The Qatar deal

The agreement with Qatar to provide us with LNG for the next 15 years at favourable rates will be presented as evidence that the government is taking the energy crisis seriously. Even though international oil prices are at an all-time low, Pakistan cannot rely on coal alone. With our gas supplies rapidly dwindling, the Tapi pipeline beset by security issues and the Iran pipeline seemingly dead, the truth is that we have no option but to turn to other countries for help. The amount we will import from Qatar will meet 20 percent of our expected usage, which is still nowhere near enough to make up for our current shortfall. It is, however, a start and should be used as a stopgap arrangement until we can come up with a better alternative. The best option is the Iranian pipeline but the deal with Qatar might be the final nail in that particular coffin. Qatar is firmly on Saudi Arabia’s side in the regional battle for supremacy and by inking this deal we seem to have made our preference clear too. We may now have to convince Iran that we can still be honest brokers in the ongoing war – one that is mainly being fought through proxies – between it and Saudi Arabia.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif presented the deal and his two-day visit to Qatar as a resounding success with all the usual sound bites about friendship and cooperation. More interesting is the unspoken part about what form that cooperation will take. Nawaz’s visit to Qatar came right after we hosted delegations from the US, China and Afghanistan to discuss a revival of peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban. The last time talks were being held, the Taliban had opened an office in Qatar. Qatar’s role in fostering militancy, particularly in the form of the Islamic State, is a matter of some controversy. Will the quid pro quo with Qatar over the LNG deal compel us to be embroiled in that particular fight? It is certainly in our interest to attempt reconciliation in Afghanistan but the further we stay away from the civil war in Syria the better. The coming months will show just what price we paid to get gas.

Back from the brink?

Pakistan has managed to avoid the risk of bankruptcy. Those are the words delivered by the World Bank President Dr Jim Yong Kim as a debate has restarted over what Pakistan has gained from accepting the terms and conditions of the International Monetary Fund bailout. The standoff over the privatisation of PIA has raised questions over international intervention in the Pakistani economy, but if Dr Kim is to be believed, then accepting structural reform has brought Pakistan back from the brink. Dr Kim told Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif that he was worried about Pakistan’s security situation, energy shortfalls and macroeconomic stability when he first met the PM two years ago. Now, Dr Kim insists that Pakistan has improved its performance on all three fronts. The World Bank president’s statements give credence to Finance Minister Ishaq Dar’s boast when delivering the budget speech that PML-N government had brought back macroeconomic stability to the economy. Dr Kim also insisted that Pakistan can exploit its location – being at the centre of important consumer markets.

This indirect reference seems to be at the China Pakistan Economic Corridor and Pakistan’s overtures towards building trade routes with Central Asia. The PM, in response, repeated the World Bank line in insisting that the government was committed to a liberal, private-sector driven economy. The PM also urged the WB to consider reviving its policy of issuing specific project based loans to Pakistan with set targets, including assistance for the Dasu hydropower plant and the Tarbela-IV extension project. The narrative is that Pakistan is ready for a full-fledged economic revival which would lift its people out of poverty. However, the WB president’s recommendation that Pakistan become much more ambitious in economic reform is a two-edged sword. With little focus on tax reform, the between-the-lines narrative delivered by Dr Kim could be that Pakistan needs to go ahead with controversial privatisation. Whether Dr Kim’s visit will bring any major announcement or not is unclear, but it will give the PML-N more confidence in its economic agenda. The problem is that, while the WB president might have other agendas in mind when praising Pakistan’s macroeconomic revival, the question of whether Pakistan’s security or energy situation has improved tangibly is open to interpretation. Terrorism is not over nor is our energy crisis. There is electricity and gas loadshedding in all seasons and the government has fumbled the launch of a number of power-generation projects. The road to economic recovery in Pakistan is a much longer one. Only when the CPEC begins to come to fruition can anything concrete be said about the economic direction the country is taking.

Published in The News Feb 12, 2016

Date: 17 Feb, 2016.

An emerging maturity

That an Indian diplomat has said, on the record, that the recommencement of the talks between Pakistan and India is not linked to the Pathankot incident and its investigation is both welcome and encouraging. There was the diplomatic equivalent of a sharp intake of breath after the attack, followed by a slow exhale rather than the stereotypical and absurdly ritualised sabre-rattling and drum-beating that both sides are prone to under such trying circumstances.

Those that carried out the attack did so in all probability in the hope of getting just that — the usual suspects acting out the predetermined script leading to the complete collapse of what are the most promising talks for many years. But it has not happened that way this time around, and something very different is in the making. This positive message came via India’s new envoy to Pakistan, Gautam Bambawale, who was speaking to journalists on February 15. The foreign secretaries and national security advisers of both countries are still in touch and a meeting will happen, all in good time.

It must be assumed that immediately after the attack, India weighed the options that it was confronted with. There seemed little doubt that the attack had originated in Pakistan, but was unlikely to have the Pakistan government or any of its agencies as its prime movers. Keeping the talks going is a potential win-win for both countries at a time when there is a regional churn that was prompted by the American ‘pivot towards the Pacific’, a change of government in Kabul and the rapid emergence of China as a large hinge on which much turns. There was nothing to be gained by breaking off the talks. In Pakistan, a decision was made to take a more pragmatic line than otherwise, not to go into ‘ostrich mode’ and instead offer to cooperate with the Indians in the investigation into the incident. Both sides made cautious moves outside the box. This points to a new maturity in the thinking of those that manage relations on both sides. The Pathankot incident could have been fatal for bilateral relations, but it was not. Long may such maturity continue to develop.

