What Raymond Davis Gave Pakistan

As 2011 started to vane, we all started to look back about the major political issues our country went through this last year. The incident of Raymind Davis is one of the most significant : he was the CIA contractor who reportedly killed 3 people in Lahore. Initially he was arrested but later released after the families of the deceased were paid the 'blood money'. Yet the incident wasn't as clear cut as this rubric makes it out to be...it left a lot of people seething and others, bewildered. For me, it was one of the eye-opening affairs that had to be penned down

 On the Northern side of Tahrir Square, is a street named after Abdul Moniem Riad, the General of the Egypitan Armed forces killed in an Israeli attack on 9th March 1969. On 4th February, 2011, during the Egyptian Revolution, the army’s crane approached the street in an attempt to remove the barricades formed by protesters after long nights of continuous violence and often deadly attacks, attributed to pro-Mubarak supporters. In response, people in Tahrir offered themselves as human shields to protect the entrance, many slept in front of the tanks as hundreds rushed to stand over and in front of the cranes refusing to let the military clear  the barricades, what they believed to be their only protection.

That is not all.

Earlier, as the looting and violence had  intensified and the police were nowhere to be seen, some of the protesters  lined themselves around the Egyptian museum, creating a human shield to protect it from the looters.  Others actually removed all the products from the stores nearby, took them to their apartments and called the store owners to tell them their things were safe.

By now, you must be wondering whether I have forgotten that the case of Raymond Davis has nothing to do with Egypt. You are right, it doesn’t. Yet these were the images running through my mind and replaying themselves on 16th March, the day Davis was released.

A lot of people are blaming the legal system and the government claiming that both were manipulated by CIA and that the latter ‘cares more for Americans than for Pakistanis’. I have heard this so many times that, quite frankly, it has become quite annoying. You want to blame our legal system? Trust me, even if you go to the US, you will still be whining about the system there. Watch ‘Conviction’ (based on a true story) and you will have all the proof you need. Feel like pointing fingers at the government (again)? Unless we are all suffering from long term amnesia, I believe we can recall how they were elected in the first place.

Bear in mind, I am not a fan of the two and every day I imagine about a dozen ways to kick them out of the country (none of them entirely satisfying). I have just come to realize however that it’s not doing me, or anyone else any good.

You must have guessed my next words (‘Its us we need to blame….we are soooo hopeless yadda yadda). Truthfully I have heard that too and while I do agree to an extent with that, it does not matter how many times we hear it. We will still remain in denial.

As painful as the truth is, here goes: There is the possibility that the families who were paid the ‘blood money’ were forced into submission. According to Imran Khan, when he visited the families of the slain youths, he was assured by them that they did not want money. Up to the time she took her own life, Shumaila Kanwal, widow of Mr Fahim, vowed that she would not take blood money. In fact she went as far as voicing her own fears that her late husband would not get justice.

I ask you, as a people, if we had been collectively united would the possibility have even arisen? Would a woman have taken her own life because she was convinced there was no justice in the country?

What Raymond Davis gave us in the most brutal way possible was a chance to be united. This was an issue everyone felt strongly about. This was our chance to be a ‘human shield’ for our own people (the victim’s families), to prove that we were not numbed into acceptance, that we too could take a stand!
Why didn’t we?

Everyone knows the answer. Let me illustrate it with an example of a Pakistani who, all her life, has been dying to go abroad. She has heard of the ‘American dream’ and it has made her believe that is where her future lies and there is no place for her in this third world country. Only recently has she faced the fact that she has been an absolute imbecile. Me.

I have always been dreaming of living in any other country but here. I sometimes pretend I am living in New York, coming home  from work, and ordering take away and having those TV dinners New Yorkers are famous for. I cannot imagine having a job here. Why? Because there is no nice subway I can use, the taxis are in dire need of repair and paint and because I will probably be stuck in some building with walls that have paan spit on them. Abroad, I would not mind working, even if I had to work in some fast food outlet because, hey, it’s all so cool there! The shopping malls are huge, clean and a heaven for teenagers. Here, I would not even dream about it.

My view changed entirely, when I joined NGO entities such as MBAKH (Meir Bhi Aik Khwaish Hai) and Nixor Hospital. Going to medical camps, I found myself having to scream at the top of my voice at people to wait for their turn. All the while, I watched, as they braved the heat and looked after their family while they fought for their turn for this was a rare chance for them to get free medical care. What I could only see before were their dirty clothes, scrawny hands, bloodshot eyes, and worn faces. What I saw then was their unconquerable spirit. These people had to fight battles I could not even dream of. They were fighting everyday of their life to attain basic standards of living. They were survivors. They were the unsung heroes that we love to romanticize in English movies but when it comes to our own countries, we barely acknowledge them. Going to cancer hospitals with MBAKH, I met so many mothers who told me how they had come all the way from places such as Bannu to seek medical care for their dying child. How could I have not known all this? How could I have been living in a bubble my entire life while so much had been going on in my own hometown?!?!

We know what is going on. We just don’t care. We may want change but do we have the spirit to attain it? Are we ready for a revolution? Or is just the work of a moment of heated patriotism and then gone in an instant? A revolution does not mean beating yourself up or screaming in fervour. Majority of the people are not educated. How will they know what we are fighting for?

If we really are to take a step towards a revolution there needs to be unity and a form of standardized education so that we on the same intellectual platform. Do we really need 30 years of some Hosni Mubarak to be united? Because if we do, then Mubarak would be a blessing for us.

There is something else we need as well: hope. We must refuse to believe all is lost. The current generation is aware of what is going on and if they are taught to value their country and people, there is no stopping them to bring about a positive change and if that happens, then, before we know it, then we all will be revolutionaries in every sense of the word.

"Rise up ! The world is going to change its ways,
Your era will be ushered in the East and the West in the coming days                                     
 Great daring even a river refuses to accept
                For not long the dewdrop on the petal lies!
                The song of the republic is a cause for rejoicing,
                How long can Alexander and Jamshed hypnotise?
                In the womb of the world a new sun is being born.
                For how long, for the setting stars, will be your cries!
                The nature of man has smashed all the chains,
                How long will Adam bewail his fall from paradise.
                The season of spring asks the gardener with the healing touch
                From the crushed flowers how can you an ointment devise? "

                                                                                                Allama Iqbal, Capital and Labour