Express Tribune Editorials - February 2016

8/18/2019 Express Tribune Editorials - February 2016

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February 2016

ITORIALS


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February 2016

W W W . T H E C S S P O I N T . C O M Page 4

ontents

The chaos at PIA ................................................................................. 6

Getting connected ............................................................................. 7

Understanding Balochistan ................................................................ 8

The Pathankot inquiry ........................................................................ 9

The devil in the details ..................................................................... 10

Attack in Quetta ............................................................................... 11

Marriage and minorities .................................................................. 12

Managing the migrant stream ......................................................... 13

Implementing RTI laws ..................................................................... 14

Fixing healthcare in K-P .................................................................... 16

Criteria behind censorship ............................................................... 17

LNG deal with Qatar ......................................................................... 19

Justifying domestic violence ............................................................ 20

Plain words at last ............................................................................ 21

Development and security — intertwined ...................................... 23

RIP Fatima Surayya Bajia .................................................................. 24

Going beyond the IP pipeline ........................................................... 25

A testing mayoralty .......................................................................... 26

Reforms of the educational kind...................................................... 27

Good news for Hindus ..................................................................... 28

Feeling the heat ............................................................................... 29

The bombings in Turkey ................................................................... 30

PIA privatisation — complexities abound ........................................ 31

Steer a middle course ...................................................................... 32

A NAB too far ................................................................................... 33

Inefficient in innovation ................................................................... 34

The Kisan package — a mirage ........................................................ 35

Slow progress on Pathankot ............................................................ 36

An existential battle ......................................................................... 37

Thar and its many commissions ....................................................... 39

Another set of goals ......................................................................... 40

The dilemma that is the Steel Mills .................................................. 41

The troubled census ......................................................................... 42

Riots next door ................................................................................. 43

Cremation sites for Hindus .............................................................. 44

Enter: Pakistan Airways Limited ....................................................... 46

Where is the honour in killing? ........................................................ 47

‘In’ or ‘out’ for the UK ...................................................................... 48

After the Baldia fire .......................................................................... 49

Staying on track ................................................................................ 50

A triumph for Pakistan cricket ......................................................... 51

One hand clapping ........................................................................... 53

Heatwave approaching .................................................................... 54

Pay tax? No thanks ........................................................................... 55

BJP promises .................................................................................... 56


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February 2016


Students and stupidity ..................................................................... 57

Fragile but holding ........................................................................... 59

Transporting Karachi ........................................................................ 60

Outlawing domestic violence ........................................................... 61

Education in a shambles .................................................................. 63

Mirror, mirror on the wall… ............................................................. 64


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February 2016


The chaos at PIA

It seems that the PML-N government has still notrealised that its actions vis-a-vis the strike actionby PIA‟s unions have the potential to lead it onto apath that it may eventually regret taking. Theevents that have swirled around the airline in thelast 48 hours have been tragic at the human leveland disastrous financially with the national carrierhaving ceased all domestic and international flights

on February 3 as the strike by the unions entereda second day. There is still no confirmationregarding who fired the fatal shots on February 2that killed three people protesting thegovernment‟s action to partially privatise theairline.

In the wake of the deaths, the PIA chairman hasnow resigned his post with immediate effect,taking responsibility for the violence. Undeterredby the extreme hostility of the unions, the primeminister has made a personal intervention sayingthat strikers would be punished with jail as theyhave flouted the Essential Services (Maintenance) Act 1952, and those that worked normally wouldbe rewarded, though with what and under which

ordinance was unclear. As is evident, thegovernment and the unions are deeply entrenchedwith both sides carving bleeding chunks off an

already-beached whale. What the employee unionscompletely fail to acknowledge is that PIA isdesperately in need of reshaping. With over19,000 employees (November 2015 figure) andover 700 employees per aircraft, it is simplyunsustainable. With flight operations suspended,private airlines are now having a field day, and oneof them promptly doubled the one-way fare

between Karachi and Islamabad, rank profiteeringif ever there was.

Notwithstanding the intransigence of the unions,the government now needs to realise that theinvocation of the Essential Services legislation hasbackfired and that the PIA engineering division hasthe capacity — and probably the will — to keep allaircraft grounded for as long as it wants.

Accusations from the government‟s side that thestrike is politically motivated are as yet unproven.Meanwhile, the travelling public suffers massiveloss of utility; business suffers as does the nationalimage internationally. All sides need to stand back,take a deep breath and stop butchering whatought to be a national asset. Common sense mustprevail.


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February 2016


Getting connected

Connecting Pakistan to the internet has been apainfully slow process, but there are nowindications that connectivity generally, and not justthrough PCs and laptops, is rising significantly,courtesy of smart mobile devices and the rollout of

3G services. The number of broadbandsubscriptions has now passed the 25 million mark.The cellular service providers had a bumper monthin December 2015 when they sold more than 1.5million high-speed mobile internet connections,this according to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority. There are now 26.3 million mobilebroadband connections which is a startling six percent increase on the previous month, November.

Whether such levels of growth are sustainableremains to be seen, but the figures suggest thatPakistan is becoming more connected by themonth.

Other technologies such as DSL, WiMax and Fibre-to-the-home were measured as stagnant in thesame monitoring period, another indicator of the

primacy of the mobile phone over all other types ofinternet connection. Mobile internet users nowaccount for one-fifth of cellular users nationally.

This number can only continue upwards assaturation is yet distant. There are around 200million people in Pakistan and about 13 per cent ofthem are now net-connected. Some of theimplications of this explosion in connectivity arenot immediately obvious and bear closerexamination. There have been widespreadanecdotal reports of mobile phone usage,

particularly in rural areas, leading to a rise inlimited literacy, with people of no formal educationusing Urdu and Roman Urdu scripts tocommunicate via SMS services. How this might becapitalised by expanding their literacy via an onlineconnection is yet to be explored. There is alsoconsiderable evidence that retail sales via theinternet have grown in rural areas. Whilst thenumbers are interesting, it is the underlying social

changes — and benefits — that mark the humble „mobile‟ as a major change agent for rich and poor

alike in the country.


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February 2016


Understanding Balochistan

The past, present and future for Balochistan haveall preoccupied governments of Pakistan fordecades. The largest and most-thinly populated

province is underdeveloped and has not benefitedfrom the abundant natural resources that lie withinits borders. In recent years, it has become abattleground for separatist, ethnic and sectarianinterests. Terrorists of many adherences havemade the lives of many a misery and killedcountless others since 2004. The use of force bymultiple actors has led to huge suffering for thepeople of the province. All of this was tacitly orexplicitly acknowledged in a presentation ofstartling candour by Army Chief General RaheelSharif on February 2.

A two-day seminar on “Prospects of Peace andProsperity in Balochistan” heard General Raheelsay that the province had become “a hotbed of

proxy wars” which were a part of a “regional andglobal grand strategy”. He called Balochistan amost complex problem — it is — and then went

off-piste to talk of economic, ethnographic andsectarian divides, demonstrating a grasp of the bigpicture, the landscape beyond the militaryperspective, that has marked him out as adistinctly singular player in the recent history ofgovernance in Pakistan. The army chief also talkedabout the poorly developed infrastructure,extremes of poverty, desperately poor education

and health facilities and lack of jobs — all of whichhave contributed to the parlous state of theprovince. There was nothing that was particularlynew in what General Raheel had to say, but it wasunusual to hear all this coming from a militarysource, at least in terms of an understanding ofthe wider problems that are not the core businessof the soldiery. The army in the form of theFrontier Works Organisation has been doing its bit

of late, and by the end of 2016 will havecompleted 870km of roads in the province since2014. Without burnishing the general‟s imageunduly, one might wonder why the civiliangovernment wasn‟t able to undertake such

initiatives.


