May 14, 2008...5:29 pm
The Glorious Judge, the Evil Zardari and the lawyers
This is a passionate and rather heartfelt piece from our young contributor Shaheryar Ali
Re-throne Iftikhar Chaudhry and hang Zardari, and sing all Faiz and Jalib on Geo. It will be the same. That’s the bitter truth…
“What I call middle-class society is any society that becomes rigidified in predetermined forms, forbidding all evolution, all gains, all progress, all discovery. I call middle-class a closed society in which life has no taste, in which the air is tainted, in which ideas and men are corrupt. And I think that a man who takes a stand against this death is in a sense a revolutionary. Fervor is the weapon of choice for the impotent.” Frantz Fannon
The quotes from Frantz Fannon form the basis of my thoughts on the problem of libertarian politics in Pakistan. The problem that has been disguised in the fervor of middle class intelligentsia, civil society and the so called lawyer’s trade union “movement” to reinstate the judges who were “not called” to take oath under the PCO of General Pervez Musharaf.
The first casualty of this movement was “clarity”, quite understandably when middle and petty bourgeois classes and institutions of a post colonial state are the stalwarts of a “libertarian movement”. When I am writing down these lines the “count down” to the end of days is over in Pakistan. The serene voice of Iqbal Bano singing Faiz Ahmad Faiz’s epic revolutionary poem Hum dekhen ge is glorifying the “Judicial Movement.” The day promised by Faiz being the day the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of The Islamic Republic of Pakistan should and must be “re-throned” in his “Castle of Justice” in Islamabad.
This and this alone is the solution to all Pakistan’s problems. This and this alone was the goal of all libertarian politics of Pakistan, from Syed Sajjad Zaheer to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. This and this alone was the meaning of all progressive discourse, from Manto to Faiz, from Jalib to Faraz. Any other view is treason, anyone suggesting an alternate view is a “sell-out.”
Pakistan Peoples Party and its evil leadership, its evil supporters have betrayed the revolution, the Messiah of liberation incarcerated for months in dungeons, the dungeon being official residence of the Chief Justice in Islamabad with his family. Mr Ten Per Cent spent 8 years in jail without conviction and bail, never saw his children growing up, enjoying a “married life”, half of which was spent in friendly imprisonment in the worst of Pakistan’s jails, where his back was broken and his tongue was cut!! (Bol keh lub aazad hein tere). Yea our Messiah of Liberation was manhandled during his long march from his palace to the court, the haircut was destroyed, the black coat martyred. And all in front of cameras.
Mr Aitzaz Ahsan, the Marxist lawyer, who charges six-figure fees and delivers justice to 80% of the people of Pakistan who earn less than 2 dollars a day, speaks, his voice crackling with passion over the fate of the children who were forced to live with their parents in their own house. Has anyone ever heard from him any names other than Balaj and Palwasha? Any names like Bilawal, Asifa, and Bakhtawar who grew up without a father, who were not allowed to see their father for years and years. Who were not allowed to live in their country. When they got their father, their mother was killed. Who killed their mother? Did anyone talk about any “countdown” to start a probe into murder of leader of people of Pakistan? Of course it’s the destiny of Asifa to live half her life without a father and the rest of her life without her mother. Destiny!!
The Glorious Judge:
A military dictator, General Pervez Musharraf, imposes martial law, suspends the constitution and takes over. Army surrounds the Chief Justice House, arrests the Chief Justice. Our glorious Judge Iftikhar Ahmad takes oath of personal loyalty to General Musharraf accepting him as the “source of law”
The great Judge sits in 4 benches of the supreme court declaring :
A. The martial law was legal.
B. Suspension of constitution was legal.
C. LFO and PCO were legal.
D. Those judges who haven’t taken oath of PCO are no more judges.
E. General Musharaf, the chief of army staff, can amend the constitution.
F. General Musharraf can keep his uniform and be President of Pakistan.
G. 17th amendment which changed the basic structure of constitution of Pakistan is legal and constitutional.
The evil PPP doesn’t accept any of the above, its leaders and workers are jailed, one is Prime Minister today, the glorious judges refuse to listen to the habeas corpus.
