Pakistani Ministers In New York

I have nothing to add to this except to say, shame on us because we keep electing the same losers:

“Pictures from The Big Apple have been freely circulating on the internet, capturing the ministers of Pakistan in the throes of ecstasy while they shake their booty in a stretch limo that can outstretch any stretch limo. Inside, the stage is designed for fun and games. Loyal "supporters" of President Zardari's cabinet ministers whipped up the limo and the party was on. The custodians of Pakistan's destiny gyrated, shook their butts and roared with laughter and pleasure as the greenbacks flew, just as they do in the great "mujras" here. Mr Qamar-uz-Kaira and Mr Nazar Gondal, surrounded by their loving friends, had a blast. The reports say that by the time the party was over $16,000 had been thrown into the Big Apple's stratosphere. Not bad for a mission that went without shame to beg for more US aid.

What the legislators from Pakistan were celebrating is not known, but it was obviously a good-enough reason. As for what the bewildered Americans are making of this strange and bizarre performance of the president's party that had arrived with large begging bowls and looking like something the cat had brought in – well, we will never know. They must be wondering what kind of demented people now run the affairs of this blighted nation, which has nothing of substance left and certainly no shame in asking for alms every few hours. What has the president to say about this behavior? Is this conduct unbecoming? Can you hold a public office and behave like a common party lout? Where is the sense of decorum? Breeding? Education? Perhaps there is none of that, because they have none of it anyway. Will they be openly reprimanded? We shouldn't hold our breath. Worse things have gone unpunished.

No explanation will be required. The official thinking on this would be that there is no need to tell anything at all. As for the errant ministers who don't deserve to be where they are, no need to ever worry. Neither will they ever be questioned nor, God forbid, punished. Instead, they will, things being bizarre here, rise to greater heights and accumulate lots of money on the way up. This is not the first time public money and our tattered image has been further eroded by those whom a capricious twist of fate has placed where they least deserve to be. The capability of these people who call the shots in Pakistan today is very questionable. In real life you wouldn't even give them jobs as peons in your office. But this is not real life. You could sweep all this under the carpet because graver offences are taking place daily and the louts were just "boys" letting down their hair and partying, but it further depresses millions who see in such behaviour the end of our existence.

As for the "Chak De" business, the former president's Chak Shahzad villa has been under the spotlight. But rest assured, the media is as usual lying and gunning for a man who has given his all for this country. Nothing is amiss at the ranch, so we are told. This is wonderfully reassuring news. It transpires that the villa--constructed on land that has always been controversial, illegally occupied and in violation of all rules and regulations, and where the Big Man has built his retreat--also has an agricultural electricity connection which is meant for genuine farms and not plush retreats from the buzzing capital. This connection, of which the Big Man knows nothing and which is not noticed by his staffers who are forever searching haystacks for needles, is the cheapest form of electricity in Pakistan. When the story breaks with irrefutable proof in the form of power bills, the lying machinery goes into auto-drive. First there is denial, then indignation, then more mumbo jumbo. In between, IESCO, quietly "changes" the telltale meter and gives the connection another cloak to wear. By some twist of fate, Chak Shahzad is beamed to the FATA areas and, lo and behold! The villa receives a FATA power connection. Not as cheap as the agricultural one but cheap as dirt, nevertheless. FATA? Could IESCO not come up with a better lie? Even lying presupposes some common sense, which IESCO does not have.

Denials have been flying like drones. The issue is being sidetracked, so that the heat can be taken off. Since there is an open season on lying at all times of the year, this is easy to manage. No one can dare question anything that touches the life of the royals, even ex-royals, so this too will be dumped into the overflowing garbage dump of our national shame. Pakistan continues to be raped and plundered at will, particularly by those who claim to be its biggest champions. The common folk, slapped by absence of power in this summer and random acts of the violence that stalks our lives, have nothing to look forward to. This is our destiny. As Zia Moheyddin once said at a cricket match which Pakistan converted from an easy win to a bewildering loss, "Shikast hamara muqaddar ban-chuki hai." Defeat has become our destiny.”

This fine column was written by Masood Hasan in The News on Sunday, May 31, 2009.