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February 2016


The Pathankot inquiry

The team investigating the attack on thePathankot airbase in India has reported that it canfind no linkage or evidence to suggest that Masood Azhar had ordered the attack or was involved in itsplanning. He is the head of the bannedorganisation Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM) which theIndians claim carried out the attack. After the

attack and the allegations made by the Indianside, action was taken relative to the JeM. Itsheadquarters was sealed and several dozenactivists detained. The Joint Investigation Teamset up by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is still slatedto visit India, but the attack is casting a longshadow over the nascent peace process.

The report goes on to say that “low cadre

members” of the JeM may have been involved butthat does not deliver sufficient clarity to satisfy theIndian side nor indeed should Pakistan be satisfiedeither. There is no paucity of evidence as to theorigins of the attack, and if the Indians haveintercepts of phone conversations made while itwas in progress, then it is up to them to share it.

For its part, Pakistan needs to be a lot moreproactive in addressing the problem of extremismand not only in Punjab.

Where all of this leaves the peace process isunclear. Neither side has gone down the well-trodden road of finger-pointing and re-running theblame game, a welcome development in itself.Both sides, at least via their respective leaders,have said they remain committed to thedeveloping dialogues at the foreign secretary level.Equally unclear is the fate and future of Azhar,currently in what is described as „protectivecustody‟. If there is no evidence against him, eventhough he heads a banned organisation, the justification for holding him may be considered bysome quarters to have weakened. Yet releasinghim is unlikely to play well with India as well as theUS, the UK, Japan and France, all of whom havehad a hand, quite possibly a heavy hand, in

pressuring Pakistan to wield a bigger stick in thedirection of extremist organisations. What Indiaand Pakistan need to do is to keep talking,because if they do not, they are handing a win totheir enemies.


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February 2016


The devil in the details

There is a strong argument in favour of peacetalks with the Taliban in Afghanistan as thereappears to be no other way forward, but gettingbeyond a position that is purely conceptual to onethat is substantive is a tortuous road indeed. Thelatest construct to be deployed in the search for

peace is the Quadrilateral Coordination Groupmade up of representatives from Pakistan, Afghanistan, the US and China. They met onFebruary 6 and are to meet again on February 23to work on what is optimistically called a „roadmap.‟

It would be fair to say that there is considerable

scepticism about the chances of success for thisquartet, in large part because some sections of theTaliban hold the military initiative in Afghanistanand the fighting season is now well under way.Urging the Taliban in their various iterations to jointhe talks while they have the Afghan governmenton the back foot is likely to be a waste of breath,the more so as other preconditions relating to the

release of prisoners and the opening of the Talibanpolitical office in Qatar, plus the removal of travelrestrictions — are unlikely to be met. Road maps

do not come much sketchier than this.

Alongside these developments, Afghanistan andPakistan are doing some essential repair work onthe relationship between their respective leadsecurity agencies, the ISI and the Afghan NationalDirectorate of Security. What looked like arapprochement with the signing of an MoU in May2015 to the effect that the two would work in amore closely coordinated fashion, quickly turnedsour. It became a memorandum ofmisunderstanding and then dropped off theagenda altogether. Attempts have been made torevive it in the past week, with some quietdiplomacy being deployed and we warmlywelcome this positive move. How the variousthreads mesh together productively given the

overarching trust deficit is difficult to see. Butmesh they must. Devils and details as yet remainun-reconciled.


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February 2016


Attack in Quetta

The city of Quetta has once again been left reelingfrom violence. Asuicide attack targeting acavalcade of the Frontier Corps (FC) killed at least10 people, including four troops, and wounded two

dozen more in the city‟s red zone on February 6. Aconvoy of the FC was patrolling Quetta‟s high-security area when a man riding a bicycle triggeredhis explosive belt next to a paramilitary truck,causing loss of life and leaving a trail ofdestruction. A spokesman for the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan has claimed responsibility forthe atrocity.

The assault came barely two days after PrimeMinister Nawaz Sharifinaugurated the Rs13 billionGwadar-Turbat-Hoshab Road, part of theambitious China-Pakistan Economic Corridor(CPEC). As is evident by this latest bloodbath inBalochistan, there is no doubt, if there was any,that reaping any fruits from the CPEC will remain agargantuan task, especially in the insurgency-

wracked province. Balochistan is no stranger tobloody violence orchestrated by militants ofvarious stripes. A low-key insurgency by Baloch

separatists has since long left the province inchaos and badly mauled. But what is of increasingworry is that this time around, the militants wereable to breach the red zone area of the provincialcapital, which in general is relatively better securedthan other parts of the city. The security failurehere needs to be examined carefully. It is clearthat militants continue to retain the ability to cause

considerable havoc, even with the gains that themilitary may have made against them in recenttimes.

In addition, the attack also sounds a warning tothe authorities as there is no reason why projectsrelated to the CPEC may not be targeted in thefuture in Balochistan. This episode illustrates thechallenges that lie ahead on the road to peace and

development. The civilian and military leadershipsneed to act with resolution and purpose althoughone feels that this quagmire will need a lot morethan that to get resolved.


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February 2016


Marriage and minorities

Laws governing marriage, divorce and inheritancein the minority communities in some instancespredate Partition, and have been the source ofconsiderable inconvenience to minorities sincePakistan came into being. Attempts to redress theirgrievances by reforming legislation have, to saythe very least, had mixed success. Some hope forthe Hindu community has now appeared on the

horizon in the form of the Hindu Marriage Bill2015. The Standing Committee on Law andJustice, sitting with five Hindu MNAs who werespecially invited, have adopted the Billunanimously with the addition of two amendmentsfixing the age of marriage at 18 for both men andwomen and making the new law applicable to theentire country, not only the federal territory.

The Hindu minority is tiny, and shrinking as theycome under pressure either to convert or to shifttheir businesses from ancestral locations. Thedifficulties of legalising marriage has the knock-oneffect of creating other problems in makingchanges in the CNIC, and NADRA recognisingHindu marriages as legal. Why it has taken so long

to produce a piece of legislation that affects such asmall minority is something of a mystery, andthere were members of the Standing Committee

who until the very last were stonewalling the Bill.

Committee Chairman Chaudhry Mahmood Bashir Virk said that he regretted what he described as a “tactical delay” in the framing of a basic piece of

legislation. He lamented, rightly, that it wasunbecoming of Muslims in general and theirpolitical leaders in particular to deny the rights ofminorities who presented no threat to the Muslimfaith or the state itself. With Hindus being lessthan one per cent of the population, Mr Virk has apoint. Peaceful and almost invisible for the mostpart, they are regularly marginalised anddiscriminated against, the vast majority being low-caste, poor and with little chance of advancement.It is to be hoped that the Bill will now be signedinto law by the lower house and a wrong righted,

though from the behaviour of some members ofthe Standing Committee, its progress may not beautomatic.


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February 2016


Managing the migrantstream

Events that started on December 10, 2010 inTunisia have a direct causal linkage to the refugeecrisis that is consuming the Middle East, Turkey,the Balkan states, Greece, all the countries of the

Maghrib and the UK. Millions are on the move andthe small kingdom of Jordan is close to beingoverwhelmed. Turkey has taken in two million andthe European Union (EU) finds that its open-borderpolicy enshrined in the Schengen Agreement isclose to collapse such is the scale of the humancrisis. People from Pakistan are in the mix of thisvast stream, and not all of them are refugees, withmany being economic migrants seeking theirfortune and a better life in the EU.

What to do with illegal immigrants has become anissue within an issue. The EU needs to manage theflow as best as it can and has been deportingillegal immigrants to a range of countries and notonly Pakistan. Pakistan has in the past protested

that some of those it was asked to receive asdeportees had not been verified as Pakistanicitizens in the first place; and some that had been

inappropriately described as having connections toterrorism had themselves been illegally deportedby the EU itself. Now, the EU and Pakistan haveagreed a set of protocols that satisfy the demandsof Pakistan in terms of deportations, adevelopment that has received an endorsementfrom Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar. This is notthe first time that „agreement‟ over this matter is

said to have been reached, and it is to be hopedthat the latest agreement is both durable andworkable to the satisfaction of all sides becausethis is a problem that has the potential to getworse rather than better. The EU has now agreedto the verification process proposed by the InteriorMinistry in line with the Readmission Accord. Itnow remains to be seen whether all sides are ableto effectively implement what are complex

procedures in a timely manner, and a diplomatic „incident‟ with deportees shuttling to-and-fro,avoided.