A testing mayoralty

A new(ish) layer of governance is emerging into the light, along with newly-elected and appointed figures, none of whom are likely to have an easy job wherever they are in the country. The local government elections have produced mayors, men and women who at least theoretically are going to be holding powerful positions. The new mayor of Islamabad, Sheikh Ansar Aziz, elected on February 15, is set to take charge in the coming days, and he will have a lot on his plate. Even before he gets into his office on the first day, there is the matter of how he handles people like Chaudhry Riffat for instance, who is one of three deputy mayors also elected on February 15. That Mr Riffat has ‘an agenda’ for Islamabad is well-enough known, and it may not be quite the same agenda as that of Mr Aziz. Then there is the established, and deeply entrenched, bureaucracy that has been used to having its own way virtually since the foundations of the city were first laid. It is complex, layered, seemingly infinitely and unaccountably powerful and unlikely to welcome any new broom that Mr Aziz will bring with him.

Islamabad looked wonderful on paper in the 1960s and when the capital was moved there in 1966, its open aspect and tree-lined avenues were something of a wonder. In many ways, things have gone steadily downhill ever since. The new mayor says that his priorities are solving the chronic sanitation problem, the equally chronic water shortages and building (yet more) new roads. He might also add rubbish collection, the provision of affordable housing, demolishing illegal building encroachments and taming a bureaucracy that is hand in glove with some of those involved in illegal developments. On taking up his post, Mr Aziz becomes the head of the Islamabad Metropolitan Corporation (IMC). He is to provide ‘leadership vision’ to the IMC in consultation with others of the many departments that have fingers in the Islamabad pie. Somebody needs to get a grip of Islamabad, and we can do no more than wish Mr Aziz the very best of luck. He’s going to need it.

Going beyond the IP pipeline

The Iran-Pakistan (IP) pipeline was always a problematic venture, pursued only because an energy-starved nation was desperately looking for avenues to meet its requirements. With most sanctions on Iran having been lifted, the IP pipeline started grabbing headlines once again. However, soon after, the project was nipped in the bud as the US Department of Energy stated that the fate of the pipeline was still to be judged. Pakistan, on several occasions and on different platforms, has stated that it wants to continue pursuing the completion of the project, yet work on it appears to be stalled. Simultaneously, Pakistan is vigorously working on other projects in a bid to meet its energy needs. The fate of the IP pipeline project, therefore, will continue to hang in the balance.

But there is more to bilateral trade relations with Iran than just the IP pipeline and our policymakers must remember that. As our neighbour moves towards coming back into the international fold, there is much that Pakistan can achieve through its next-door partner if diplomatic relations run on an even keel. Pakistan’s export receipts amounted to $211 million in FY13, shooting down to $128 million the following year, according to central bank figures. With different sectors, including IT, sports goods and surgical instruments, eager to make their mark, Iran presents an ideal market. Cynics would argue that Pakistan lacks in competitiveness and exports items that most countries can also obtain from elsewhere. But geographic location counts and that must not be forgotten. It means that an entirely new market is available and with strategic planning — that focuses on a variety of exports ranging from auto parts to e-commerce — bilateral trade has the potential to expand. Banking channels may take some time to be established, but with Iran ready to make a comeback to international trade, Pakistan needs to be ready to knock its doors. We need to enhance our understanding of the Iranian market. Curbing smuggling and establishing formal channels should be the next step. The stalling of the IP project shouldn’t deter us from pursuing what can be a very exciting opportunity for the Pakistani economy.

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"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!

Date: Friday, February 19, 2016.

Fighting fascism in India

The reaction to the protests at the Jawaharlal Nehru University has shown the real face of today’s India, not the Shining India propaganda we hear about so much. First there was the police which manhandled protestors and arrested student union leader Kanhaiya Kumar. They then produced a report saying the protestors were seen eating beef, a big no-no in Modi’s India, and revealed they had been spying on students for two years. Then there was the BJP government which called the protestors anti-Indian and desperately tried to find a Pakistan link, first saying Hafiz Saeed was behind the protests and now accusing Umar Khalid, a PhD student at JNU of being part of a Pakistani militant group. Then you have the lawyers, who should be upholding the right to protest and rule of law, chanting slogans against Kumar at his hearing and pelting reporters with stones. Even the jailors have shown the same instincts, throwing Kumar into the same cell in which Afzal Guru – the anniversary of whose judicially dubious conviction and execution sparked the protest – was once held. These protests are now not only about Afzal Guru or the occupation of Kashmir; they are really a test of whether dissent is allowed in India.

To show their peaceful intentions, JNU students, joined by labourers in Delhi, marched on Thursday armed with nothing but flowers and tricolour flags. They were rerouted by an apprehensive police force but this was more than compensated by the solidarity shown at universities around the country. It is a sign of how this protest has grown that disenfranchised workers too have joined in. The BJP, mixing xenophobia with neo-liberalism, is the most anti-worker government possible. One of its MPs, Gopal Shetty, has even said that farmers are committing suicide not because of starvation and poverty but because it is in ‘fashion’. The government also ordered that the Indian flag be flown at all central universities. None of this stopped students, not just from JNU, but around the country, from taking out solidarity rallies. They even had to endure clashes with BJP goons in places like Bihar. Congress has also taken the side of the protestors, although one cannot be sure if that is for opportunistic political reasons. The Aam Aadmi Party, which rules Delhi, has shown its name to be a misnomer. While it has attacked the government, it has done so on the wrong grounds. It taunted the BJP, claiming that if it cannot arrest a few anti-Indian protestors it will never be able to find those who carried out the Pathankot attack. Calling the brave students of JNU anti-Indian is a slur. They are holding up the best progressive traditions, aspiring to form a more democratic society.

