That’s The Way, Mahi Way
By Fatima Tassaduq • Jul 18th, 2008 • Category: Politics • (3,617 views) • 12 CommentsSocial Democratic Ritt Bjerregaard was the Mayor of Copenhagen and one of the luminary female ministers. Once she went to Paris to participate in an international conference in her official capacity and resided in a hotel nearby the conference hall, instead of the embassy. She paid the bills of the hotels from her officially allocated travel and dwelling allowance. There is a tradition in Denmark that the officials don’t dwell in the hotels or guest houses on official expenditure, rather they stay in the embassy, or with friends, or at their own expenditure. They are not even supposed to use the official TA/DA.
When Ritt Bjerregaard returned to Denmark, media broke the news of her stay in the hotel, and all hell broke loose in the Denmark. Though Ritt vainly tried to explain her position that she opted for the hotel because she was ill and was not able to come to the conference place from embassy due to the long distance, but Danish were not ready to listen to her, and ultimately she had to resign with in front of the mounting public pressure.
Recently, when Asif Ali Zardari summoned the whole of Pakistan People’s Party central executive committee in the plush Dubai, the whole government moved. Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gillani, who was returning from Malaysia after participating in the D-8 conference, changed directions and with his entire entourage landed in Dubai. Premier and his 40-member delegation, which also included one member from the opposition and five businessmen, had left the country on July 7 to attend the Summit. More than 50 security personnel and bureaucrats had gone to Kuala Lumpur in advance. They all accompanied him to Dubai. That diversion cost national exchequer more than 10 million rupees.
Not a leaf turned in the country, except some columns in the country and this useless blog post.
Last 5 posts by Fatima Tassaduq
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July 18th, 2008
And one more post at my blog too
Awesome correlation with the Danish though.
July 18th, 2008
nice work fatima,there is no doubt about that that you articulated the article fabulously.regards
July 18th, 2008
you are wrong. pakistan is not denmark. you should not confuse issues of trivial things. you have narrated story of mayor. is pm of pakistan a mayor.
July 18th, 2008
Trivial things………… if pm can not match and arrest his position and oath as PM,rest assure would definately sleep with him at his demand.these are eunuchs with no moral ethical and defined boundaries and extent as masculine characteristics,
July 18th, 2008
It is painful to accept that we only discuss these issues in public with friends, love to circulate emails about but never ever even plan to take a practical step to stop such things to happen in future.
But whom should we look to in order to have justice. Justice itself is in chains and there is no easy means of awakening the responsible. Isn’t there anything we can do to stop this drama happening every day around us ?
July 18th, 2008
Syed Fazl ul Hasan (also known as: Maulana Hasrat Mohani) was a very active politician, parliamentarian and a fearless freedom fighter of Indo-Pak Sub-continent. It is said and written about his prodent approach to the official funds as politician being custodian of trust. I came across an interesting episode from the history of struggle for independance; he was to lead a group of workers to some far off area on the instruction of Muhammad Ali Jinnah (The Quied-e-Azam) behalf the Muslim League. The Maulana asked those to join him who could arrange their stay in the locality at friends’ and relatives’ and he made his arrangements also accordingly, they travelled 3rd class to and fro thus maximizing the savings refunded the party. When our Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah heard of this asked the Maulana why he did this and not travelled comfortably. His reply was it was not my money!
Now, is it a good example for others to follow?
July 18th, 2008
Quaid-e-Azam himself never show any austerity, but he was the man of principles, so he never used the government money upon himself and his family.
July 18th, 2008
I do like this article by Fatima, nice reminder to all of us. Thank you Fatima!
Aftab Bhai, thank you for sharing about Syed Fazl ul Hasan. We all need reminders of the great leaders from the past, that took responsibility when taking positions of power. Nice example to follow indeed!
July 18th, 2008
Well, while convalessing in Ziarat around just before his death; the Quaid-e-Azam had almost stopped eating anything, whereas, his doctors wanted him to eat. His complain was, apprarently, that nothing tasted good. The people around him decided to fetch the cooks (they were two brothers) based in Lahore whose cooking was Mr Jinnah’s favourite. Finally, they were brought and they cooked for him and when the food was served, the Quaid ate a bit and praised it and asked who made the food. Someone boastfully informed about bringing these two, brothers, cooks. The Quaid inquired from where they were brought; answer was that searched was made in Lahore and eventually found them in Lyalpur (Faisal Abad) and brought over. The Quaid was very annoyed and immediate wrote a cheque reimbursing the Government of Pakistan.
Now, is it good enough an example for others to follow?
July 18th, 2008
Doctor Sahib, I have no doubts, whatsoever, that among us about 165 million Pakistanis there are many, many people who have principles like the Qaid-e-Azam Mr Mohammad Ali JInnah and Syed Fazl ul Hasan (Maulana Hasrat Mohani). The only trouble is we have, by default, allocated such a noble cause of leading the nation to thugs. Obviously, the thugs have made sure that no one other than their kind has chance to come forward in public life. Let’s see how long it will take us to chase these knaves and charlatans out from where they don’t belong.
July 18th, 2008
Very touching story Aftab Bhai! My parents use to always share similar stories of our past leaders but now they seem to be all forgotten. I hope someone will write a book detailing the accounts of these great leaders. We need to share them with our future generations, before all this it is forgotten.
July 18th, 2008
Fatima Tassaduq, “Not a leaf turned in the country, except some columns in the country and this useless blog post.”
Fatima Tassaduq, let me assure you this is NOT a “useless blog post”. You will see its value in due course. I can almost see it. Just remember, writings take their own time but they certainly have their positive impact.