Satire: 20th ‘effective mechanism’ in the workings to bar outlawed leaders from polls

For the 101^st time in all, and 50^th time in 2019 alone, Minister of State for Interior Shehryar Khan Afridi has hinted at developing an effective mechanism to bar leaders of proscribed organisations from taking part in polls.

First winking at the crowd, and then looking into the eyes of TV cameras sternly, the firebrand minister of the firebrand Prime Minister Imran Khan’s cabinet told a dumbfounded gathering: “What has been happening in the past will not be allowed to continue.”

 Later on, he told reporters after addressing the closing ceremony of a spring festival at the Kohat garrison that if those proscribed organisations take part in elections with some other names and symbols in the coming local government elections, we will let them do and later on we will again come up with an another effective mechanism to bar leaders of proscribed organisations from taking part in polls with camouflaged names and symbols.  

If done so that will be for the 20th times in the history of Pakistan.

When asked whether a mechanism was being evolved to prevent leaders of banned outfits from taking part in electoral politics and to stop fourth schedulers from travelling for Haj and Umrah, the minister thundered that the impatient press needed to wait unless the mechanism was evolved.

The minister, very seriously, said that the ongoing “crackdown” on outlawed organisations had not been initiated under any external pressure.

“By external pressure, I don’t mean the opposition leaders such as Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, who day and night presses us to go tough on banned organisations. Mr Bilawal, please listen to my words with your open ears that we will not succumb to any external pressure.”

A reporter jumped in and said that China and America were also pressing Pakistan to rein in outlawed leaders, the minister smiled (for the first time after being inducted into the cabinet) and said that China and America were our friends and friends’ advice should not be dubbed as external pressure.   

He said the government was committed to transforming Pakistan so that nobody could point a finger at it.

He said the government has seized religious seminaries, ambulances, dispensaries, hospitals and other assets linked to the proscribed organisations. “The government has also released funds to run these assets,” he said. When a few reporters chuckled, the minister got angry and said he was not cracking a joke.

The reporter said that if the religious projects are running smoothly, what is the good of seizing them.

The minister said the world should appreciate the government for our good intentions.

Mr Afridi said in the past, whenever the FATF delegation arrived in the country, Pakistan’s case was weak because all state institutions were sending different vibes. However, this is not the case now, he added.

“Vibes are very important in such matters. The vibes, which influenced the elections 2018 would be used to FATF delegations,” he explained.

He said the spring festival in Kohat was the beginning of a new season. Over a dozen foreign diplomats attended the festival.

Disclaimer: This is a piece of satire. 

Satire: Imran Khan discovers laughing gas worth more than $201 trillion

In a bold bid to defeat his junior stalwart Murad Saeed’s (in)famous $200 billion news, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf Chairman (and also a prime minister) Imran Khan has announced that the nation is going to hear good news in three weeks. Leaving it to the imagination of the audience that the good news carries $201 billion or $200 trillion sums, Mr Khan said the news would change the fate of the nation forever. As soon as the TV channels ran the tikers of the statement, the whole nation went berserk.

The prime minister said during his interaction with senior journalists and owners of newspapers on Thursday the offshore drilling for oil in the Arabian Sea was in final stages and there could be a major find. “I implore that we all pray that Pakistan gets this natural resource in substantial quantity.” His appeal was answered with great fervour and the whole nation (read Bani Gala) kept offering prayers. This news, however, did not go well with some circles.

As soon as the prime minister announced the possibility of natural resources deposits discovery in the Arabian Sea, the Oil and Gas Authority announced increasing the prices of natural by 200 per cent and petroleum products by 100 per cent. Predicting their job in danger after the discovery of huge oil and gas reservoirs and the provision of the utilities at cheaper rates, Ogra authorities struck the public for the last time with petrol and gas bombs, said the public circles.

The public, however, was unfazed by the Ogra attack. They have been flocking petrol pumps and filling up their motorcycle and car tanks with their usual orders – Rs100 and Rs1,000.

