Reporting Pakistan

by Meena Menon

  The police, summoned for clarity by the judges, said he had left his home in Chak Shahzad for court at 12.15 p.m., but he felt ill on the way and went to the AFIC. Exasperation all around. Justice Arab granted him another exemption. Akram Sheikh said a one-time exemption had been granted earlier and even though he had all sympathies for the ailing person, a non-bailable warrant should be issued. It was now clear that Musharraf wasn’t coming and the entire morning was wasted for the second day running. We went out to see the Rangers piling on to their trucks and leaving. There was no need for them now. Even the security guards looked miffed.

  Musharraf was admitted to the cardiac care unit. The hospital became a refuge till the court which granted him a lot of indulgence since he was a former President and chief of army staff, lost its infinite patience and issued a non-bailable warrant. The defence strategy was to delay matters and they used every trick in the book. They filed myriad applications challenging everything from the constitution of the court to the appointment of the special public prosecutor, and said the trial couldn’t go on because the judges and the prosecution were biased, that the Code of Criminal Procedure could not apply to these proceedings, Musharraf must be tried in a military court, and so on. Much time was spent arguing each one of them. At one point in March 2014, Justice Faisal Arab recused himself after the defence lawyer Anwar Mansoor kept objecting and insinuating that he had no confidence in the court and questioned the manner adopted by it while passing orders. However, he was back in court later. Musharraf’s appearance in a civilian court was as expected, big breaking news (before that, his non-appearance was causing hysteria). This was unprecedented in a country which deified the military, and everyone went berserk, but for different reasons. There were quick conclusions that Pakistani democracy had finally come of age and that civilian authority could actually triumph over the military. As usual, everyone was wrong—democracy had its Lakshman Rekha in Pakistan. Soon, retired army officers organized meetings to defend Musharraf, and it became obvious that the move to try him wasn’t popular. For a former chief of army staff and President to be so arraigned was unthinkable. Some reporters I knew asked me if India had ever tried a dictator for treason. I had to remind them we didn’t ever have army rule, though the Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi was repressive. While trying Musharraf had set a precedent, little else was likely to be achieved, and there was a remote possibility that something like this would be emulated. There were those who said that even if Musharraf was convicted, he would be pardoned. Justice Faisal Arab heading the three-judge bench tried to be as patient and function as best as he could, despite the burden of trying a military dictator in a land where the army was a sacred cow. The government, too, distanced itself at one point, leaving it to the courts to decide. Public opinion was divided on whether it was worth it all to bring him to book. Musharraf, who gave a lot of interviews, asked the army to support him and even said that it was doing so according to his own information. This was naturally and repeatedly denied by the defence minister. The MQM offered support by proclaiming that Musharraf was being tried for being a Mohajir. There was scepticism in some quarters as to whether it made sense to have a trial when the country was battling poor economic growth, terrorism and other challenges.

  Akram Sheikh was fond of saying ‘let the mills of justice grind slowly but surely’. Every time I asked him about the future of this trial, he would smile and repeat this phrase. He loved trivia—after Musharraf went to hospital, he said, ‘Musharraf was not confined to his hospital bed, he had visitors, including his legal counsels, and received over 1500 flower bouquets.’ He also referred to an order passed in 2002 by Musharraf himself which said that all cardiac ailments should be treated in the country itself.

  The trial was also why I ended up going to the Sharia courts, set up under Zia-ul-Haq’s regime to try cases under Islamic law. It was tucked away behind tall trees opposite the Supreme Court, and in the front, was a pretty garden. The courts were small rooms done up in wood and green, and unused for the most part. Few cases came here, I was told, and behind the lavish exterior and the marble steps, nothing really happened. It suddenly became a place the media flocked to since the special identity cards for the Musharraf trial were issued here. The registrar, a kindly sessions judge from Sindh, asked for a photocopy of my ID card which I didn’t have. He then graciously got it done with a few extra copies for me. Later, he would read out the many orders in the treason trial in one of the cold courtrooms on the first floor. He was patient with impatient journalists whose phones were recording his orders, and who started breaking the news even before he had finished reading. He would always read it out again for those of us in print who were not in any real hurry other than to lamely tweet.

  The court was the auditorium of the National Library with a wooden stage and trappings. The deep, green seats offered marginal comfort in the cold. One of the defence lawyers, Ahmad Raza Kasuri, called the court a Shakespearian theatre and predicted we would all be blown up one day due to the poor security. A comforting thought! The proceedings could easily pass off for a Shakespearian farce. The whole place was crawling with Rangers, and truck containers were placed at strategic intervals to deter potential attackers. Container drivers found themselves out of a job and played cards next to their vehicles. The canteen on the first floor, never used to making more than a few cups of tea, suddenly found itself unprepared for the large demand. The cook invested in a large aluminium vessel and made extra samosas. Cups were always short though.

