Rigging – A General Spills Beens

The main wheeler and dealer of the ISI during the 2002 elections, the then Maj-Gen Ehtesham Zamir, now retired, has come out of the closet and admitted his guilt of manipulating the 2002 elections, and has directly blamed Gen Musharraf for ordering so.

Talking to The News, the head of the ISI’s political cell in 2002, admitted manipulating the last elections at the behest of President Musharraf and termed the defeat of the King’s party, the PML-Q, this time “a reaction of the unnatural dispensation (installed in 2002).”

Zamir said the ISI together with the NAB was instrumental in pressing the lawmakers to join the pro-Musharraf camp to form the government to support his stay in power.

Looking down back into the memory lane and recalling his blunders which, he admitted, had pushed the country back instead of taking it forward, Zamir feels ashamed of his role and conduct.

Massively embarrassed because he was the one who negotiated, coerced and did all the dirty work, the retired Maj-Gen said he was not in a position to become a preacher now when his own past was tainted.

He said the country would not have faced such regression had the political management was not carried out by the ISI in 2002. But he also put some responsibility of the political disaster on the PML-Q as well.

The former No: 2 of the ISI called for the closure of political cell in the agency, confessing that it was part of the problem due to its involvement in forging unnatural alliances, contrary to public wishes.

Zamir’s blaming Musharraf for creating this unnatural alliance rings true as another former top associate of Musharraf, Lt-Gen (retd) Jamshed Gulzar Kiyani has already disclosed that majority of the corps commanders, in several meetings, had opposed Musharraf’s decision of patronising the leadership of the King’s party.

Ma-Gen (retd) Ehtesham Zamir termed the 2008 elections ‘fairer than 2002’. He said the reason behind their fairness is that there was relatively less interference of intelligence agencies this time as compared to the last time. But he stopped short of saying that there was zero interference in the 2008 polls.

“You are quite right,” he said when asked to confirm about heavy penetration of ISI into political affairs during the 2002 elections. But he said he did not do it on his own but on the directives issued by the government.

Asked who directed him from the government side and if there was somebody else, not President Musharraf, he said: “Obviously on the directives of President Musharraf.”

Asked if he then never felt that he was committing a crime by manipulating political business at the cost of public wishes, he said: “Who should I have told except myself. Could I have asked Musharraf about this? I was a serving officer and I did what I was told to do. I never felt this need during the service to question anyone senior to me,” he said and added that he could not defend his acts now.

“It was for this reason that I have never tried to preach others what I did not practice. But I am of the view that the ISI’s political cell should be closed for good by revoking executive orders issued in 1975,” he said.

Responding to a question regarding corruption cases that were used as pressure tactics on lawmakers, he said: “Yes! This tool was used, not only by the ISI. The NAB was also involved in this exercise.”

Proof of Rigging in Pakistan Elections

For the first time in the history of the country, a private news channel aired on Friday a video unmasking rigging in the February 18 elections in Pakistan. In the video, scenes of polls rigging from two polling stations of Karachi and Lahore were aired.

In one of the scenes, some armed persons were tearing ballot papers from a book, putting their thumb impression, stamping on the symbol of their favourite candidate (MQM’s) and stuffing the ballot boxes at a polling station. One of the women at the polling station was heard saying to one of the armed persons to take away his rifle. An unidentified female polling officer was also heard saying that the armed persons harassed them at gunpoint and bogus votes were polled after occupying the polling station.

At another polling station, the seal of the ballot box had been broken and an unidentified man was seeing in it after removing the cover. The video showed the armed persons entering the polling station and one of the officer also questioned as to how many armed persons entered the poling stations and how many bogus votes they cast.

The video showed that bogus votes were also being cast at one of the polling stations in PP-152 constituency of Lahore (Punjab).

Pakistan government has blocked Youtube in Pakistan which carried several video clips of rigging in the elections of February 18, 2008.

Don’t Interfere with Nature

“I remembered one morning when I discovered a cocoon in a bark of a tree, just as a butterfly was making a hole in its case and preparing to come out. I waited awhile, but it was too long appearing and I was impatient. I bent over it and breathed on it to warm it. I warmed it as quickly as I could and the miracle began to happen before my eyes, faster than life.

The case opened, the butterfly started slowly crawling out and I shall never forget my horror when I saw how its wings were folded back and crumpled; the wretched butterfly tried with its whole trembling body to unfold them. Bending over it I tried to help it with my breath. In vain.

It needed to be hatched out patiently and the unfolding of its wings should be a gradual process in the sun. Now it was too late. My breath had forced the butterfly to appear, all crumpled, before its time. It struggled desperately and, a few seconds later, died in the palm of my hand.

The little body is, I do believe, the greatest weight I have on my conscience, for I realize today that it is a mortal sin to violate the great laws of nature. We should not hurry, we should not be impatient, but we should confidently obey the eternal rhythm.”

Annonymous

Biased Wikipedia

Wikipedia, the so-called free online encyclopedia, is acting very partial and stubborn by refusing to remove depictions of the Prophet Muhammad May peace be upon him), despite being flooded with complaints from Muslims demanding the images be deleted.

Already 217,000 persons worldwide have joined an online protest claiming the images, shown on European-language pages, are offensive to Islam, which prohibits any representation of Muhammad. But the defiant editors of the encyclopaedia insist they will not bow to pressure and say anyone objecting to the controversial images can simply adjust their computers so they do not have to look at them.

Editors of Wikipedia maintain “So long as they are relevant to the article and do not violate any of Wikipedia’s existing policies, nor the law of the US state of Florida where Wikipedia’s servers are hosted, no content or images will be removed because people find them objectionable or offensive.”

This is the sort of impartiality, the non-Muslims in America and Europe have.

If you think that to hurt the feelings of one-sixth population of world is not a good action, sign the petition after clicking here.

Life

“This is the true joy in life: the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community, and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no ‘brief candle’ to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.”

George Bernard Shaw said it. And I have the same opinion.