Just for Fame and Prominence
ALI SUKHANVER
Fame and prominence are very natural type of desires. Living and dying in this world without any recognition and without being acknowledged is something very difficult and very unnatural. Different people adopt different ways and manners to satisfy their desire of fame and recognition. Some take the sword of knowledge in their hands and some opt for the service of suffering humanity but some unfortunates go for a way which though brings fame and prominence but deprives them of reliability and credibility. Throughout the world one can find countless characters of the same types who are so much fame-craving that for the achievement of this interest they even ignore the religion they follow and the land they belong to. They all of a sudden forget what their country has showered upon them and what blessings their religion has brought for them. All these thoughts on fame and recognition stormed into my mind when during net-surfing, I came by an article written by Mr. Hussain Haqqani, published in the Washington Post of 13th June, 2012. The title of this write up was, ‘My Real Crime.’ Mr. Haqqani says in that write up, “In Pakistan conspiracy theories and hatred for the United States has become a daily staple of the national discourse. My detractors in Pakistan’s security services and among pro-Jihadi groups have long accused me of being pro-American; they condescendingly described me as the U.S. ambassador to Pakistan based in Washington. Our Supreme Court, pursuing a populist ideological agenda without regard to legal or constitutional niceties, intervened directly. Without any trial, it created a Commission of Inquiry and barred me from leaving Pakistan. The commission alleged that I had acted against Pakistan’s interests and had authorized the controversial memo. The report’s release has been timed to distract attention from serious allegations by a Pakistani businessman that he paid millions to the son of Pakistan’s chief justice as part of efforts to buy favors”. After going through this article I got an impression that Mr. Haqqani has tried to convince the world that Pakistan is a land of fraudulent and dishonest people; here everyone from the judiciary and the security forces and even from the business community is corrupt. Mr. Haqqani on one hand seems trying to reveal it to the world that he is the only honest person ever born in Pakistan and on the other hand he is trying to make realize the US authorities that he has been branded as a ‘traitor’ simply because he loves America.
It is noteworthy that My Real Crime is not the first article written by Hussain Haqqani which tried to tarnish the image of Pakistan and the people of Pakistan, in 2005, he wrote a book titled ‘Pakistan between Mosque and Military’. This book specifically targets Pakistani military and Pakistani nuclear ambitions. According to authentic sources in the western media, Haqqani received a sum of $100,000 from Smith Richardson Foundation for writing this book. In one of the chapters of this book, Haqqani says “Washington must not ignore Pakistan’s state sponsorship of Islamist militants, its pursuit of nuclear weapons and missiles at the expense of education and healthcare, and its refusal to democratize; each of these issues is directly linked to the future of Islamist radicalism.” Now many years after the publication of that book, Mr. Haqqani has expressed the same thoughts in his controversial ‘Memo.’ Here the question arises; why Mr.Haqqani does always speak against his own country, his own nation and belief system. Why does he always try to stand on the side of the Americans? Is this all for the achievement of fame and recognition or is it some kind of reaction? Some defense analysts are of the opinion that Haqqani’s movement against the security institutions of Pakistan is in fact a reaction to the refusal by General Musharraf to whom he had desired to be appointed as an advisor for Information but could not convince the General of his loyalties and remained unsuccessful in becoming a part of Musharraf’s internal set up. Since that day he has devoted all his vigour, zeal and zest to disgrace and disrepute the security institutions of Pakistan. Mr. Hussain Haqqani is no doubt a man of matchless talents. He started his political life as a student leader in Karachi. Ultimately he acquired prominence by becoming President of Student Union in Karachi University. He remained a part of Jamaat-e-Islami, PML (N) and succeeded in winning sympathies from the Pakistan Peoples Party. He is a very good poet, writer, debater and no doubt a wonderful speaker and politician but in spite of all these characteristics he could not win repute as a loyal son of land. He could have won that type of repute if he had desired and struggled but it seems he struggled otherwise.