She shouldn’t have died

The tragedy of discrimination and lack of dissent in our schooling system has been captured by the tragic suicide of a 17-year-old girl in Quetta. Reports confirm that the girl had committed suicide after her college, the Government Girls Degree College Muslim Bagh, had refused to send her intermediate-level examination forms to the education board. The girl’s family reported that she had been organising protests against college authorities, including the principal, over the poor quality of education; this reportedly led to the principal deciding to withhold her examination forms. The college had suspended classes owing to a shortage of female teachers. Twelve other girls from the college were also been reported to have been denied the right to sit in exams on the charge of protesting against the college administration. The tragedy of 17-year-old Saqiba is that she was a bright student who wanted to get educated at all costs. Her damning suicide note is addressed to her principal. A position-holder, she was willing to take up the cause of education for others. Her’s was a precious life that should not have been lost.

The police have resisted protests by the girl’s family to register a case against college officials. It is unclear what kind of justice a criminal case would be able to provide in this matter, but the reality is that the role of college officials in pushing the girl to commit suicide cannot be discounted. While a probe into the incident has been ordered by the Balochistan chief minister, the suicide is nothing short of a damnation of our public education system. The Balochistan education minister himself spoke of a brilliant girl who had been demoralised by the petty attitude of her principal. A girl who wanted to get education was denied that by the schooling system. This is a story we can tell many times over in our country. What was different is that this girl chose to take her life after being denied an education. It is easy to dismiss her decision as immature. Like the recent case in India, where a Dalit student committed suicide in a university, the girl’s suicide should instead be taken as a moment to kick off a national debate on our schooling system. The life of a girl who protested being denied her right to education must not go to waste. We must also talk about the victimisation that our students face generally – whether in public schools and colleges or the more elite universities – when it comes to their right to question their teachers or their educational institutes. There are no mechanisms in place for students to turn to when they face bias or unnecessary censure merely for speaking out.

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"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!

Date: Saturday, Feb 20, 2016.

Drug regulation

Drug prices in Sindh have soared after an official 15 percent price increase by multinationals has led to a shortage of supplies. The price of some medicines is reported to have gone up by 70 percent as pharma manufacturers and sellers are fleecing patients. The price hike in medicines led to opposition senators walking out of the Senate, and the situation has been made even worse by the ineffective action taken by the federal government and the Drug Regulatory Authority Pakistan (Drap). While Health Minister Saira Tarar has taken notice of the matter, there has been little change on the ground. This has raised questions over whether the federal government should have charge over regulating drug prices. The regulation of drugs and their prices was one of the more controversial subjects after the 18th Amendment omitted ‘Drugs and medicines’ from the concurrent list. Drap was created as a compromise between provinces as the federal government retained control of regulating medicines. The authority has come under criticism from Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah for being unable to control medicine/drug prices. The Sindh CM has expressed his helplessness on taking action on the matter as the subject remained under the control of the federal government.

Can provinces do a better job of regulating drug prices? The answer is unclear. The current price increase has not been approved by the federal government. Instead, it is the product of a tussle between the federal government and the pharma industry. In 2014, the health minister promised that drug prices would not be increased before July 2016 via the Drug Pricing Policy 2015. The Pakistan Pharma Manufacturers Association challenged the price freeze in the Sindh High Court. It was only after the SHC suspended the freeze on drug prices in 2015, that multinationals used the SHC verdict to defy the government’s directive to push prices up. Will individual provinces be able to put up more resistance? That seems rather unlikely. Instead, the SHC verdict – which has cited free market logic – leaves everyone in a situation where trying to implement price controls on drugs goes against court orders. The Punjab government has directed district administrations to act against the price increase but there are limited legal grounds to do so. While Pakistan’s pharma industry has been vocal in asking for deregulation, the fact is that the prices of medicine in Pakistan are already twice as high as other regional countries. Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani has questioned whether the SC can be allowed to ‘protect’ drug cartels. Drap had been trying to get big pharma to agree to a major decrease in drug prices when the price hike was announced. Individual provinces would probably have less leverage with pharmaceutical companies than the federal government. The threat of suspending the licence of pharma marketing companies poses its own challenge as it would merely heighten the drug shortage, in turn pushing prices further up. The question, then, is not whether the federal or provincial governments have the power to regulate drug prices. Instead, it is what mechanisms can be put in place to control prices. Right now, the government is in a difficult position.

The NAB debate

The debate over the role of accountability bodies, including the National Accountability Bureau, has taken centre-stage after the prime minister’s statement on NAB acting beyond its authority. Two days after the statement, the proposal of creating a supra-commission to check the apparent ‘misuse of power’ by NAB seems to have been revived. While the PML-N has insisted that the proposal had been on the government’s agenda for a long time, the timing of the proposal makes the link quite clear. When the PPP had protested being targeted by NAB and the Federal Investigation Agency the government had chosen to maintain its silence. It is true that when the PPP and the PML-N agreed on the Charter of Democracy, one of the key features was NAB reform. But implementing the charter has not been on anyone’s agenda for the last half decade. The government has offered the PPP some support by proposing similar oversight over the FIA, but it seems clear that the real issue is ensuring one’s own protection. Under pressure, the NAB chairman has reportedly asked his staff to complete all major investigations within the next 10 days.

