The state rolls on, impotently

Kamran Shafi

Just on the heels of the government's knee-jerk responses showing self-righteous indignation at the stick the Big General has come in for as a direct result of his by now infamous remarks about rape, there are at least five credible stories in the press about this dastardly crime being committed upon all manner of victims, from baby girls to grand-mothers. The one that stands out, however, is about an under-aged (according to the Hindu way) Hindu girl who was kidnapped and gang-raped in Jacobabad, Sindh, and who has subsequently reportedly converted to Islam and married one of her assailants. The two criminals who had been arrested for the crime of rape have been released consequent to the girl's statement in court regarding her marriage to one of them.

The case has been discussed in the National Assembly, no less, reportedly in the following words: "Speaking in the National Assembly Minister of State for Interior Wasim Shahzad said that the girl was abducted on September 14 and a case was registered the same day. 'Two of the four abductors were arrested', he said in response to a Calling Attention Notice. The minister said she gave a statement in the court that she has married one of the accused and embraced Islam at Dargah Amrit Sharif. 'In light of her statement the court dismissed the case and freed the rapists,' Wasim added".

Isn't something very, very wrong here? The case that was registered on September 14 against the four was one of the horrible crime of rape was it not? Suppose the poor girl was intimidated into proselytising and changing her religion AND marrying one of her assailants to let them off the hook? Does the State have no part to play in any of this? Can the State not be a complainant and prosecute the case on its own, for the original crime of rape, carried out by four men? What about Zina bil Jabr something we hear so much about in the Land of the Pure? Or is it only to be applied in reverse: to women who have been raped?

This is not all. Minority members of the National Assembly, Gayan Chand Singh, Krishan Bheel and Ramesh Lal have demanded that the case be dealt with as one of abduction because under Hindu law and custom a girl of 17 is a minor and cannot marry of her own will until she is 20. If Pakistani society is inclusive, and all are equal citizens of the country, the State must enforce the customs according to which its various components, including Hindus, live. Surely the girl can be recovered from the rapists and returned to her parents, and the criminals proceeded against by the mighty State of Pakistan?

In a further and equally damaging revelation made in the National Assembly, Krishan Bheel said many Hindus, businessmen and others, are also being kidnapped for huge ransom in Sindh. "These incidents are taking place to force the Hindus to leave Pakistan, where they have been living for the past five thousand years", he said. "Several religious parties are reportedly behind this move by convincing the people that it is their moral responsibility to get rid of infidels from Pakistan and (that) taking ransom from non-Muslims is not a sin" the report concludes.

These are serious charges and show up the hollowness of the government's fight-back against what it still says is an unfair reading of the Big General's remarks to the Washington Post. Which, by the way, the newspaper has posted, in an audio clip on its website at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/audio/2005/09/23/AU2005092301253.html

Before I go any further, however, after hearing the General himself I have to say that he started on the issue of women and rape and violence in an extremely eloquent and supportive manner. In a nine-minute clip of his own voice and words there are eight minutes in which he says just the right things; just the things that need to be said in addressing the problems of women in our country which is made up largely of misogynists of the worst kind. And then, out of the blue, the BOMBSHELL for no reason under the sun and the moon and the stars: bila wajah he says what the WP says he said. So outlandish and shocking were his remarks that one can clearly hear several loud (and unbelieving) moans from someone or other present in the same room as the General. Actually, despite reading the remarks repeatedly; in spite of writing about them twice, and having taken part in a demonstration called by the JAC in Islamabad to protest them this last Thursday even I could not help an "Oh no!" escape my lips when I heard them verbatim yesterday.

Let me once again advise the Big General to apologise -- it will only prove he is a big man. And to women it will send the signal that he is their protector who just made a mistake that is all. It will do much more for him than any silly letter to the editor such as the one written by our Ambassador to Washington to the NY Times the other day.

Bushism of the Week: "Then I went for a run with the other dog and just walked. And I started thinking about a lot of things. I was able to -- I can't remember what it was. Oh, the inaugural speech, started thinking through that" -- President George W. Bush; U.S. News and World Report; January 22, 2001.

The writer is a retired army officer

and a freelance columnist

kshafi1@yahoo.co.uk

VIEW: Empowerment, my foot —Kamran Shafi

VIEW: Empowerment, my foot —Kamran Shafi

Seeing how the Big General is smitten by General Naqvi’s handiwork, specially by the possibilities of its becoming an electoral college for an indirect presidential election, the situation will have to become a lot worse before any attempt is made to correct it. Empowerment of the people? Ask Sonia Naz

The hottest topic under discussion in the Fatherland, a country where there is never a dull day, is Lieutenant General Majeed Malik’s matriculation certificate, or lack of it. Whilst the “bloody civilians” are asking how come an under-matric (as it is referred to colloquially) rose to the giddy heights of Corps Commander; Director General Military Operations; Federal Minister; Vice President of the Pakistan Muslim League (The Big General’s Own) etcetera and so forth, and the Big General himself is worried enough to step in and try and defuse the turmoil in the King’s Party triggered by General Malik’s desire to become Chakwal’s Nazim and Chaudhry Pervez Elahi’s opposition to that, its secretary general Mushahid ‘Mandela’ Hussain insists it is only a very normal occurrence as can be expected in any democratic dispensation (as if the Kings Party, particularly its takeover by force of arms by the present group that has qabza over it was democratic!); that nothing out of the ordinary ails his flock.

