General Shuja Pasha is all set to hang his boots on March 18, 2012, a date by which he is likely to have given his testimony. In the absence of Mansoor Ijaz, who has refused to come to Pakistan because of his security concerns after the PPP government successfully intimidated him, Gen Shuja Pasha’s testimony would be the most vital.
Mansoor Ijaz has, according to sources, in his secret letter to the Chief Justice of Pakistan, which was kept in wraps by the court on Monday, asked CJ Iftikhar Chaudhry to give him his personal assurances that he would not be stopped from returning to his country after he has testified in the Memo Commission. It is not clear whether any such precedent exists that the CJ can give his personal guarantee to a witness.
Talking to media persons on his return from Davos after attending the World Economic Forum Conference, the prime minister is reported to have said, “Any decision about the extension of DG ISI would be taken at an appropriate time.”
There is no explanation as to why did the prime minister say this but given the track record of the rulers and their style of soiled politicking, Gillani may use the extension card as a lever to get Pasha softened on memo issue. However, those, in Pakistan Army, who know Gen Pasha well are ready to vouch that Pasha is not a saleable commodity.
Only last week, Gen. Shuja Pasha submitted his statement before the Parliamentary Commission on National Security and reiterated his earlier stance before the SC i.e. he is satisfied that Mansoor Ijaz had enough corroborative material to prove his version of the incident.
In the absence of Mansoor Ijaz and even otherwise, the testimony of Shuja Pasha before the Memo Commission is vital for the reason that Gen. Pasha had met Mansoor in London on Oct 22, 2011 where Mansoor had shared with him in fair amount of details about the circumstances leading to the drafting of memo and why it was delivered through him.
In his statement before the SC and the NA Committee, Pasha had stated that after having seen the means of communications used and as produced by Mansoor Ijaz, he was satisfied that Mansoor had enough corroborative material to prove his version of the incident.
Like Mansoor Ijaz, the government would definitely want Pasha not to appear before the Commission or soften his stance and not to share the kind of details, which could be embarrassing for the government. At this stage, the government may smartly play the trick of giving a choice to Pasha i.e. embarrass the government or get the extension.
It was the memogate, which recently created serious differences between the civilian and military leadership with the former terming the memo a non-issue while the later terming it a serious issue of national security that required serious probe.
For the same reason, the prime minister launched repeated attacks on Pakistan military and even went to the extent of saying that the army chief and the DG ISI had acted unlawfully and unconstitutionally in their response to the SC’s notice issued to them in the memo case.
However, later the prime minister backed off and retracted all the venomous statements that he had issued against his own army and ISI.
In his latest statement, the PM Gilani said that he wanted to move beyond a series of statements (against army) that had almost cost him his government. He refused to talk about his earlier statements about the responses of the army and intelligence chief in the memogate case before the Supreme Court. “I do not want to revisit the matter. We acted against those responsible,” he said, referring to former Defence Secretary Naeem Khalid Lodhi, who the premier sacked after the Inter-Services Public Relations issued a strongly-worded rejoinder to Gilani’s statement in China.
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