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Freebooters’ Paradise
Sheikh Saadi’s in a Hikayat in ’Gulistan’ tells ”a king who having no heir apparent willed that the first person who entered the city at dawn after his death should be made the king. As luck would have it the first one to enter the city was a beggar in rags. The loyal courtiers fulfilled the death wish of the king and gave him the reins of power. Soon there were difficulties and multifarious problems of governance. He lost a city to his opponents and was in deep distress. A friend who had begged alongside him came to meet him was deeply impressed by the regal affluence and opulence and congratulated him on his good fortune. The beggar king said ”My friend congratulate me not but commiserate instead because there is no happiness in this sorrowful situation. Then I only had worries about myself but now a world of worries crushes me.” For one it seems that we too have a similar method of succession for the throne here and throne it is. Secondly, quite in contrast to the wise beggar’s attitude those crowned become infatuated and smitten with it after enjoying the luxuries of powers without accountability. They never give it up alive and if alive not without a lot of ruckus and plenty of biting and kicking and keep yearning for it. Certainly I am not distorting the facts about the driven snow that gets to rule the roost here. PM Shaukat Aziz better known as Shortcut Aziz has himself said that, ”I will always be a candidate for PM office”. They simply will not quit unless forced to do so. It seems he, the middle-class man who rose to the office of the prime minister, doesn’t want to leave the unlimited perks and privileges come what may. But then there is BB, who claims that it is her love and concern for democracy that is forcing her to come to an understanding with one who has always ridiculed her, also vying for this post. I remember her lamentations eleven years ago about how her children miss the PM House. I suppose in addition to ’serving democracy’ her urge to have her children back in the PM house that they sorely miss pushes her towards the unsavoury ’deal’. The poor polo ponies of Mr. Zardari must be missing their air conditioned stables too. This veritable freebooters’ paradise is surely a weird place with weird happenings; we had the record breaking good fortune of being blessed with three PMs in 2004. It is a record that could stand till eternity but the fickleness knows no bounds here. Moreover we are all set to have the General who has ruled for eight years re-elected in uniform because he thinks the country needs him and he is determined to be re-elected ’at any cost’. We have the quorumless and spineless assemblies which do precious little and a Cabinet which will long hold its record for its size and incompetence in Guinness Book of Records, unless of course the capriciousness of the rulers here brings forth another monster. By the way have you ever wondered how much do these dead-weight freebooter demi-gods residing at the local Olympus aka Islamabad cost the exchequer of this poverty ridden freebooters’ paradise. The place where billionaires pay taxes in five figures at the most, where indirect taxes have broken the back of masses, where according to the State Bank the government has borrowed a staggering amount of over $15 billion in the last four years as country’s total debt and liabilities have reached $40 billion mark. Here’s for a starter, in 2004 Zafarullah Jamali, Chaudary Shujaat Hussain and the present incumbent all decided to thank the Most Beneficent Allah for His Mercies by performing Umra. Mr Jamali took 29 persons and the trip cost the people Rs.16.7 million, Chaudary Sahib took 134 persons and the trip cost Rs.15.23 million, I suppose some fudging of accounts must have occurred to reduce the figure, and Mr Aziz took 49 persons with him and the trip cost the taxpayers Rs.11.12 million. The CM and Governor of Sindh along with spouses and children went with the incumbent. With all of them the families, cronies and hangers on of all hues went to thank Allah. The ministers who performed Umra on tax payers’ money included Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, Humayun Akhtar, Mohammad Nasir Khan, Naseer Mengal, Babar Khan Ghauri, Syed Safwanullah, Hamid Yar Hiraj and Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao. I think it is unfair to grudge the expenditure of taxpayers’ money on them those who cannot afford to go on Umra at their own expenses. Shaheen Sehbai is on record as saying that Humayun Akhtar claims to be a dollar billionaire. This is freebooting at its worst. We need to ask if any of these free Umra tourists have ever contributed to governance, polity, culture, history or economy of this place. This place is famous for its free lunches and rampant corruption. Here any freebooter with an opportunity