  Here, too, the spooks would question my driver and ask him what I was doing there, as if they didn’t know. I would see intelligence guys (my friends said they were) trying to blend in with the large media contingent. No security can stop journalists who want to sneak mobiles into court and every day the police would keep asking if we had deposited our phones at the counter. Once the woman police constable refused to believe me and asked me where my second phone was. It was a trick question and she wasn’t convinced. The security staff were bored with the trial. They used to ask us if Musharraf would come to court or if anything really was going to happen at all. I also realized that Musharraf may be vilified for imposing emergency rule, but he was still sought after in the media; in fact, he enjoyed a fair degree of popularity and there was a scramble to speak to him both times he actually came to court.

  The National Library is situated on a height and one had to park at the open ground below and walk up to the main entrance, lined with the tall Rangers and plainclothes police in salwar kameez. For the women, there was a small cubicle near the gate for security checks. On 31 March 2014, the day Musharraf rode up in his black SUV for the second time—for his indictment—the tension cut through the morning chill. I thought I was early at 9 a.m., having reached the junction near the Supreme Court, which you cross to go to the National Library, but my car was stopped by the police who said I couldn’t go ahead. I argued furiously and made my way to the pavement where more cops tried to turn me back. I said I was from the media and had to make it to court. ‘Movement hai, madam, jaldi jaiye,’ a cop grinned. I half ran, half walked to the court and arrived in a dishevelled mess, sweating despite the cold. Who could have guessed that Musharraf would decide to be punctual that day? I was lucky to have even made it. People behind me, including a BBC journalist, were furious. He was stopped and he argued with the police for allowing me, a mere Indian, to pass, while a true-blue Pakistani could not. Apparently, when he told the policeman that he let an Indian pass and stopped him, the cop said he didn’t know I was one. I wondered if he would have stopped me. I was a little disconcerted by the event—would he have minded so much if an American or Greek journalist was allowed to pass? The journalists covering the court were friendly for the most part. Some of them who sat next to me in court were questioned by the spooks. ‘Why are you sitting next to that Indian? What do you talk about with that Indian girl?’ This didn’t deter them at all and they, like all the lawyers and police, were always cour
teous and very helpful.

  For the second time Musharraf came to court, a 2000-strong security cover stretched all the way from the AFIC to the National Library building, and he blew in at 9.40 a.m., saluting everyone, again fresh and breezy in a beige salwar kameez with a smart dark blazer. That was the time he wanted to leave the country to meet his mother in Dubai who was ninety-four and unwell. On the day of the indictment, Musharraf’s entire legal team led by the redoubtable Sharifuddin Pirzada was replaced with the MQM senator and lawyer Dr Farogh Naseem. After the charges in the high treason case were read out to him, he pleaded not guilty to all five. He then asked the court’s permission to speak. ‘Thank you very much,’ he said in English, ‘for giving me the opportunity to address this court. I hold this court and the prosecution in the highest esteem. I am a strong believer with conviction in the supremacy of law and strongly believe in the equality of law.’ He had said much the same things in TV interviews. He proclaimed he was not a traitor and had won a gallantry award in the 1965 war and was ready to shed his blood for the country. A traitor, he explained, is one who sells his country and who surrenders before the enemy. He said he was part of the Special Services Group where the motto is ‘ghazi ya shahid’ (a living hero or martyr). A traitor is one who loots his country and fills his own coffers and reduces the country to penury, he went on. He said he had not taken a single paisa for himself or accepted a bribe. He gave details of the progress the country made when he was President in terms of debt, poverty alleviation, jobs, improvements in the security apparatus and foreign exchange, and said he could hold forth on various sectors of the economy. Judicial appointments had been made on merit and his tenure was better in every way than previous governments. He even said the development in Balochistan in terms of infrastructure was better than earlier and more funds were made available to that province than the Punjab.

  He was not alone, he said, in deciding to impose the Emergency on 3 November 2007 and it involved the then prime minister, the Cabinet and other stakeholders. From a state in default he had raised it to a level of progress and prosperity in every field. There was a lot of respect and honour for the country as a result and he said the treason charge was what he got for his loyalty.

  The court was silent on his application to go abroad to seek treatment in the US, visit his mother in Dubai or be taken off the Exit Control List (ECL). On 3 April 2014, the day he left for home from hospital, a bomb exploded on the footpath after his convoy crossed it early in the morning, but he had reached his farmhouse at Chak Shahzad by then. I went to check this out near the Faizabad junction and could barely make out the chipped-off portion of the pavement.

  After the non-bailable warrant, Musharraf had no choice but to appear in court. The prosecution said there was nothing in the medical reports to keep him from attending the court, and that he had not suffered a heart attack. Akram Sheikh kept harping that nothing was wrong with the general and he had the blood pressure of a young man and the pulse rate of an athlete, as stated in the medical report. As another diversion, the defence sought exemption for him appearing in court by citing a threat alert issued by the ministry of interior on 10 March 2014 which said that Musharraf could be assassinated; proper screening of the security personnel accompanying him would take six weeks and not seventy-two hours, and Musharraf should be exempted till then. Akram Sheikh was livid and said the government had deployed 2500 personnel and three different routes were worked out for Musharraf’s journey to court. His personal security was chosen by him since he was not under arrest. The deployment of security personnel had cost over PKR 20 crore for the last eight hearings and this had never happened in the recorded history of Pakistan.

