Pakistan a picture of institutionalised incompetence: daily

The variety of statements following Osama bin Laden's killing in Abbottabad makes it "a picture of institutionalised incompetence that runs right to the top", said a Pakistani daily.

The Al Qaeda leader was shot dead May 2 by heavily armed US commandos who flew into Abbottabad and took out the world's most wanted man.

An editorial in the News International Tuesday criticised Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani's Monday address to the parliament on the Osama raid.

"Have we truly been taken into confidence and learned anything new as a result of the prime minister's address to parliament yesterday evening? No we have not.

"The PM spent much of the time giving history a run around the track -- again -- reminding us of our sacrifices -- again -- and telling us that the intelligence failure that allowed the world's most wanted man to live in peace and security in Pakistan was a global failure and not ours -- again. All this we already knew."

It added that the "policy of say nothing or prevaricate or simply hide, once again won the day".

The editorial noted that Gilani's speech "was the culmination of three days of conflicting and confused statements by our senior diplomats and politicians".

It said: "We are getting contradictory statements from our ambassador to the US and the interior minister, and on his single outing so far in the bin Laden affair the foreign secretary was floundering considerably out of his depth as well. The PM when it came to his turn, in effect, promised to tell us nothing".

"This quartet of talent was each speaking to a different audience," it noted drily.

It went on to say that "taken as a package and viewed from a distance all this looks like a monumental cock-up, a classic failure to coordinate".

"It is a picture of institutionalised incompetence that runs right to the top; and does nothing to inspire confidence at home or abroad. Had our government and its various organs and mouthpieces arranged to sing from the same song-sheet from the outset, then we would not look as foolish -- or culpable -- as we do now."