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February 2016


Implementing RTI laws

Contrary to popular perception, when it comes toprotecting the rights of citizens, Pakistan has someexemplary laws. The 18th Amendment decrees

that access to information held by governmentbodies is a right of every citizen. The provincialgovernments of Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa(K-P) have gone further by introducing their ownRight to Information (RTI) legislation and havebeen lauded for their comprehensive transparencylaws. Unfortunately, it appears that this is wherethe good news ends. A report titled “The State ofProactive Disclosure of Information in Khyber-

Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab Public Bodies” hasreviewed several websites of Punjab and K-Pgovernment departments and found them woefullyslow in adopting RTI laws. Large gaps existbetween what the law states must be made publicand what government bodies are actually willing todisclose.

Broken links, lack of contact information andchanged web addresses are just some of the

problems highlighted in the report. Some websitesonly provide postal addresses and no online meansof requesting information. It seems that theinternet, despite its global power and outreach,remains something of a mystery to ourgovernment bodies. There is a general state ofreluctance when it comes to adopting the web as aquick and easy means of sharing information. Itsusefulness is misunderstood and underestimated.This is compounded by the fossilised mindset ofkeeping the public at arm‟s length and making theprovision of information an onerous task. The RTIlaws in Punjab and K-P can be of little use if theyare not followed up by widespread and effectiveimplementation. Rather than making individualsdig through mounds of broken links and unhelpfulweb pages, there must be proactive

implementation of these laws. The websites andinformation offices must be fully functional, easilyaccessible and actually able to provide theinformation required. Our government bodies needto start considering public welfare a priority as wellas realise that the internet is increasinglybecoming the primary source of information for thepublic.


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February 2016



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February 2016


Fixing healthcare in K-P

Reforming anything in Pakistan is fraught, themore so when years of neglect or politicalinterference has led to deficits in public servicesthat are deeply systemic, only reformed by radicalintervention. Hospitals in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) are in need of root-and-branch overhaul andhave been for many years, and as for many otherentities, privatisation has been floated as a

possible solution. As is common, wheneveranything that smacks of privatisation, or a versionthereof, is proposed, mayhem ensues, and such iscurrently the case in K-P. In broad terms, wesupport the K-P government in its desire forreform but yet again there is evidence of chronicineptitude, nay incompetence, when it comes tocomplex and sensitive changes to systems that arehighly resistant to revision of existing practice.

Imran Khan has clarified that no privatisation wasunder way when it came to the province‟s

hospitals; merely an improvement in standardsand their management. He further said that theimposition of the Essential Services Act by the K-Pgovernment was in reality the provincial authorities

acting in accordance with a decision by thePeshawar High Court on December 7, 2015. Thishas seemingly mollified nobody. There were strikes

at some hospitals, partial strikes at others and nostrikes at all at yet others. The Insaf DoctorsForum has condemned political interference,patients‟ relatives have held protests and burnedtyres and the PML-N leader Amir Maqam hasstirred the pot by going to Hayatabad MedicalComplex and appearing to incite doctors to strike.This has led Mr Khan to ask the chief minister to

file an FIR against him and, in the midst of thepolitical grandstanding, patient services are pushedaside and healthcare in general takes another stepbackwards. A poverty of competencies lies at theheart of the problem. Difficult as it may be, andinconvenient, stakeholder consultation prior toimplementation is essential if the evident chaos isto be avoided. Un-making corrupt and bad practiceis never easy, be it in healthcare or anywhere else.

We prescribe a dose of management training forall concerned.


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February 2016


Criteria behind censorship

Is there any logic or coherence in the way thePakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) hastried to block objectionable online content? Theshort answer is „no‟. Last month, the PTA hadprovided internet service providers with a list ofover 400,000 domains that needed to be blockedfor pornographic content. According to the PTA, ithad been asked by the Supreme Court to “takeremedial steps to quantify the nefariousphenomenon of obscenity and pornography thathas an imminent role to corrupt and vitiate theyouth of Pakistan”. It has now emerged that

among the hundreds of thousands of websites onthe list provided by the PTA, there are countless

websites whose content cannot be consideredobscene by any stretch of the imagination. Amongthese is the microblogging website „Tumblr‟ as well

as websites for photography, ecommerce, bloggingand business.

While not all of these websites may have beenblocked yet, their mere presence on the list is

disturbing, indicating that the PTA has littleunderstanding of the nature of online content. It iscompletely baffling to comprehend how „Tumblr‟

could possibly be considered a “nefariousphenomenon of obscenity”. Some time back, evenInstagram, the popular photo and video-sharingsocial-networking service with nearly 400 millionusers globally, was blocked for some days. Clearly,there is no system or transparency behind theseactions. What the PTA has ostensibly ignored isthat people who want to access blocked content

will be able to do so through the use of proxiesand VPNs. The YouTube ban lasted for over threeyears. And who suffered? Mostly people who werenot tech-savvy enough to find ways to accesscontent blocked by the government. YouTube andsocial networking websites, among other onlinecontent, provide an avenue for people to educatethemselves, find entertainment, launch businessesand expand their careers. Yet, the authorities

conveniently snatch this access away from citizenswith there being little or no accountability. It istime freedom of information is recognised as abasic right in this country in the true sense of theword.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 11th,2016.


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February 2016



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February 2016


LNG deal with Qatar

The $16 billion dollar LNG deal signed betweenPakistan and Qatar on February 10 is being hailedby analysts and industry representatives as a stepin the right direction and perhaps rightly so. Mostquarters have pointed towards the benefit ofimporting the fuel to bridge the widening demand-supply gap in the country, moving a step closer toaddressing the power crisis. The deal will see

Qatar export the fuel to Pakistan for 16 years tomeet our domestic energy requirements. Accordingto the agreement, LNG will be transported toPunjab where power plants are being set up. Theaim is to generate more electricity and also toconvert the fuel to provide it to CNG-basedstations. On paper, everything seems to beworking for the PML-N. Pakistan will buy LNG fromQatar at 13.37 per cent of Brent crude price, whichamounts to $4.68 per million British thermal unitswhen oil is sold at $35 a barrel. This also includesport charges of $320,000 a vessel. This is a muchbetter deal than what was originally planned andgovernment officials have not stopped talkingabout how they have saved millions.

But there are other issues that need to be sortedout. Sindh has expressed its displeasure at theLNG-based power plants being set up in Punjab

and this is where it could all get ugly. We havealready seen smaller provinces resenting projectsthat are based in the PML-N‟s stronghold ofPunjab, as they point towards the lack ofdevelopment taking place elsewhere. With LNGbeing imported to meet domestic requirements,Sindh wants a piece of the action as well and thefederal government should address its concerns.The fact is that LNG is cheap and could greatlyimprove the country‟s energy mix, where a pilingcircular debt has had to be parked in a holdingcompany to reduce the burden on the budget. Fornow, the PML-N will celebrate the deal and use itto garner more votes come the next election.However, it must not ignore that the use ofimported LNG needs to go beyond Punjab. Theconcerns of the smaller provinces must be heeded.



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February 2016


Justifying domestic violence

Anew study has revealed that over half of theteenage female population in Pakistan and Indiahas twisted and misinformed notions aboutdomestic violence. The report by the UnitedNations Population Fund (UNPF), “Sexual andReproductive Health of Young People in Asia and

the Pacific”, found that 53 per cent of teenage girlsin both countries believe that domestic violence is justified. A high percentage of adolescent boysbelieve the same according to data collected fromIndia and other developing countries. It is indeed atragedy that the youth in our country and in thewider region is growing up with such medievalbeliefs.

