Nowadays, whenever I read or hear about corruption by Imran Khan or other leaders, I'm reminded of a terribly corrupt man (Riaz Agha). He was perhaps the most successful crook in the oil industry and in 1975 he became the Managing Director of the nationalized oil company I had been working in since 1969. Of course I'd been hearing about his corruption for years (when he was in Caltex and PNO) but even I didn't know the extent of his corruption until I came in direct contact with him.
He wasn't a very striking figure, in fact he was darker and shorter than most Pakistani executives. But there was this thing about him, his subordinates (even senior executives) were scared of him. He used to yell at the top of his voice whenever he found some fault. I think I was the only one who stood up to him, which is why I resigned only a few months after he took control of the company.
They used to say that his astounding success was either due to him being an Ahmedi (he wasn't), or due to his wife sleeping with prominent people (this too was untrue). She was a successful woman in her own right, a doctor. They didn't have any children, which could be one reason for Riaz Agha being the repulsive man he was.
Bhutto once called him a "badmash" (scoundrel). Riaz Agha was then transferred to run the Pakistan Tourism Department, but was arrested for corruption by the Zia government after Bhutto was removed. He was sentenced to pay a fine of Rs. 5 million (a huge amount in those days) and seven years in prison. I don't know how much time he spent in jail, but somehow he managed to escape to the US (where I heard that he worked with ex-President Jimmy Carter). I don't know if his wife followed him there or not. I'm just wondering, if he hadn't been so corrupt and greedy, people would have remembered him as an honorable man after his death.
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