Dogar is a bad judge:
Dogar is a very bad judge. What has he done?
Same as above.
The Glorious “No”
Our great glorious judge said “No” to General Musharaf. He stood up to the dictator. No one else had the courage to say No to the general.
1, The Evil Party’s Asif Ali Zardari was having a picnic in Attock Fort and Pindi jail, cutting his tongue and breaking his back. He kept saying yes to generals.
2. Yousaf Reza Gilani, the Prince of the Gilani clan which has been revered in Multan since Mughal times and have always enjoyed governance, also said “Yes” to the general and spent 5 years in Pindi Jail. Perhaps the first person ever in his family to do so.
3. That thug Javed Hashmi also said “Yes” to general, and was beaten, repeatedly perhaps, for his pleasure. He was also having picnic at jails. Did anyone hear his habeas corpus? No. Yet another glorious No.
4. Akbar Bugti also said “Yes” to the general and got him self hit in the head. Perhaps some suicide ideation?
5. 300 or more evil PPP workers who lost their lives in Musharaf rule also died saying yes to the general.
6. Nawaz Sharif also said “Yes” to the general when he was being entertained in Attock Fort.
But The Glorious Judge said No to the general.
The Change of Heart: An Independent Judiciary
The glorious Judge is restored. The judiciary has become independent!!
A. The Independent and restored judiciary dismissed the petitions of the Communist Party of Pakistan, Qazi Hussein Ahmad and Imran Khan on technical grounds, allowing General Pervez Musharraf to contest the presidential election in uniform. (But who cares, judges should be restored.)
B. Nawaz Sharif is dragged and sent back to Saudi Arabia against a court order, our glorious judge takes action on road blocks in Islamabad, Khawaja Asif is running with contempt of court petition in hands, it takes weeks and weeks till the glorious judge is dismissed again.
C. The glorious Chief Justice declares the written and sealed deals of Punjabi politicians Sharif brothers unconstitutional, both of whom are convicted criminals allowing them to return, at the same time not activating their sentences. But our glorious the Chief Justice passes a stay order against the NRO by which the cases which the State of Pakistan failed to gain a conviction in any court of the world in 10 years, and for which evil Sindhi Zardari served the due time in jail were withdrawn, accepting their political nature.
The Public Interest Litigation, the Civil Rights Jihad:
“Our glorious Chief Justice took notices causing a civil rights revolution in Pakistan”
1. Did the glorious Chief Justice revise and nullify Maulvi Tameezuddin case which is the backbone legal precedent of almost all unconstitutional acts in Pakistan? No
2. Did the glorious Chief Justice revise and nullify Begum Nusrat Bhutto case? No
3. Did the glorious Chief Justice revise and nullify Zaffarullah shah case? No
4. Did the glorious Chief Justice revise and nullify The Lawyers Forum case? No
5. Did the glorious Chief Justice revise and nullify The Hudood Laws which are discriminatory and unconstitutional? No
6. Did the glorious Chief Justice revise and nullify Law of evidence by which woman’s evidence is considered half of that of a man? No
7. Did the glorious Chief Justice nullify the Anti Ahmedi laws which are one of the most draconian laws that ever existed any where? No
8. Did the glorious Chief Justice lift the unconstitutional ban on student unions, especially since his restoration owed a lot to “lawyer’s unions”? No
9. Did he lift the ban on trade unions? No
10.Did he take notice of the murder of Nawab Akbar Bugti? No
11. Did he take notice of the Baluchistan operation? No
12. Did he take notice of the murder of 170 PPP workers and allow the PPP to register an FIR? No
13. Did he remove laws against homosexuals and gay people? No
But he took notice of individual cases. Which a supreme court normally should not. It should make legal civil rights moves to change the existing system, like in the USA. But who cares?
Evil Party is not impeaching the General
They should impeach him, apply article 6. But what will happen to glorious judges who aided the general to subvert the constitution? How can Musharraf be hanged for subverting the constitution and Justice Ifikhar and Justice Dogar and company be spared after they subverted the constitution, broke their oath and legalized his actions?