Regressive attitudes regarding gender roles haveseeped so deeply into culture and society thatoften victims and potential victims of domesticviolence or violence against women in generalbelieve that there is nothing wrong with suchabhorrent behaviour. There is a tendency to blamevictims of violence for their own plight, with the

perpetrator all but absolved of responsibility. Ourpatriarchal societal structure, widespread genderinequality, twisted notions of honour, a weak legal

framework and a general increase in violence insociety have all contributed to domestic violencebeing considered an acceptable part of life. It is asif our society is suffering from the psychologicalphenomenon of the Stockholm Syndrome, whereinvictims develop feelings of sympathy towards theircaptors or offenders. This mindset is setting youngwomen up for lifelong violence. Their children willbe exposed to the same violence and besusceptible to the same beliefs later on.

One way to alter this mindset is by addressing ourwoeful education standards as this was positivelyassociated with such beliefs in the UNPF report.Unemployment and a history of family violencewere also positively associated, both of which canbe found in abundance in Pakistan. Sex education

can go a long way in educating young womenabout their bodies and rights. The responsibility tochange medieval notions falls on society at large,and educators, the government and the media allneed to play a role here.



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February 2016


Plain words at last

It has taken the Director General of theIntelligence Bureau (IB), Aftab Sultan, to finallygive the nation‟s politicians a salutary reality checkregarding the presence of the Islamic State (IS) in

Pakistan. This newspaper, along with a range ofother media outlets and platforms, has beensending out alarm signals for over a year. Thereare well-sourced and researched reports on ISpenetration in the country. Time and again, thosereports have been rubbished by senior politicians,some of them fond of making ludicrous statementsto the effect that “not even the shadow” of the IS

would be tolerated on the soil of Pakistan. The

Senate Standing Committee on Interior wasinformed on February 10 by Mr Sultan that the ISwas emerging as a threat within the country, andthat it had linkages with the banned groupsLashkar-e-Jhangvi and Sipah-e-Sahaba to namebut two, though there are others. He said thatthese organisations had “a soft corner” for the IS

and its ideology. The IB has broken up an ISnetwork in Punjab — no surprise given thepresence of extremist groups leading untroubled

lives there — and Mr Sultan pointed out, as haveinnumerable analysts and knowledgeableobservers, that terrorist groups are “reorganising”.Indeed they are.

This briefing for the Senate Standing Committeeshould finally and conclusively draw a line underthe serial denials of reality by politicians whosemotives for doing so in the light of this informationappear at least suspect. Foot-dragging and denialhave created a space into which the IS has flowed,doubtless grateful at the opportunity it has beenprovided. It has proceeded to do what it does best — exploit local weaknesses in terms ofcountervailing activity and connect to the plug-and-play mass of unfocused but latent extremismacross the country and pressed the „send‟ button.

Its message has been received and understoodfrom Khyber to Karachi and all points between.Interestingly, Mr Sultan squashed another popularmyth, namely that it was “foreign hands” behindthe majority of terrorist attacks. Not so said MrSultan, the majority are home grown and emanatefrom the tribal areas. Whether our tin-eared


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February 2016


Interior Ministry heard any of this, never mindunderstood it, remains an open question.


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February 2016


Development and security —

intertwined

The president of the World Bank, Dr Jim Yong Kim,has paid Pakistan a visit, and although he trodvery carefully in his public communications, hiswords bear close attention. He said that the WorldBank was not an ideological institution, andportrayed it more as an advisory body to those

states it engages with, providing what he termed “evidence” as to what has worked and what hasnot in terms of lifting populations out of poverty. “We do not tell people what to do,” he said in anaddress to the Institute of Business Administration,Karachi on February 10. Possibly not, but thesubtext is that the World Bank expects its advicenot just to be listened to, but heeded.

Guarded he was, but also to the point — Pakistanhas a severe problem both now and in the futurewhen it comes to the stunting of its children. Asmany as 48 per cent of all children under fivesuffer from inhibited growth and development, oneof the highest levels of stunting in the world.Fifteen years or more in the future, these children

may not be able to participate in a more developeddigital economy. The food insecurity of today isgoing to feed the jobs insecurity of tomorrow.

Stunted children make for a stunted workforce ageneration hence. Stunted children are less likelyto be adequately educated and are anyway poorlyserved by the government in terms of educationalprovision.

The issue of stunting thus has implications thatreach far beyond nutritional needs and deep intothe way in which the nation develops in themedium-to-long term. With half of all under-fivesstunted today, the future looks less than rosy. Theneeds of pregnant women — indeed women ingeneral — must be better addressed if inequalitieswere to be mitigated, followed by creating the kindof industries which would create jobs for a futuregeneration, said Dr Kim. Given the failure to reachMillennium Development Goals, in many instances

by a mile, Dr Kim might be forgiven for soundingunduly optimistic.

Moving down the list of ailments to be remedied,Dr Kim stressed the need to improve the energysector, something this government has had a verymixed report card on. As with all matterspertaining to privatisation, the government


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February 2016


appears divided, in two minds, demonstrative of apaucity of joined up thinking across federal andprovincial administrations and a lack of a unified

national vision that transcends political rhetoric.This was a time of opportunity, said Dr Kim, whenPakistan needs to be more ambitious as well asmaintaining the momentum of reforms that aretargeting higher economic growth. He rightly hadwarm words for the government when it came tothe stabilisation of the economy over the last threeyears, but there are inconsistencies and failureswithin the wider picture, and much more needs tobe done in terms particularly with raising standardsof public health and education.

Visiting dignitaries of the stature of Dr Kim comewith sound advice. The World Bank has longsupported Pakistan across a spectrum of needs butthe capacity to respond to treatment has beenpatchy to say the least. We acknowledge that

there have been improvements, and not just theresult of the efforts of the current dispensation,but as indicated above, there are vast systemicproblems that can only be addressed by a radicalrethink of the way Pakistan, all of Pakistan, ridsitself of its ills and retreats from donordependence. Dr Kim is right in saying that now is atime of opportunity, but to take advantage of

opportunity hard decisions have to be made andthen implemented. „National plans‟ have a track -record of running into the sand once the initial

impetus fades. Development cannot be separatedfrom security and for Pakistan, the two areeternally entwined — and battling the curse ofstunting would be a fight well worth winning.

RIP Fatima Surayya Bajia

The past several months have not been very kindto Urdu literature, with writers who have served usfor decades leaving this world one after the other.Pakistan has lost Intizar Hussain, AbdullahHussain, Jamiluddin Aali and now Fatima SurayyaBajjiya, leaving not only this country, but the

entire subcontinent much poorer. These were alltowering literary personalities, who possesseddeep intellect and great insight into society.

With Bajia‟s departure on February 10, a gloriouschapter in Pakistani drama has come to a close. After a prolonged fight with cancer, she died at 85,leaving behind numerous works that have lived


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through the decades. Bajia gave us some of thebest plays of Pakistan Television (PTV) history,such as Aroosa, Shama, Afshan, Ana and Aagahi.

Before the advent of television, she also wrotescripts for radio and worked not only as aplaywright, but also as an activist and author. Hercontributions to Pakistani culture and literaturewere invaluable.

Bajia is said to have written nearly 300 plays,focusing particularly on women, children, historyand culture — areas in which works have

increasingly become a rarity in Pakistani drama.Having lived a difficult life, raising nine siblings onher own, she was able to communicate socialcomplexities in her plays in ways that everyonecould relate to. As one of the pioneeringplaywrights of PTV, Bajia was a source ofinspiration to many, not just for her work as awriter, but also because she led the way for other

women to come into the field of drama. Shecourageously weathered all the odds thataccompany being a professional woman inPakistan. While tributes have poured in for Bajiafrom the heads of different political parties, theprime minister and the president — and it isheartening to see her services recognised by all — it would be an even greater tribute not to let

literature and culture die with the death of ourgreat writers, poets and dramatists. Theimportance of quality fiction and drama cannot be

overstated in these times and it is hoped that thestate helps build institutions that foster the workour intellectuals stood for.