NAB has insisted in a press release that non-interference had made the bureau independent and it would be better to keep it this way. Despite the clearly politicised agenda for talking about reforming Pakistan’s accountability authorities, we have an opportunity to talk about what would be a real reform of these authorities. The current NAB chairman was appointed after a bipartisan consensus but it seems a united appointment is also not stopping political parties from crying foul. Clearly, the concerns over NAB are deeper. The media has asked questions over why accountability has focused on political parties, but not generals or judges. Already, the DHA City case has made enough waves for serious action to be taken, but it seems to have been relegated to a matter ‘inside the army.’ The problem is that the PML-N seems to be using these concerns to its own advantage. India, in the meanwhile, has been engaged in a public debate about more accountability. Creating a supra-authority to NAB would only increase interference and make the authority more controversial. It would be better to shut down NAB than go this route. The debate should be about making NAB more effective and independent, nor weaker.

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"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!

Date: Sunday, February 21st 2016.

Pathankot FIR

By registering an FIR against unknown attackers for the Pathankot airbase incident, Pakistan has done what India asked of it. But this has not been enough to mollify the Indian government. The Indian defence minister has accused Pakistan of ‘pretending to be asleep’; the Pakistani government was also blamed for not mentioning Masood Azhar and Jaesh-e-Mohammed in the FIR. The fact is that India cannot expect Pakistan to do so without proof. Azhar is currently in the protective custody of the Punjab government and action has been taken against seminaries linked to the JeM. Calling on Islamabad to do more will achieve nothing if it isn’t accompanied by proof. If there is anyone who is asleep, it is the Indians. Weeks after the attack Delhi still isn’t sure if there were four or six attackers. The National Security Guard, which led the response to the attack, maintains that it killed six attackers but the remains of only four have been found. Such investigations take time and patience, something India has sorely lacked when it comes to Pakistan. With its own investigation running into such hitches, it should not pretend to be on a moral high ground.

There is some reason to believe there was a Pakistani connection to the attack. India provided Islamabad with mobile phone numbers that were called in Pakistan and it has been found that they were purchased with fake identification, indicating that these SIMs were used for criminal activity. But it requires a considerable leap of faith to go from a possible Pakistani connection to not just blame Jaesh-e-Mohammed but also imply that the state was in on it. An FIR has been registered and a joint investigation team is being sent to India next month. India should now wait and see what its own and the Pakistani investigations turn up. It is doing no one any favours by pre-judging Pakistan. But that seems to have become a bit of a nasty habit in quite a few Indian circles, including their media. Right now let us just focus on the investigation. There will be plenty of time for politics later.

Controlling universities

Since 2013, after the Sindh government passed the Sindh Universities Amendment Act (SUAA), it has been in conflict with academics over who has the authority to control the affairs of the university. The Federation of All Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association (Fapuasa) has threatened to boycott educational activities at all varsities. The SUAA 2013 transferred administrative powers from the governor to the chief minister of the province and, after the amendment was passed in 2013, the government immediately transferred two vice chancellors . The tussle between the CM and the governor has continued after the governor’s office tried to appoint new VCs to Dow University of Health Services and the Karachi University. The result has been confusion.

Fapuasa argues that the act has transferred power away from varsity syndicates. The stance of academics raises important questions about the independence of universities. Academics have criticised both the governor and the CM for interfering in university affairs. Earlier, when university committees were formed, political appointments were made ignoring senior academics. It is apparent that bureaucratic and government meddling has stunted the growth of universities across the country. Fapuasa argues that the SUAA 2013 has created the space for unnecessary meddling in university matters. The body gave up a strike call in August last year after the government agreed to pass another amendment to restore the autonomy of universities. Universities need to be spaces that encourage the culture of debate and research on campus. Political meddling is a major restraint on creating and developing universities as creative spaces of learning. Coming at the time of the Indian government’s crackdown on students of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), the struggle for academic freedom and universities’ control over their own affairs is an important one. The government must recognise the just demands of academics and step back.

Harper Lee for today

Few works of fiction have had as lasting an impact as To Kill a Mockingbird. Author Harper Lee, who passed away at the age of 89, never published another novel until an alleged sequel was released last year, most likely against her wishes. The circumstances of the sequel’s appearance and publication are dubious. It is hard to overstate the impact of Mockingbird. Set in the Deep South of the United States in the pre-civil rights era, it was released in 1960, during the height of the civil rights movement, and became an instant classic. The indelible character of lawyer Atticus Finch – so memorably played by Gregory Peck in the great screen adaptation – who treats everyone with decency and defends Tom Robinson, a black man accused of rape, resonated in a country slowly awakening to the idea of racial equality. That the story is narrated by Atticus’ daughter Scout only adds to its sense of innocence and shows us that racism is something society poisons us with and not an innate trait. Atticus, and through him his children, battle this racism with logic and kindness.

As a work of literature To Kill a Mockingbird is impeccable, judging it for its sociopolitical impact may be a little harder. Perhaps it can be attributed to the limitations of the time when the novel was written that Harper Lee, in spite of her best and most sincere intentions, did buy into the trope of the white saviour belonging to the white middle or upper middle class. Progress in civil rights, when it came, was led by the black community and not well-meaning white men. The alleged sequel, a rather unimpressive, immature and certainly unfinished work, does show Atticus as having devolved into a bitter racist. But what is much more significant is that To Kill a Mockingbird fired the imagination of countless many in their struggle against racism and bigotry. At a time when the idea of segregation enjoyed majority support in the Deep South, Harper Lee’s work was important and necessary. She confronted the ugliness of racism at a time when it was easier to ignore it – and in doing so she showed the best of what we can be. One book can rarely fuel a movement but Lee did change minds through her fiction. That it is still read at schools across the world speaks to To Kill a Mockingbird’s success. It may have been set in a very particular time and place but the values it espouses are universal. In our age, when persecution and demonisation of whole communities and ‘races’ has become rampant in politics, the media and the so-called intelligentsia – when the easiest thing to do is to fuel fascism by inventing racist fantasies of mass harassment of white women by brown refugees fleeing their home after destruction wrought on them by imperial ‘interventions’ and invasions – the Atticus Finch of Lee’s novel is one character who should never stop inspiring us. And for that Harper Lee should be remembered and celebrated.

