The vultures will have to wait

Mansoor Ijaz plans to be in Pakistan only from before dawn to early afternoon, will that be enough to question him?

Now then, those licking their chops and smacking their lips at the prospect of the prime minister being led in chains and shackles from the Supreme Court straight into a prison cell must surely be saddened at the dignity with which both the honourable court and the honourable prime minister and his lawyer, the peerless Aitzaz Ahsan, handled the situation made needlessly explosive by our ranting and raving TV anchors and a certain raucous newspaper (hint, hint). Kudos to all, with the hope that in the future too, everyone concerned will behave with decorum and rectitude. The world is watching: let us Pakistanis send out the message that we are a responsible and a graceful people.

However, might I express my utter disgust at the sloganeering by two groups of lawyers, one purporting to be the PPP’s supporters and the other the honourable chief justice’s. This is absolutely unacceptable and should never have been allowed in the hallowed precincts of the Supreme Court. I do think strict notice should be taken and the offenders hauled up. If the PM can be proceeded against, why not these ruffians?

By golly if looks could kill, all the ‘bloody civilians’ sitting around the table during the Defence Committee of the Cabinet (DCC) Meeting the other day would be long dead by now. I refer not only to the angry demeanour of the Sipah Salaar but also to the Navy and Air force chiefs: all three of them looking down at the table before them as if contemplating a particularly loathsome insect crawling on it.

Can you believe this, readers, even the Navy and Air force commanders who account for nothing before the might of the Sipah Salaar, even they were making their presence felt, as if in complete consonance with their senior comrade! Now, before there are howls of protest from the fans of our Deep State, let me cool them down with a little reminder. I hope they recall that when another Sipah Salaar, the Commando, and his kitchen cabinet generals mounted the foolish, and in the end futile and disastrous Kargil misadventure, the air chief of the time, the gentlemanly and coldly professional Air Chief Marshal Pervaiz Mehdi was not even informed of it until the great strategists found themselves in rather hot waters and it was much too late.

It is also said that when the ACM admonished Musharraf for not informing the air force about the misadventure while planning (or whatever went by the name of planning!) it, the Commando took umbrage and never forgot the slight. I myself remember the cheap shots Musharraf aimed at ACM Mehdi at another air chief’s (ACM Mushaf’s) funeral prayers. So please, fans, take it easy: we might be ‘bloody civilians’ but we also know what goes on in our country. Here’s more:

As part of the present onslaught on the democratic government by the Deep State and its camp followers, a retired general Lodhi, reportedly the Sipah Salaar’s chum, just sacked from being the defence secretary has lodged a petition with the IHC praying that his dismissal had everything to do with the government’s “further illegal steps to arbitrarily remove the COAS (Sipah Salaar) and the DG ISI to fulfil a political agenda and ruin the country”. This from a Grade-21 former government servant? I ask you.

Anyway, how the devil has the man come to the conclusion that he was sacked because the government was about to sack the Sipah Salaar and the DG ISI? Could he as defence secretary block any such order from being carried out? Would he refuse to issue the notification? Well, he could have been sacked pronto right then. So? Indeed, how would sacking two people ‘ruin the country’?

On to the Murky Memo and will he or won’t he come and depose before the Commission. Even if he comes, the question to ask is whether the Commission will agree to his demand that he will only appear before it before people begin to stir, i.e., before dawn, and leave Pakistan by the early afternoon?

The fact that he is travelling by private jet (as we are informed by the press) it seems he is going to be in the country for maybe eight or ten hours. Well, what if the defence lawyers for Husain Haqqani (for he is virtually an accused, his passport taken away without him being charged) want to question Ijaz over some days, and then some, while they get more evidence to counter his claims? What then? Will Ijaz come back on another date, on another private aircraft for another eight or twelve hours?

Also, there is much hoopla raised by his lawyer about the possibility of Ijaz being harmed while in Pakistan upon which the Deep State let it be known that he would be looked after by the army and the ISI. Hang on though, for we do know that Ijaz has very often abused the ISI in the most vicious terms, in his most recent rant in the FT in these words: “Questions about the ISI’s role in Pakistan have intensified ... the finger of responsibility in many otherwise inexplicable attacks has often pointed to a shadowy outfit of ISI dubbed “S-Wing”, which is said to be dedicated to promoting the dubious agenda of a narrow group of nationalists ... .

“The time has come for the state department to declare the S-Wing a sponsor of terrorism ... S-Wing must be stopped. ISI embodies the scourge of radicalism that has become a cornerstone of Pakistan’s foreign policy”. He has also called the ISI “terror-masters”; “rogue”; and a “cancer”.

What if, God forbid, some members of the ISI, particularly the feared ‘S’ Section, do him harm because of the spiteful and vicious things he has said about them/their organisation? What then? Will the noose be in the necks of the ‘bloody civilians’ as per always?

Stop Press: The government has announced that the DG ISI will not get any further extensions. Will the mighty ISPR roar again? We wait with bated breath ...

Published in The Express Tribune, January 20^th, 2012.