President Pervez Musharraf and cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan are among the winners of the “Hall of Shame awards” for 2007 announced by a Pakistani magazine. Musharraf bagged two Hall of Shame awards “The Pinocchio award” for playing with facts and “The Richard Nixon award” for dirtiest political advertisements.

Imran Khan, whose politics is not taken seriously in Pakistan, is seen as the voice of Pakistan by many outside the country. The World Cup winning captain, currently in the US to speak on Pakistan’s political future: an alternative perspective”, was given the “Paris Hilton award” for being the most undeserving media darling, by Newsline magazine. The “citation” for Khan reads: “He is the leader of a party that is the proud holder of one National Assembly seat (and) gets media coverage inversely proportional to his political influence.

The citation for Musharraf’s Pinocchio award reads: This award was hotly contested between President General Musharraf and the artist formerly known as Pervez Musharraf, standing off the stiff competition from himself, the award goes to Musharraf for an interview he gave to The New York Times: “I know what they (Pakistanis) feel about the emergency when all these suicide bombings were taking place. Their view is, ‘Why have I done it so late?”

“The other award Musharraf bagged was for an advertisement with the theme “Pakistan First”, in which the President said he imposed emergency to protect democracy and lifted emergency to protect democracy. “The Judas award” for biggest betrayal went to Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam leader of Maulana Fazlur Rehman because he had pledged that members of his party would resign from the North West Frontier Province assembly before the presidential election but they did not.

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