THE day following the restoration of the Supreme Court judges in Pakistan, I was on a long taxi journey on the highway between Dubai and Abu Dhabi. As luck would have it, my cab driver, Sohail, was a very engaging and personable Pakistani national from Shalimar Town in Lahore. A schoolteacher by profession, he had abandoned any hope of pursuing that career in his homeland, and had set out for the Gulf for his slice of the golden pie.
It wasn’t long before we struck up a conversation on the latest developments in his home country. Sohail was unquestionably a man of political opinions and discourse, and did not feel inhibited about speaking out his mind.
“Look Sir. I was up all night watching the long march before it was called off. What Nawaz Sharif did was for the good of Pakistan, and Zardari finally had to relent. The people that thronged the roads during the march brought pride and tears to my eyes.
“Pakistan was in danger of moving into a very volatile state had it not been for the resolute decisions of Nawaz Sharif and his supporters to call Zardari’s bluff. Even though many were prevented forcibly by joining the march, in many places, the police who were sympathetic to the cause allowed some of them to get through. All those false promises that Zardari made before were finally put to rest.”
“OK, Sohail. I understand that Nawaz Sharif snarled and Zardari blinked. But, what now? What is to happen to your country? Where does Pakistan go from here?” I asked.
“Well, first of all Sir, these crooks must be booted out of office. The people of Pakistan have shown that they are fed up with those who parade behind the curtain of martyrs. What did Benazir Bhutto do for the people, except to fatten the purses of those around her?
“And as for Musharraf, he sold his country to the Americans. Look, even now they send their spy planes to bomb our villages. Our sovereignty has been threatened, and we are under constant siege. And that corrupt Altaf Hussein who heads the MQM. Where is he now? Hiding in London, and inciting ethnic violence to create more unrest?
“Sir, you ask what will happen now. The restoration of judges will bring in a high degree of political ethics to a country whose politicians have ignored their people. Nawaz Sharif is a good man and has done a lot of good for the people. Granted, his mistake was when he tried to boot out Musharraf as army chief. But for all his faults, he is not a thief and Pakistan needs clean leaders like him at this moment. Zardari on the other hand has proven to be a man who makes false promises and we don’t need any more people like him running our country. Even when our relations were bad with India 10 years ago, it was Nawaz Sharif who took the lead and called for normalization of ties. He invited Indian Prime Minister Vajpayee to the Wagah border where both signed an agreement called the Lahore declaration. Soon, Pakistanis and Indians were exchanging visits and ties between the two countries were warming up.”
“Then why did he approve of Kargil, Sohail? That military excursion into India was done when he was in power,” I countered.
“Musharraf was the mastermind behind Kargil, Sir. He was not very happy about the peace arrangements with India, and it was through this mad adventure that he hoped to achieve a breakdown of trust. In the process, we lost over 4,000 lives. But did he care?”
“What about Prime Minister Gilani, Sohail? How do you feel about him?”
“Gilani is a good man, but has been overshadowed by Zardari. Even though I feel his conscience is clean, he cannot confront Zardari on issues he disagrees with. And that will be his undoing. His boss had become another dictator under false democratic pretenses, and unless Gilani moves, the levers of power from the president to the prime minister which is stated in our constitution, he will not last too long.”
On the return trip back to Dubai after finishing my business, it was a swarthy but gregarious Sikh, Joginder Singh who was to be my driver. And it wasn’t long before he proceeded to give me an earful on Indian politics. But that would be another story.
