The Villain of Villains

Asif Ali Zardari is an enigma which has intrigued many for over a decade and nobody expects any relief anytime soon. It is not strange that he has never craved for gaping slot of a hero. What is mind boggling is that he has never imagined himself to be anything other than a villain. Why should he otherwise be smiling all the time and madden people who are already half mad on seeing him in presidency.

If people started calling him Mard-e-Hur(freedom lover) after eleven years in jail (where it seems he kept lolling ), it was contradiction in terms. Jail bird would have been more befitting. After all it was not his doing and choice. It was somebody else's bidding. He only complied complacently. Heroes are always proactive and die young. Neither is expected of him. And then eleven years is also not that long duration for a person like Zardari.

After becoming the president he has kept baffling us as before. As Pakistanis have no stomach and patience for heroes and settle comfortably for long time villains, Zardari has decided not to delay the party. In any case old habits die hard. He doesn't want people stop cursing and get deprived of our national sport

What story can be interesting enough without a villain. The Pakistan's story does not suffer from lack of villains. In fact it is so crowded with villains that heroes had to make room for them, not amiably all the times. The people have become addicted to villains after having to breath the same air with them for a life time. In Zardari they have found a ready made villain and continuity. The amount of fun people have at his expense is phenomenal. From a common man to highly placed persons regularly wallow in Zardari humour. The acute lack of mirth which people felt before he became the president is fast disappearing. But for him people of this country would have gone crazy while endeavoring to unearth what went wrong with their beloved country.

He has considerably mitigated the guilt which every Pakistani should find extremely difficult to reconcile with. Everyone is in a state of denial and cannot for a second admit that he has anything to do with the direst situation Pakistan finds itself in. Most of the intellectuals, judges, bureaucrats and last but not least the generals find it very convenient to have a willing scapegoat.

Very pronounced streak of desire to become living martyr which Zardari is blessed with has saved us from getting mired in searching the needle of blame in a hay stack. Mr Zardari's larger than life craving for self effacing blissfully saves us the trouble of witch hunting.

He has something for everybody. Intellectuals and common folks equally benefit from Zardari 'factor'. Intellectuals bash him for not aspiring to be Quaid-e Azam. Taking too much time to clean or start to clean the mess which more than eight years of frolicking of Pervez Musharraf has wrought. They want him to turn all generals into steadfast democrats overnight and then send them packing on democracy trail. They moan the way he makes short work of English and cannibalizes humour to look cultivated. One famous columnist (and my most favourite) lamented in four consecutive columns the total absence of leadership qualities . When he came down to criticizing the way Zardari dresses and grins I knew he had exhausted his imagination if not passion to malign the maligned.

A common man considers Zardari as a comrade with open arms. They can blame him for anything ad everything with impunity. Zardari comes to their rescue when they run short of plausible reasons for having digressed. If you ask a shopkeeper why his rates are higher he doesn't take a second to confide in you the conspiracy Zardari personally hatched in outrageous price hike. Bus conductors charge more in the name of Zardari and owners of different businesses keep their employees under paid because of astronomical Zardari Tax they have to pay to keep the business afloat.

It is ironic but embarrassingly true that Pakistani media is having a bonanza at times like these. It is the only industry which is flourishing unabashedly. If three quarters of the bounty is due to what Talibans are up to, for one quarter Asif Zardari has to be thanked. When Zardari rumour mill runs short of 'facts' and stops churning out tales belittling Harry Potter, Zardari generously provides the fuel. A few months back when Zardari had to shake hands with Sarah Palin more than once to oblige journalist who missed the first hand shake he jokingly asked the media whether it would be satisfied with anything short of hugging. It took Pakistani media by storm and every one suffered the acute pangs of moral indignation. The processions, mostly by women, were taken out to register their jealousy triggered protests Nazir Naji suggested at that time. On the other hand when Pervez Musharraf confidently claimed during a tour of the west that women in Pakistan had hit upon a novel though arduous way(getting raped)of obtaining visas for the western countries, it failed to catch the imagination of many.

Him being at the helm of affairs, at the present juncture of Pakistan's history is blessing in disguise. In Zardari we have a person who might not have chanced upon Nietzche's saying "It is nobler to declare oneself wrong than to insist on being right, especially when one is right", but may be handicapped with it intrinsically. That suits us capitally.

To help us retain a semblance of dignity if our inner distortions need to be balanced with outer misrepresentations then it is vital to let Zardari preside over our micro world view, bigotry, 'moralistic' hegemony and victim mentality and take the blame till we are ready to kick the habit and be a part of civilization as popularly understood.