SPOTLIGHT: Hats off to...!

In writing this piece I am inspired by President Musharraf's "hats off" to those who carried out the Lal Masjid operation. Hats off to Asif Zardari for managing Nawaz Sharif so effectively by leading him up the garden path for so long, for successfully procrastinating the issue of the judiciary from Murree to Bhurban, to 30 April 08 to 12 May 08 and now to at least end July 08, for having rid himself of the blame of every single alleged misdeed attributed to him.
Courtesy NRO (read USA, Musharraf), for not having to account for all the alleged gains (amounting to a whopping in Rs 100 billion in possession of the couple, according to a foreign media estimate), for managing to reach the top of the ladder in PPP as well as the Government of Pakistan despite everything.
Hats off to Nawaz Sharif for being willingly led up the garden path by PPP, by being made to believe in the 30 April 08 deadline proposed by PPP, then by agreeing to extend it to 12 May 08, then by returning from Dubai without a signed agreement, then by announcing it alone as an agreed agreement only to be contradicted by Farooq Naek, then by agreeing to receive the Package despite the fact that his stance was restoration of the judiciary by a simple resolution or executive order and not through a package with so many poison and delay pills, then by forming a committee to discuss the package and return it with his own amendments, by repeatedly falling victim to the delay game and by swallowing the PPP line - hook, line and sinker - with eyes open.
Hats off to Rahman Malik (who materialised on the political scene from seemingly nowhere) for his mastery of the negotiating skill, quite at home negotiating with elected people in brightly lit corridors of power and allegedly equally at home talking in dark alleys to emissaries of behind-the-scenes people, arriving at decisions thrust suddenly upon an unsuspecting populace.
Hats off to Boltapakistan for articulating alarm at the fact that Jamaate Islami activists and Madrassah students were joining the long march in large numbers and for expressing great concern lest the movement be "hijacked" by those who may again fill the air again with slogans for Nizam-e-Mustafa! How terrible!
Hats off to Attorney General Abdul Qayyum for moving from Justice to Justice (Retd) with great ease and sweetness despite circumstances which might have vanquished the spirit of an ordinary mortal, for allegedly being, in general, a man for all seasons, for allegedly piloting the constitutional amendment for cancellation of the requirement that a candidate for an assembly or parliament be at least a graduate, thereby allegedly easing the way for Zardari to contest for a seat in those august bodies, by apparently becoming a protégé of Mr Sharifuddin Peerzada to keep the torch of the "law of necessary" burning brightly, for declaring with a straight face before millions of TV viewers that Chief Justice Iftikhar was free, at a time when even his children could not move out of their house which had been for months then heavily surrounded by guards and barricaded with barbed wire and steel!
Hats off to the one and only Mr Sharifuddin Pirzada, constitutional expert, for allegedly keeping the torch of the "law of necessity" burning in service of successive usurpers, in the tradition of Justice Muneer and especially for President Musharraf and for allegedly having trained a successor in the shape of the present Attorney General to carry on the tradition in service of an entirely different set of people.
Hats off to Fazlur Rahman for playing his cards so well that, come rain or sunshine, he is never without a slice of power, for hanging on to it with his teeth without much concern for stupid principles, for having the uncanny ability to choose the right moment to strike for best self-serving results, for "seeming all things to all people" as a well known columnist put it and for cleverly ducking demands to resign and give up positions of privilege for the sake of principles.
Hats off to Lawyers and anchors (who will not be named here) dazzled by the glitter of gold, jumping to defend every action of Musharraf and for finding ingenious reasons and justifications to support their client and for successfully stifling the voice, their respective consciences must be raising.
Hats off to Chaudhri Pervez Ilahi for demanding in recent past, not once but many times that President Musharraf-in-uniform be elected President and for lacking the courage to now say "I was wrong". Hats off to Mushahid Hussain and Sheikh Rashid for their unparalleled eloquence in support of ever new masters.
AND, FINALLY: Hats off to myself for having stayed at home instead of joining the brave lawyers in their long, tortuous march for a great cause under the hot, hot sun and, in the process, undergoing additional suffering caused by executive order in the shape of denied accommodation in hotels and ordinary comforts! ([email protected])