The Friday Times: Najam Sethi’s Editorial
A picture on the front page of most papers says it all. It shows a Pakistani team of officials talking across the table to a British team on national security matters. Pakistan’s young foreign minister, Hina Khar, is leaning forward and gesturing, and the new DGISI, Gen Zaheerul Islam, is straining to get a slice of the dialogue. But the man who holds all the aces, General Ashfaq Kayani, is sitting back and staring ahead, impassive as a wall of stone. Still waters run deep, do they?
Last week, President Asif Zardari, who is never still, called up Gen Kayani to ask if his preferred candidate for the next Prime Minister, Makhdum Shahabuddin, was acceptable to the brass. The call was necessary in light of the military-run Anti Narcotics Force’s unfolding “get Shahabuddin” operation. The considered response came a couple of hours later: take whatever political decision you deem fit but “we don’t want to get involved” in political matters. Mr Zardari took that as a diplomatic NOC and gave the green light to Mr Shahabuddin. In the event, however, he had to retreat in a blaze of ignominy next morning when the ANF pitched a tent outside the PM-nominee’s house, brandished handcuffs and served warrants on him.
Two conclusions may be drawn from this episode. One, President Zardari knew perfectly well that Makhdoom Shahabuddin was in the sights of the Supreme Court and the ANF, two institutions over which the government had no control. Yet he persisted in trying to thrust his man on the nation. He thought that by “informing” the brass of his nominee he would lock Gen Kayani into his purpose. Two, on the other side, there has never been any question of Gen Kayani being locked into Mr Zardari’s decision-making matrix. Under the circumstances, that is literally what transpired the following day: Gen Kayani did not get “involved” when the ANF, spurred by the SC, went for Mr Shahabuddin, all guns blazing.
The judges of the Supreme Court would be advised to heed the same message from the same quarters. They should not pass any orders whose implementation requires any overt intervention by Gen Kayani to take sides. He won’t. If push comes to shove, he will bat for his own team and not for anyone else’s. Mr Zardari did not defy the SC’s orders because his alliance partners advised restraint. But if there is a next time, Mr Zardari’s response might well be different, which could embarrass the SC if Gen Kayani again refrains from getting “involved”.
Are developments veering in the direction of mutual restraint or aggression? The SC has given the new PM two weeks in which to tell the court whether or not he is going to write the letter to the Swiss authorities. And the Lahore High Court has given the president until September in which to relinquish his position as co-chair of the PPP. This means that the judges are mulling the consequences of sending another prime minister home even as they marshal their case against the prime minister and president. In the meanwhile, Malik Riaz is waiting in the wings to launch another damning charge or two against the chief justice.
There are two roads that can be taken. In one, the SC and government are bound to clash and draw the army into the fray. If that happens, both Mr Zardari and the CJP will lose out. In the other, the SC can avoid a clash with Mr Zardari by commissioning fellow judges to write the same letter without sacking the PM for not doing so. Certainly, the court should consider not just the possibility of defiance by Mr Zardari and non-involvement by Gen Kayani, but also the probability that the decision will be even more controversial than the last one, with harmful unintended consequences.
We need a degree of political space for the government and opposition to settle outstanding matters – nomination of a new CEC, rules for interim governments, matters relating to new provinces – before calling the next general elections. And they need to lend their shoulders to restoring the relationship with NATO that is hurting Pakistan in many ways and isolating it from the rest of the world.
There is talk in some government circles of changing the law of contempt to evade the extending arm of the SC, of amending the constitution to create four provincial supreme courts and of shunting the current CJP to a constitutional court in Islamabad in order to thwart his penchant for political activism. There is a likelihood of the government changing the rules to nominate the election commissioner if it cannot persuade the opposition to agree on a consensual candidate. Our advice to the government, opposition and courts on all such matters is not to jump the gun and provoke another round of mutual acrimony that will do no one any good.