How can Imran Khan be spared, agter supporting the unconstitutional referendum, thus helping a uniformed general commit high treason?
How can Qazi Hussein Ahmad be spared for passing the 17th amendment, again committing high treason by legalizing a uniformed general’s subversion of constitution?
Its very bad to take back “corruption” cases (which were never convicted and Zardari only served legal time if he was convicted). But what about the high treason cases against judges which were never filed? What about the convictions and sentences of Punjabi Sharifs? Who will file the corruptions charges against Zia and Jamate Islami? The Afghan Jihad? Who will look into the empires of General Hameed Gul and General Abdul Rehman? Is only the PPP is to be persecuted? Its one chairman hanged, second stunned, third shot, and now fourth to be hanged? Eight years of prison is not enough so will he be hanged too? But why only PPP’s politician have to be held accountable? NRO is bad ? But what about the “unsung NROs”? The high treason to corruption to murder charges that never were filed in first place?
Re-throne Iftikhar Chaudhry and hang Zardari, and sing all Faiz and Jalib on Geo. It will be the same. That’s the bitter truth…
8 Comments
May 14, 2008 at 5:33 pm
[...] ozymandiaz wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThis is a passionate and rather heartfelt piece from our young contributor Shaheryar Ali Re-throne Iftikhar Chaudhry and hang Zardari, and sing all Faiz and Jalib on Geo. It will be the same. That’s the bitter truth… “What I call middle-class society is any society that becomes rigidified in predetermined forms, forbidding all evolution, all gains, all progress, all discovery. I call middle-class a closed society in which life has no taste, in which the air is tainted, in which ideas and men are corrupt. And I think that a man who takes a stand against this death is in a sense a revolutionary. Fervor is the weapon of choice for the impotent.” Frantz Fannon [...]
May 15, 2008 at 6:49 am
A factually incorrect and rather naive piece written to justify Asif Ali Zardari’s about turn.
Since when did Aitzaz become a “Marxist” lawyer?
May 15, 2008 at 3:06 pm
This piece is absolutely brilliant, a violent, sarcastic, paranoid, anti-populist rant. It is as overly sensational and melodramatic as the bombast and bluster of all the Shahid Masoods, Talat Hussain and Ansar Abbasi’s. It is grounded in a writing method and tactic which can be best described as ‘radical subversion’, it displaces the paradigm and is able to reconfigure the practices and voices by making the marginal central and central marginal and to bring about a new ‘distribution of the sensible’ to borrow a term from Jacques Ranciere.
Now I am not saying I necessarily agree with the piece, but it is bracing to read because it is as crazily energetic and demented and outrageously polemical as the popular media is these days.
In an environment where the populist opinions are engineered by the media, where there is no impartiality and balance and where the discourse is not around analysing the merits and demerits of the particular positions taken by the parties on resolving the issue but begins from a pre-concieved notion that one party is necessary evil and where ‘other’ voices are marginalised, then an act of suberversion is artistic.
Good one Shaheryar
May 15, 2008 at 4:14 pm
You can ask Aitzaz Ahsan if he is a Marxist [self proclaimed] or not.
the famous poem he wrote which is the “Internationale” of Lawyers movement these days alludes to his old romance with Marxism
Carl Ernst spoke at University of North Carolina’s seminar on Comparitive Islamic studies spoke about Ahsan apporach of building Local national national against fundamentalism. Citing his diverse works on Indus civilization he mentions his Marxist approach to history.
