The recent failings and ineptitude of the ‘elite’ police force in the country has laid bare the reality behind the myth of Scotland Yard. It has shown the fallacy in seeing Western institutions as role models for policing, politics and journalism.
Back in 1994 Channel 4 ran a series of programs on the police force in Pakistan. Set in a Karachi police station it highlighted systemic failings in crime investigation: the police officers were shown beating inmates; taking bribes; making up evidence; and simply being inept at their jobs. For those familiar with the Pakistan police force it came as no surprise and much of what was shown most likely still goes on today.
The sometimes comical Western image of the institutions in the Muslim world has accentuated their incompetence by presenting the seemingly unquestionable professionalism of Western institutions like Scotland Yard. A romantic notion of thousands of Sherlock Holmes delving into every small detail of a case before handing out justice to the accused.
It is therefore unsurprising that governments in the Muslim world who admire anything colonial would turn to the West to aid their own failing institutions.
Pakistan turned to Scotland Yard to help solve the murder / suicide / natural death of Cricket coach Bob Woolmer in 2007 and then again when Benazir Bhutto was shot dead. In the latter it was a clear case of attempting to hide the total ineptitude – at all levels – of the Musharraf government since getting Scotland Yard in meant transparency, honesty and closure for the case.
The reality however bears little resemblance to the near picturesque image the Met and Scotland Yard have worked so hard cultivate. Indeed this idealised view is about as real as Sherlock Holmes.
In the fictional characterisation Watson would be horrified if Sherlock had missed the elementary and thought it unnecessary to examine bin bags full of evidence, Ex-Deputy Commissioner of the Met John Yates is no Sherlock that’s for sure. Yates’ boss Sir Paul Stephenson would make even the most bent Karachi cop feel ashamed at the kind of dubious relationship he had with News of the World.
The level of corruption, ineptitude and downright disregard of responsibility is something that the News of the World would gleefully associate with a banana republic however it is endemic at the top British police force.
With this level of policing it wouldn’t be surprising if future cases were blamed on Colonel Mustard in the kitchen with the spanner. If further proof was needed that Scotland Yard has been running a circus it was given when they failed to protect Rupert Murdoch from a pie thrown at him by stand-up comic Jonathan May-Bowles – maybe he was applying to be the next Commissioner of Scotland Yard.
The problems at Scotland Yard are systematic of a failed Ideology: capitalism will always produce corrupted and irresponsible institutions whose sole goal is the accumulation of wealth. This has clearly been shown by the Banking crisis, the MP’s expenses row and now by the goings on at the News of the World.
