Memo from USA

Memories of another day come floating back as I watch the live fireworks celebrating the US Independence Day in New York. It was July 4, 2007, that I had a friendly chat with Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain at the Islamabad home of Mushahid Hussain. Later the two were due at Ambassador Anne Patterson’s home to partake of the July 4 reception.
Over a splendid lunch with the Margallas in front, we talked freely of different forms of political ‘marriage of convenience’. ‘Gen Musharraf, who was plotting to stay in power for as long as he could, was that summer courting Benazir Bhutto in Dubai.
He wanted her to return and join hands with him to impress the Americans that Pakistan was on the way to democracy. But good folks like Raza Rabbani were continuing to dispel such a deal: “We will never elect General Musharraf as president with or without his uniform,” was his firm stand. You mean General Musharraf is not acceptable to Ms Bhutto at any cost? I asked Rabbani, the then leader of the opposition in the senate. “I’ve said what I had to say,” he averred.
Said Shujaat, when I mentioned Rabbani’s comment: “That’s mere public posturing.” Now I’m an admirer of Shujaat’s simple diction. He’s a straight shooter. His one-liners have humour: “Abstinence is assent,” he continued, citing a verse in Urdu. “The PPP will abstain from voting to facilitate the president’s re-election.”
Exactly three months later, his prediction came true. The PPP abstained when Musharraf was voted as the president on Oct 6, 2007. A day earlier the Gen had signed the NRO so that BB could return. Don’t you feel like the jilted first wife who has been discarded (by Musharraf) for a younger, prettier second? I teased the PML-Q leader. “Actually, ours is a nikah and with the PPP it’s a mutah,” chipped in Mushahid with a mischievous grin. Don’t you feel cuckolded? I persevered. “In politics everything goes and we are prepared to accept the PPP as a coalition partner.”
It took four years for the American dream to materialise. Playing the part of a marriage broker, something that US does best in Pakistan, a wedding between Q and the PPP became a reality some months back with Yusuf Raza Gilani as the best man, Shujaat as the father of the bride (or groom) and Zardari as the priest. The maids of honour (oops I mean men) were the Q stalwarts lined up in the front row to hear the marriage vows: ..in sickness or in health...until death do us part.
The raison d’etre for the marriage? Look up a three-day-old photo in newspapers and you have your answer. Under the portrait of an angry Jinnah sits Prime Minister Gilani in the centre; on his right sits Shujaat and coz Pervaiz Elahi. Both gents are wearing starched shalwar kamiz suits with waistcoats. On his left sits Rahman Malik with folded hands resting in his lap. Elahi wanted to be the deputy PM but had to make do with the portfolio of a senior minister. Missing in the picture is Amin Fahim, who perhaps is working the phones to get Zardari on the line to bail him out.
Apart from Moonis Elahi s/o Pervaiz Elahi “Amin Fahim, Rahman Malik and a son of an influential person (don’t we all know who that be!) are responsible for the suspension,” a source in FIA said after the suspension of Zafar Qureshi, brought in on the Supreme Court orders to investigate the NICL case. Now you know the reason for the marriage.
Happy July 4 America and thanks for handpicking our fly by night leaders! For next time, spare us the above.