“his paper analyzes the legitimation strategies employed by anti-fundamentalist lawyer Aitzaz Ahsan in his series of newspaper articles entitled “The Cultural History of the Indus Basin.” His theoretical legitimation goes even further than the basic nationalist argument: it claims to retrieve a Pakistani identity from a 6,000 year history, from Mohenjo-Daro to the present. The series of articles, which featured titles such as “The Mullas of Mohenjo-Daro” and “Buddha and Iron Destroy the TAbe,” appeared in the English-language daily The News. Ahsan tries to draw out a distinction (using a Marxist socio-economics) between Indus Basin culture, the Indian subcontinent, and the Arab world”
“In addition to such broad cultural interpretation, Ahsan espouses a Marxian economic approach which Dr. Ernst characterizes as “not . . .a strong ideological slant, but a general ’scientific’ tendency to look for economic determinants for historical change, and a somewhat rigid progressivist view of social structures.”
Here is Mr Aitzaz Ahsan on International Marxist Website, on behalf of Pakistan Trade Union defense Campaign urging:
http://www.marxist.com/ptudc-model-resolution-on-repression.htm
and to the great heights this goes, here is an Austrian Marxist Website where Mr Aitzaz Ahsan appeal has reached , u photo pf Mao is visible on the sides as well
http://www.derfunke.at/html/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1171
It has reached to Latin America as well , here is a Latin American Marxist Website with Mr Ahsan’s appeal
http://www.militant.cat/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=186&Itemid
May 15, 2008 at 4:24 pm
In 2005 when Alan Woods the British Marxist visited Pakistan he was received by the PPP in Pakistani Parliament , he spoke the them as well where Mr Aitzaz Ahsan, introduced himself as a Marxist and had a famous battle of words with comrade Woods. The incident was reported by International Marxist Website :
“The final contribution was made by Aitazaz Ahasan, who, while apparently praising the speaker and even calling himself a “Marxist”, in reality launched an attack against socialism and Marxism—-”
http://www.marxist.com/alan-woods-pakistani-mps170305.htm
so here the “Inter-Marxist” sectarian debate as well
May 15, 2008 at 4:50 pm
Ali Zain, thank you very much. The basic purpose was to deconstruct the populist political discourse in Pakistan. The complete hegemony of certain Media and middle class ideologues on the political discourse has made its utterly impossible to judge the positions of different parties on the issue. The attempt was to break this status quo by subverting the boundaries . Trying to show the positions being celebrated as “ideological” are as open to an ideological criticism as those positions which are being condemned as “deals” and “compromises”
Defending one party and condeming other was not an intention as you have rightly mentioned , such a tone was adopted to mock the “morally righteous” orthodoxy of Shahid Masood and Co on political discourse. From stand point of Left Libertarian politics [whose textual structures are being used or abused by these people] none of the existing position is even democratic what to say libertarian, PPP’s position is not right as well but its not worse than that of any other so called “revolutionaries” .
In the age of Simulation and Simulacrum , its important to develop fatal strategies [to borrow the phrase from Baudrillard] against the hegemonies. Its most important to first subvert violently the discourse imposed on the Working classes by the nexus of Professional Petty bourgeois classes and Giant Media business empires. Once this fog melts a libertarian discourse is possible.
Loss of Job of 60 people is being pushed on national agenda and the thousands of workers made job less during last 10 years no one speaks of their restoration, why not to restore all workers in PTCL, Banks, why bcz they dont have a LLB and they havnt hanged prime ministers and legalized dictators????
S Ali
May 15, 2008 at 6:40 pm
just bec. someone hasn’t stepped up to the plate in the past, doesn’t mean that they will never do so. At some point, someone has to take a stand. The supreme court justices weren’t perfect, who is? but at least they decided to say “enough is enough” rather than keep bending their necks for Musharraf.
May 15, 2008 at 8:32 pm
Did they said enough is enough? After the restoration they
1 Allowed General Musharaf to contest the election
2 they refused to undermine his legal backbone, the cases of supreme court which gave him legitimacy
3. They allowed the illegal election of uniformed general to go on and let Mushy win as well, askin EC to withhold the official notification. They knew already that SC verdict exist which stated , its not important weather the question asked was legal or not but whats important is the answer” in case against dissolution of Junejo parliament. where they said the dissolution was illegal bus as new elections have occurred , its ok.
After allowing the illegal election to take place from a parliament that was about to end itself they paved the way to his next martial law. They are as much responsible for this mess as any one else.
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