Well, that is some claim when the King’s Party seems on the very verge of splitting every which way. Which it will not, precisely because the Big General has personally stepped into the fray to separate the rivals in this fight for the lucrative offices of district and tehsil nazim. ‘Lucrative’ being the operative word here, this is just the place for a short anecdote: A friend who is not only a course-mate but also a buddy I cherish, but who shall remain anonymous, told me just the other day that he was approached by someone desirous of becoming the ‘approved candidate’ for a naib-nazim’s office somewhere in the Punjab. That someone told my buddy he would give him two crore (20 million) rupees if my buddy would introduce him to “a general, any general in an important post in GHQ”. Such then, are the stakes in these local elections that people are willing to invest such vast sums for a mere introduction.

It is evident from what one sees around oneself that the system unleashed by General Tanvir Naqvi and his cohorts of the National Destruction Bureau is the cause of both: corruption of the highest order, and bad governance of a kind never seen before. What else could prove this point better than the Sonia Naz case in which the entire police department of one of the most important districts in the Punjab, the Mother of all Provinces, has been held to be inept, inefficient and corrupt to the core? Two of its highest officials, the Deputy Inspector General of Police and the Superintendent of Police, Investigation, have been accused of fighting with one another; of heading qabza groups; of fraternising with subordinate officials, one of them best friends with one inspector of police, the other with another inspector; inspectors of police filming each other in what is known as “compromising positions” with women of easy virtue; the District Police Officer exercising no control whatsoever, you name it. Think of the most scandalous possible police set-up in the world and the Faisalabad police would stand out a mile. A veritable den of iniquitousness, and worse.

Now it is only Faisalabad that has come to the notice of the press. But what about the other districts where God alone knows what may be going on? What pray will those who trumpet good governance do about this example of most horrendous governance? When will they realise (and admit) that if there was an effective magistracy in existence in Faisalabad, most of what happened would not have happened. That the commissioner and the deputy commissioner had, as one of their primary functions, oversight of the police? That Sonia Naz would not have tried to meet Shaukat Aziz in the National Assembly if she had recourse to a district-level official with the clout to order an immediate inquiry.

I am afraid, however, that seeing how the Big General is smitten by General Naqvi’s handiwork, specially by the possibility of its becoming an electoral college for an indirect presidential election, the situation will have to become a lot worse before any attempt is made to correct it. In the meantime, the country is in the hands of feudals, qabza groups and the moneyed classes who will lord it over the mass of the people until something (hopefully) snaps. “Empowerment” of the people, my foot. Ask Sonia Naz.

A word of advice to the protectors of Pakistan’s ideology, aka the thekedars of Pakistan: Please, sirs, immediately read The wrath of Khan by William Langewiesche, a two-part article in the Atlantic Monthly, the first part of which has been published in the October 2005 issue. Excerpt:”Then for Khan, in January of 2004, the good life came crashing down. He was sixty-eight at the time. US agents had intercepted a German ship named the BBC China carrying parts for a Libyan nuclear-weapons-production programme, and Libya, in subsequently renouncing its nuclear ambitions, had named Pakistan, and particularly the Khan Research Laboratories, as the supplier of what was to be a complete store-bought nuclear-weapons programme. The price tag was said to be $100 million. At about the same time, it was revealed that the Pakistani-run network had provided information and nuclear-weapons components to Iran and North Korea, and had begun negotiations with a fourth country, perhaps Syria or Saudi Arabia. The current dictator of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf, denied any personal knowledge or governmental involvement, and with his masters in Washington, DC, looking sternly on, accused Khan of running a rogue operation, outside the law. It was theatre of the diplomatic kind. But Musharraf was an unconvincing actor. In the context of Pakistan he might as well have expressed surprise that Khan had built a house on the shores of a drinking-water supply [Rawal Dam].”

Whilst I know the powers that be are made of sterner stuff, I, a complete coward, am quaking in my chappals.

Bushism of the Week: I want it to be said that the Bush administration was a results-oriented administration, because I believe the results of focusing our attention and energy on teaching children to read and having an education system that’s responsive to the child and to the parents, as opposed to mired in a system that refuses to change, will make America what we want it to be — a literate country and a hopefuller country” — President George W Bush; Washington DC; January 11, 2001.

Kamran Shafi is a freelance columnist. His writings can be accessed at http://www.kamranshafi.blogspot.com

Sorry is such a little word

Sorry is such a little word
By
Kamran Shafi

Quote: “I'm sorry.” Why are those two little words so difficult to say? Perhaps because they hold such power. An honest apology can mend relationships, dissolve anger, soothe shattered pride or heal a broken heart. And a study conducted by the University of Michigan showed that apologizing can even have health benefits, such as lowering stress levels. Meanwhile, avoiding an apology makes relationships more strained -- and it can reveal something negative about you. Being incapable of apologizing can be a real character flaw, says Beverly Engel, a psychotherapist and author of The Power of Apology (John Wiley & Sons, 2001). Unquote. (Maria Neumann, writing in ‘Shape’, 2003).

