The day I cold-called Senator Rehman Malik

The only point Senator Rehman Malik saw in political power, a formidable contacts book - and being, as he would say, 'blessed' - was putting all three at the disposal of others

Senator Rehman Malik greeting President Obama

This is the story of a rather unlikely, all-too-short, but nevertheless profoundly affecting friendship that I was lucky enough to have had.

The first thing to be said about Senator Rehman Malik is that he was a remarkably charismatic man, who very obviously enjoyed power, the trappings of high office and a mobile phone that had on speed-dial just about everyone of consequence around the world. The second and more important thing to be said about Malik is that he saw no point in any of these unless they were deployed in the service of others.

Over the years, I’ve got to meet quite a few people to whom life has been good — they’d all reached a certain age and position in life — who had come to this view. Sir Roger Moore, the actor who worked so tirelessly for the international charity UNICEF, another great example. So, too, Bill Kenwright, the theatre producer whose generous support for so many individuals in dire need only emerged after he’d died. The philosophy of all three men was simple: we don’t help people because we have to, but because we can.

The other day I found myself speaking about Malik, a former interior minister of Pakistan, at an event in London organised by his sons Ali and Umar. The event celebrated, on the third anniversary of the West’s shameful abandonment of Afghanistan, how the Rehman Malik Foundation had helped to get out of that brutally oppressive and misogynistic country a group of women. A few of them stood up and spoke movingly of their gratitude and also of  their deep unease about the women they’d had to leave behind and whose potential was being so wilfully squandered by the Talban regime. I said that Malik would be proud of his sons for what they had achieved in getting these extraordinary women out, and added how, on that warm night in the capital, I felt his spirit in the auditorium.

So how on earth did I, a London-based hack, get to know a man like Malik? The reality is I’d never spoken to him before in my life before I literally cold-called him a few years ago. He owed me absolutely nothing and there were a great many people in his position who would, if I’d called them out of the blue in such circumstances, have petulantly demanded to know how I’d got their number and would I kindly never bother them again. As a matter of fact, a great many had actually reacted like that when I’d reached out to raise the case of a family in mortal danger in a country that was falling apart around them.

No names, no pack drill about the family concerned — lives would be endangered by going into too much detail — but Malik’s details I had got from Muhammed Raza Hussain, a former colleague, who’d followed him on Twitter and had some engagement with him. It was quite late on a Sunday night that I’d put in the call and my hopes were not especially high, and, as I say, too many people had previously told me this wasn’t their problem. He was, it so happens, the 67th person on the list of people I’d called that night.

“Senator Rehman Malik?”

“Yes…”

I rather long-windedly put the case for the family I knew, explained why they were in such danger, and then there was a long pause at the other end of the line. “Mr Walker, I’ll see what I can do. I know the chairman of one of the airlines still flying into that country and I also know some diplomats out there. I think this might be fixable. Leave it with me. Stay blessed.”

I went to bed not feeling especially optimistic — the situation in the country concerned seemed quite frankly hopeless — and, on the last Zoom call I’d done with the family, I’d sensed we were all pretty much reconciled to the sum of our fears very soon being realised. Over the next few days, however, people around me got used to me picking up the phone and finishing the conversations with the words “thank you, Senator.”

‘We don’t mourn anyone for being brilliant at their jobs. We mourn them because they were kind.’

A few days later — time was never on our side in this situation — Malik called once again. “Mr Walker, you will be happy to know I’ve got them on to a plane that will be flying out quite soon,” he informed me, almost matter-of-factly. “Seat 1A for the head of the household with his wife and children around him. Would that be alright with him”

At this point, I think Rehman was just showing off. As we were talking, I glanced up at images playing out on the news of an entire country imploding, and said that, in all the circumstances, I didn’t imagine this guy was going to have a hissy fit if they put them all at the back of the plane. The Senator laughed. “Stay blessed,” he said again.

On the morning of February 23 2021, Malik died of Covid. He was 69 years of age. I don’t think that I am an unusually emotional man, but I broke down in tears when I got the news. I’d done the same when I had heard of the deaths of Kenwright and Moore. I’d say all three individuals were brilliant at the jobs they did, but, you know, we don’t mourn anyone for being brilliant at their jobs. We mourn them because they were kind, and, for one reason or another, they touched our lives.

The family Malik helped are now safe and well and thriving in a country that has welcomed them with open arms. They serve — along with countless other individuals around the world — as a monument to Senator Rehman Malik’s kindness. Still more are now being added posthumously to this list through the work of the Foundation that his sons have set up in his honour.

At the event I attended last week, I asked Ali Malik why his father ended every conversation with the words “stay blessed.” He reckoned it was because his dad understood that good fortune is always a matter of luck, that we should never take it for granted we are going to be blessed forever, and that, during the times we are blessed, we should always use it to help others.

Details of the work of the Malik Foundation can be found here https://irrinternational.org