Going beyond the IP pipeline

The Iran-Pakistan (IP) pipeline was always aproblematic venture, pursued only because anenergy-starved nation was desperately looking foravenues to meet its requirements. With mostsanctions on Iran having been lifted, the IPpipeline started grabbing headlines once again.However, soon after, the project was nipped in the

bud as the US Department of Energy stated thatthe fate of the pipeline was still to be judged.Pakistan, on several occasions and on differentplatforms, has stated that it wants to continuepursuing the completion of the project, yet workon it appears to be stalled. Simultaneously,Pakistan is vigorously working on other projects ina bid to meet its energy needs. The fate of the IP


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pipeline project, therefore, will continue to hang inthe balance.

But there is more to bilateral trade relations withIran than just the IP pipeline and our policymakersmust remember that. As our neighbour movestowards coming back into the international fold,there is much that Pakistan can achieve through itsnext-door partner if diplomatic relations run on aneven keel. Pakistan‟s export receipts amounted to

$211 million in FY13, shooting down to $128million the following year, according to central

bank figures. With different sectors, including IT,sports goods and surgical instruments, eager tomake their mark, Iran presents an ideal market.Cynics would argue that Pakistan lacks incompetitiveness and exports items that mostcountries can also obtain from elsewhere. Butgeographic location counts and that must not beforgotten. It means that an entirely new market is

available and with strategic planning — thatfocuses on a variety of exports ranging from autoparts to e-commerce — bilateral trade has thepotential to expand. Banking channels may takesome time to be established, but with Iran readyto make a comeback to international trade,Pakistan needs to be ready to knock its doors. Weneed to enhance our understanding of the Iranian

market. Curbing smuggling and establishing formalchannels should be the next step. The stalling ofthe IP project shouldn‟t deter us from pursuing

what can be a very exciting opportunity for thePakistani economy.


A testing mayoralty

A new(ish) layer of governance is emerging intothe light, along with newly-elected and appointedfigures, none of whom are likely to have an easy job wherever they are in the country. The localgovernment elections have produced mayors, menand women who at least theoretically are going to

be holding powerful positions. The new mayor ofIslamabad, Sheikh Ansar Aziz, elected on February15, is set to take charge in the coming days, andhe will have a lot on his plate. Even before he getsinto his office on the first day, there is the matterof how he handles people like Chaudhry Riffat forinstance, who is one of three deputy mayors also


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elected on February 15. That Mr Riffat has „anagenda‟ for Islamabad is well-enough known, andit may not be quite the same agenda as that of Mr

Aziz. Then there is the established, and deeplyentrenched, bureaucracy that has been used tohaving its own way virtually since the foundationsof the city were first laid. It is complex, layered,seemingly infinitely and unaccountably powerfuland 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, itsopen aspect and tree-lined avenues weresomething of a wonder. In many ways, thingshave gone steadily downhill ever since. The newmayor says that his priorities are solving thechronic sanitation problem, the equally chronicwater shortages and building (yet more) newroads. He might also add rubbish collection, the

provision of affordable housing, demolishing illegalbuilding encroachments and taming a bureaucracythat is hand in glove with some of those involvedin illegal developments. On taking up his post, Mr Aziz becomes the head of the IslamabadMetropolitan Corporation (IMC). He is to provide „leadership vision‟ to the IMC in consultation withothers of the many departments that have fingers

in the Islamabad pie. Somebody needs to get agrip of Islamabad, and we can do no more thanwish Mr Aziz the very best of luck. He‟s going to

need it.

Reforms of the educational

kind

Amidst the terrorist attacks on educationalinstitutions, images of school teachers carryingfirearms while conducting lessons and reports ofmismanaged security drills, education in Pakistanhas been in the news for all the wrong reasons.Long ignored by governments, increasinglycontrolled by privately-owned institutes and nowunder threat from extremists, it is safe to say thateducation has never been much of a priority.However, with the approval of minimal standards

of teaching criteria during the Inter-ProvincialEducation Ministers Conference held recently,there is some good news for this beleagueredsector. The criteria which focuses on learningenvironment, curriculum and teaching methods isexpected to “rejuvenate the years-old methods ofeducating students”, according to the Minister of


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State for Federal Education and ProfessionalTraining.

These reforms have been a long time coming andit is a relief to know that education is finally beingprioritised to some extent. However, theimplementation of the criteria by our fracturededucation system — a motley mixture ofgovernment-run and privately-owned institutions,as well as madrassas, each with their own agendas — remains to be seen. Creating buy-in for the neweducational criteria amongst all these stakeholders

will not be easy. There is no doubt that educationin Pakistan needs to be reformed, and soon. Oursystem is producing individuals unable to copewith industry demands and with poor criticalthinking skills. Often, their minds have beenshaped by a diet of extremism. This coupled withan inability to form independent opinions makesthem ripe for exploitation. Then there are the

millions who have never seen the inside of aclassroom, and grow up with little chance ofimproving their situation. An inclusiveenvironment, trained staff and greater outreach inremote areas are needed. However, none of thiswill be possible without adequate budgetaryallocation and a steady commitment to change.


Good news for Hindus

The Sindh Assembly passed the Hindu Marriage Bill

on February 15 and in doing so has taken alandmark decision. Legislation which is to thefacilitation or protection of any religious minority inPakistan is exceedingly rare. Such legislation asthere is, rarely gets implemented and the rights ofthe minorities are routinely either sidelined ortrampled upon. This makes Sindh the first provinceto pass such legislation and it is much to be hopedthat every other province follows the lead taken byit. In the previous week, a National Assemblypanel had cleared — despite some dissentingvoices — the Hindu Marriage Bill which was theway-paver for the creation of new regulations onthe registration of Hindu marriages, inheritanceand divorce.


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Whilst this move is worthy of our support, indeedpraise for the Sindh Assembly in itself a rareoccurrence, we do note that this is a step taken

almost 70 years late. There has not beenunanimous support across the political spectrum,and opposition lawmakers wanted further referralto the standing committee, claiming that thereneeded to be more input from minoritystakeholders. This attempt to derail progress wasthwarted by Sindh Parliamentary Affairs MinisterNisar Ahmed Khuhro who ruled out the need forany such step, saying that the assembly hadalready consulted members of the Hinducommunity — and there is ample evidence to theeffect that this is correct. Interestingly, it is beingrecommended that the Bill be retrospective inrespect of the registration of marriage that is goingto make life considerably easier for those alreadymarried. The challenge now is going to beimplementation. The agency which is going to

have to make some adjustments is NADRA, alongwith Union Council and Ward administrationsacross the land. Bureaucracies are slow to changeand adapt, and can be highly resistant. There is noexpectation that this legislation is going to beimmediately implemented — no legislation ever is — but we would urge the relevant bodies to have

a spring in their step in righting a long-standinghistorical wrong.


Feeling the heat

The tendrils of suspicion always begin to advancewhen any government seeks to limit its ownwatchdogs. The National Accountability Bureau(NAB) operates under the National AccountabilityOrdinance 1999, and its sole purpose is toeliminate corruption using what is described as a

holistic approach that encompasses “awareness,prevention and enforcement”. It is the latter that is

giving a soupcon of unease to the rulingdispensation. The NAB has been getting distinctlylong-fingered of late as those that run the show inSindh and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) have beendiscovering. This extension of the digits of


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accountability is not sitting easily with thecorporate paradigm that dominates Punjab, andPrime Minister Nawaz Sharif is giving every

indication that his government will take pre-emptive action if, as he opines, the NAB is “harassing” government officers to the point atwhich they are afraid of taking decisions, signingoff on project files and “hindering them fromperforming their duty”.