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"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!

Date: Monday, 22nd February, 2016.

Black spring

Artists in Lahore, linking up with the people of the Walled City, have initiated a project titled ‘Black Spring’ to lament the taking over of culture and traditions by government and the consequent ‘entrapment’ of life and liberty by such actions. The Awami Art Collective, begun by a group of artists, put up a unique installation art display with elongated laser lights used to demonstrate colour in skies and how this has been taken away by the ban on the festival of Basant. Local people have joined the AAC in a protest aimed at peacefully demonstrating what Basant was all about. Members of the Kite Flying Association have said the ban has left some 150,000 people jobless in Lahore, chiefly in Mochi Gate, and affected another 80,000 in Kasur. The art exhibition, best seen from the high roof tops of the Old City will continue till March 20, and is expected to add to the debate over these contentious issues. Lok Virsa, the federal government-run institute of folk and traditional heritage, has announced a Basant festival to be organised on March 6 in Islamabad. The ban on Basant applies only to Punjab, with the Punjab CM reportedly ordering a tough crackdown on illegal kite-flying.

As most of us know, the ban on kite flying first by the Lahore High Court and then the government followed a series of horrendous deaths caused by razor-sharp kite twine slitting open necks. These deaths were tragic and unacceptable. But it is also a fact that they could have been stopped by enforcing laws that already existed on the sale and use of the chemically treated twine. Other safeguards were also possible, so that a colourful, secular festival that united people across the class divide and which has been a part of Lahore’s heritage for centuries was not snatched away. This loss is being highlighted by the innovative protest staged by artists alongside ordinary people who lament the loss of Basant and the joy taken away with it. We hope their voices will be heard. With Lahore’s heritage sites already under threat due to ongoing construction in the province, we can look to other countries that have ‘developed’ without losing their history, art and culture. We can learn from them and return to people a festival they own – and a city they love.

Census confusion

Will Pakistan hold a census as per schedule in March this year? With February already over, the country is facing a strange situation where different government officials are giving contradictory timelines for when the exercise of counting the population will be completed. Last week, the parliamentary secretary for finance and revenue affairs told the National Assembly that the government would need the army’s assistance to conduct the census as per schedule. This is hardly anything new; it was known to the government since March 2015, when it agreed to conduct a census. If this was known for over a year, how is it that the government still does not know if the army will be available to assist with the census? Already, half of the Rs15 billion budget for the 18-day exercise has been earmarked for the army, but we still don’t know if our already overstretched military would be able to spare almost 200,000 troops to provide security to teams conducting the census. Moreover, the selection and training of officials who will be conducting the actual census has not even begun. The likely outcome of the government’s wavering is another ‘indefinite’ delay in conducting the census.

Given that Pakistan has conducted only one census in the last 35 years, the government’s statistics should be considered to have expired. Not that the government would do much better if it had the correct statistics, but without anything resembling accurate data all decisions are based on and often marred by major statistical guesswork. There is a reason the constitution of Pakistan mandates holding a census every decade. The pattern was followed till 1981, after which only one census was held in 1998. The absence of a census has increased the sensitivities of smaller provinces, with Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakthunkhwa much more active in pushing the government to follow timelines. The PPP leadership in Sindh has called for an All Parties Conference (APC) on the issue. Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah has called it an issue of ‘life or death’ and has urged the government to convene another CCI meeting to finalise the dates for the next census. The MQM is insisting that the Housing Census 2013 needs to be completed instead of initiating a new census from scratch but the MQM demand will create more problems if accepted. The government would be advised to provide a clear answer to whether it will hold a census in March this year or not. The debate should then move to what methodology will be used to ensure accurate results.

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"Allah is sufficient for us;an excellent guardian is He!

September 03, 2016

CPEC security

At the conclusion of the two-day seminar on the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in Gilgit, there was no doubt left as to the purpose of the occasion. Chief of Army Staff Raheel Sharif took to the podium and delivered his sternest warning yet to any external actors looking to destabilise the project and the country. At the same time, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, accompanied by the Chinese ambassador, on a visit to Balochistan, repeated the same message. The COAS named the Indian PM Modi and the Indian intelligence agency RAW, as he reasserted Pakistan’s commitment to keeping its borders safe and ensuring the security of the CPEC. He was clearly responding to Modi raising the Balochistan issue recently as well as the Indian media’s attempts to paint protests in GB as part of a separatist agenda. The PM’s message in Balochistan that terrorists had been eliminated seemed to be directed more at the Baloch separatist insurgency than Islamist terrorists. The PM travelled to open the Kohlu-Sibi road whose construction had to be halted in 2006 due to the ongoing insurgency. With the Chinese ambassador in audience the message was clear. Pakistan can and will deliver on its commitments on the CPEC.

It is most certainly a powerful message to send, which will be received well in the power corridors in China where questions have been raised over whether Pakistan could deliver on its commitments. As a message to external actors who may want to destabilise Pakistan, there is no doubt that this is the right message to send. No one should be allowed to interference in the internal affairs of the country. The COAS presented the Chinese city of Urumqi as a vision for the future of Gilgit-Baltistan and spoke very highly of the hard working people of the region. But that the state is inclusive towards the people of GB and Balochistan should be a sense that must grow much stronger than it is at the moment. The road between Sibbi and Kohlu promises much by reducing the distance between the two from 600km to 174km, but the benefits must go to not only the investors but to the ‘locals’ as well. It is good that the PM talked of the ‘usurped’ rights of the people of Balochistan, but it would be better if the government could come up with ways of bringing those who are sceptical on board with carrots, not sticks.

