Not on!

Pakistan is going through one of the worst financial emergency to hit the country. Escalated terrorism had brought the country’s economy to a fester, only to make it even worse with the worldwide recession. Pakistan is dreadfully seeking help not only from international financial institutions but also from the ‘friendly countries’ or ‘Friends of Pakistan group’ as they would call it. Country, they say, is at the verge of a bankruptcy since they do not have enough dollars to support even one month’s import bill.

One would expect the government to take desperate measures to solve the liquidity crunch and to bring back the economy on track. Things like cutting down on avoidable imports for a while, lessening non-developmental government expenditure, efforts to save every penny in the exchequer that can be etc. But what do we see instead? A cabinet expansion in the central government; by not just one or two, but by forty ministers. A fifty member cabinet now increased to a big fat 55, with as many advisors inducted by the Prime Minister with all the perks and privileges that come with the designation. What an open and cold-blooded injustice with the tax payers’ money, as ten million rupees is the budget for each minister for a period of one year.  

There is still a likelihood the number of ministers may swell up to seventy, once two othercoalition partners of the government are accommodated in the federal cabinet. Nepotism at it’s worst.

What one fails to understand is that what do they actually plan to do with all these ministers? If Chinese government can run its country, rather successfully, with only twenty five ministers, if Japan can do exceedingly well with only eighteen, if Germany is content with a fifteen member cabinet, why does Pakistan need fifty five? The other thing that one needs to know is the credentials of all those ministers and the basis on which they were chosen to lead a particular department. One would also like to meet the genius who invented portfolios like ‘Ministry of Population’.

If that was not enough, Mr. President – the Fresh King of Islamabad, Asif Ali Zardari took an army of 200 delegates with him on a chartered flight to meet the King of Saudi Arabia just to get concessions on oil payments.

How long will nepotism rule the roost in this ‘Land of pure’? How long will it take before our taxes would actually be spent on us? I hope I live to see that day.

Hope - All's lost or All that remains?

It has been a year and a half now. It all started with that gloomy morning of March 9^th last year when (ex) President Musharraf decided to dismiss then Chief Justice of Pakistan, Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chauhdary, and we haven’t had any respite since then.

It seems as if we have gotten into a never ending cycle of disappointments, disasters, depression and dismay. Suicide bombings, processions on roads, strikes, political tug of war, assassinations, economic melt down, flight of capital, earthquake and what not has stricken this ‘Land of pure’, since then, all of which earlier seemed to have been doing quite well, atleast since 2001. Musharraf, a dictator, had everything under control, apparently, until his decision to sack the Justice. Things just never got back on track, if they ever were, but deteriorated with every passing day.

We saw a panel of Supreme Court judges reinstating their ‘Boss’ back onto his position only for a couple of months before they all were to go because of an ‘emergency’ imposed by the former President/Army Chief of Pakistan. Country was back on streets, chanting anti Musharraf slogans and reciting revolutionary poems in corner meetings, from Khyber to Karachi. All of a sudden ‘Army ruled-Land of the Pure’ had found new saviors in form of leaders of protesting lawyers. Nawaz Sharif, former Prime Minister, ousted by Musharraf in a bloodless coup back in October 99, attempted to come back to the country he once ruled  after an 'exile’ of about seven years, only to find him thrown on a Jeddah bound flight just an hour after he touched Islamabad. He eventually was allowed back again, in a month’s time, after dew deliberations by ‘foreign friends’ of the ‘Holy Land’.

Benazir Bhutto, too, ended her self imposed exile and came back to Pakistan after a deal brokered by British, later hijacked by the Americans to lead the supposedly ‘planned’ setup that was to form after the polls. She was greeted by thousands of people and a bomb blast in Karachi.

Unfortunately we lost her in the following month in a successful assassination attempt. No one has yet claimed responsibility of this murder. This brought Asif Ali Zardari, the ‘unpopular’ widower of late Ms. Bhutto into the forefront of Pakistan's political wrestle mania. In the aftermath of Bhutto’s assassination, country saw widespread lawlessness for at least three days, especially in her native province, Sindh. Polls were delayed for a few weeks. 

February 18^th was the D-Day. People voted. Pakistan Peoples Party of the deceased former Prime Minister won a majority in the centre and Sindh, with Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) coming in second lead in centre. Musharraf backed party, PML Q was voted out but not completely. Sindh went entirely to the PPP, where as Punjab got a coalition government as did NWFP and Balochistan.

People held high hopes of this new government, rightly or wrongly, and the whole nation seemed up beat, which wasn’t to last long. A tug of war started between PPP and PMLN on over the issue of deposed judges. Governance was ignored all this time. A sudden flight of capital started from Pakistan and within months Pakistani rupee devalued by some thirty percent. Federal reserves decreased by half and country came on the brink of bankruptcy. In the midst of all, Musharraf ‘wilted’ under the pressure put by the ‘democratic forces’ and resigned. This brought Asif Ali Zardari, aka Mr. 10%, at the helm of the affairs as he was crowned as the ‘Fresh King of Islamabad’. Rupee devalued even further, stock markets crumbled, industries closed down when democracy finally ruled the 170 million frustrated people after nine years. International financial conditions and oil prices didn’t help either. As of today, Pakistan has agreed to enter in a support program with IMF, an institution Pakistan had got rid of only two years earlier. 

 All this time, western borders of the country adjacent to Afghanistan have seen an intense fight between Pakistani forces and ‘Taliban’. Conditions have been sores then ever before with people being killed day in and day out in this ‘holy war’ of sorts which doesn’t seem to be ending anytime soon.

It has been several months since the inception of the new ‘ray of hope’ government, but things have gone worse. Economy and terrorism are the two bleeding wounds draining this overly populated country of ours, Pakistan.

So, should we lose hope? I don’t think so. I am hopeful that things would change – for good- if we pull up our socks and take on all these problems head on.