Mukhtar Mai was publicly gang raped on the orders of a village jirga in Meerwala, Southern Punjab. When Mukhtar refused to be cowed down, Pakistani human rights groups helped propel her cause across the globe so that she became an international icon for battered and bruised women. After Nicholas Kristoff of The New York Times wrote about her ordeal, donations of over $100,000 poured in to help set up a school and rehabilitation centre for women like herself. What did the government do?
It was compelled to arrest the alleged rapists and order a trial. But it was so peeved at Mr Kristoff for “hurting Pakistan’s image” that it refused to allow him to return to Pakistan. Nor did it care to seriously prosecute the rapists. Indeed, when the court ordered their release from prison last year, it frowned upon police apathy in marshalling evidence and pursuing conviction. But the judiciary received bitter public censure. When had “lack of evidence” ever stopped it from furthering the dirty political agendas of governments in the past? What did the government do?
It detained the alleged rapists on the pretext of law and order. But it didn’t do anything to expedite their trial in the Supreme Court. Its promise to build a “crisis control” shelter for women in Meerwala remains hollow.
Mukhtar was recently invited by a group of concerned Pakistani-American physicians to tell them how they might help alleviate the plight of oppressed women like herself. This was a noble effort from conscience-stricken, affluent Pakistanis abroad who want to “do something good” for their motherland. What did the government do?
The courts sprang into action in defense of “justice” and ordered the alleged rapists freed. The government curtailed Mai’s freedom on the pretext of “security”. Then it secretly whisked her away to Islamabad and pressured her to call off her trip to America because it would hurt Pakistan’s “image”. Nelofer Bakhtiar, the PM’s “advisor” on women-matters, dragged Mukhtar to a shoddy “show conference” on Tuesday and refused to allow her to utter a free sentence. Mukhtar whispered that she was in “virtual house arrest in Meerwala”, she insisted her name should be removed from the ECL, she said she wanted her freedom. But Bakhtiar aggressively egged her on to say that she had decided not to go to America because her mother had taken ill. Asked about the nature of her mother’s illness, Mukhtar was conspicuously silent. Bakhtiar also announced that Mukhtar’s security cordon which includes six commandoes outfitted in menacing black would not be relaxed. Later, Mukhtar was taken to the US embassy to retract her application for a visa and her passport was seized by her Pakistani handlers. As a propaganda stunt, the interior minister then announced that her name had been taken off the ECL.
Of course, the net effect is exactly the opposite of what the government intended. “Musharraf’s Pakistan” has been catapulted into the eye of an international media storm. Mr Kristoff has written an article in The New York Times headlined: “Mai: raped, kidnapped and silenced”, a devastating indictment of the government’s misplaced concreteness about manufacturing a “soft” image of Pakistan. His angry conclusion: “Musharraf has gone nuts”. Mukhtar’s hosts are dismayed. Every major Pakistani newspaper has criticized the government for mishandling this issue and urged it to let the woman go abroad. Christina Rocca, the US Secretary of State for South Asia, as well as a spokesman of the US embassy in Islamabad, has lamented the restrictions on Mukhtar. And The Independent in London wrote: “When Time magazine nominated Ms Mai as one of Asia’s heroes, it commented: ‘As long as the state refuses to fully challenge the brutality of tribal law, the plight of Pakistani women will continue. Mukhtar Mai is a symbol of their victimhood, but in her resilience she is also a symbol of their strength.’ In the end, it seems, that strength and resilience was not for export.”
And what has the government done? It is in a shambles, scrounging around for scapegoats and clutching at conspiracy theories.
Who is responsible for this sordid state of affairs in which General Musharraf is personally becoming the “fall-guy” for the international media? Bad advice by more-loyal-than-the-king ministers and khakis constantly shows up Musharraf in a bad light despite his avowed good intentions and sincerity. What might Mukhtar have said and done if she had been allowed to go abroad?
She would have shed light on the horrible practice of tribal jirgas and dilated upon the plight of rural women. She might have tried to raise public awareness about the desperate need to set up women’s shelters. What’s new about that? General Musharraf himself never tires of exhorting Pakistanis to abandon vicious tribal and feudal practices and is constantly asking for foreign funds to help alleviate their lot.
The bungling of Mukhtar Mai’s case is a monumental blunder that will cost Musharraf’s government.