‘Mind your language’ should be the watchword
Social media is a double edged weapon. It has made the planet ‘small and round’ through intense global connectivity, but is also the hangout of Big Brothers, virtual ‘Peeping Toms’, spymasters, con men and other misbegotten fauna. And then there is the innocuous but deadly tweet, a web weapon made famous in the last 100 days by US President Donald Trump. Another controversial tweet dominating our media was made without much thinking by the DG, ISPR, in response to the ridiculous notification on ‘Dawn Leaks’ by the Prime Minister’s Secretary, himself reportedly one of the suspects in the lingering affair. This notification proved the proverbial red rag to the bull.
The government’s overall incompetence and negligence have rightly invited critical media comment and remark. In ‘Dawn Leaks’, there is also the confusing and contrasting viewpoint of the Interior Minister and the Prime Minister’s Office regarding primacy in issuing the official notification. Another puzzling aspect of this whodunit is the mysterious absence of the Defence Minister, who should be in the forefront in allaying mutual suspicions. His silence is deafening. Was it because the Interior Minister and the Defence Minister are not on talking terms for the last many years?
What stops the Interior Minister from living up to his statements and issuing the notification with full public disclosure of the entire Dawn-Leaks report, sparing no sacred cows, cronies or close relatives? Or is he, too, a party to the attempted hush up? The unfortunate habit of blaming others for all ills while studiedly ignoring repeated lapses or deliberate ulterior designs, in order to gain goodwill and support of certain quarters, will not wash any more. The remarks of the Interior Minister that tweets (meaning that by DG, ISPR) are poisonous for democracy will hardly defray an already charged situation. The civilian leadership should remember it has delivered nothing to the common man that would gain his sympathy and support on the streets. If democracy is weak today it is because the two successive governments failed to deliver.
