Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: By refusing to appear before the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and by preparing a reported reference against the Supreme Court’s Justice Khosa (of the Godfather fame), Nawaz Sharif and his hawks have almost declared an open war, a policy of defiance, no matter what the consequences.

This defiance has also opened the deep fissures within the PML-N and the Sharif family.

On Saturday, a sidelined Shahbaz Sharif, who was supposed to be sick, called a meeting and directed all MNAs, MPAs and leaders not to attack national institutions. In what capacity he issued the ‘orders’ is not yet clear.

How we knew he was sick, because Nawaz Sharif cancelled his visit to Lala Musa and Wazirabad with some spokesperson saying that Shahbaz Sharif was sick.

Reportedly, Shahbaz Sharif and Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan had detailed discussions, probably on phone, and agreed that a no-confrontation policy best suited the party and the ousted PM in the present circumstances.

Nisar was attacked by Dawn leaks victim Pervaiz Rashid publicly and there were reports Nisar may respond at a news conference on Sunday. The hawks-doves divide could then be called official and public.

Interestingly, before the reference against Justice Khosa was sent to the SC registrar, it was released, or partly leaked to the media, and was all over the place, though officially it had not been sent. Politics was written on each page, without doubt.

Later on Saturday evening, after the alleged leaked copies of the reference had circulated all over, a spokesman of the NA speaker said, “He had not filed any reference.”

In yet other development, NAB had reportedly decided that the references against Nawaz Sharif and family would not be delayed and, as per SC directives, would be filed even if the Sharif family refused to appear or boycotted the proceedings. As part of the fast-moving chess pieces, the NAB chairman was proceeding abroad and may not be available for a week or 10 days. He had earlier been reported to have met Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani for three hours, quietly, as nothing was officially said after the meeting.

Attacking the judge who first disqualified Nawaz on April 20 in his dissent note, Speaker Ayaz Sadiq has not mentioned anything about the ousted PM but he thinks the office of the speaker has been degraded.

“To label the speaker as a nominee or loyalist of the PM is a misstatement and contrary to the facts. It is also tantamount to disparagement and breach of privilege of the august National Assembly” is Ayaz Sadiq’s main grievance, at least in the portion that was made public.

“The honourable judge is either totally ignorant of the provisions of the constitution or he has been prejudiced by his pre-inclination to condemn the offices of the state,” say some parts of the alleged reference.

Curiously, Page-2 of the supposed reference was not included in the leaked portions while Page-5 where signatures would be affixed was also deleted. So it was a deliberate job for tactical purposes.

By releasing and retracting some of its contents to the media, the PML-N hawks have stated their intentions in no vague terms.

The party, it appears, will fight the judiciary, NAB or anyone else to delay the convictions of Nawaz Sharif and family in accountability courts and try to break or split the 5-member bench, which found him guilty.

The NAB, under Chairman Qamar Zaman, is also playing games quietly.

According to insiders, a lot of time has been wasted out of the six weeks that the SC gave to prepare and file the references. Then, in a hurry, notices were issued, the Sharif family was summoned, a NAB team was even sent to Lahore, although other PMs in the past had to come to Rawalpindi to appear before NAB.

This haste and unofficial statements to the media that ‘no extension would be sought to file the references’ indicate that “hastily and shabbily cooked up” references may be filed, that may be thrown out later by the higher courts on points of law.

The process has also been hampered by the absence of the supervising judge who will look at everything when he returns from vacation. So either he will have to agree to what the NAB puts in front of him or will have to give more time for a better job.

Insiders say the law provides that the NAB investigation officer (IO) has to call the accused and ask them detailed questions, confront them with facts and then write a report.

They say the JIT report was only a “fact finding exercise” and cannot replace the “investigation report” of the IO, as provided in NAB law. If the NAB uses the JIT report as the “IO’s investigation” and the accused do not appear before the IO, this flaw would later be exploited by the accused to their benefit.

It has been reported that the members of the JIT have refused to appear before NAB as witnesses, so whatever they have gathered in the 10 volumes would not be authenticated in the NAB references. It would become a piece of evidence similar to the Qatari letter.

These loopholes are being deliberately left unplugged and this is a serious matter for the SC bench and the supervisory judge of the SC to look into.

By politicising the cases, by boycotting the NAB, by attacking the judges of the 5-member bench, by putting pressure on the SC to take up the review petition quickly, Nawaz and his legal team have come up with the strategy to delay matters and force the “establishment” to come to terms, a la a NRO.

The so-called establishment is double minded, many analysts agree, on whether to continue with this soft approach towards the Sharif family or to take a hard line.

The soft approach is visible. Nothing has been done by NAB to treat the Sharifs as accused of serious corruption, while in contrast, on Saturday, arrest warrants were issued against the entire MQM leadership in Karachi just because they had violated the “loudspeaker ban” months ago.

The basic strategic flaw in the entire episode has been a divided law enforcement establishment. While the PM at the top was removed, his entire support structure, his protocols, his privileges, his security and the federal and Punjab governments run by his family were intact and were allowed to treat him as the PM, despite his ouster by the SC.

Nowhere in the world would this be possible allowing a disqualified politician to act as the de-facto PM. But in the case of Nawaz the entire new cabinet has expressed full confidence and pledged to follow him and his policies.

That is the real dilemma and the sooner it is resolved, the quicker will things get settled.

Otherwise a dysfunctional, handicapped Abbasi government at the centre, run by remote from Raiwind, will be unable to handle the enormous economic, security, regional and international challenges, pushing the country deeper into the dark hole. It may become harder to rescue it.

Published in Daily Times, August 20^th , 2017.