The crowded vault

 Dramatis personae of the farce otherwise known as Pakistan

With all that needs to be done, there’s nothing but a lot of noise and you needn’t strain much to get the lyrics. It’s just one word: me, me, me, me, me, me. The Chief Justice with his selective verdicts, the wily President and his moronic sidekick, the squealing PML(N) leadership, the eternally hopeful Q, and the confused Khan. Here is some pie in the sky until the plain bread arrives, if ever:

Make the CJ president in return for taking it easy. He can move into the Suoto Moto suite at the President House and enjoy the increased obsequiousness of countless minions, plus the additional satisfaction of kicking Mr Gilani out of the sixth floor where he may currently be found licking his wounds and playing at being PM in purdah. Check everywhere for abandoned baggage, stray Nargis Sethis and Lasharis tend to linger on the scene. Mr Gilani can (once he’s licked his wounds), take a letter writing tutorial and take notice of and record power outages once they top the unbearable mark. That should keep him happily occupied in between hand kissing ceremonies in his dusty native town.

Give the current occupant of the presidency a one way ticket to Switzerland where he can lock himself in Gringotts’ vault 720 and spend his life running his fingers through his accumulated galleons. Hopefully they’ll multiply and burn as fast as he can touch them. Mr Gilani’s son can join Mr Zardari Bhutto in the vault or else check into a drug rehab, while the Bhutto hopeful must get his butt back into school where it should be and learn to wait until he’s a bit less wet behind the ears before he returns, if then.

Nawaz Sharif would be better off running a flash halwa joint where he can sit cross legged at the wok squeezing vengefully complicated whorls into the burning oil. His brother on the other hand would be great at selling kites; bright clean colourful kites, many of them, and he can hold all their lines in his own one hand. He wouldn’t get very far but that’s not the point.

Aitzaz Ahsan could make guest appearances on the Bandar Road series where he could engage Mirza sahib in baith bazi sessions. Oh and he must also take refresher courses in Kathak dance. He knows the footwork but has forgotten the neck movements.

What should one do with Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain? It would probably be best if he switched places with Mr Ashraf and became the PM rather than nominating people for the post of deputy PM. I quite like him, and he’s proved he can leave the post if he has to. But he must do a correspondence course first with the gobbledygook school of elocution. We have enough international misunderstandings without more of his creation (Shujaat Hussain: ‘Baitho, thanks, Khao’= Cameron Munter: NATO tanks jao!)

As for Mr Ashraf, well if he can manage to cure himself of his unfortunate addiction for sticking his fingers into power outlets he could stick himself anywhere he likes, really. We couldn’t care less, truly.

Much the same could be said for the other Chaudhrys, Pervez Elahi and Nisar Ali Khan. We definitely couldn’t care less.

The real mucky players in the field now, the Meher Bukharis and the Mubashir Lucmans of this country… they’re easier than the others: just skip their channel.

Malik Riaz…another candidate for Gringotts? It’s getting a bit crowded, that vault. But then again, should we care? Nah. He’s done his bit and found them all and in the darkness bound them. We’re still uncertain who holds the one ring that rules them all though.

Imran Khan is a bit harder to place. We love him for those wonderful sixers. In that far away time when things were bad but not quite as bad as they are now, he hit them just when we needed them, with a resounding whack and two. He was in his element then, and one is never quite sure if he’s in it now. How about giving him a madrassah to run with a pulpit from which he could rant five times a day? The kids are already there and waiting.

Quite the neighbourhood this one, the trendy madrassah, the corner jalebi joint, the colourful kite vendor and one covert ring to rule them all. None of this makes much sense, I know, but neither does anything else the way it is right now.