The Friday Times: Najam Sethi’s Editorial
An extraordinary case is threatening to discredit the generals of the Pakistan army and undermine the trust of the people in the armed forces. It involves serious charges by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of parliament against three generals of misconduct, misappropriation, misdemeanor and misadventure when they were in charge of the National Logistics Cell (NLC) and took decisions that led to the loss of about Rs 2 billion to the exchequer. The three retired generals are Lt Gen Khalid Munir, Lt Gen M Afzal Muzaffar and Maj-Gen Khalid Zaheer Akhtar.
An inquiry committee investigated the matter and came to some damning conclusions: the top decision-making generals of NLC violated all the rules in the book by speculating Rs 4 billion in the stock market, including Rs 2 billion borrowed from the banks, and ended up losing Rs 2 billion. It recommended that action be taken against them because they had taken commissions and kickbacks for committing funds to such an illegal and dubious enterprise.
The leader of the opposition, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, initiated the inquiry in 2009. He says the army chief, General Ashfaq Kayani, informally asked him to hold his horses until GHQ had carried out its own investigation into the matter since it involved three generals. In December 2010, the defense secretary, Lt Gen (retd) Syed Athar Ali, assured the PAC that the military’s report would be ready for presentation within a month. But GHQ’s “investigation” didn’t see the light of day for another two years, provoking the PAC under a new chairman in 2012 to raise the matter again. The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) tasked to investigate and prosecute corruption in the private and public sector and led by an ex-chief of the navy, Admiral (retd) Fasih Bokhari, stepped into the fray but was swiftly thwarted by GHQ.
The case then took an extraordinary turn. GHQ announced it had “re-hired” the three retired generals and intended to court martial them. The PAC, a bipartisan parliamentary body, is stunned. It says GHQ has resorted to an unprecedented and illegal method to protect the three generals from civilian scrutiny and prosecution – court martial proceedings are not revealed to the public under the Army Act 1952.
The unofficial response from the military stresses the “sensitive” nature of the NLC’s operations. The military also claims the three generals acted in good faith.
The NLC case follows on the heels of another remarkable case involving another government organization, the Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF), that falls in a similarly grey area. It is staffed by army officers who are ostensibly under the federal Health Ministry but take orders from GHQ. The ANF is currently trying to arrest a former Health Minister, Makhdoom Shahabuddin, and Musa Gillani, a son of former prime minister Yousaf Raza Gillani, allegedly for authorizing the import and distribution of a restricted drug (Ephedrine) which allegedly lined their pockets with tens of millions of rupees. The ANF has taken many questionable actions in pursuit of its investigations. Much the same sort of arrogant attitude was on display when a former defense secretary, Gen (retd) Athar Ali, shrugged away the orders of prime minister Gillani some months ago and took unilateral decisions in the Memogate case. This provoked Mr Gillani to stand up in parliament and castigate “the state within the state” that is the Pakistan army.
The reality is that the army does exist concretely as a state within the state in Pakistan. It remains unaccountable to the civilians but it periodically holds them accountable via imprisonments and exiles during periods of martial law. Even the actions of a lowly serving military officer in relation to any civilian of any status cannot be challenged in a court of law. High Courts have no jurisdiction, not even in cases involving fundamental constitutional rights, under the Army Act 1952. Indeed, court-martial decisions cannot be overturned even in the Supreme Court of Pakistan. Military officers tend to disregard court and executive orders. Army chiefs have openly contemned the courts and walked away free. And they have stopped saluting elected prime ministers and presidents of the country.
But this reality is changing with the establishment of a strong and questioning media, an aggressive parliament and an independent supreme court. The many omissions and commissions, historical and current, of the generals are now being revealed and shed unfavourable light on their invincibility and credibility. Indeed, there is a rising consensus in civil society, media, government and opposition, that the military cannot lord it over them in the future.
Under the circumstances, GHQ would be advised not to spurn public opinion just to save the face of three erring generals from its stock. Two decades ago, the “midnight jackals” (disgruntled ISI officers) conspired to oust Benazir Bhutto from power. Can we hope today that the “day of the jackal” will draw to a close and soldiers and civilians alike will be subject to the same constitution and law?