True or false?

The Rangers operation in Karachi has received broad support from political parties at the national level and few have refrained from appreciating its role in reducing violence in the city. There is no need for the paramilitary organisation to be insecure about its work and embellish details about its record. It should also repay the faith placed in it by the country and giving regular updates to our representatives about the operation. A recent development threatens to undermine the across-the-board unity and raise questions about the operation. The Rangers had been touting the apparent fact that a human rights organisation, known as the Human Rights Commission South Asia, had endorsed its operation. This is now being disputed by the Senate Standing Committee on Human Rights, which claims that no such organisation exists and is a propaganda creation. To make matters worse, representatives of the Rangers have skipped two meetings of the Senate committee where they were to be questioned about this organisation and asked to submit a copy of the report endorsing the operation. The reason given for the absence was that the prevailing law and order situation did not allow for officials to make themselves available in Islamabad. This seems like an attempt at deflecting the controversy since it shouldn’t be too difficult for one higher official to be available for briefing elected representatives of the people, especially when the Rangers have claimed such success in bringing peace to Karachi. Such an attitude will only compound the original error and break the bonds of trust.

The Rangers have now said they will not be able to make anyone available to appear before the committee till November. This, too, is not sufficient to ensure civilian oversight over the operation. What’s more, the Rangers have forayed into political matters in recent days, with the director general suggesting that the quota system be abolished. Such issues are better left to those given such responsibility by voters and if the Rangers believe political topics affect the success of the operation then they should be presented in parliament. Ensuring the supremacy of parliament, as laid out in the constitution, will be beneficial to the Rangers too as they will have the security of knowing that their actions have the backing of the people’s representatives. That should be more important than the supportive words of an outside organisation, whether genuine or not. The Rangers operation needs to stand on its own merits and should not need bolstering in such a manner. Otherwise, there may be all sorts of questions raised about the efficacy of the operation.

Source : Editorial

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To succeed,look at things not as they are,but as they can be.:)

September 04, 2016

KP attacks

Just one day after both Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Chief of Army Staff Raheel Sharif gave speeches about our success in the fight against militancy, we learnt that security is a relative term in Pakistan. For the second time in a month, following the killing of a lawyer and the bombing of the hospital in Quetta where his body was taken, militants again struck the legal community, this time killing 14 people and injuring 52 at a suicide attack at the district courts in Mardan. Earlier in the day, four suicide bombers targeted the Christian Colony in Peshawar but were intercepted; it was local security guards who first resisted heroically the attack. But if 14 dead and terror spreading across two cities is what constitutes failure, we must shudder at the thought of the scale of damage the two attacks could have caused. The questions arising will naturally be hard after the narrative of victory becomes more pronounced.

What these attacks do show is that the government should refrain from declaring almost final victory when discussing the fruits of military operations. The still-routine nature of such attacks in Pakistan means that talk of success will only undermine confidence in the government and make it even harder to eliminate the militant threat. Given the ease with which militants from both sides are able to cross the fluid border, the assertions that attackers were foreigners or came from Afghanistan are without much use as long as no further details can be offered. For what it is worth, responsibility for the attack was claimed by the TTP’s Jamaat-ul-Ahrar faction, which does have a significant presence in Afghanistan. Still, the real need here is to be self-critical and realistically assess the situation we face within our own borders and adopt adequate steps to tackle it. These were obviously well planned attacks and we need to accept that the menace of terrorism still lives on within our country, even if there is support for it from beyond our borders. It is also essential that we examine why our intelligence apparatus was not able to predict the new action by the terrorists. It is possible – as a police spokesman said – that these are the last, desperate acts of a force which is close to being obliterated. But certainly, the force for now seems able to act at will without any prior knowledge to our own security apparatus. Both the civilian and military leadership need to work together to address the problem which still claims lives at regular intervals.

Asking for the moon

In 1608, Hans Lippershey designed the first telescope which was used a couple of years later by Galileo to sight the moon. In 1969, Neil Armstrong actually walked on the moon. In 2016, Mufti Muneebur Rehman, the chairman of the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee, wrote a letter to the Ministry of Religious Affairs asking it to stop the Met Department from making ‘predictions’ about the sighting of the moon before the committee had an opportunity to pronounce its verdict. Twice a year, controversy invariably breaks out over whether the moon has been sighted, where it has been seen and when Eid will be celebrated. On Friday, the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee announced that the moon had not been sighted, an assertion that was immediately contradicted by the Met Department. If sides must be taken in this controversy, then clearly the Met Department is in the right. Science has reached the point – indeed reached the point many decades ago – where it could predict the lunar cycle for the next hundred years. But cold, hard science has been rejected in favour of the showmanship of the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee, whose members seem to enjoy their perks and being in the limelight. Recall how, for Eidul Fitr earlier this year, Mufti Muneeb was seen angrily disconnecting his telephone cord when his spokesman leaked information about the sighting of the moon. A hunger for publicity should not trump science, especially when it inconveniences millions of people who have to make preparations for Eid.

The problem is not with the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee alone. Freelance committees in provinces decide to hold moon-sightings of their own, with the Masjid Qasim Ali Khan in Peshawar particularly notorious for spotting the moon on a different day than the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee. Celebrating Eid on different days is bad for the cohesiveness of the country and can throw a spanner in the plans of people who have to travel to meet their relatives and loved ones. If, for the sake of tradition, we choose to keep the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee, the process needs to be reformed. The Met Department’s statements on when and where the moon can be sighted and at which angle it will be seen should be taken on board and used to corroborate moon-sightings by the public. The Met Department can also be asked to generate simulated images of the moon beforehand to further confirm its sighting. Then the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee can enjoy its five minutes of fame and we won’t seem like a disunited and unscientific nation.

