A CLIP from a recent television talk show is doing the rounds on the banned platform, X. In it, a journalist/ commentator discusses how rumours of a possible extension for the Supreme Court chief justice have cropped up time and again. The option was ‘discussed’ during the tenures of Saqib Nisar and Asif Saeed Khosa, he says. The present times are no different, it appears, for he mentions how the rumour has come up again and how he would be in favour of the current Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa accepting an extension.
However, he does hasten to emphasise that this was his personal opinion and nothing more. It is an important caveat because there are no reports of the chief justice being interested in such a move but this has not put an end to these rumours.
Such chitchat, like the monsoon cycle, is a seasonal occurrence. Whenever the moment is ripe, it seems to appear out of nowhere and pervades the air in Islamabad as does the humidity in those rainy days, before vanishing one day. Those of us who do not speak to the most powerful can never really understand how the rumours begin or end. But we do hear of them, as do most others.
This seasonal occurrence is not limited to the job tenure of those leading the robed men on Constitution Avenue. There are other positions of power, too, where during times of transition, rumours of an extension swirl around, sucking all the oxygen out of Islamabad and politics, as well.
How and why have these moments of transition........