5 times VIP protocols disrupted public life in Pakistan
Yesterday activist Jibran Nasir was roughed up by a VIP's security protocol. But this is just one incident of many
Yesterday, lawyer/activist Jibran Nasir was briefly detained on his way home for allegedly obstructing the movement of a VIP protocol belonging to Sindh High Court judge Faisal Kamal in Karachi's Clifton area.
According to Nasir, he was beaten and his clothes torn by the judge's security personnel before he was taken to a police station. While senior officials in the police say that blocking a judge's convoy is a crime, Nasir maintains that traffic prevented him from giving way to the protocol.
Nasir's mistreatment is just the latest incident in an unfortunately long tradition of VIP protocols disrupting public life. Let's take a recap of four more of such incidents:
A 10-month-old girl died at the door of Karachi's Civil Hospital in December 2015 after her father was allegedly denied entry by protocol staff due to the arrival of Pakistan People's Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari to inaugurate the new trauma centre at the public medical facility.
Bisma's parents claimed that they remained stuck in the traffic jam due to the VIP movement before arriving at the hospital where the ailing girl was denied entry. All the entry and exit points of the medical facility were closed and even ambulances were not allowed to enter the hospital.
While Bakhtawar Bhutto denied that Bilawal ordered a shutdown of the hospital, senior PPP leader and Sindh education minister, Nisar Khuhro, while talking to media said that he is grieved if someone has died but "Bilawal's security is more important".
"Bilawal, who always had security concerns, is dearest to us and whatever we did it was in the better interest of the country. As the country's well being is linked to their security."
A pregnant woman delivered a baby boy in a rickshaw in Quetta in 2010 during a road closure to facilitate then President Asif Ali Zardari's convoy.
Momin Khan, a labourer by profession, was on his way in a rickshaw along with his pregnant wife and mother from their home in Nawan Killi to the Civil Hospital on Thursday, when he was intercepted by the police near Askari Park on the Airport Road due to Zardari's protocol. The rickshaw was forced to wait for more than three hours and the woman gave birth to a baby in the rickshaw.
However, Zardari tendered an apology to President PPP Women Wing Balochistan, MPA Samina Raziq and vowed that it would not happen again. He also announced a token amount of Rs0.5 million for the family.
Speeding cars accompanying Nawaz Sharif's 'homecoming' motorcade crushed a nine-year-old child to death in Lalamusa in August 2017.
The child, who was reported to be among a crowd of supporters gathered to greet Nawaz Sharif, strayed onto the road and was hit by one of the cars belonging to the Elite Force before multiple following cars ran over him without stopping.
According to eyewitnesses, the child succumbed to his injuries while the vehicles passed over him. While a mobile health unit was accompanying the deposed prime minister's motorcade, bystanders said no car stopped to take stock of the child's condition.
Nawaz Sharif offered his condolences over the incident and promised that he will visit the victim's family. He labelled the deceased boy as the first 'martyr' of his struggle for strengthening democracy in the country and led a prayer for him.
Nawaz Sharif's son-in-law echoed similar sentiments, terming the child's loss "a sacrifice for Pakistan" while noting that "millions of others had also sacrificed their lives during Pakistan's creation."
Early in 2017, PTI Media Affairs Head Faisal Vawda was spotted riding a heavy bike down a busy Zamzama... with a convoy consisting of four security vehicles in tow.
People were vexed at the police protection being afforded to him due to the glaring wastage of taxpayer money and resources as well as Imran Khan's anti-VIP culture stance. Vawda, however, attempted to rationalise his joytrip thus: "We all are human and I'm a human too. So I also have the urge to do things that everyone does. On that particular day, it was cloudy and it was predicted to rain and I thought it would be a good time [to take the bike out]. I only use the bike for leisure trips, not official business. "
Elaborating on the need for an extensive security detail, he said,"I'm a businessman, my family belongs to a business community. I've been attacked, my father's been attacked in the past. And I've been keeping security for the past 20-25 years. The day Pakistan is going to be secure, I'm going to make sure that we don't need all this, that nobody wants to use security."
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