Pakistan’s embarrassing cover-up

Pakistan has created a public relations disaster, said Farooq Hassan in the Islamabad Nation. American newspapers are full of 'œscathing' denunciations of Pakistan's persecution of a gang-rape victim. As all Pakistanis know by now, three years ago, a tribal council ordered that Mukhtaran Mai be raped by four men to punish her family for a brother's crime. Instead of retreating in shame, Mai bravely testified against the men and got them sentenced to prison. Last month, she planned to travel to the U.S. to speak about her struggle. But the government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf tried to silence her, to avoid embarrassing Pakistan. She was put under house arrest, her passport confiscated, and her attackers released from prison. The U.S. press promptly took up her cause. Columnist Nicholas D. Kristof of The New York Times led the effort to demand her release, and the international uproar forced Musharraf to reverse course and let Mai go. The affair has 'œdisgraced Pakistan' and exposed the 'œthuggish behavior' of the generals who rule us.

The American media only showed one side of the story, said Kunwar Idris in the Karachi Dawn. The High Court freed the alleged attackers after weighing the evidence and concluding the men had been unjustly jailed. The court found that Mai was raped by 'œone man, and not by a gang of men,' and further, that the rape was not ordered by the village council. In fact, it was a piece of personal retribution committed in defiance of the council. Of course, the crime was terrible, and, of course, Musharraf should not have prevented Mai from going to America. But the government's 'œill-conceived and unlawful action' doesn't give the press license to 'œdisregard the facts established through judicial scrutiny.'

Turns out, the U.S. press was right to be skeptical, said Abdul Sattar in the Islamabad Pakistan Observer. The Supreme Court has since reinstated the rapists' convictions. But the damage has already been done, said Abdul Sattar in the Islamabad Pakistan Observer. We should have taken a lesson from the U.S. When the Americans tried to downplay abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, they hurt their reputation far more than if they had admitted it and apologized. The cover-up is always worse than the crime. The same is true with the Mai case. Up until last month, her story, while appalling, was really a success story for women's rights in Pakistan. It received unprecedented coverage in the local press and focused nationwide attention on the persistence of 'œarchaic tribal customs.' Only when the government tried to shut her up did it look bad.

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This is the fault of those 'œForeign Office goons,' said the Peshawar Frontier Post in an editorial. Mai was going to be honored in the U.S. as a feminist heroine. She showed that a poor peasant woman from 'œsome godforsaken tribe in the hinterlands of Meerwala' could bravely stand up to the beasts who raped her. Her example could have 'œbrought laurels to her country.' But the idiots at the Pakistani Embassy in Washington thought otherwise. It was their idea to confiscate Mai's passport. Now Pakistan looks more repressive and 'œbigoted' than ever.

M.T. Butt

South Asia Tribune