The do ankhain standing right behind Mian Nawaz Sharif at his dharna outside parliament in Islamabad last week attracted a lot of interest and comments on at least two TV chat shows. The lady with the eyes happened to be a vocal member of the Q League, once an avid Musharraf supporter and the person President Bush referred to as “Miss Articulate”.
Now it seems Miss Articulate has jumped ship and is applauding NS. We hear that the do ankhain matter also came up in an interview given by the PM to two Islamabad-based senior journalists. One asked, “We hear that you sanctioned 35crores development funds to the lady and yet…” Said PM with what seemed an undertone of regret “Not 35 crores. It was actually 36 crores. I just keep signing the files”. Like the lady would say “It comes from the exchequer not your pocket, sir.”
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Like any movie director will tell you, when you want to depict harmony among people you show harmony in the colour of their costumes. When the Hillary Clinton team met the PM Gilani team on Friday, the American line up was conspicuous for one thing. They were all men and women in black. As for the Pakistani side there was Ms Khar in pure white and General Kayani in pure khaki and the rest too in colours of their individual choice of which black also happened to be one.
So while the Americans seemed to have a common stance as signalled by their dress sense, the motley Pakistani side seemed thoroughly confused and discordant.
Now we hear that the Pakistani ambassador Hussain Haqqani is blacker, figuratively speaking, than any man in black. Apparently, he recently assembled the embassy’s diplomatic staff in Washington and painted a horror scenario of what the US could do to Pakistan if it did not toe the line.
The terrified staffers were shaking with fear for some time and took time to recover till they realised that Haqqani has to work overtime to prove his loyalty to his sponsor. Also, as the joke goes, he has to continually prove that he may carry the Haqqani name but he does not belong to the Haqqani network.
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We hear that Ghaus Ali Shah is quite cut up by the fact that he does not enjoy the PML(N) position in Sindh that he once did. Of course, he feels it has nothing to do with his ripe old age and the fact that he has not delivered. Recently on a visit to Lahore he sat in apparent unity with NS for every photo op but privately and off the record he confided to people and scribes that NS was mixing with the wrong, no dubious, kind of people in Sindh. Apparently he fears that they may lead PML(N) straight into a scandal. Genuine concern or just sour grapes?
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