  Musharraf’s security became more important than the trial. Threat ‘alert 239’ cited in a letter dated 10 March 2014 from the National Crisis Management Cell (NCMC) of the interior ministry spoke of a bomb attack by the TTP/al-Qaeda or ‘a Salman Taseer incident’ (which means one of his security guards could pump bullets into him). Hard-core fighters were placed on the route from the AFIC to the court for this fell purpose, and the threat also said that the terrorists had sympathizers in Musharraf’s security cavalcade. This led to fresh delays and a briefing of the judges by the intelligence agencies. The trial was full of these nuggets on a daily basis and provided for much entertainment and news. I faithfully reported everything for the paper as it was important to document the fledgling prosecution of a military dictator in Pakistan.

  While covering the trial, I found out that Anwar Mansoor, one of Musharraf’s defence lawyers, was held prisoner after the Bangladesh war in 1971. It was an outburst from Mansoor in court in response to something the judge said. The relations between the defence and the prosecution made for more news than the trial itself and slanging matches were common in and out of the court. Mansoor complained of several attacks on him and disturbances at night. He was even robbed once. That morning, an exasperated Justice Arab asked the two teams to be more cordial and this sparked off an unexpected reaction from Mansoor who said it was like asking him to be friends with the Indians which was not possible. He had fought a war with them and could never be friends with Indians since he had been a prisoner of war. Despite this deep-seated feeling, he was friendly to me and always answered all my questions. Later when I spoke to him, he said he had gotten over it but that memory and pain would always stay with him. There were unspeakable tortures and he came back physically and mentally broken. I realized it wasn’t something one forgave. That trauma was uppermost in his mind and surfaced at the slightest provocation. This turn of events in court served as one of the many reminders I kept getting that despite all the friendliness, I was reporting from ‘enemy’ country. We had fought wars, yet we were so courteous on one level. Imagine Mansoor, a 1971 prisoner of war, speaking to an Indian journalist in his own country which had surrendered and lost its eastern wing. It could happen only in our two countries!

  Once Musharraf had called all the foreign media for interviews to his farmhouse before the trial began but Snehesh and I, the two Indian journalists posted in the capital, were not invited. In 2013, he was all set to leave the country after he managed to get bail in both the assassination cases of Akbar Bugti and Benazir Bhutto, but he was arrested in the case involving the storming of the Lal Masjid. He was advised by those who knew him, including a former ISI chief, not to return, but blinded by a surge in online popularity, he could only see a glorious comeback and a handsome victory in the elections. He had arrived in Pakistan full of hope but a disappointingly small crowd welcomed him in March 2013. Someone blamed it all on Facebook. As it turned out, not only was he disqualified from contesting the polls but he was to find himself arrested for various cases. It was after an FIA team asked to probe the imposition of Emergency, detention of judges and holding the Constitution in abeyance by Musharraf, submitted its report in November 2013 that the government decided to try the former military dictator for high treason. Nobody thought the government would even attempt this and events showed that it was a mock trial. Justice Tahira Safdar from Balochistan read out the five charges against him: his ‘Proclamation of Emergency Order, 2007’, holding the Constitution of 1973 in abeyance and subverting the Constitution, thereby committing the offence of high treason punishable under section 2 of the High Treason (Punishment) Act. He had issued a ‘Provisional Constitution Order No. 1 of 2007’ which empowered the President to amend the Constitution from time to time and he had also suspended the fundamental rights. Thirdly, he issued the ‘Oath of Office (Judges) Order, 2007’ whereby an oath was introduced in the Schedule which required a judge to abide by the provisions of the Proclamation of Emergency, dated 3 November 2007, and the Provisional Constitutional Order of the same date. This order also resulted in the removal of numerous judges of the superior courts, including the chief justice of Pakistan. Fourthly, on 20 November 2007, as President he issued ‘Constitution (Amendment) Order, 2007’ whereby Articles 175 (relating to establishment and jurisdict
ion of courts), 186-A (pertaining to the power of the Supreme Court to transfer cases), 198 (jurisdiction of the high court), 218 (appointment of an election commission), 270B and 270C (relating to elections) were amended and Article 270AAA which reaffirmed and validated all of Musharraf’s orders and ordinances, was added to the Constitution.

  Fifthly, on 14 December 2007 at Rawalpindi, as President, he issued ‘Constitution (Second Amendment) Order, 2007’ whereby the Constitution of 1973 was amended.

  The statement of charges said that these criminal acts of subversion of the Constitution constituted high treason, and were personal acts of Musharraf for the purpose of ‘personal aggrandizement and a consequential vendetta’; at no point of time did Parliament validate these changes in the law.