Accountability is seemingly fine so long as it is atarm‟s length and firmly under the federal and

provincial government‟s thumbs. The primeminister has indicated his displeasure at theactivities of the NAB which, he says, has enteredthe houses of “innocent people” sans anyauthentic reason for doing so. Further partiality isalleged by the PPP in Sindh. In K-P, the DG of theEhtesab Commission resigned in the last weekprotesting against the promulgation of an

ordinance by the provincial government amendingthe Ehtesab Act of 2015. In the PML-N back-garden, the NAB is enquiring closely into projectssuch as the Metro Bus and the Orange Line train inLahore. Discomfort abounds.

Whilst we in no way condone the NAB exceedingits mandate, the level of corruption and its

presence in every corner of public life and serviceis such that any investigation is going to rufflefeathers on every bird in the nest. No political

party and no state institution are anywhere nearfree of malfeasance. Every project, no matter howwell planned or intended, has corruptionsomewhere inside it. The NAB may need to be alittle more prudent, but have its wings clipped?Certainly not.


The bombings in Turkey

Once again, Turkey has been the target ofbombers operating in the overspill both frompurely internal conflicts with the Kurds in the

southeast, and the civil war in Syria. Bombs onconsecutive days saw 28 killed in a suicide attackin Ankara, 26 of them army personnel, andanother six killed in a bombing on the roadbetween Diyarbakir and Bingol in the southeast, onFebruary 18. According to Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, the Ankara bombing is being


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attributed to the Kurdish YPG militia, which isbased in Syria and is working in collaboration withthe banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Nine

arrests have been made in connection with the Ankara bombing, none, nor is there any claim orattribution, regarding the bombing of the militaryconvoy on February 18.

The conflicts that now envelop Turkey areextremely complex. The Turkish government isactively fighting the PKK and has been since 1994.It is hostile to but not necessarily actively fighting,

the Syrian Kurds of the PYD, which is aligned tothe PKK. It is friendly towards the Iraqi Kurds andthe Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) and itspeshmerga forces. The PKK, PYD and KRG are allfighting the Islamic State (IS), as is the Turkishgovernment which has in the recent past beentargeted by the IS in a series of suicide attacks. Allof these conflicts are interlocked and none of them

is susceptible to an early resolution or a cessationof hostilities. Further adding to the complexity, thegroup attributed to the Ankara bombing, the YPG,is closely allied to the US, which is backing itmilitarily and logistically in its fight with the IS. TheTurkish government regards virtually all Kurdishgroupings with the exception of the KRG asterrorists and thus fair game for air strikes and

other military actions — which put it at odds withthe US and other interested parties such as theEuropean Union. Add in the massive burden of

Syrian refugees both in transit and camped inTurkey, and the future of this complex,multilayered conflict seem far from any resolution.


PIA privatisation —

complexities abound

Intricate details of PIA‟s privatisation have not yet

been finalised, but initial recommendationssuggest that non-core businesses of the airlinecould be carved out of the holding company beforeit is offered to prospective bidders. This essentiallymeans that the business of real estate, all hotelsand the Precision Engineering Complex thatoperates under the direct supervision of the


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Ministry of Defence would not be offered tobidders. However, flight operations, cargo, charterservices and mail services will most definitely be

up for grabs as the government continues topursue a privatisation process that has caused itplenty of headaches in the past few months.Proponents of PIA‟s privatisation feel that itsaccumulated losses and debt burden have taken itto the point of no return, where only anestablished business can turn things around.

But given PIA‟s balance sheet, which shows total

liabilities attributable to shareholders to be aroundRs190 billion as of September 30, 2015, noprospective bidder would show an ounce ofinterest if the government does not wipe the slateclean. How it intends on owning up to billions onits books is yet to be finalised. How it intends totackle the employee unions also remains aquestion mark. If liabilities are transferred to the

new owner, the PIA business won‟t prove to be anattractive one. If they aren‟t, the government — already under a mountain of debt — will incur amassive burden. These questions are not easy toanswer. Therefore, it makes sense that financialadvisers want to segregate PIA into two and find amiddle ground, easing the pressure on thegovernment as well as the buyer. The

government‟s progress on its privatisation policyhas so far been unimpressive. It has only managedto sell stakes in profit-making entities and hit a

dead-end in the case of loss-making companies.Given this history, PIA‟s privatisation serves as acruel reminder that the issue is not just of thePML-N‟s failure to get everyone on board. It is amirror for all governments to look at and reflect — they all had a part in ruining what was once aprofitable entity and turning it into a mountain noone wants to climb.


Steer a middle course

Uncertainty muddles perceptions around exactly

what should be the role of Pakistan in the 34-member coalition assembled by Saudi Arabiatasked to fight terrorism and extremism. The 34members do not include three troubling omissions — Iran, Syria and Iraq. Questions have beenraised in the National Assembly of Sartaj Aziz, theprime minister‟s adviser on foreign affairs, who


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was as vague as he ever is. That he responded inwriting rather than in person is perhaps indicativeof the distance the government wants to put

between itself and parliament in this matter.

Perhaps Mr Aziz is as much in the dark as the restof the nation, though he did say that the six-pointobjectives of the coalition were shared withPakistan in the last week. There were alsoquestions about our participation in the ongoingmilitary exercises in Saudi Arabia, and it transpiresthat those of our military that are participating are

drawn from a standing cohort of around athousand that are a permanent fixture there, andno new forces have been deployed from themainland.

Questions and yet more questions — and a ringingsilence in the answers‟ department. Pakistan

welcomed the announcement made on December

14, 2015 by the Saudi Arabian press agencyregarding the 34-member coalition — butappeared to have little by way of foreknowledge ofwhat was being proposed. If there was anydetailed consultation prior to the announcement, itis not in the public domain. Other states werelikewise somewhat taken aback.

In broad terms, the government is supportive ofany move at a multilateral level that provides acounter to the terrorism that is sweeping the world

today, and we support that. Yet we would urge adegree of caution in terms of our engagement withwhat Saudi Arabia is proposing. Pakistan hasalready, and rightly, declined the option ofparticipating in the war that Saudi Arabia isfighting in Yemen, and our long-held policy of onlyparticipating in UN-sanctioned overseas operationsmust be maintained. Saudi Arabia is most certainlyone of our most important allies — but not theonly one.

A NAB too far

If the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) iscausing such discomfort to a range of politiciansacross the country, then it stands to reason that itmust be doing something right. Prime MinisterNawaz Sharif is so exercised that he is seeminglymulling a revision in the way in which matters


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relating to accountability are pursued andmanaged. Few politicians anywhere in the worldwelcome their affairs being scrutinised, even fewer

in a country where corruption and politicalskulduggery are the norm rather than theexception. Corruption is rife across the entirepolitical spectrum, from the lowest ward level tothe highest offices in the land.

Of late, NAB has been knocking on any number ofdoors and finds itself accused of overreach, goingbeyond its mandate. The prime minister delivered

a thinly veiled warning that action would be takenif this continued unabated — and he now appearswilling to be as good as his word.

If ever a country needed a body that was able toinvestigate abuses of power and privilege, it isPakistan. To be scrupulously fair, we would notsupport the harassment of individuals who are freeof taint or suspicion, all too easily done, but wewould also not support any development thatserved to insulate those in power from scrutiny, nomatter how exalted they might be. Investigativebodies do need to have their terms of referenceand mandates clearly delimited, but we wonder ifthe creation of the supra-commission currentlyunder consideration is the right way to go. The

government might argue that it is merely „guardingthe guards‟ but it looks uncommonly like a knee- jerk reaction to some uncomfortable, if

opportunist, digging by NAB. Nothing is about tohappen overnight but revision of accountabilityprocesses is on the agenda and likely to bepursued with some diligence. That some form ofrevision was in the mind of government in thehistorical past may be true, but it should not beallowed to inhibit investigations into some seniormembers of the ruling party in Punjab by NAB. Wewill follow closely and with interest.