Pension problems

While there has been some attention directed recently towards the plight of the nearly six million pensioners in the country registered with the Employees Old Age Benefit Institution, their plight is in so many ways a desperate one. The government has announced it will be setting up a scheme enabling the pensioners to draw the amounts owed to them using ATM cards from December this year. This may solve some of the administrative hassles currently involved in obtaining the meagre amounts. But the real issue goes beyond this. Around 40 million mine and industrial workers are particularly perturbed by the fact that they are being paid only the sum of Rs5,250 per month as pension and have demanded that since it is impossible to survive on this amount, the pension be raised to at least Rs15,000. The miners and industrial workers deposit each year at least Rs20 billion into the EOBI, as an insurance for their needs in old age.

While the EOBI has consistently complained it lacks the funds to pay out pensions, the question is why. Currently, the reserves of the institution stand at about Rs300 billion. There is an argument they should be higher given that workers have been depositing the allocated percentage since 1976 with the amount paid to them as pension rising only gradually. Someone must look into this for signs of possible mismanagement and corruption over a period of many years. In the first place, a major audit of the EOBI is required to determine quite where the amounts deposited with it have gone. There also needs to be a scheme to ensure pensioners are able to recover what is owed to them each month in a dignified and convenient manner. This has not been the case so far. It is also clear that the sum of under Rs6000 does not provide sufficient income to survive on, even if we assume that by the time a worker begins collecting his or her pension, there will be other earning members in the family. This of course is not invariably the case and what is most important of all is that the underlying purpose of the EOBI Act be enforced with all institutions compelled to follow the rules and an adequate amount paid out as pension to those who have toiled for years.

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To succeed,look at things not as they are,but as they can be.:)

September 05, 2016

Back on the streets

The team of Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri returned to the streets on Saturday to add uncertainly to the political atmosphere. Not satisfied with what became of his allegations of systematic rigging in the May 2013 elections, the PTI chairman told his supporters outside the Punjab Assembly that Nawaz Sharif would steal the next election in 2018 by using illegitimately earned money to buy people over. This was an ironic and twisted acknowledgement of the fact that, after all that has been said and done, and as things stand at the moment, the PML-N will still win the elections. Destabilising the whole order then seems to be the only way out for Imran. If he were a simpleton he would need to be told how the electoral system works. Sharif has of course been among the wealthiest figures in the country for many years. He has, however, not won every election because he possesses wealth, and he has not won all of them. Wealth – illegal or legal – matters for him and his party as much as it does for the Imrans and Tareens and their party in the system we live in and which also produced Imran and his party. The Panama Papers and arcane fights over the terms of reference for a judicial commission have, thanks to the mindlessly unprincipled politics over them, failed to capture the imagination of the public and left Imran with a fraction of the people he would normally pull in for a major rally. Imran went after not only Nawaz Sharif but just about every political institution in the country – from the National Accountability Bureau to the Election Commission of Pakistan and the Federal Investigation Agency – for not taking action over the Panama Papers. The ECP has only recently been reconstituted and the PTI and others have filed petitions there as part of their strategy to pressure their rivals.

What has been glaringly clear from the outset is that Imran is not interested in justice or fighting corruption. Rather he wants Nawaz’s head handed to him on a plate so Imran can be installed, by hook or by crook, where he thinks he belongs more than anybody else. Tahirul Qadri took to the streets of Rawalpindi and, true to his chosen calling, issued a call to the army chief to intervene to provide justice to those who were killed in the Model Town incident. Again, what has been clear from the outset in this case is Qadri’s intention not to seek justice but to exploit lives and deaths in order for him to be installed where he thinks he belongs. Both men are ready to propagate the ugliest stories about the government because the only aim is to achieve power, no matter what the cost. With their messianic complexes both have almost descended into parody. But the capacity of parodies to do real damage to the polity is well-known and the government should not react in a manner that gives more importance to the whole affair than is necessary. With containers set up across the length and breadth of both Lahore and Rawalpindi on the day, the government succeeded in angering even those who are now tired of the gimmicks of the Khan-Qadri nexus. Many wonder if lessons have been learnt from the four-month long standoff at D Chowk in 2014. Nothing new has been brought to the table with the rallies and, consequently, the question remains what it was when it all began. If the protests are taken up a notch higher – and it appears that the PTI and PAT cannot do so unless violence and tragedy are introduced into the mix – what strategy does the government have? It could be the ability or inability to deal with this in a rational and wise manner that might define what direction the situation takes.

Clear choice

South Asia faces a water crisis and it may not be simply about water scarcity. Some reports have claimed that South Asia is water-scarce amidst abundance – as is evident in the frequency of major floods that continue to hit the region. However, flood water here cannot be harnessed for either drinking or for agricultural use. This can be managed if the right kind of water infrastructure is put in place. It is this problem that poses the greatest challenge. According to a report by academic journal ‘Nature Geoscience’, 60 percent of the groundwater in the Indo-Gangetic Basin is contaminated. The report challenges the commonly held idea that depletion of water resources is the biggest challenge facing the region. Instead, it says, the attention of authorities needs to turn to the severe contamination of the region’s water supplies. Hundreds of millions of people in the region continue to consume water that can cause serious short- and long-term diseases. The two major concerns are salinity and the presence of arsenic, which can cause cancer. We would do well to remember that last year authorities in Lahore reported that over 50 percent of the city’s water tube wells produced water high in arsenic.

