Author’s Interview on NBC Television the Day After

The author’s interview to NBC television was recorded at the home of mutual friends in Virginia, a day after the heinous incident against Jawaid Bhutto. In it, she speaks about how the couple had elected to live in Anacostia, DC since 2003. They kept good relations with all the neighbors, believing in the essential goodness of human nature regardless of race, color or faith.

During the interview the reporter, himself an African American, steers the questioning to the mentally challenged nature of the attacker.

However, it was only later that the facts have painted a clearer picture about what occurred on March 1, 2019. A meeting with the state prosecutor revealed that Jawaid’s assassin – Hilman Jordan – had actually murdered his own cousin in 1998. Thereafter he was committed for treatment to St Elizabeth Psychiatric Hospital. Even during probation, he returned to the hospital with a gun where he attempted to kill a worker. Despite that, in December 2015 he was released and began living in the apartment below us in South East DC.

All these facts were kept hidden from Jawaid & myself, who owned the unit above the condo rented out to the killer and his family. Its owner, Joe Holston had rented that unit to Jordan and company without informing residents that he was a killer who had spent half his life in a mental asylum.

We would see Jordan hanging out in the porch, obviously unemployed… smoking pot… but without being aware of his dangerous past. Despite that we kept up our friendly nature, wishing him well whenever we parked and walked up to our apartment.

As details begin to emerge, US media and the law need to dig out the different levels at which the US systems miserably failed us. As a nation that prides itself on providing security to its citizens, the US needs to answer why it allowed a human catastrophe to occur within a gated community. That the end result was not only a personal loss, a loss for Sindh but for the civilized world.

If only Ignorance had not been Bliss

Barely a month before the attack on him, Jawaid sat in his living room, blissfully unaware of the evil that was being plotted underneath our condo unit. After decades of hard struggle, the `American dream,’ of finding work in one city.. and supporting near and dear ones.. had become a reality. The tranquility on his face was emblematic of the kindness in his heart and the good which he searched in every human being.

MEMORIES

Like yellow falling leaves on a warm summers eve,
Flutter and fall on fading heaps,
The winds of time swirl them aloft,
And light them to the eye in sunny beams,
So memories flutter before the eye,
Of past tears,
And past laughter,
And I quiver like a boat tied to the shore,
That can glide on roving waves no more.

WAIT JB, DON’T SAY GOODBYE

I wandered through the earth,
My heart was heavy with yearning,
My spirit scoured the angry seas to find a sorrow bearer,

The earth I tread shall cover soon my unfulfilled soul,
For death is the only peace,
That follows the torture of desire,

I wandered lone in search of God through the blindness of the earth,
If the earth has seductive lights, why hast thy no guide?

I walked all day to the sun but thy let thy curtain fall,
Oh let me die that I may see,
And rest my aching soul

BAN THE GUN

ON March 1, a burst of gunfire snuffed out the life of a gentle soul in Washington D.C. He was a social worker helping the mentally challenged and drug addicts. He was Jawaid Bhutto, a teacher of philosophy and a progressive scholar in Pakistan before he moved to the US. I knew him as my friend and the husband of a former colleague Nafisa Hoodbhoy. Bhutto’s death grieved us immensely.

The irony didn’t escape me on this occasion. Here was a man who was known to be an ardent advocate of peace and love as well as gun control laws being killed by someone who was not entitled to be carrying a gun, given his mental state, so it was reported.

Such are the ways of America where the gun is god. I would also say this was a murder committed not by just one man — it was a killing by the entire gun lobby in America which has now globalised its reach. I still remember the pain in Barack Obama’s voice when he said in a television interview that “failure to tackle gun control has been the greatest frustration of my presidency”. It was horrifying to learn that Bhutto’s killing was the 50th case of homicide in D.C. alone since the start of the year. According to New York Times column writer Nicholas Kristof, the US has suffered more gun deaths (1.45 million) since 1970 than have occurred in all the wars that America has fought in the same period.

A fortnight after his killing, the world was shaken by the mosques shooting in Christchurch, New Zealand, that took the lives of 50 worshippers as the country’s gun control laws were lax and a white supremacist could buy guns and shoot at will. The prime minister of New Zealand, Ms Jacinda Ardern, reacted with compassion, immediately promising, “Our gun laws will change”. And they did within a week.

It was a murder committed not by a single man but by the entire gun lobby.

These gunshot incidents are horrifying. Yet we in Pakistan react differently. I can count people known to me personally who were shot dead in Karachi — Perween Rahman, Abdul Waheed Khan, Zara Hussain and Sabeen Mahmud. Thousands have been targeted but these deaths didn’t stir our leadership the way similar killings moved Obama (who actually cried in public) and Ms Ardern.

Glance at some of the data to know where we stand and why we need the compassion of Obama and Ardern in our macho leadership. Guns in Pakistan have more than doubled in the last decade — 1.8m in 2007 and 4.39m licensed (with another 30m illicit ones) in 2017, says Naeem Sadiq of Citizens against Weapons, the sole civil society group in the country demanding a ban on guns.

