Daily Times

Scuffles like the one that broke out between members of a National Accountability Bureau (NAB) team and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) workers when the former raided the house of CM Sindh’s aide Aijaz Khan Jakhrani in Jacobabad only lend weight to claims that the law is sometimes different for the rich and the poor in this Islamic republic. Jakhrani was wanted in an assets beyond means case, while he and 12 others have also been facing corruption charges of Rs360 million in a separate reference, but when an official team came to pick him up for questioning they were greeted with sticks and stones, which injured NAB’s representatives and damaged their vehicles. And it was only after the Bureau filed an official complaint with the local police that five members of Jakhrani’s circle, who allegedly led the assault, were arrested; though only to be released very shortly on bail.

Everybody knows only too well what would have happened if the Bureau’s target had been a less powerful or influential person. It was unfortunate that the Sindh government chose to side with their man in this matter, even when he was challenged within the confines of the law, and their spokesmen did their best to discredit the accountability watchdog. They are now demanding that, owing to NAB’s rather overbearing reputation, this and other such trials be shifted to Karachi. But nobody is willing to play along because of concerns that, given its own reputation, the Sindh government is making such demands only so it becomes easier for it to arm twist witnessed and control the flow of investigations that could prove harmful to it.

This case raises a couple of very important questions. For one thing, there should be no question of certain individuals taking the law into their own hands just because of their closeness to certain seats of power. For politically influential people to not just resist arrest, but also try and rough up government officials directed to arrest them, is simply unacceptable and demands very serious action on the part of the state. Unless such incidents, and individuals responsible for them, are dealt with very strictly, they will keep happening. For another, it does not behoove governments, provincial or federal, to try to shield their blue-eyed boys from official inquiries. If they are, as they say, innocent and only being persecuted because of their political affiliations, then there’s no forum better than the courts to prove their innocence. It is, once again, for the state to put its foot down, regardless of the immediate political fallout, and make or enforce laws that prevent such unfortunate sequence of events from ever taking place. Otherwise the law will often be different for the rich and the poor in this country. *