Musharraf and Aziz should return the gifts

JUL 9 - It is a shame and a pity that both Gen (R) Musharraf and his Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz carted away during their tenure literally truckloads of gifts worth millions of rupees that both had received from foreign dignitaries and during their official trips overseas.

It is true that they "paid for them" but the value attached to these gifts to make them "worthwhile" for their purchase smells of rat and bad odor. As they say in the army: It's conduct unbecoming.

The two gentlemen may not have apparently broken any rules but doing such things seems morally wrong and politically incorrect - specially when there were more than one agency hounding many others to reclaim stolen monies or to uncover inappropriate incomes. NAB comes to our minds as one such agency established under the watch of Musharraf.

According to reports, official documents of the Cabinet Division reveal that Shaukat Aziz received 568 gifts more than Musharraf. But Musharraf's 168 gifts were still valued way more at Rs40 million as compared to Aziz’s Rs25 million for 568 gifts. Aziz, who took away all the gifts he received, paid Rs2 million to retain them. On the other hand, Musharraf paid Rs5.9 million to retain his gifts. These numbers in millions may sound too high but imagine paying only 6 million for getting 40 million. That is paying only 15 cents to a dollar. It is even less than value gotten in 'fire sales' or in auctions in America - generally speaking!

Writes Rauf klasra in The News of July 8: One retired Lt General and a former corps commander Karachi requesting anonymity revealed that he was given an expensive watch by one of the foreign visitors to pass on to Musharraf. He handed over the gift the same evening to the president but was shocked to see that instead of submitting it to ‘Toshakhana’ Musharraf was wearing it the very next day.

DAWN editorial on the issue:

Pervez Musharraf and Shaukat Aziz are very rich men. Yet, according to a series of revelations in The News, neither man could resist the temptation to leave office with hundreds of gifts presented to him by various heads of state and other officials during his tenure. The presents — everything from luxury watches to expensive handicrafts to exquisite jewellery — have a market value of tens of millions of rupees, but, according to obscure rules governing the claims to such gifts, were valued at a song and duly carted off by Gen Musharraf and Mr Aziz after paying a pittance.

Rules may or may not have been broken, but, politically and morally, it looks very bad — yet another instance of the rich and the powerful in Pakistan making off with booty. There is absolutely no doubt what needs to be done: the gifts, each and every one of them, must be returned, they must be valued transparently and, if the rules allow it, the two must pay the fair price for whatever they want to purchase. Anything less and the stench of ‘legal’ corruption will not go away.

Will that happen? The former president and prime minister have kept quiet thus far, perhaps hoping that the furore will die down and they will continue to be able to live in comfort surrounded, perhaps, by their cheaply acquired expensive knick-knacks. They may even feel aggrieved for being ‘targeted’ and ‘victimised’. But the only ones who have a right to feel aggrieved are the luckless people of Pakistan. Gen Musharraf and Mr Aziz were supposed to be different; they were supposed to be clean in office; they were supposed to have been a decisive break from ‘dirty’ politicians. But it seems they were in fact all too willing to climb into the mud and have a good time.