Why is the government so unresponsive? True the laws are weak and inadequate. Sadiq says they allow too much discretion to the licensing authorities. They are discriminatory and licences are given to the rich and powerful as a bribe or political favour. Surely the government can change this. It doesn’t because it uses guns as a political tool. The excuse given is that guns are ostensibly needed for the security of the citizens. This is an incongruous excuse in a country where the state is bound to protect the lives of all its citizens and where the Constitution bans private armies (Article 256). Given this attitude, it is not surprising that no strict background checks are carried out by the licensing authorities.

For the last several years, CaW’s has been the single voice in Pakistan, demanding unequivocally a de-weaponisation programme that includes the surrender of all illicit weapons and buyback of all licensed arms. CaW has cited Australia and Britain as models for this process.

CaW also wants “the government to explicitly declare that all categories of weapons lie only in the domain of the state and no citizen, group or gang will be allowed to possess, carry or display any weapon — licensed or otherwise”.

It is time each of us who value human life should demand the same. Pakistan is at a watershed point. It is a do-or-die moment for the country. The choice is between surviving by cracking down on the militant extremists who thrive on terrorism or perishing by allowing a free rein to those who believe their path to paradise is awash with the blood of victims of terror attacks. They should have been disbanded a long time ago under the National Action Plan.

NAP could never have succeeded even if the government was serious because it had no provision for de-weaponisation. Today, there is much that is being said about mainstreaming the terrorist lashkars, but again, the issue of de-weaponisation does not figure in the picture. It would be horrifying to visualise hordes of fully armed bloodthirsty brutes being let loose in the name of mainstreaming.

There is a need to look at the gun control issue more closely and wisely.

www.zubeidamustafa.com

Scholar Jawaid Bhutto’s murder termed great loss for Sindh

HYDERABAD: Speakers at a condolence reference paid rich tribute to philos­opher and scholar Jawaid Bhutto, who was gunned down in Washington on March 2, and called him a great asset of Sindh.

They were speaking at the programme organised by Progressive Writers Associa­tion and Awami Workers Party at Sindhi Language Authority on Friday.

Late Jawaid’s widow and writer Nafisa Hoodbhoy recalled that her husband had always loved such gatherings and was a regular in them. The man who mur­dered her husband was a mentally sick person, she said.

She said she badly missed Jawaid today. His murder was mysterious and she failed to reconcile with the fact that her husband had been killed and was no more with her, wondering why that man killed an innocent person like Jawaid.

Sindh United Party presi­dent Syed Jalal Meh­mood Shah said that Jawaid was a nice and humble man who had always felt people’s pain. In such incidents one paid the price for the mis­takes committed by others. He had had several meetings with Jawaid but philosophy was never discussed between them, he said.

Rahat Saeed observed that one must discuss as to why Jawaid left Sindh. Perhaps he had thought that he was talking to walls and there was no one to listen to him. Such conditions always caused despondency among people but his love for Sindh always brought him back to his land and people, he said.

She said that Jawaid believed that philosophy of Karl Marx ensured eman­cipation of humanity and he never gave up being compa­ssionate to people. This was something that led him to mysticism.

Awami Workers Party president Dr Bakhshal Tha­lho recalled that he had first witnessed Jawaid talking to students on philosophy in Sindh University in the ’90s and he could never forget that moment. Jawaid was a free-thinking soul and he always believed in moulding opinion but he never compromised over truth, he said.

He said that Jawaid was a teacher of philosophy and his death was a great loss for Sindh. “There are many poets and artists today but we do not find philosophers in our society and since Jawaid was a teacher of this subject he had command over every subject. Jawaid was not a conventional socialist or communist but he was a man who believed in ground realities,” he said.

Imdad Chandio said that Jawaid always remained in search of truth and redis­covering everything. The late scholar had defined an intellectual as a person who could challenge establish­ment and stand for uprig­htness and truth, he said. He said that today Sindh needed people like Jawaid who had the art of explaining different concepts and ideas. He was a great asset of Sindh, he added.

Writer Amar Sindhu cal­l­ed for redefining progre­ssi­vism in Sindh and said that only people like Jawaid could interpret real progressivism. If anyone was able to redefine progressivism for the educa­ted lot of Sindh it would be a great achievement.

https://www.dawn.com/news/print/1471258

Glowing Tributes Paid to Jawaid Bhutto in Karachi

The gathering in Karachi Arts Council was as untraditional as Jawaid Bhutto’s life had been. The portrait of him looking down on the gathering was the face of a thinker, a philosopher who reflected in the most intense way on the meaning of life.

But Jawaid was no hardnosed intellectual. Instead, he was a `peoples person,’ loving the human spirit through his clear prism of love and humility.

Ever effervescent Ayub Shaikh, who was master of ceremonies, started with a minute of silence for Bhutto. It echoed the celebration of his life that had been held in Washington DC a week ago. There, again Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, Jews, Hindus and secular admirers… spoke of the man who radiated pure love… his spirit rising far above the hate filled bullets of a deranged tenant who lived below us and whose dark past had been kept a secret from us.