to use taxpayers’ money does so without compunction and the rot is ubiquitous. Their protection too costs a pretty penny, the repairs of the official Mercedes Benz of the President cost a mind boggling Rs 8.7 million to the national exchequer in March 2005. Just imagine how much the car, that needs repairs worth Rs.8.7 million, must be costing. While the poor souls whose money from indirect taxes sustains these repairs ride ’Suzukis’ and buses packed like sardines. Little wonder the General insists on staying as the president because he gets protection which will be missing once his sun sets. The rot is deep and pervasive. In the seven years that this self-styled absolutely indispensable dispensation has been enriching itself and cronies and enjoying themselves at expense of people, the cost of maintaining them has risen in an breathtaking manner, the figures create an atmosphere of ’shock and awe’ to use a much detested word coined by the US during Iraq invasion. The expenses at the President House have risen from Rs75 million in 1999 to 309 million now, on the PM from Rs98 million to Rs367 million, on the National Assembly it has risen from Rs250 million to Rs1,006 million and on the Senate from Rs111 million to Rs577 million and the icing on the cake is that the veritable army of incompetent, bumbling and at times positively rude ministers, advisers and special assistants now cost Rs155 million while seven years ago they cost Rs24 million. These expenses are minus those incurred on foreign trips, trips to different cities and the measly Rs.72 millions that are often spent on a single public meeting for the President. Much too much for a poor deficit ridden land and that too on dead-weight freebooters; this is the freebooters’ paradise if there was ever one. They bulldoze through the money that people earn and spend money as if there is no tomorrow. Certainly you cannot blame them because people who squander public money so ruthlessly and frivolously have no tomorrows whatsoever. When the ruthless French colonizers were driven away from North Vietnam after a stunning defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954; Comrade Ho Chi Minh as President used a small place within the huge grounds of the magnificent place built for the French Governor as his residence. He lived simply and frugally not that people would have grudged him a better life style but because his conscience and his love for his people and country would not allow him to spend money which is a trust of the people and not meant to be frittered away. When Che Guevara left Cuba to struggle for the rights of the oppressed people of the world he wrote to Fidel Castro, ”Wherever I am, I will feel the responsibility of being a Cuban revolutionary, and as such I shall behave. I am not sorry that I leave my children and my wife nothing material. I am happy it is that way. I ask nothing for them, as I know the state will provide enough for their expenses and education.” Ho Chi Minh and Che left nothing material for their families because money, wealth and property was meaningless for them. Just check out how the assets of the Generals, politicians and bureaucrats have multiplied over the last 60 years and you’ll get an idea how viciously this place has been plundered. Closer to home the former president Abul Kalam saved the state a handsome sum of an arab and 70 crores during his term because he didn’t go for the Armani suits and other luxuries so closely identified with the iniquitous rulers here. In ’Gulistan’ Sheikh Saadi narrates his meeting with a trader whose caravans traded everywhere, who told him about them and then asked him to say something, Saadi said,
Aan Shuneed Asti Kay
Dar Sehra-e-Ghaur It means, Have you heard that in the Ghaur Desert the exhausted merchant fell from the camel’s back, annoyed and irked he quoth, ”Either contentment or the grave’s dust will fill the miserly eye of the covetous folk.” The latter is also true for the rulers here who will never be blessed with contentment. No one will remember the likes of Wasi Zafars, Chaudaries, Arbabs, or the numerous freebooters who hang around the people’s neck like dead-weights but Uncle Ho Chi Minh and Che Guevara will be remembered for eternity. People remember the virtuous, noble and honorable leaders; no one bothers to remember freebooters. Postscript: The reprehensible forcible deportation of Nawaz Sharif by Musharraf and the equally disgraceful step of the Saudi rulers in turning the Holy Land into Guantanamo Bay prison is unprecedented in its immorality, injustice and illegality. He didn’t have much choice this time around as he was roughly put on the plane. If I were in his place I’d go on an indefinite hunger-strike and see what the autocrats of these countries do then. It may be three years or three days that he may have to stay there but the drop in Saudi prestige is eternal. |