The Business of Asma-Jehangirism & Liberal Extremism

Should we start a civil war because some liberal extremists in our elite are upset about the alleged flogging video? Some occasions are not meant for settling scores. But a minority in our elite that has an ideological problem with religion is at it again. They are not even willing to stop and consider a range of possibilities, including the possibility of foul play. Now we have a statement from the girl named in the video confirming this is not her. She still lives in the village supposedly cited in the video and no one there has seen this flogging take place. There’s no question there have been atrocities committed in Swat before the peace deal in Feb. 2009. There’s also no question that everyone in Pakistan has condemned the video. But shouldn’t intelligent people also ask questions about where, when, and how it was filmed and by whom. Rationality demands that all possibilities be probed. We still don’t know how this video was simultaneously released to several local TV channels? And why the Presidency was quick to leak to the media that Mr. Zardari may not endorse the peace deal after this mysterious incident. Why was Mr. President so quick to make this indirect statement without even considering when this alleged flogging occurred: before or after the peace deal? Or was the objective to simply find an excuse to scrap the deal, which is what the Americans badly want and Mr. Zardari is more than happy to oblige without considering what it would mean: endless bloodshed and pitching our security forces against its own people, which is apparently what Washington likes to see? These ‘liberal extremists’ are also unwilling to consider the wider picture. We have reports of foreign elements inserted into our entire western and northern regions of Pakistan. We have reports that some of them could be covert operatives fluent in Pashto or Uzbek and hiding as Islamists and sent with the objective of inciting the local population to fight against their own country [Bagram air base near Kabul has secret American crack units that eat, live and operate separately from the rest of the U.S. army] and commit excesses against minorities, which justifies more U.S. intervention inside Pakistan. These terrorists were using Islam to kill innocent people. The government has called their bluff and implemented Sharia. Now anyone who decides to continue fighting can’t say he’s doing this for the sake of Islam. If this ensures end of bloodshed, what’s wrong with that? And why should our minority ‘liberal extremists’ echo everything America says? This group raising all this noise over the mysterious video is the same one that helped Mukhtaran Mai become a multimillionaire. Now we have the truth emerging that her famous rape case may not have been what it was portrayed to be. Initially she was shown to be a 19-year-old raped by the elders of her village. It turned out later she was 10 years older, divorced and had some other personal issues relating to marriage and men. That’s her business and it by no means demeans her and none of this is meant to justify any wrongdoing done to her. But the way she agreed later to become a pawn in the hands of western embassies and NGOs who used her to smear Pakistan and make money out of it was despicable, but that’s acceptable to our liberal extremist minority who also happen to be experts in ‘self-hatred’ and are ever ready to bad mouth their own homeland at the slightest chance. Former President Musharraf aptly described Mukhtaran as a woman profiting out of rape. And he was right. There were people among our liberal extremists who encouraged her to follow the line given to her by anti-Pakistan western organizations keen to use this case to malign the country out of proportion. Our liberal extremists helped her make millions and never apologized when it turned out not all parts of her story matched. Now they are doing the same with this video. No one is bothered that there are so many conflicting stories about it [Was the flogged woman married and arrested for walking publicly with her father in law as Geo News said or was she unmarried and was set up by her former lover-turned-Taliban because she won’t marry him as Dawn News or one of the other channels alleged?]. This business of ‘Asma-Jehangirism’ [making money and fame out of nonissues that appeal to the West] should end at some stage. It’s shallow and sickening.

Swat's Whipped Girl

Everyone knows that a public flogging like this one will create a stir. The fake Taliban who also call themselves 'Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan' [TTP] did this intentionally. And the Pakistani media played along, repeating the footage ad nauseum for ratings. The problem is that this appears to be a deliberate attempt by these suspicious 'Pakistani Taliban' to derail the peace deal that has robbed them from the excuse to fight their own country and people by claiming that Shariah is not implemented. This attempt is another indicator in the piles of circumstantial evidence collected over the past two years that proves that while most of the foot soldiers of the 'Pakistani Taliban' are our own misguided young Pakistanis, the real handlers behind this shadowy group are people with links to the border area with Afghanistan where, according to the latest statement by Interior Adviser Rehman Malik, some 4000 foreign fighters are present. These foreign fighters are not the remnants of the jihad of the 1980s. These are professionally trained killers, experts in recruiting, organizing and unleashing 'death squads', and psyop experts. During President Musharraf's time, while he thought the Americans were his allies, CIA and Karzai's NDS and the Brits penetrated the Pakistani territory and established an elaborate network of their own operatives and spies on the ground. Tens of U.S. operatives fluent in Pashto and Uzbek and Chechen and other languages were released in the area and are still there. No one in Pakistan knows what they are exactly doing. When you see the strength of a fake Taliban like Baitullah Mehsud who has 25,000 fighters under his command, you wonder about his neverending supply of money and modern weapons. He has never been chased by the Americans. CIA has started bombing some places under his command to convince the Pakistani military that the U.S. is not double crossing Pakistan. The Americans and the pro-Indian Afghan security officials, in addition to the Indian intelligence outposts on Afghan soil, all have exploited Pakistani weaknesses in the area and pushed their own 'fake Islamists' inside to confuse the entire situation. Now when there is peace in Swat, this TTP comes into action to discredit the implementation of Shariah in the region. This Shariah has nothing to do with TTP. The deal was brokered and struck with genuine local known religious figures. The TTP is basically based in the tribal belt and is linked to Mehsud. Also remember that the Afghan Taliban in Afghanistan, who are the real Taliban, have ceased their links with this TTP long time back. In fact many Afghan Taliban have directly and indirectly conveyed to Pakistani authorities that they are busy in Afghanistan and have nothing to do with TTP which pays lip service to fighting the Americans and focuses on killing Pakistani citizens. News editors in our TV channels need to understand this. They should not have given these criminals who are hiding behind the name of 'Taliban' the satisfaction of giving a successful media blow to the peace deal. It is also interesting to note that everything the TTP and Baitullah Mehsud does - from attacking Lahore on the day Obama was to release his new Afghan policy, to trying to sabotage the Swat deal which Washington opposes, not to mention attacking Pakistani targets and kidnapping the Chinese- all of this generally ends up supporting the American designs in Pakistan.

Pakistanis, Not IDPs

Pakistani television commentators and anchors are acting like a herd of sheep. Half a million Pakistanis are homeless. Our media calls them “Internally Displaced Persons” [IDPs] or “tribal refugees”, as if they are some ‘thing’ and not our fellow citizens. We Pakistanis must not let the U.S. and British media numb us into using such terms about our own people. The mistakes of the American and British occupation commanders and soldiers in Afghanistan have led to tragedies in our entire western region. If you can, telephone and email these newspapers and TV anchors. Tell them that you are offended as a Pakistani when they call the Pakistanis in our tribal belt as ‘IDPs’ or ‘Pashtun refugees’. Tell them they must be called ‘Pakistanis in our tribal belt.’ Let’s not compromise on showing compassion to those Pakistanis whose lives have been destroyed because of America’s cruel and unjust war.