December was full of surprises but not surprising. We have to wait for the denouement of play called 'Institutions'. Curious tales in the twist are sure to follow; twists that could well make our real estate Mogul's unexplained wealth (frozen by UK's NCA) ending up with the Supreme Court look little more than a shoddy sleight of hand.
December came fast and furious. The PM's 'taunt' of the superior judiciary and the CJP's raised fists riposte; the kerfuffle of the Army Chief's extension; the black coats telling the white coats who packs the heftier punch; Article 6 taken to its logical conclusion and the mayhem that followed, beginning with an unnecessary rejoinder from ISPR and culminating in the Attorney General's unseemly charge at the CJP's full court reference.
We scratch our heads in wonder when there is such a hullabaloo over the death penalty for suspending the Constitution and not a whimper over the same penalty handed out on, arguably, lesser charges.
In between, there has been a jamboree of bails that some celebrated and many questioned. But the numbers have to be kept right. If one gets bailed out another gets thrown into the jug; if one court allows bail another court suspends it. Is optimum capacity utilization of jails the idea? We can perhaps leave that with Anjum Ibrahim (Partly Facetious) to explore.
There was also a flurry of Ordinances, reduced to a Punch and Judy show when they got to the Parliament. Is the plight of the Parliament, fast descending into irrelevance, a sign of things to come? Looks like there is only one show in town and all that the 'mother of all Institutions' can do is watch the institutional joust from the sidelines, not knowing who to back.
The Election Commission drama continues, with another reprieve to the Parliament from the Court. It is baffling to see the Treasury benches insisting on only one of the three names they themselves had suggested. Have they withdrawn the other two names? Less baffling is Chairman Senate's adamance in not allowing the Upper House to meet. It has been almost four months now.
We swear by the Constitution but can live with several of its provisions remaining outside our bucket list. CIC has finally met, after 13 months when it is constitutionally mandated to meet once every three months. No questions asked. A Minister, who swore to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution wants to drag and hang 5,000 people but finds the Constitution a drag. Apparently the right to fair trial, that the Constitution enjoins, is an inconvenience that comes in the way of his idea of justice.
Then there are the less thought of institutions fighting their own battles for relevance. SECP is pitched against NAB; Pemra doesn't quite know what its role is as it keeps getting buffeted between the government, the courts, and the media; Competition Commission has given a whole new meaning to the expression 'toothless tiger'; Nepra is unclear how far it can go to protect the consumer without throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Ogra dutifully minds its own business.
Meanwhile, we remain riveted to the corruption versus incompetence debate. The competence proponents seem to be edging out those who subscribe to the 'corruption is the mother of all evils' notions. It is symptomatic of our warped thinking to even have a debate of this kind, as if the two are mutually exclusive. Besides, neither side thinks what will happen if we become both competent and corruption-free. Many a fortune will be at stake!
The game of thrones at home keeps us blissfully blindsided to the great game emerging on the external front. It throws up our institutional attrition into sharp relief. Winning friends and influencing countries doesn't seem to be part of our playbook.
There are daily skirmishes on the LoC, with the stated possibility of a false flag operation as a pretext for greater hostilities from the other side. We need friends to support us, at least morally, but how many can we count on? Meanwhile, did we abandon Malaysia and Turkey, who had the temerity to take on India for its unconscionable acts in Kashmir, for Judas' thirty pieces of silver?
Our favourite pastime, in the thick of the gathering storms, seems to be wild charges of mental disorder, flung around with gay abandon. Attorney General questions the mental state of the Judges and is paid back in the same coin by those flabbergasted by his utterances. We storm and pelt offices of a newspaper without anyone knowing whatever for. We glorify the great religion but can't practice its tenets.
Are these early signs of national schizophrenia - or its confirmation?
A polarized nation recklessly chooses sides when what is needed is narrowing the gaps. What we see is our firefighters adding fuel to the fire, not trying to extinguish it. We are too busy fighting one another. When everyone is to blame there is no one to blame!
Our leadership seems obsessed with piling up more ambitions to the agenda, happily unmindful of their limitations. Counting the trees they have lost sight of the forest. They have got the priorities all jumbled up.
It is, of course, important to set the economy right, reduce disparities, attract tourists, plant trees, even mediate differences between countries, but it will be like building castles in the air if the nation remains divided. The first order priority has to be to have the nation on the same page.
If we can't do this, if we keep screaming 'no NRO' instead of giving heed to Bishop Tutu's sane advice "Without forgiveness, there's no future", we will continue to remain a nation divided by narratives. I will shut out your narrative and you will shut out mine. It will become Manto's Toba Tek Singh, without the exchange of lunatics - each side will retain its own. Only "Upri gur gur di annexe... ." will become louder, and you know how it ends!
Sir Cowasjee Jehangir came from Bombay to execute certain irrigation schemes in Sindh. Before returning home he acquired a large acreage in Giddu Bandar to construct an asylum for the mentally ill. Was it just a philanthropic idea, or a parting gift in recognition of what he thought we needed most?
shabirahmed@yahoo.com