The grim comedy goes on

Islamabad diary
Gilani’s departure is a matter neither of joy nor sorrow. Another dummy receding into the pages of history, or rather its minor footnotes...what does it matter? If at all he is remembered it will be for his extensive wardrobe, his smart ties. His replacement, Shahabuddin or whoever: another entry in the book of ciphers which is the record of our national achievements.
In the long decline of the Mughal Empire we see princes and emperors coming and going and leaving not the slightest impression on the mind. Aurangzeb’s successors: how many can we name? If they are remembered it is for their ineptitude. Presidents and prime ministers of Pakistan share the same quality. If most of them had never happened it would have made not the slightest difference to anything.
We may have the Indus and our other rivers, the highest peaks and mountains, fertile soil and enchanting desert, and a stunning variety of so many other things. But one thing we don’t have, what we have never managed to produce, is a competent leadership class. The calibre of the first generation of leaders who presided over the rites of independence was so much higher than what we have today. But Jinnah and a few of his lieutenants apart, even that class of leaders failed us, proving directionless and without much of a vision of what the new state should be. Then we had the soldier-statesmen who between them really screwed things up. And then the champions of democracy, all monuments to mediocrity.
I read about Mustafa Kemal and get depressed. Lately I have been reading about Marshal Mannerheim of Finland and have got more depressed. If we are ever lucky enough to rewrite our schoolbooks Mustafa Kemal and Baron Mannerheim should be required reading in all Pakistani schools. Kemal created modern Turkey. Mannerheim saved Finland from Stalinist domination. Both were outstanding soldiers...real soldiers and not the cardboard variety we’ve had in Pakistan.
Ours is a primitive society in so many ways, putting a premium on leadership to give it form and direction and, with luck, set it on the path of destiny. We’ve had straw figures playing at being strongmen. But the gift of inspiring leadership has somehow eluded us.
Bhutto came close but his flaws and failings eclipsed his strong points. He had a great stock of books on Napoleon and Hitler. If only he had a better grasp of Indian history. He was too eager to climb to the top and made shortcuts on the way. Still, he was the best we had. After him a long train of dummies, the quality of leadership steadily on the decline. And I am talking of Marshal Mannerheim.
There are no Ashokas or Akbars in India either. But the Indian canvas is so much broader. In a society such as ours leadership matters more. Where are we to get it from?
An especially troubling question considering the tough times we face and the tough times which lie ahead. The old mediocrity standing guard at the gates just won’t do. A renewal of the national spirit is what is required, although how that is to come about not even the oracles can foretell. The problem is not Balochistan, the energy crisis, the Taliban insurgency in Fata or the spread of extremism – another word for stupidity – across the Pakistani landscape. These are the symptoms, the outward signs, of a wider malaise: lack of direction and leadership.
Zardari’s photo as he presides over a meeting of his party parliamentarians says it all. Dazed and almost out of his wits and all he has to say is that a trial of Benazir Bhutto’s grave will not be allowed. His way of saying that the heavens may fall but the Swiss cases, pertaining to the commission-taking charges against him, will not be reopened. Consider our luck, someone haunted by his past and indeed a hostage to it, our first magistrate. And as things look, no way of getting rid of him until his term expires.
How will the new prime minister get into the stride of things? How will the SC be answered as it presses for action on the Swiss cases? And there’s the energy crisis looming over everything, slowly stoking the fires of disorder. A shambles of a government and the country stuck with it. Elections would seem to be the only solution, bringing a fresh team at the helm, but the route leading to them is not quick or easy. Who will order them? Not Zardari as the waters rise above his head.
It would be something to celebrate if Gilani’s departure was a triumph of the rule of law. But things are rarely that simple with us, the application of justice seen by many as a selective exercise rather than anything else, the letter of the law applied with great strictness some of the time but the same fervour missing in other instances.
The coming elections, if nothing happens to derail them, promise to be the most significant, and probably the most charged, since the fateful elections of 1977 which paved the way for Gen Zia’s martial law and the long night which came with it. Either these elections lead to a sense of renewal or a greater sense of hopelessness.
One thing is for sure: all the world’s magicians can come together and try but five more years of Zardari are simply impossible. Pakistan may have great reserves of endurance but not for anything like this. There has to be a change or the crisis Greece is facing will look like child’s play compared to our own. We’ve been living on borrowed money and borrowed time. The bills must now be paid.
Pakistan was not God’s anointed country or a special gift of Providence, much as we like to think along those lines. Forgive the heresy but if anyone created Pakistan it was the British. When they arrived on these shores the Muslims of India were a nation on the decline, a spent and exhausted force whose best days, days of triumph and glory, were behind them. The Mughal Empire had broken up and Sikhs and Jaats and Marathas were on the march, vying for power and influence. The British did not destroy Muslim power; that power already lay broken. If anything, their arrival created a new stability taking advantage of which the Muslims of India, central India really, were able to speak out for themselves and seek safeguards for their community, leading in time to the demand for Pakistan.
But divinely blessed or not, we had a chance to make this a going concern. What a mess we’ve made instead and the opportunities we’ve thrown away. This could have been a crossroads of east and west, an example for the rest of the Muslim world to follow. But we had no vision and we couldn’t understand the language Jinnah spoke and we went down all the wrong paths, raising temples to useless endeavours and sanctifying all the nonsense we were capable of generating at the sacred altar of Islam.
If Pakistan is to be rescued it has to be from itself. But it will take more than our usual crop of Zardaris and Gilanis and other would-be redeemers in the wings to bring this about. The most important question of all: is there a cure for the Pakistani malaise or we are doomed to go around in circles forever?
Tailpiece: Are elections a foregone conclusion? The Anti-Narcotics Force issuing warrants of arrest for Shahabuddin on the day he is to file his nomination papers. Who heads the ANF? A serving general. The political situation already shaky receives another blow. Where are we headed? What’s happening? Are the knives being sharpened in the shadows? How many times have we not been here before?
Second tailpiece: My thanks to Indian columnist Aakar Patel and Hameed Akhtar Niazi for pointing out the bloomer I made last week. It was Clive, not Burke or Hastings, who confessed to being astounded by his own moderation. For this sloppiness, very sorry.
Email: winlust@yahoo.com