ISLAMABAD:
A judicial commission probing the Memogate scandal issued on Saturday notices to respondents in the case to appear before the commission on April 5.
The application is directed to former ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani, Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) Chairman Yasin Malik and Director General (USA) Foreign Office Ubaidur Rehman among others.
The commission had earlier asked the Supreme Court to extend the deadline till March 31, so Haqqani could appear before the bench.
However, the court’s deadline to decide whether Haqqani could appear before the commission via a video link passed, so it set a new date for Haqqani’s appearance.
On March 29, the apex court extended the term of the judicial commission for another six weeks. It observed that though the commission’s probe is of high importance, it should conclude soon.
Key witness Mansoor Ijaz’s counsel Akram Sheikh on Saturday asked the commission to cross examine JKLF leader Yasin Malik.
Malik, in his statements recorded on March 26, denied allegations of having met a Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) chief. He had said that Ijaz tried to cheat him into meeting a ‘suspicious’ person in Haryana.
Published in The Express Tribune, April 1st, 2012.
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Mansoor Ijaz was used as part of a ’sting’ operation by the CIA and was actually trying to destabilize incumbent Government of Pakistan. Nawaz Sharif conveniently hijacked the Memogate by taking it to court and making it a national issue so that he could further destabilize the government and force early elections* NS met Mansoor Ijaz in London and persuaded him not to come to Pakistan – The US also played it’s role. Another interesting figure in all this is Shaukat Aziz who also spoke to Mansoor Ijaz and advised him not to travel to Pakistan. Interestingly, it was the Punjab’s PML-N government, namely Shahbaz Sharif, that promised MI security once in Pakistan, whilst Rehman Malik was issuing threats like hot cakes – why ? It was an effort by PML-N to destabilise the PPP government further and deliver a decisive blow.
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 is imminent not imaginary. The so-called ‘memogate’ scandal is effectively dead. It has been for a while. But apparently the honourable 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”