Campaign against Asma Jahangir

What is relevant is that most newspapers, their journalists act more as opinion twisters than those who present facts.

It is absolutely sad to see the way our country is sensitised by part of our powerful media, many of whom are self-righteous and evangelical in outlook. The mere thought of Ms Asma Jahangir as caretaker prime minister — as indicated by the ‘leakage’ of Chaudry Nisar Ali Khan’s proposed list of possible candidates for the position — has led to a full-fledged campaign against her. Ms Jahangir is known for her logic-laden, blunt remarks, as well as her clear stance on issues on which many of us give vague and diplomatic answers. Be it the blasphemy issue, the politicisation of our country’s judicial activism, the need to stop military involvement in civilian rule or Articles 62-63 of the Constitution, she is clear-headed and has never swayed to play to the galleries.

Ever since her name was ‘leaked’ as a possible candidate, there is campaign in the media, by people of a certain mindset, against Ms Jahangir as if she was on the way to take oath of caretaker prime minister. Some columnists, analysts, evangelists clearly mention Ms Jahangir in their columns, writing about her stance on normalisation of relations with India and meeting with Bal Thackeray, linking it to Articles 62-63 of the Constitution, while some use the shield of the same articles to indirectly attack her.

First and foremost, the best way to get anyone out of a race is to declare him (or in this case, her) a strong contender for a position. This is exactly what has happened. While other names have also been taken, the way Ms Jahangir has been targeted reminds me of Habib Jalib’s couplet on the late Benazir Bhutto: “Dartay hayn bandooqon walay aik nihatti larkee say”. The ‘bandooq’ can be replaced with ‘qalam’ and ‘larkee’ can be replaced with ‘aurat’ in the case of Ms Jahangir.

While I have no comment on who should be the next caretaker prime minister, some of the remarks made against Ms Jahangir are enough to boil anyone’s blood. We have seen what happens when you target a certain personality: Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto was a target of a continuous campaign that receded only with her assassination; Salmaan Taseer was targeted for months for his lifestyle, views on blasphemy law’s abuse, etc. and eventually, we saw him being killed in broad daylight.

In 2010, before Ms Jahangir was to contest the election for the position of the president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, she was targeted with a smear campaign by a leading Urdu language daily. She was quoted out of context on Articles 62 and 63 of the Constitution, which was at that time, being amended under the Eighteenth Amendment, to malign her. Later on, a campaign was run against her in the same newspaper to reduce her chances of winning the elections. Her win against all odds was a victory for all those who have been targeted in such a manner. Whether she becomes caretaker prime minister or not is irrelevant. What is relevant is that most of the newspapers and their star journalists are acting more as opinion twisters than those who present facts. There has to be a fine line between your wish list and character assassination and sadly, when it comes to Ms Jahangir, it is deep character assassination which makes it all the more worrying for all of us cowards and diplomats in real life.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 16^th, 2013.