So while people continue to consume water as a life force, the same water is acting as poison in the long term. The problem has emerged from the severe contamination of the regions’ rivers – the major source for replenishing the ground water supplies. The pollution of our waters is a problem of collective responsibility. Governments can lead the way but citizens will have to share in the responsibility. For its part, there are simple things that can be done by the government. First, there should be strong and effective attempts to tell people about the risks of drinking unsafe water. Second, water treatment plants must be installed to make sure that water is cleaned up and tested at regular intervals. Clean water is a right. Not getting it is a serious menace. This issue needs to be taken up on an emergency basis.

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To succeed,look at things not as they are,but as they can be.:)

September 06, 2016

Future or failure?

We seem to have once again wriggled our way out of incurring any financial penalties for the failure to start off the Iran-Pakistan Gas Pipeline Project. The perennial impasse over the project, which was recommended in the early 2000s, continues to make no sense at all. According the agreement, Pakistan is to pay Iran $1 million a day for failing to lay down its 781 kilometre share of the pipeline by the start of 2015. This means Pakistan owes Iran at least $605 million for its failure to fulfil the terms of the agreement. The only good news is that Iran does not seem keen on actually charging Pakistan the said amount and is showing considerable patience to allow the pipeline to come to fruition. The pipeline is now scheduled to be completed by the end of 2017, by which time the penalty owed by Pakistan will have come close to the actual cost of the pipeline.

The sanctions against Iran have been cited as the reason for the delay in building the pipeline, but those sanctions were in place when the pipeline agreement was being signed. It was a risk Pakistan was willing to take on. If anything, the situation has only gotten better after the slow lifting of the UN sanctions on it. Pakistan, however, appears forever caught in the cycle of renegotiating the terms of the pipeline with Iran. Now, our officials are attempting to change the date of the penalty clause to sometime in the year 2018. The IP Pipeline Project is vital for Pakistan’s future as the country remains energy-deficient. With Pakistan’s gas reserves depleting fast, the constant delays over the pipeline with Iran make no sense. Renegotiating the gas rate with Iran by dangling the spectre of another potential project, Tapi, may not work because Iran by then may no longer feel as ‘benevolent’ as it is right now. We must complete our end of the pipeline so that it can start bringing much-needed gas to Pakistan. Iran’s own failure to complete its side of the pipeline may partly explain its willingness to renegotiate terms, but this cannot be an agreement that remains on paper. Pakistan needs what Iran is offering and the project should not become a costly failure for us.

ODI rankings

The breakneck speed at which cricket has evolved was evident as Pakistan, freshly minted as the number one team in the world in the traditional Test format, was thrashed 4-1 in the ODI series and remains rooted at ninth in the world rankings. We are last among all established cricketing nations in the ranking and even below minnows Bangladesh. As things stand, Pakistan will not get automatic entry into the 2018 World Cup and will have to battle the likes of Ireland, UAE and Zimbabwe in a playoff. Should we not show drastic improvement by then, failing to make it to the World Cup is not inconceivable. The biggest problem Pakistan cricket faces is its archaic approach to batting. We still cling on to the tactics which won us the 1992 World Cup: to start slowly and keep wickets in hand to hit out at the end. The problem with that, as England showed in smashing a world record 444 against us, is that the rest of the world goes hell for leather from ball one and never stops. Our average scores of 250 have little chance of being successfully defended in an age of flat batting pitches, fielding restrictions and short boundaries.

Captain Azhar Ali may have consistently scored runs but did so at far too slow a pace to help us reach winning scores. His position as skipper, and indeed his place in the team, may be under doubt. England greatly benefited from all their bowlers being more than capable batsmen while we persist with specialist bowlers and have few all-rounders. Our fielding is, as always, a shambles. But we should resist blaming the players for our ODI woes. The fault lies in a dysfunctional system which has done nothing to identify the specialists needed for this very specialised form of the game. Back home, we have yet again changed around the domestic structure and added a new domestic T20 tournament which reduced the total number of teams and ensured the monopoly Karachi, Lahore and Rawalpindi have over the sport would be maintained. We may want to consider not just specialist players but specialist coaches too for the shorter formats of the game and an emphasis on qualities such as bowling at the death and clearing the ropes, which are not as necessary in Test matches. As justifiably proud as we are at being top of the pile in Tests, we need to ensure the stigma of being bottom of the heap in ODIs is soon removed.

Poverty report

The Sustainable Development Policy Institute has published a timely report titled ‘Geography of Poverty in Pakistan’, which looks at national, provincial and district level trends from 2008 to 2013. The report not only highlights the districts where poverty is high but also tracks the changes in poverty levels in individual districts over a five-year period. At the provincial level, it is not surprising that the highest levels of poverty are found in Balochistan (63 percent) – followed by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (39 percent), Sindh (37.5 percent) and Punjab (24 percent) respectively. But the report notes that focusing on the poorest provinces alone will not do as the largest number of poor people is in Punjab.

Rural-urban disparity too remains high and is at its worst in Sindh. This immediately suggests an area of focus for the Sindh government to focus on with its poverty reduction programmes. The report contains another alarming detail. The entire population of the two districts of Kohlu and Kohistan – in Balochistan and KP, respectively – lives below the poverty level. These districts are joined by almost two dozen others, which have over 72 percent of their populations living in poverty. It takes no genius to suggest that there is a need for the government to develop poverty reduction plans for the most impoverished districts in the country. The task is most difficult in Balochistan with 23 of its districts living in extreme poverty. There will certainly need to be national-level coordination on this issue. While the report does offer a lot in terms of data, it does seem to underestimate urban poverty. This is probably an outcome of the baseline indicators used. Perhaps, more research on urban poverty will help the picture become even more clear.

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To succeed,look at things not as they are,but as they can be.:)