Jawaid’s nephew Ranwal recalled the amazing uncle he lost, senior journalist Mazhar Abbas remembered Jawaid’s friendship from his days in Karachi University; Niranjan Rajwani his days in Bulgaria; Rafiq Chandio, Amar Sindhu and Arfana Mallah his inspirational teaching years in Sindh University; Afrasiab Khattak recalled the comrade whose vision of a tolerant society will continue to inspire; Moonis Ayaz his generous friendship; Qaiser Bengali the gentleman like qualities of the man; Nuzhat Kidwai how his beloved sister, Fauzia Bhutto’s murder had taken him on the path to seek justice. And Mir Mazhar Talpur about how Jawaid had taken a stand on pot smoking in the gentlest way before he was gunned down.

Tribute to Jawaid Bhutto at Arts Council Karachi

Posted by Aziz Ahmed on Saturday, March 16, 2019

Voice of Sindh, London carried the following report on Youtube

Pakistani philosopher killed by suspect with history of violence, mental illness

The Southeast D.C. man charged with first-degree murder for the shooting of his neighbor, Jawaid Bhutto, 64 — prominent Pakistani philosopher and scholar — was found not guilty by reason of insanity for a previous homicide in 1998.

Court documents reveal that Hilman Jordan, 45, who is currently being held without bond for the murder of Bhutto, was indicted by a grand jury 21 years ago for shooting and killing his cousin.

The documents say Jordan shot and killed his cousin, Kenneth Luke, on August 7, 1998. He was indicted later that month on charges of first-degree murder while armed, possession of a firearm during a violent crime and carrying a pistol without a license.

Jordan was committed to Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital on October 1, 1999. In 2003, the court began to order his gradual conditional release, including visits to his mother’s house on Christmas Day, New Year’s Day and Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Jordan violated the conditions of his gradual release in 2005 when he obtained a gun from his family home and carried it to St. Elizabeth’s with the intent to kill a peer.

That violation sparked his transfer to a maximum security ward, where he remained for the next five years.

In January 2015, the government consented to a court order providing Jordan with an expanded conditional release, including overnight visits with family, unaccompanied community travel and eventual full convalescent leave.

The hospital told the court he had “sufficiently recovered from his mental illness to be granted an expansion of his conditional release privileges without posing a danger to himself or others.”

The terms of the January 2015 order prohibited Jordan from possessing firearms, or consuming alcohol or illegal drugs.

Jordan fatally shot Bhutto on Friday, March 1 around 11 a.m. in the parking lot of 2610 Wade Road S.E. — the apartment building where Bhutto resided with his wife, journalist Nafisa Hoodbhoy.

Jordan lived on the second floor of the building. Hoodbhoy told NBC Washington her husband had complained about the odor of Jordan’s smoking wafting into his residence and disturbing his sleep.

Police say they have been able to observe the entire shooting from beginning to end thanks to surveillance video. Charging documents say the video shows Jordan approaching Bhutto and firing a handgun as Bhutto exited his car in the parking lot.

Police say a search warrant of Jordan’s apartment uncovered, among other things, a 9 mm handgun and a marijuana cigarette. He was taken into custody on the balcony of his apartment.

Family members of Bhutto say his death is being widely mourned in his home region of Sindh, Pakistan. He was chairman of the philosophy department at Sindh University.

Jordan is being held without bond and is scheduled for a preliminary hearing in D.C. Superior Court on March 12.

Gathering in memory of Jawaid Bhutto

Arts Council of Pakistan Karachi has arranged a sitting in memory of Jawaid Bhutto, a man of values, a progressive intellectual who lost his life in Washington DC on March 1, 2019 at the hands of a deranged killer.

Friends will pay tribute to the man whose life was filled with love for his fellow beings, regardless of race, ethnicity, color or religion. A sufi at heart, Bhutto’s life was devoted to upliftment of humanity especially the long suffering people of Sindh.

Please join us on 16th March 2019, 3:00pm at New Auditorium, Arts Council of Pakistan

President & the Governing Body Arts Council of Pakistan Karachi

SU VC pays glowing tribute to Javed Bhutto

Javed Bhutto was Socrates of Sindh. It was Sindh’s ambassador of love and peace to the world. People like Javed Bhutto stay immortal in the hearts of people on account of their intellectual contribution to society. Javed Bhutto’s death has created a void which will be hard to fill.

This was stated by VC-SU Prof. Dr. Fateh Muhammad Burfat while he addressed the condolence reference organized by SU Department of Philosophy to pay tribute to legendary lover and practitioner of philosophy, former chairman Department of Philosophy, University of Sindh Javed Ahmed Bhutto.

Dr. Burfat also reminisced fondly the days he spent with Bhutto as his batch mate at Karachi University and the pleasant memories of Bhutto’s visit to SU and his subsequent interaction with him at the eve of his lecture at Shaikh Ayaz auditorium last year.

Secretary SUTA and Javed Bhutto’s close associate Prof. Dr. Arfana Begum Mallah said she was one of those blessed individuals who profited hugely from Bhutto’s erudite company. Dr. Mallah, terming Bhutto a modest mystic, opined that Bhutto loved men regardless of their social status. She declared him essentially “a peoples’ person”.