Finally, the Swiss Connection
In Sept 15, 1997 the Ehtesab Cell in the PM’s Secretariat announced that the Swiss Government had agreed to the freezing of accounts in the names of Ms Benazir Bhutto, Begum Nusrat Bhutto and Mr Asif Ali Zardari on the basis of credible evidence about transfer of ill-gotten wealth. Their accounts, vaults and lockers were in the Union Bank of Switzerland, the Barclays Bank, Citi Bank S.A. and the Contrade Ormond Burrus Banque Privee SA. Senator Saifur Rahman, Chairman of the Cell, who was flanked by the Federal Law Minister Khalid Anwar, disclosed that the seizure order, effective from Sept 8, 1997 was conveyed to the Cell by the Federal Office for Police Matters (FOP), Berne. The Swiss have given Government of Pakistan (GoP) three months until Dec 7 to come up with more evidence. With this seizure, the Bhutto/Zardari duo take their rightful place in the history of the infamous and the corrupt, along with the likes of Marcoses, the Shah of Iran, Rajiv Gandhi and Mobutu, leaders who looted wealth from the countries and the people they professed to love. For the record, Ms Benazir has denied these allegations, her defence is ingenious, “who doesn’t have accounts abroad?” One may well ask, why not declare them then? And also where did all the money come from?
Obviously someone close to the Bhutto/Zardari clan has squealed. The obvious suspicion falls on Javed Pasha who benefited most from Zardari’s largesse and had intimate knowledge of his dealings or it could be Hamid Asghar Kidwai who had a bone to pick. Whoever has turned State’s evidence to spare his own neck is not important, the fact is that for the first time in the history of Pakistan illegally held assets abroad have been disclosed. Their existence in actual fact should mean automatic disqualification for the royal duo and the Queen Mother from Parliament and public life since these were not declared in their assets. The filing of assets being done under oath, it amounts to also committing perjury. Since CBR and SBP laws have also been broken, at the very minimum all their local assets should be confiscated. If indeed these foreign accounts are not really the property of the accused, then let them certify that its contents should be handed over to the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP). On the other hand, if the threesome want to contest the ownership then there is the question of where they got the undisclosed sum, ranging between US $ 65-80 million? There is also the problem of justifying as to why they needed six offshore foreign firms; among them Bomer Finance Inc, Mariston Securities Inc, Capricorn Trading SA, Cotechna Inspection SA, etc. The disclosure of details of all the transactions would allow private investigators to trace back the umbrella tree identifying all those “holier than thou” foreign firms doing business in Pakistan who benefited by the support of the royal duo and for which in return they received this illegal largesse. There would also be a catalogue of a number of Pakistanis who have been paying money to the royal couple for unspecified favours. More than the treasure trove available on the accounts, these links should provide clues to a number of mysterious transactions, some of these may have also bordered on the fail-safe line of national security. Persons who loot the country at will, normally have no qualms about selling the country’s secrets to the highest bidder. It is upto the Chairman of the Ehtesab Cell to commission private investigative companies without delay to trace out the origins of each transaction. It would also be very interesting to clear the air about the purported cheque of US $ 5 million given to the Government of Pakistan (GoP) in 1972 by the Libyan Leader Muammar Gaddafi, ostensibly to help Pakistan out in nuclear research. The cheque was supposedly in the name of late Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and he is supposed to have deposited it into his own personal account with Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) in Geneva, purchasing (it is believed) about 10-12 tons of gold. Then there is the matter of the many boxes of Swat emeralds that disappeared without a trace from Pakistan in 1972, suppose they should turn up in some vaults?
Self-accountability-the Decontamination Process
The final accountability being that rendered by the masses at the polls, should not the public expect the political parties to themselves filter their candidates through a pre-electoral weeding process to ensure that they pass measure at various levels leading to the anvil of the Ehtasab (Accountability) Ordinance? The recurrent failure to carry out accountability has brought a once vibrant economic engine fuelled by a dynamic people resplendent in hope to its knees, the last three years at the hands of a band of looters who would put vultures to shame. Not that any thief has ever accepted guilt (to quote renowned columnist Ardeshir Cowasjee “which thief will give you a receipt?”) without being faced by incontrovertible evidence but seldom has there been such highway robbery and then a brazen display of shameless feigning of benign innocence as by the members of the universally unlamented late government of Ms Benazir Bhutto. Unfortunately that is their benign right under the laws of the land unless they are brought to justice.
We have to studiously guard against a rush of judgment. As columnists and journalists, except for investigative journalists like Ardeshir Cowasjee, Kamran Khan, Kaleem Omar, etc we have seldom access to hard evidence, we simply articulate the mass perception. In doing so we fall into the Catch-22 trap of kangaroo courts insofar as we mix truths and half truths that feed on each other mixing these such that the palate of the population becomes anxious and hungry to apportion blame. A responsibility devolves upon us to verify the accuracy of what we put down in print, more so because in our haste to lay accusations and see the looters brought to justice we may be unknowingly playing into their hands because hastily levelled accusations run the risk of being shown to be without depth and substance, it is more difficult to cast doubt on hard evidence obtained more deliberately. Some of us are also guilty of letting our own personal bitterness and frustrations get the better of our own judgment, in effect we attempt to project as the truth what we would like to believe is the truth.
The Emperor and His Clothes
The Mehran Bank scandal continues to devour reputations in its oily, inky embrace. On May 31, 1994, the previously unassailable credibility of the President of Pakistan, Farooq Ahmad Leghari, become its latest casualty, accused by the Leader of the Opposition of being involved in a less-than-meets-the-eye land sale transaction supposedly structured by the now most infamous Habib, Yunus of Mehran (and Habib) Bank fame. The President was said to have received Rs. 15 million in two instalments of Rs. 7.5 million in September and November 1993, just prior to the General and Presidential Elections respectively, at Rs. 32,000.00 per acre a fair price for 531 acres of his ancestral land in D.G. Khan. As Kamran Khan has suggested there is a balance of Rs. 19,92,000.00 (almost Rs. 2 million) which seems to have been delivered in cash. For good measure, the PML (N) leader also castigated the President for spending Rs. 150 million (Rs. 180 million according to an aroused FPCCI) of the tax-payers money attending his son’s graduation in the States in what should have been a private visit and what in fact seems to have inadvertently become a semi-official junket with a lot of unnecessary frills thrown in.
The immediate reaction of the Government on both counts was predictable, bordering on hysteria. Not before 2-3 days had elapsed did present GoP’s spin-masters get their act together and a sustained “damage control” operation was initiated. Clearly on the defensive and stung by the accusations of his critics, the President produced documentary evidence to prove that the land sale was a genuine transaction. GoP machinery went into overdrive to show that the President’s official rounds in USA were in the greater interests of Pakistan and, therefore, reason enough to spend the tax payer’s money. There is no doubt that the dialogue with the US, at a crucial crossroads, had to be continued and the simultaneous visit of the Indian PM had to be countered. The President’s meeting with potential US entrepreneurs, particularly in the energy sector, was another plus point.