Beware of watchdog

Pakistan Today, June 12, 2012

It’s all about access: those who have it seek to protect it; those
that don’t will speculate till the lie becomes accepted fact.

I stop paying attention for a week and look what happens! It seems my whole world is in turmoil. A father tries his own son; a journalist defends his income on national TV; more undead Al-Qaeda zombies; a fresh wave of suicide bombings; the French Open; the Euro Championships and Elmo the Embezzler (more on that later). I think I will have a breakdown if I try to process all of this information simultaneously.

So let’s start with the most harmless issue: the media’s stake in the Arsalan Chaudhary-Malik Riaz scandal. Here are the facts as we know them: Malik Riaz is Pakistan’s answer to Donald Trump, Sir Richard Branson and Laxmi Mittal all rolled into one; while Dr Arsalan Chaudhary’s claim to fame is his descent from our chief and most honourable bastion of justice. Allegedly, the errant son extorted favours from the magnate in return for favourable decisions in court. When the prodigal child failed to come good on his promises, said magnate whipped out ‘evidence’ of his profanities and showed it to his friends in the media. These friends immediately chimed in, vouching for the veracity of this ‘unseen evidence’ like chorus boys singing Auld Lang Syne. Then there was ‘great debate’ between those lucky enough to have seen this ‘evidence’ and those cynics who didn’t get an invitation to the tycoon’s garden party. However, this so-called evidence has yet to see the light of day, even though it is under subpoena by the highest court in the land.

I have a few opinions too. The big chief is still ‘intimidating’ the prime suspect through other cases. He may have left his son’s bench, but there are other ways of twisting arms. And also, just because a case involves some of the most high-profile figures in the country does not mean that it warrants airtime on the primetime TV shows. And just because it’s on TV or in the newspaper doesn’t mean you should believe it. Especially if it’s not a public interest story. Because we in the media tend to make things up when it comes to the corridors of power and the people therein. It’s all about access: those who have it will not go to the trouble of writing about it lest they spoil their access; while those that do not will speculate and flog nonexistent horses until the lie is accepted as a fact. Beautiful, isn’t it?

Also, in all of this circus, we all seem to have forgotten that no evidence has been presented in court, no charges framed and no prosecution made. One small step for justice, one giant leap for speculation.

Then we have the curious case of Sim Sim Humara, the scandal that shook the muppets and puppets around the world. While the facts were laid out quite succinctly by this very newspaper, the story is bloodcurdling, to say the least. That a children’s show, meant to educate and entertain the most impressionable minds, was being used as a vehicle of embezzlement, is serious business. My sources tell me that while things are not as bad as they have been made out to be, the bulk of the allegations is true. While I can’t believe I’m actually saying this, but all this could have been avoided (according to my sources) if the people in question had coughed up the “cost of doing business”. Since that was apparently too much to ask, they had to pay the ultimate price: the death of a dynasty. The donors, on the other hand, were going to pull out anyway. Only now, they will do so after a full inquiry and with a bitter aftertaste in their mouths. This may also apply to other projects the same donor has been funding and we may see a lot of cleaning house in the months to come. This obviously does not bode well for the artists and creative persons of the land, who are being sullied by association with the organisation responsible. It is a sad, sad day on Raiwind Road.

Finally, a topic I’ve tried to talk about before. It seems that our treatment of women is steadily declining into the medieval and the macabre. Be it Kohistan or Fort Monroe, it seems women can only be treated as commodity or cattle. Or objects of desire. This frustrates me to no end, because I generally try to consider them human beings. But there is something fundamentally wrong with gender relations in our fair land. Otherwise, the use of brutal and unforgiving force against (mostly) defenceless girls would not be on the rise.

Let me just say that I don’t care who wins the next elections. It’s obvious that nothing (much) is going to change, even if the tsunami does roll in. The chief of our problems will remain politics and human beings will continue to score very low on the ‘valuable things’ index. And the watchdogs that we trained to keep us safe, well, let’s just say they have begun to turn on their masters. Beware.