Protesting teachers
THERE has been another, smaller protest going on in Pakistan since the past week, far away from the sound, lights and fulminations in Islamabad. This one has been taking place close to another seat of power — Bilawal House in Karachi. Here the participants include some of those inducted to teachers’ posts by the Sindh government’s previous education minister, Pir Mazharul Haq: they say they have not been paid their salaries for two years and are now being made to sit departmental tests in an effort by the current education minister, Nisar Khuhro, to weed them out. The latter, meanwhile, maintains that his intention is to ensure appointments on merit, and says that in Mr Haq’s tenure 13,000 people were recruited against the 1,425 sanctioned vacancies. Matters came to a head Friday evening when police cracked down on the protesters who, frustrated by Mr Khuhro’s insistence on his stance, tried to march on to Bilawal House — perhaps taking a cue from recent events in Islamabad but drawing a far harsher response in this case. As the African proverb says, when two elephants fight, it’s the grass that gets trampled.
In politics especially, when big egos clash, it’s the common man who gets crushed in the middle, his rights and privileges given short shrift. So it appears to be in the case of these employees of the education department who find themselves caught in that perennial revolving door of political appointments where those inducted during the tenure of a previous minister — or government, as the case may be — find themselves in peril of being shipped out wholesale to make way for fresh appointees. Graft and nepotism are wretchedly all too real in Pakistani politics, and while efforts must indeed be made to root this out, it should not be at the expense of those who, for no fault of theirs, have had to survive in a system that values connections over merit. The protesters’ genuine grievances must be addressed without delay.
Polio emergency
WHEN the world embarked on its fight against polio decades ago, amongst the most iconic images coming from Pakistan was that of the then prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, administering the drops to her child. Since then, millions upon millions have been poured into the initiative and in much of the world, the dreaded virus has been eradicated altogether. In Pakistan, though, things have gone far from as planned. This now remains one of the world’s three polio-endemic countries — the others being Afghanistan and Nigeria — and, much more frighteningly, the only one where the crippling disease seems to be on the resurgence. For years now, Pakistan has received aid in cash and kind from all sorts of donors, and has been materially helped by international polio eradication initiatives, because it was recognised that a polio-free world cannot be envisaged unless all countries are taken along; this state’s abysmal rate of success — even though matters reached such a pass that the WHO was forced to issue a travel advisory for unvaccinated travellers in May — would suggest that it has all been money and effort down the drain.
Since the fight is too important to be abandoned, though, helping hands continue to reach out. On Friday, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council approved a Rs33bn emergency plan to battle the virus. The plan is made possible through loans running into millions of dollars from sources including the Islamic Development Bank and the Japan International Cooperation Agency, with the tab for interest on these loans being picked up by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Under an agreement with the lending agencies, the loans will be converted into grants if Pakistan succeeds in eradicating polio. It can thus be argued that for an already indebted country such as this, there is an economic reason to urgently ramp up its efforts. That said, however, Pakistan needs to wake up to the fact that its interests stand compromised in all sorts of ways by the increasing incidence of polio. Over 20 cases have been detected this month alone, and the count for this year so far is soaring near the 150 mark. Punjab and Balochistan, which had earlier been thought to be polio-free, have also seen the myth shattered. The new emergency plan simply has to be made to work; the lackadaisical approach of the authorities must not lead us into quarantine.
Army, protesters and the government
AN emphatic set of statements by DG ISPR Gen Asim Bajwa during a press conference on Friday may help roll back some of the persisting criticism that the army leadership is directly or indirectly backing the anti-government protesters camped out on Constitution Avenue in the federal capital. At the very least, whatever the truth to criticism directed at the army previously, it appears that the army leadership has, going forward, decided against direct intervention or open involvement in the ongoing political crisis. To the Sheikh Rashids and Shujaat Hussains of the political class, this is surely a setback. Many an ardent admirer of military rule and unabashed supporter of the army’s role in politics have openly invited the military to either take over or keep the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif pinned to the mat — self-serving advice at best, given that it is the military that would have to deal with the fallout from a derailment of the democratic process. Now, with the army speaking more firmly and candidly of its commitment to the democratic process, the air of conspiracy and intrigue can hopefully begin to clear. Yet, in a depressing re-enactment of many of its earlier missteps, the PML-N appears to have interpreted the lifeline handed to it by the army leadership as an opportunity for renewing pressure on the anti-government protesters.
Two things will eventually need to be done by the government: the protesters will need to be peacefully moved away from the present sites they occupy; and those involved in violence on Constitution Avenue and attacks on state property will need to be identified, arrested, charged and prosecuted. Anything beyond that would be an excessive, unnecessary and unwise use of force — and a potentially fatal mistake by the PML-N. Unhappily, the PML-N often appears to have its priorities mixed up: rather than focusing on doing what it will take to strengthen the democratic process and salvage the government’s mandate, the PML-N leadership seems more inclined to flex its muscles against the protesters. Perhaps the PML-N leadership mistakenly has come to believe that the protests are really a numbers game — that if Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri had managed to bring a crowd in six figures into the streets of Islamabad, the government would have fallen. But it is not and never has been a question of a numbers game. Even when whittled down to a few hundred protesters, Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri have had their voices amplified nationally through the media. Even if the numbers at the PTI’s rally surge over the weekend — assuming the government backs away from its disruption tactics — that would not fundamentally weaken the government’s case and the democratic argument that much can be negotiated, but not everything the protesters want. Strategic patience, tactical nous and generosity of spirit — the PML-N still appears to lack all three.
Published in Dawn, September 14th , 2014