecture circuits, are incredible displays of disrespect for Pakistan. Much like thumbing his nose at it, confident of immunity.
As a very young democracy and akin to the pain of childbirth this trial must happen. Indelibly our history must write that violating the Constitution gets punishment, not highly-paid lecture circuits and golf games in luxury European courses. The Pakistani mindset must permanently put the military in the barracks and apply justice to civilian and military alike. Placement of processes and institution-building is painful but vital in the working of a nation. As is the setting up of principles and precedents; that everyone should be cognizant of. And most importantly the endless plunder of Pakistan, as though it were our father’s fortune, must stop. One objector: “This way you have to try everyone in power”. Be that as it may. If you’re corrupt you ought to go. There are now 180 million Pakistanis, more than enough to work the government.
With the salacious release of the conspiratorial indemnification of Musharraf, it becomes even more important to proceed with a trial. Or at the minimum present this as a motion to Parliament. The people must speak via their elected representatives. And if among their mounting misfortunes is also the travesty to have unknowingly elected deeply corrupt parliamentarians who scuttle the resolution for party gain and personal motive rather than acting in the favor of the nation and to set up precedent and accountability so that this terrible repetitive free ride stops once and for all, then, it is Pakistan’s national tragedy.
It is a foregone conclusion, I know. And you are right, what else is new?
(Mahjabeen Islam is free-lance columnist and physician. Email mahjabeen.islam@gmail.com)