Inefficient in innovation

During the past few days, Dr Nergis Mavalvala wasin the news for being part of a team, which hadmade a historic scientific discovery by detectinggravitational waves. Her Pakistani background was


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highlighted and celebrated. Everyone from theprime minister downwards expressed their pride ather achievement. However, the fact that Dr

Mavalvala‟s success is not reflective of the state ofeducation and scientific innovation in Pakistan waslargely ignored. This point has now been broughthome by the Global Innovation Index Report of2015 in which Pakistan ranks an abysmal 131 outof 141 countries. This is not surprising, sinceaccording to the Ministry of Science andTechnology, the current allocation for research anddevelopment is only 0.29 per cent of GDP. There isno clearer way than this to indicate our lack ofinterest in higher education and science. This,after all, is the country which tried to give theworld the car that ran on water.

Pakistanis have managed to do great work in avariety of highly demanding and technical fieldsbut usually they do it when outside their

homeland. The infrastructure and money requiredfor quality education and research is simplyunavailable here. There are only 10,670 PhDs inthe country, a tiny number, especially whenconsidering that according to HEC guidelines auniversity is required to have atleast two PhDfaculty members in order to offer MPhil and MSprogrammes. In order for there to be innovation,

educational institutions should have a culturepromoting curiosity and critical thinking.Unfortunately, the current atmosphere only

encourages the attainment of the highest gradesthrough the retention of facts memorised frombooks. Questioning conventional wisdom andforming independent conclusions are notencouraged. The Ministry of Science andTechnology now claims to have developed astrategy to reverse this trend. One can only hopethat it will be implemented and the next DrMavalvala will not have to move abroad to make ascientific breakthrough.


The Kisan package — a

mirage


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The Kisan package, announced by Prime MinisterNawaz Sharif around the time of the localgovernment elections, has not just faced incessant

delays in its implementation, but some of itscomponents are just a repeat of the budgetmeasures announced in June 2015. In a recentbriefing to the National Assembly StandingCommittee on Finance, it was revealed that thegovernment‟s half -hearted attempts have resultedin most parts of the Rs341 billion package notbeing implemented, casting a huge question markon the PM-level announcement. The much-trumpeted cash assistance was restricted toPunjab, as other provinces have so far beenunwilling to delve into their wallets. However,some areas where progress has been made issubsidising the purchase of fertilisers andsupporting sugar mills in exporting the commodity.

Repeating and remodeling measures and compiling

them into a Rs341-billion package may manage towin the hearts of the farming community for awhile, but persistent delays will not keep it quietfor too long. The package was announcedsupposedly to support low-income farmers bearthe wrath of falling commodity prices. It wasmeant to uplift the low-income group and facilitateit in acquiring loans for machinery and raw

material. Floods have not helped the farmers‟cause and the package was meant to mitigatesome of their losses. But when the country‟s

finance secretary admits — five months after thepackage and eight months after the budget wasannounced — that it will take another two monthsto implement it on a larger scale, there are boundto be some raised eyebrows. For once, we wouldlike the PML-N to act like a democratic,forthcoming government. Farmers can see throughits shenanigans. It seems that true progress isusually only made close to the general electionswhen the government is in need of votes, and notwhen it is trying to pacify the IMF through areduction in the budget deficit. It is all abouttiming for this business-minded government.

Slow progress on Pathankot


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It appears that neither side is disputing that theattack on the Pathankot airbase in India had itsorigins in Pakistan. On January 2, a group of at

least six gunmen crossed the perimeter of whatwas deemed a high-security airbase andproceeded to wreak havoc for three days. Theykilled seven Indian soldiers and wounded others.India claimed, very quickly, that the attack wascarried out by the banned Jaish-e-Mohammed(JeM) and cited phone intercepts as evidence oflinks to Pakistan. The attack came at a crucial juncture in the bilateral dialogue between Indiaand Pakistan and was in all likelihood mountedwith the sole intent of derailing the talks andtaking both sides back to square one. Aspreviously noted in these columns, this has nothappened. Talks have been interrupted and brieflylooked like they may be killed off by both sides,but wiser counsel prevailed. They are still alive andthe investigation into what happened at Pathankot

goes ahead — if painfully slowly.

An FIR has now been filed in Gujranwala by thePunjab counter-terrorism police citing unidentifiedsuspects and significantly not naming the JeM nordoes it name any leader of that organisation,which is known to be headquartered inBahawalpur. The filing of the FIR is allegedly a

condition set by the Indians as essential to theresumption of foreign secretary-level talks. Themove is the product of talks between the National

Security Advisers (NSA) of both countries,presumably tasked with crafting the modalities andprotocols that will allow the talks to proceed, andin that sense, are to be welcomed.

It is now for Pakistan to proceed with theinvestigation with all speed, and any further foot-dragging or procrastination is going to be sendingthe wrong signal to India. The FIR once again

brings into focus the presence of extremist groupsin south Punjab. There has been persistentcriticism of the government that its implementationof the National Action Plan has been highlyselective, and that south Punjab in particular hasenjoyed something close to immunity. Thoseconcerns need to be addressed and dispelled, notonly in pursuit of peace with India but in pursuit of

peace within our own borders.

An existential battle


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It is no exaggeration to say that the battle toeducate the children of Pakistan — and their

parents because there is almost as much work todo there — goes to the heart of its very existenceas a modern state. There are innumerablesystemic ailments that beset the national body, butthe most damaging in the long term is the failureto get to grips with adequately educating aburgeoning population. Historically, education hasnever received either the attention or thebudgetary allocations that would see it prosper,

and the nation along with it. Underfunded andundervalued, generation after generation ofchildren has been indifferently served.Dissatisfaction with state education has led to themushrooming of the private sector which hasgrown in parallel with the middle class. Whereparents can afford, a choice few would opt to sendtheir child to a state school, and those that do,

know that their children are getting a poor second-best.

With the state failing to adequately discharge itsduty, a duty enshrined in the Constitution, othernon-state actors have entered in the last 15 years — those that would actively seek to discourageeducation and are not afraid to destroy schools

and colleges across the country and kill and maimchildren in pursuit of their goals. Extremist groupsview education as a threat and will do all in their

very considerable power to break the desire of thepeople to seek betterment for their children.

The state education system in Pakistan may be inlarge parts broken or indeed absent, but it is notbeyond fixing, and the current dispensation ismaking some attempts to redress historicalwrongs. There is alongside this an emergingunderstanding that the provision of security for

schools, whilst a duty of the state is not one it canwholly fulfill, at least to the point at which everyparent can send their child to school without fear.It is simply unrealistic to expect the army to deployto every school in the land, or for local andprovincial law-enforcement agencies to guardevery gate and entrance to the hundreds ofthousands of government schools.

This was to the forefront of the mind of the primeminister when he visited the first Montessorisection in a public school in Islamabad on February19. He called for “escalated” security provisions atevery school, saying that raising walls and toppingwith razor wire was insufficient given the level ofthreat presented by extremist groups to education


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as a whole. The establishment of Montessorisections is part of the prime minister‟s educationreform programme under which 422 schools and

colleges that are administered by the FederalDirectorate of Education will be upgraded.Splendid as this may be, it is but a drop in theocean of unfulfilled need, and the extremistsrecently gave a powerful demonstration of theirreach.

The mere threat of attacks by the Taliban wasenough to prompt the closure of all public and

private schools in Punjab for three days inJanuary; the army also closed its own schools. Inthe event no school was attacked, but untoldthousands of children lost days of education andmore importantly from the Taliban perspective, asense of fear was engendered in parents. It is thatfear that undermines confidence and erodes oftenfragile commitments to education by parents who

may be food-insecure and in grinding poverty.Girls are most likely to lose out in the educationlottery, and the cohort of educated children thatwould take Pakistan forward into the knowledgeeconomy in 15 years‟ time is not being grown.

Taking back both the education agenda as well asthe narrative from the extremists is a mighty

challenge. Seen globally, Pakistan suffered thegreatest number of fatalities caused by attacks oneducation between 1970 and 2014. Over a dozen

terrorist groups have committed these crimes, withthe TTP the biggest killer of our children. Thebattle is going to be long and hard, but we cannotafford to lose it.

