Lost evidence
April 25th, 2012
There are some who have criticised the Supreme Court’s proceedings in the Asghar Khan petition on the grounds that, even if the intelligence agencies did pay off politicians to influence elections, it happened more than 20 years ago and is irrelevant now. That is a dangerously misguided view. With elections scheduled to be held less than a year from now and with the military as powerful as ever, an investigation into the conduct of the intelligence agencies and those politicians who benefited from it is clearly in the public interest. This is what makes the April 23 revelation that reports regarding the petition compiled by judicial commissions in 1994 and 1996 had gone missing so disconcerting. Although there is a possibility that these reports may have been innocently misplaced, given our past especially with regard to threats — real and perceived — to democracy it is always better to err on the side of cynicism.
There are now two things that the Supreme Court and Attorney General Irfan Qadir must do. The first is to locate the missing documents since making a case against the ISI and corrupt politicians will be difficult if the judges have to rely solely on spoken testimony. Just about every politician in the vicinity of the Mehran Bank case has some ulterior motive or the other, making it very difficult to take their testimony at face value. Secondly, the Court must determine who was behind the disappearance of these documents. If it can establish who had the motive to make sure these reports are never aired in public, the Supreme Court will get further confirmation of the forces that were responsible for the bribery of politicians in the first place.
It is ironic that those who have previously complained the most vociferously about lost evidence are now most likely to stay quiet on the issue. When former ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani said that he no longer had the BlackBerry through which he communicated with Mansoor Ijaz, the right wing political parties and military circles instantly accused him of lying, even though cell phones are routinely lost and replaced. For the sake of their credibility, these same political actors should now speak out even more loudly for the recovery of the lost reports. For the reports to be permanently lost would show just how little respect these groups have for the independence and work of the Supreme Court.
The battle continues
April 25th, 2012
Pakistan is fighting a very deadly battle all over the country. No village, hamlet, town or city has been spared of its wrath. But this is not a war that involves tanks, guns or grenades. In fact, the only weapons in the fight against the deadly battle are an amber liquid and some droppers. The enemy is polio — a disease which Pakistan has been attempting to gain control over with inadequate success.
Despite the fact that a national emergency on polio was declared last year, we have struggled to limit its occurrences with 198 cases recorded in 2011, which is the highest anywhere in the world. As a result, Pakistan has been declared the world’s focal point for the spread of polio, with experts from the World Health Organisation converging to discuss what they consider a highly dangerous situation. Adding to Pakistan’s embarrassment is the fact that this year, India was taken off the world’s list of polio-endemic countries after it competed 12 months without a new case being recorded. Today, only Afghanistan and Nigeria stand on that list alongside Pakistan.
Can Pakistan gain an upper hand in the battle against polio once more? Till the early 2000s we appeared to have been making progress. Even so, it is still encouraging that this year, only 15 cases have been recorded in contrast to 28 by the same time last year. But, of course, it is too early to say if we are indeed moving towards success. In the last year, polio re-emerged for the first time in districts of Balochistan that had remained polio-free for years. The latest anti-polio drive has been backed by a strong media campaign. This is wise, but we also need to take other steps suggested by experts, including better-run campaigns, an effort to reach every child, persuading people to vaccinate, dealing with migrations that result in children failing to receive the drops and combining the drive against polio with more generalised healthcare for children, which incorporates other vaccinations that they should be receiving. Pakistan needs to win this battle. The consequences of losing it are terrible.
Draining away talent
April 25th, 2012
It is only normal to expect that government bodies would work for the country and its people. Yet, the federal government’s Overseas Employment Corporation appears to be doing just the opposite by encouraging highly qualified persons, who are needed desperately in the country, to leave it. The body is currently facilitating a team from the health and defence ministries in Saudi Arabia to recruit doctors to be employed at hospitals and other medical centres in that country. Specialists in various fields are being sought and, quite naturally, the Saudis will be looking for the most highly skilled practitioners.
As is already happening because of the ongoing brain drain, Pakistanis are being deprived of the expertise of these skilled individuals. The same process is, of course, taking place in other fields as well. Nurses, scientists, teachers and others are all leaving the country. The very last thing we need is for an official body to encourage them to leave. While senior doctors have expressed concern over the situation, younger doctors say they are eager to work in Saudi Arabia and other countries because of the better salaries and working conditions there. They can, of course, like other professionals hardly be faulted for such sentiments. But at the same time we need to find ways to persuade people — especially in critical fields such as medicine — to stay in Pakistan.
This can only be done by improving salary structures and working conditions. Nurses and young doctors have both been demanding this over recent months. The drifting away of talent is an area we need to give more attention to; ways need to be found to curb this detrimental practice. Certainly, a government body should not be working to send doctors abroad, but perhaps focusing its efforts on the unskilled and semi-skilled labourers, who are perhaps in more dire need for such help. The body ought to assist these people so that a better future can be built for their families so that they may have a chance of escaping the poverty trap as well.