On the other hand, Murad Saeed was also happy at the discovery of oil and gas reserves in Pakistan. “Look, now we don’t need to worry about $200 billion stashed in offshore and foreign banks because we don’t want to put efforts to retrieve that ill-gotten money for our kids. Now, our kids will play with bundles of Petr-dollars,” he smiled at a public rally somewhere in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

State Minister for Climate Change Zartaj Gul did not give credit to herself for the likely discovery of the oil and gas reserves. She said since she was the minister of climate change, so the climate was going to change gradually.

“First, there was lots of rain in February and March, thanks to me being the climate change minister,” she said very humbly, showing visible signs of humility. “To some extent, my leader Imran Khan is also responsible because he is the chief executive of the government of Pakistan, and of course, he appointed me the junior minister for climate change.”

When asked when the climate of her constituency, plagued with poverty, disease and dirt, in Dera Ghazi Khan would change, she smiled ear and ear, which changed the climate of the venue, and the reporter did not press her for comment.

Disclaimer: This is a piece of satire.     

Satire: Pakistani Trumps and Acostas make the headlines

Taking a cue from Donald Trump’s wisest decision of banning CNN correspondent Jim Acosta from the White House, the Donald Trumps of the Pakistani journalism have banned Jim Acosta of the cabinet – Fawad Chaudhry, alias Honest Chaudhry – from entering press clubs across the country.

“You can’t enter our press clubs and eat the subsidized meal from clubs’ café,” said one of the Donald Trumps of the Pakistani press clubs in a social media footage shot at pre-dawn hours of a chilly night of February 2019.

The reason for stopping Mr Chaudhry from entering press clubs was not explained by the president of the (most) press(ed) club of Pakistan.

Unanimous sources, who are available to every reporter anywhere, anytime and free of cost, helped us to divulge the untold reasons for the minister punishment.

“As you know that Faraad Chaudhry is very honest in his comment on media, so his predictions about the bleak future of the print media and bad quality journalism did not go well with broken, beaten and bruised journalists, and that’s why press clubs have decided to mute his voice,” said the source, without seeking anonymity. The source even pleaded this seasoned scribe to publish their name, caste and phone number but as per prevailing reporting traditions of the day, no name can be published as a source of the story.

Earlier, the White House suspended the press pass of CNN correspondent Jim Acosta on November 8 last after he had an exchange of words with President Trump during a news conference.

Mr Acosta wanted to know from Mr Trump about the caravan of migrants heading from Latin America to the southern US border. When the CNN reporter tried to ask another question, Mr Trump said, "That's enough!" and a staffer tried to take the microphone from Mr Acosta.

A similar situation should have happened, had Mr Chaudhry met a delegation of the journalists who wanted to see him asking for his intervention to get their salaries released and sackings delayed, if not scrapped. Despite a scheduled meeting with them, the minister refused to see them after putting them on wait for over two hours outside his office.

The source said the delegation awaiting a meeting with the minister was asked about refreshment, and most of them ordered tea and pakora which were never delivered despite the passage of time.

“The non-delivery of tea and pakora worsened the matters, bringing minister-journalists relations to the point of no return.

The minister was, however, unaware of the consequences. Now, whenever he tried to enter the press club, the gatekeeper will not allow him into the club.

“Oh, I’ll never miss the food of the club canteen,” said the smiling minister at a talk show later in the evening. The same refrain he said to so many anchors.

The press clubs’ decision is doing the round in the whole world.

The White House was first to comment.

“We’re greatly thankful to both Fawad Chaudhry and Press Clubs for stabbing each other. Fawad Chaudhry deserves our full support for his war on journalism and press clubs for following our tradition of not tolerating hostile ministers,” said a US intern, according to our imaginary sources.

President Trump in a tweet (addressing Fawad Chaudhry) said: “You’re not fake. You’re doing good service to journalism. Down with fake news.”