Yet, it is such a big word when it comes out of the mouths of big people. People such as our Big General: Chief of Army Staff of the Land of the Pure; President of the Citadel of Islam; Lord and Master of all he surveys in the Islamic Republic to end all Islamic Republics because of it’s bum, and so on and so forth. A country better than many developed countries according to himself, notwithstanding the fact that at last count eleven people had died, yes died, in Landhi from drinking contaminated water. Landhi, in case anyone has forgotten, is located in the metropolis of Karachi, the Karachi of the Creek Cities and other such glittering oases for the rich and the famous.

Yes sirs, “sorry” would be such a big word were the General to employ it to regret his appalling amplification of what somebody (surely some bigoted chauvinist male supremacist pig) purportedly said in his presence about a “lot” of people in Pakistan saying “if you want to go abroad and get a visa for Canada, or citizenship, and be a millionaire, get yourself raped”. All he has to do is to stand up straight, look the nation in the eye, and just say, simply, “Sorry, I should not have said (even ‘amplified’ or ‘repeated’ will do) what I did”. That is all. No more, no less.

I have oft made the point, not that anyone has listened, that the mass of the Pakistani people, excluding the chattering classes of course, are a good and a kind and an understanding and a wise people. They know all about making mistakes; of asking forgiveness; of forgiving; of being forgiven. They are also so in awe of authority that if the Big General would sincerely apologise, they would not brook (be part of anyway) his further criticism. But will he apologise when all manner of toady is advising him not to; and every sycophant is telling him it would be a sign of weakness?

He will not apologise, for our Commando is in fighting mood: even before going to visit the US Central Command Headquarters in Tampa, Florida, which is sure to have brought a further flush to his demeanour and a higher spring to his step, he has already challenged an un-named woman in New York to a fight. This was someone who, according to reliable news reports, asked him a question about his get-raped-for-a-visa remarks. He said, variously, first echoing Louis X1V when he declared: “L’État, c’est moi”, “I am the state”: “ You are against me and Pakistan”; “If you are against me, you are against Pakistan”; “Are you a Benazir supporter? (The) lady was Prime Minister of Pakistan twice, ask her what she has done for Pakistan”. In an obvious reference to the House of Zahoor, Gujrat City, politicians known not only for great truthfulness but other qualities such as shining honesty, the General said, “We have introduced new leaders who don’t tell lies, unlike your leaders who did; I am a fighter, I will fight you”. And so on and so forth, unbecomingly, he went on.

Indeed, in such a fighting mood is he that he even went to the extent of accusing the Washington Post of misquoting him in these words: “I never said that. I am not so silly or stupid to make such remarks.” Fatal mistake, for one does not play around with the likes of the Post. If one is right and one has been misquoted in matters as grave as rape, one sues the paper concerned for millions of dollars; if one is wrong one keeps one’s head down and prays for the ill-winds to blow themselves out. As it happened, and exactly because of the bad advice proffered by the toadies, inside of 24 hours the WP ran another story reiterating the General’s own words, and in the “And moreover” category added: “…then as the reporters prepared to move to the next question, Gen. Musharraf interjected the comments about rape as a money-making concern, saying it was the “popular term” in Islamabad”!!

For the uninitiated, mayhap a recounting of the “And moreover” anecdote will do us well. A Sikh got into an heated argument with a lager lout or some other Yahoo in Hounslow or thereabouts. Soon, choice epithets began to fly between the two and just as the Sardar Ji thought the Brit lout was having the better of him in English swear words he reverted to Punjabi and said, “And moreover, teri #@%*&#”! This is what the Big General exposed himself to by trying to wriggle out of a difficult situation he had put himself in, instead of facing the question squarely … and … simply apologising.

Which reminds me. Where was Information Minister and Sole Spokesman of the Islamic Republic, Shiekh Rashid ‘Tulli’ during this brouhaha with the Washington Post? He was nowhere to be seen, and was sorely missed by his fans such as I who so look forward to hearing his impassioned defence of the General in his impeccable English, and witness his courteousness and civility and good manners. Seems he has been put under wraps, poor chap, his place taken by the ISPR gent for reasons best known to the powers. No wonder the matter got out of hand – just one of his deft touches and the WP would have been eating out of the Big General’s hand. I mean when you have an eminence such as ‘Tulli’ on your side why not use him?

Bushism of the Week: “Nothing he (Saddam Hussein) has done has convinced me – I’m confident the Secretary of Defense – that he is the kind of fellow that is willing to forgo weapons of mass destruction, is willing to be a peaceful neighbor, that is – will honor the people – the Iraqi people of all stripes, will – values human life. He hasn’t convinced me, nor has he convinced my administration” – President George W. Bush – Crawford, Texas; August 21, 2002.

END