Thar and its manycommissions

One would think that after the failure of thenumerous commissions that were formed in thepast to look into the causes of deaths ofmalnourished children in Thar, the Sindh

government would have realised that it needed togo beyond the forming of commissions. Thefindings of such commissions have rarely resultedin concrete solutions and have done little toalleviate the misery of the people of Thar. Thelatest commission to investigate the causes ofdeaths in drought-hit parts of Thar, formed under


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Justice (retd) Ghulam Sarwar Korai, is expected tosubmit its report in court by March 17.

In December 2014, this newspaper published areport on the failure of the fifth commissionformed by the Sindh chief minister to probe themounting death toll in Thar. The commissionformed under Justice Korai is the seventh suchbody. It seems that distracting the courts andNGOs — which have gone to court against allegedgovernmental negligence — by creatingbureaucratic hurdles has become the norm for the

authorities. It is clear that the mere formation of acommission to probe the cause of deaths andassign responsibility is not working for the benefitof the people. One of the earlier commissionsformed under Justice (retd) Zahid Kurban Alavihad categorically held the Sindh health departmentand the elected representatives from Tharresponsible for the deaths of children. Justice Alavi

called the provincial disaster managementauthority a “white elephant” for failing to deliver.Before that, a commission headed by the thenHyderabad DIG had also held the provincialgovernment responsible. The authorities‟ responseto these findings had been to disband thesecommissions and refuse to accept theirrecommendations. It remains to be seen if the

Sindh government will accept the findings of thelatest commission that has been formed, but ifhistory is any reflection, its findings, too, will be

filed away until another bout of disease takesdown more people from Thar. What we need is asolid response from the Sindh government as wellas the relevant departments that have beenpreviously identified as being responsible for Thar‟sdismal state.

Another set of goals

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) wereadopted in 2000 by all the member countries ofthe UN. A 15-year timeline was decided uponduring which governments across the globe weregoing to try and end poverty, hunger and disease.Progress has been patchy and Pakistan is amongstthe many countries which failed to achieve thegoals. On February 19, the National Assemblyadopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG)for 2030 and called upon both the private andpublic sectors to work towards their achievement.The SDGs are aspirational, even more so than their


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predecessors. They aim towards sustainable andinclusive growth, an end to inequality, gender-based discrimination and poverty for all citizens of

the earth regardless of whether they live indeveloped or developing countries.

According to the National Assembly, this is whatPakistan hopes to achieve by 2030 or at leastmake efforts for there to be significant positivechanges. However, there is little in the way ofpolicies and actual groundwork to achieve any ofthese goals. The resolution has been adopted but

the commitment is missing, as it was for theMDGs. Our approach to dealing with problems stillheavily relies on waiting until they become too bigto ignore and then hastily fixing whatever is easilyfixable. Yes, terrorism has slowed us down andcost us precious resources which could have beenbetter employed elsewhere but poor governanceand lack of resolve has been plaguing our

development agenda for far longer.

The SDGs focus on sustainable and inclusivedevelopment. That is something we in Pakistanhave failed at spectacularly and for a long time.The division of resources has historically beenunequal and other provinces lag far behind Punjab.It remains to be seen whether the policies for

achievement of this new set of goals will focus ona more equitable division of resources or follow theprevious pattern. The adoption of aspirational

resolutions is an important first step in bringingabout long-term positive change. Also required is acommitment to inclusivity and that is wherePakistan consistently falls behind.

The dilemma that is the Steel

Mills

The federal government has asked the PakistanSteel Mills (PSM) to justify the retention of itsemployees, with the public-sector entity witnessinga virtual shutdown. It has directed the PSMmanagement to invoke a 1968 law to cut back on

the workforce and, with it, reduce theexpenditures on employees. The directive comesafter the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC)had already directed the lay-off of hundreds ofdaily-wage workers in an attempt to save money.The recent development, however, expands the


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scope of the lay-offs so as to include permanentemployees as well.

The ECC has regularly approved salaries for PSMemployees, releasing the amount despite thevirtual closure of Pakistan‟s largest industrial unit.

Suspension of gas supplies and its failure to clearthe dues it owed the SSGC has been the finalstraw for the public sector entity. In a recentinterview, the chief executive of the PSM had saidthat the entity needed Rs9 billion just to see itthrough to June. The industrial unit has been

incurring losses for a while now and it has suffereddue to incessant oversupply of Chinese steel in thecountry as well as due to its outdated machineryand short-term strategies — a hallmark ofPakistani managers working for a state-ownedentity.

Now, the federal government wants to settle theissue once and for all. It has been involved in atussle with the Sindh government, which isunwilling to let the centre sell the PSM, but less-than-willing to do anything about sorting out themess at the industrial unit either. No one appearsto be willing to take responsibility for resolving thevarious problems faced by the PSM and not manybuyers have shown interest in it. The PML-N now

obviously feels that the solution is to start layingoff employees, which could mean the virtual end ofthe PSM. We feel the PSM has taken the same

path as that of PIA — running into losses andtaxpayers‟ money being pumped into it to bail itout, all to no avail. The government is choosingthe easy way out here, but the fact remains thatthis will still not help it find a buyer for the PSM,which is the real dilemma it is facing.

The troubled census

The last national census was in 1998 and we arenow eight years overdue for another. A host ofpolitical considerations under the all-envelopingcloak of „sensitivity‟ have delayed and delayed thecensus for Pakistan, and it now appears thatdespite being far advanced in terms of planning,the upcoming census, scheduled for next month, isgoing to be delayed yet again. Broadly, theproblems this time can be divided into three.Firstly, the military is unwilling and in real termsprobably unable to spare the number of men itwould take to ensure the security of those who will


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actually be conducting the census. Secondly, theprovinces outside of Punjab are crying „foul‟ — they have not been adequately consulted if indeed

they have been consulted at all as to a range ofcensus-related issues, and the census commissionthat oversees the entire process is heavily loadedin favour of Punjab. Third, refugees.

None of the above is susceptible to an early orquick resolution, and the deadline set for thePakistan Bureau of Statistics by Finance MinisterIshaq Dar to come up with a solution in three days

is as unrealistic as the last three-day deadline hegave them — two weeks ago. Now the matter isgoing to be placed before the Council of CommonInterests, which is meeting on February 29.

The Afghan refugees are going nowhere, at leastnot in the numbers to satisfy Balochistan that hascalled for the cancelling of the census until theyare repatriated. The army is not going to magicallyproduce at least double the 100,000 it is willing tocommit and the Punjab-centric government isever-unwilling to give equity to the rest of thenation, this to the detriment of everybody. There isa competency deficit that feeds each of thesethree elements creating a perfect storm ofspineless mediocrity when it comes to the big jobs,

and jobs do not get much bigger than the census.It is projected that there will be 300 million of usby 2050 — but we will never know for sure unless

there is a headcount conducted, something that atthe moment appears to be a difficult prospect tocarry out.

Riots next door

The tensions within the Indian caste system arenever far from the surface, the more so as Indiabecomes a more developed state. Given that Indiahas a diverse and complex set of relations withcontiguous states, Pakistan being one and peacenegotiations notwithstanding, any disturbanceinternally can quickly have a knock-on effect. Thus

it is that train and bus services between India andPakistan have been temporarily suspended aftercaste riots in the state of Haryana. Thedisturbances are some of the most serious thatIndia has seen for many years, and are spreadingto the capital New Delhi that may lose its water


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supply as protesters have damaged a vital canal.The army has been called in to restore order.

The train and bus services between our twocountries are a tenuous link. They are low volumeand reflective of the bilateral tensions that inhibitso much in terms of people-to-people contact. Visaregulations on both sides are oppressively tight — although India has of late eased the visa regimefor business travellers — but visiting artists,sportspersons and writers both ways can findthemselves denied entry. The suspension of bus

and train services is understandable, given thefluid situation in India, and the capacity for rapidspread that

Express Tribune Editorials - February 2016

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