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IN the board game Monopoly, players move their pieces around, buying, selling and renting property. The winner is the one with the most assets.
In our version of the game, the Sharifs have showed themselves to be adept players; buying and selling steel works, paper mills, sugar factories and expensive London properties. Along the way, they also seem to have picked up the coveted ‘Get Out Of Jail Free’ card that keeps players from being locked up for three turns for landing on the ‘Go Directly To Jail’ square.
If only life were that simple. In the Supreme Court hearings, we were given a bewildering array of disclosures regarding the strange and wondrous ways money works for the Sharifs. I, for one, confess that I am no wiser now about their assets than when the proceedings began. I do hope their Lordships have a firmer grip on the meandering narrative than I do.
For politicians, truth is subservient to power.
I know somewhere in the mix is Ishaq Dar, a shady Qatari sheikh, Mossack Fonseca, the legal firm that is behind this entire furore, and dodgy offshore companies. The principal personae in this drama are the prime minister’s children, Hussain, Hassan and Maryam Sharif. And the primary focus is on the six expensive London flats allegedly owned by the Sharifs.
But who bought what and when makes my head spin. The paper trail doubles back and forth in the convoluted manner of an inebriated snake. And while we learned about the Sharif ownership of at least four Mayfair flats in the mid-1990s, the manner in which they were acquired still remains a mystery despite — or because of — the many clarifications provided by the Sharif defence team.
Editorial: Panama Papers and media ‘court’
Not long ago, I read a tweet about there being a ‘surface truth’, as opposed to a ‘deeper truth’. Then there is, according to Donald Trump’s counsellor Kellyanne Conway, something she called ‘alternative facts’.
After the US presidential elections last year, there has been much talk about the post-truth era we are now in — where truth is flexible, and can be bent to suit any agenda. But when truth becomes malleable, how do we navigate a path in a world where solid reality is suddenly transformed into elastic markers that shift shape and positions?
The defence team came up with a series of differing explanations about how the various London properties were acquired. The younger Sharifs, too, seem to have added to our confusion. And the daily post-hearing statements made by Sharif and Imran Khan loyalists before TV cameras did little to clarify matters.
For his part, Imran Khan has also muddied the waters with his various explanations about the manner in which he bought his Bani Gala estate and built a palatial mansion there. Was the money a gift or loan from his ex-wife Jemima Khan? How was it transferred? And what about Khan’s own offshore company and his London flat?
Frankly, I neither know nor care. But since these grubby dealings have come to occupy centre stage in Pakistan, and have been the subject of endless televised debate, it is hard to escape this steady stream of seemingly contradictory positions.
Truth has a way of shining through, and is usually recognisable for its simplicity. Once a lie is told, further elaborations and obfuscations are needed to cover it up. As the layers of deceit build up, the whole edifice becomes harder to sustain.
Donald Trump has a simple way of brushing away allegations of being caught out in a fib: he simply says he heard it somewhere. But as a Swedish politician said recently: “We would expect the president of the United States to have sources of information other than Fox News.”
For politicians, truth has always been subservient to power. Thus, propaganda machines lie at the heart of governments. Spin doctors shape the message and persuade a gullible public to go along. Voters are sold promises and pie in the sky. Lies are the currency of politics, so Trump’s free and easy way with the truth should surprise nobody.
Hitler and his propaganda minister Goebbels believed in the effectiveness of the ‘big lie’. Basically, both asserted that if you tell a huge fib, and repeat it often enough, the public will come to believe it because ordinary people cannot conceive of such a major distortion of reality.
Then, of course, there is the realm of statistics. As Mark Twain said: “There are lies, damn lies and statistics.” Figures are often used to win arguments. ‘Half the population now lives above the poverty line!’ says one politician. ‘Fifty per cent of our people struggle below the poverty line!’ counters his opponent. Same statistics; different messages.
In the fairy tale Pinocchio, the wooden puppet’s nose grows each time he tells a lie. I wonder how long the noses of those who had been appearing before the court in the Panama affair have become.
Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly mentioned an 'Oman sheikh'. The error was later corrected to say 'Qatari sheikh'.
Published in Dawn, February 25th, 2017
