You Are Being SERVED!

There are good days and then there are bad days, but to be fair, days are all the same. The difference lies between lines of the day's events. The motivation for this article was a highlight that appeared on social media, "Iran hangs first of the four-man involved in the bank scandal". Exposed in 2011, the 30 trillion-rial ($2.7 billion) scandal involved embezzlement, bribery, forgery, and money-laundering in 14 state-owned and private banks between 2007 and 2010 by people close to the political elite, the affair severely damaged the reputation of Ahmadinejad and his entourage towards the end of his eight-year presidency. Mehafarid Amir-Khosravi, described as a self-made tycoon, was hanged in Tehran's Evin Prison on Saturday after the Supreme Court upheld the four death sentences.

Another incident worth mentioning is of Chen Shui-bian, former President of the Republic of China, who stepped down on May 20, 2008, the same day that Ma Ying-jeou took office as the new President of the Republic of China. Just one hour after he left the Presidential Office Building, as a former President of the Republic of China and no longer enjoying presidential immunity, he was controlled and limited from leaving the nation by Taiwanese prosecutors due to allegations of corruption and abuse of authority. On Nov. 11, 2010, the Republic of China Supreme Court sentenced Chen and his wife, Wu Shu-Jen, to 11 years in prison for taking bribes for a land procurement scam in Longtan and 8 years in a separate office-buying scandal.

Now the two event, both exclusive but still have some common ground, Corruption charges; long trials and appeal period and guess what! Both were “served well”. Let me refresh a few events of our own history now and I will let you be the judge of it all.

Not a long time ago, in the wake of 2013 elections, massive electoral rigging was exposed through first-hand accounts of several members of the public via social networking websites (Consider it a warm-up though). The conspiracy to put PIA and Pakistan Railways on sale, The NICL corruption case (2012), PMDC fake registrations, (2010), Hajj corruption case, Rental Power Projects (RPP) scam (2006), not to mention the nation’s fortune “safely deposited” by our politicians in their Swiz bank accounts over the past decades, is reason enough for even an ordinary man to look beyond the events of the day.

It’s said that in some countries, the power controls money, while in other countries, the money controls power. Ours is the country with the most complex organization of governance. There is a small fraction that controls “our” money and its “our” wealth that buys them power, and protects them from "us". We can’t expect them to be hanged and we can’t expect them to be imprisoned. All we can do is wish though. And what else then! Let’s just say, “All hail the mighty law, you are being served!”