An Open Letter to Waqar Zaka

Dear Mr. Zaka,

This letter is in response to an email you have sent me that I found lying in my spam mail today. Since you and a lot of my others might be wondering why the famous Waqar Zaka would write me an email on my personal email address, let me give a bit of the background.


On April 1 2013, A news story was published in The Express Tribune titled "Waqar Zaka hopes to go from cobra to constituency". This story was written by one of the paper's staff members.

This news story covered your intent to contest in the upcoming elections. On April 2 2013, I (as an independent blogger) did a blogpost for Express Tribune titled: 'Stick to kissing cobras Waqar Zaka!'. This post was a response to the news story and was aimed at analysing some of your statements published in the said news story and that too on a lighter note. A clear reference to the news story was also mentioned in my blogpost.

So what happened next? The daredevil inside you got furious and you left comments on the blog's link on Express Tribune's Facebook page and directly attacked me.

So the key points of your comments were:
1. What was my source of information?
2. Did I take any comments from you?
3. I wrote this post to gain cheap publicity?

Mr Zaka, as for the source, I clearly mentioned it in my post, only if you have bothered reading it. By the way why would I take any comments from you? I assume the staffer at a reputable newspaper took your comments and published that news story on which I based my blogpost. And seriously??? you think if I would want to gain publicity, out of all the zillion available options, I would choose you to write an article about?

Anyway, I gave a comprehensive response to your comments on Facebook, and on that very forum.

I was expecting that either you will respond me on that forum or you wont give any response and the matter will be closed at my end atleast. To my utter surprise, I found an email from you while I was clearing my spam mails.

While it is a lengthy mail boastful of your big election plans, but I will stick to the part that addressed me. 

"Dear Sana,

   I have never said a word to any of the writers , saying anything about my TV Shows, but this is serious stuff, write anything you want but why you have written that this is what Waqar Zaka wants or offering in Elections?, check my profile or twitter ,www.facebook.com/waqarzaka5 , I have never said what you have written , who gave you this information ? one of your writer named Sidra, called me just to confirm if I am contesting in elections or not, thats it, then from where this Education thing came up? "

Dear Mr. Zaka. Miss Sidra is NOT my writer. Its funny how you ignored the fact that I clearly stated in my comment on facebook that I am just an indepenendent contributor to Express Tribune.
I noticed that you sent a CC of the email to the concerned section of ET as well. In that case your mail should have been addressed to the concerned editor and not me.

Here's a small tip in case a similar event occurs in future. It might be helpful for you as you are likely to face such circumstances during your political career.

What You Should Have Done?

Mr. Zaka. If you thought that it was necessary to respond me, you should have done so on the same public forum where you addressed me and attacked me with all your rants. If your daredevil side felt a bit less daring in doing so, you should have better kept silent and should have let things subside with time. We all have short memories.

If you thought that a news media had falsely published a story related to you, you could have approached the editor or the concerned management and could have asked for an apology. Moreover the law also gives you a right to take the newspaper management to court for character assasination charges.

The most surprising part is that the news was published on April 1 2013 and my blogpost was published the next day. You never bothered to give any clarifications about the news on your Facebook/Twitter.

While I do not want to drag this any further as I do not intend to get any publicity out of it, I would like to tell you someting Mr Zaka. You might have handled cobras and crocodiles really well on your shows. Unfortunately, you do not seem that good at handling criticism, humor, controversies and whatever comes with the package of being a well known person. I am afraid, this kind of attitude my hurt your political career.

Anyway, I wish you luck for your politcal career.

Sincerely,
Sana (Iqbal) Adnan.