Finding Surer Foundations

Perception of populist support is a fickle indicator; confidantes have uncanny knack of transforming into ‘approvers’.

When the book Spycatcher written by a former MI5 officer about his experience and the working of the agency was banned by the British government and the ban upheld by the House of Lords, The Daily Mirror published upside down photographs of the three lords with the caption, “YOU FOOLS”. The British edition of The Economist ran a blank page with an explanatory note published saying, “In all but one country, our readers have on this page a review of Spycatcher, a book by an ex-M.I.5 man, Peter Wright. The exception is Britain, where the book, and comment on it, have been banned. For our 420,000 readers there, this page is blank — and the law is an ass.”

The ban was subsequently lifted, however, not before making a rather ordinary book an international bestseller. We gravitate towards the prohibited. The Spycatcher episode is instructive to revisit in our circumstances. The Law Lords did not see any visible decrease in authority after The Mirror’s careless use of adjective. The moral fabric of English society and institutional harmony were not destroyed by the publication of the book. Free expression, freedom of the press and the law of contempt in Pakistan are right where they ought to be; in the centre of things.

The contempt notice against Mr Imran Khan has been withdrawn. Congratulations to Mr Khan for not backing down. Keeping that aside today, has the dignity of the Court now been restored? Like the Spycatcher episode, where it was not the book itself but the ban that became the real story, was the use of the word sharamnaak more damaging to the moral authority of the Court or the subsequent insistence on receiving an apology? To begin some fights is to admit defeat already. Time for some introspection My Lords, perhaps recourse to the wise words of Lord Denning who said, “Let me say at once that we will never use this jurisdiction as a means to uphold our own dignity. That must rest on surer foundations.”

The suo-motu notice of airing the video of the terrorist attack on Ziarat residency is in the same vein, and is in vain. To act as paternal guardians in the times of YouTube (via proxy, albeit) is a losing battle to begin with. More people would now watch the video, not less. More significantly, it changes the focus; now it seems airing that video of the attack is the issue and not the attack itself. Like concealing Hamoodur Rehman’s Commission Report, like Musharraf’s comment about washing dirty linen in the Mukhtaran Mai’s case, the same delusion that preventing disobliging information from coming out will make the problem go away.

Revolutions eat their own children and sometimes, the children devour the revolution. Last week, hearing the speakers at the Lahore High Court Bar Association (LHCBA) gave one a vertiginous feeling. Eminent lawyers from all sides of the political divide and from all over the country, along with media personnel, spoke in a singular, eloquent and sometimes fiery tone. That has happened before in this very building, a few years ago, the voice was uniform then as well. Just the adversary has changed; roles directly inversed. Musharraf ignored this voice as well. To become deaf is to be condemned. Either everyone who supported the movement, parties who lost workers, lawyers who went to prison, media personnel who had television channels blocked, has now become malicious or else the fault lies on the other side. All those who spoke at the LHCBA have a legitimate stake in a vibrant and independent judiciary; anyone who chooses to ignore them does so at his own peril and by shutting eyes to the dialectics of history.

Power has a language of its own. That language that does not allow dissent and hence it makes it all the more necessary to dissent. Perception of populist support is a fickle indicator; confidantes have the uncanny knack of transforming into ‘approvers’. To lose the ability to listen is also to become inarticulate and mute. As the tone gets angrier and pitch rises, the content inevitably becomes hollow, judgments become cryptic. ‘Shameful’ was not nearly sure enough footing; time to write serious judgments, articulating jurisprudence and leaving the political affairs to those to whom they belong.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 29^th, 2013.

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