The Fallacy of Ehtesaab By Jehangir Mirza

Our most celebrated Cricketer of the century recently had a brief scuffle with a TV reporter. To a seemingly harmless and reasonably relevant question, Afridi took his typical wild slog at the ill-fated Dunya TV correspondent, declaring: “Mujhe umeedthee k aap ghatya sawal hi kareyn gai”. An outburst along thelines is not new to Afridi, but one wonders if there’s something fundamentally wrong with a professional Reporter quizzing a professional Cricketer for his lackluster on-field performance.After all they are both doing what they are paid to do. Or, as some would insist, should only a Cricketer that matches Afridi’s credentials qualify to hold Boom Boom accountable for his failures? Are mere mortals, fans and supporters not eligible to voice dissent to our Cricketing Lords?

Democratically Elected Lords that grace us with their presence in national & provincial bodies are even harder to ‘Nab’. The most popular comeback that runs in the ranks is: “Hamaraehtesaab awaam karay gi.” It doesn’t take a PHD Diploma to decipher where this argument naturally ends up. It is assumed that immunity afforded by public votes should serve as shield against being probed for malpractice of all kinds and forms. If a Session Court Judge mistakenly accepts a legal petition to the contrary, his behavior is snubbed as ‘judicial activism’. At the mere mention of accountability, Jamhooriyat appears in imminent danger of being overthrown by power hungry Generals aiming to enforce unconstitutional Ehtesaab.

Fact is, we are a nation driven by expedience and apologists. We pick our favorite criminal, draw comparisons with a greater evil, decide that our favored offender is the lesser of many devils lurking in the backdrop and before we know it, our blue-eyed culprit gets a clean chit in the name of ideology, nationalism, national interest etc. Jamhoori boys refer to this beautiful dry-cleaning act as ‘Reconciliation’. Dictators call it ‘Nazarya-e-Zarurat’, Dictator-bred-pseudo-Jamhoori boys, a mixed breed,yawn ‘Mitti Pao’ in unison. Regardless, aversion to accountability prevails and further polarizes a deeply disintegrated society. For our coveted Holy Cows, life may goon seemingly uninterrupted but the noose tightens for an average Pakistani with each passing day.

Thus, what happens when a lower-class fanatic veiled as a security guard shoots his allegedly blasphemous VVIP Boss in broad daylight? Chaos erupts, theories ensue and being the desensitized bunch we have grown into, everyone waits for the dust to settle. And then at a distance, some of us watch in horroras educated contemporaries begin to justify the act of murder as a rightful obligation. For the first time it becomes blatantly obvious that education doesn’t necessarily eradicate fanaticism.You can be a well-educated professional working for a top-notch multinational and still qualify to be a militant at heart. Where law is in absentia, morality becomes the sole judgement criteria. And since morality is purely subjective, it affords us the luxury to pick personal favorites even among murderers.

Our failure to evaluate things objectively accurately defines theinnate aversion to accountability. In politics, much like in sport, we generally work on extreme ends. It is either Boom Boom-ishas we go down all guns blazing or plain Tuk Tuk, tame withdrawal from tough situations. Consequently, there’s little motivation to invest in grass-root political homework that puts us in sync with ground realities – the Cricketing equivalent ofconstructing an innings by taking Singles. So it’s Hit or Block, Black or White, All or Nothing. In Sport, we pin hopes on our favored failure in a wide assortment of established failures, amid hopes of miracles to bail us out of impossible situations. In politics, we pick the lesser tainted among many, praying the gamble pays off. In turn failures of all origins, political or otherwise, respond to dissenting voices by ‘managing’ dissenters, not by addressing the actual flaws at hand. ThePMLN government’s reaction to Panama Leaks is a living testament to that fact.

Mainstream political discourse remains largely driven by allegations and thus ineffective. If anything it enables apologists on each end of the spectrum, Left and Right, to ensure their favored brand of lawbreakers are not only acquitted but duly glorified. Naturally it is rare to find a politician of the subcontinent origin who is open to questions, queries and investigation about personal assets and wealth like contemporaries in the West. This is where men like Imran Khan & Arvind Kejriwal should stand out from the rest but sadly end up being scrutinized for fundamentals like foul language, poor team selection and rigid policy stances etc. Even more frustrating is the inability of political brands like PTI to sell the notion that Imran alone, despite all his political shortcomings, can be trusted with our tax money – a criteria most contenders can’t adequately fulfill.

When sportsmen hit a lean patch, they are advised to get back to the basics and try nothing out of the ordinary. In trying timeslike these a similar recommendation may serve us well on the policy level. Pakistan needs a singular, centralized reference point that Pakistanis from all walks could tailor their behaviors in accordance with. The good news is that one such document,aptly called the Constitution of Pakistan, already exists andcommands consent of all relevant stakeholders on board. It needs to be taught in classrooms like any other academic subject and not exclusively to Law students contrary to popular belief.An educated, countrywide discourse on the Constitution willreset the benchmarks driving public opinion for good and is undoubtedly the game-changer we desperately need. If sections and subsections of the 1973 document are deliberated in classrooms and across multiple electronic media interfaces, it will nurture forthcoming generations to respect the indiscriminate rules and limitations governing their lives. Now, more than ever, the onus also lies on the State (not Government)of Pakistan to establish that it’s neither a tunnel-visionedMullah’s hostage nor a myopic, corrupt-to-the-core Liberal’s wet dream. On each level of discourse, let’s start by calling spade a spade.

 

About the Author: Jehangir is a social activist with a keen interest in economic & geopolitical affairs. Currently based in Dubai, he is a Business Grad from IBA Karachi and remains extensively involved in managing affairs of Overseas Pakistanis based in the UAE & Middle Eastern countries. Jehangir tweets at @jehangirmirzaa.

by webmaster@insaf.pk (tkiadmin)