Opposing for Opposition’s Sake
By Karamatullah K. Ghori
Toronto, Canada
Question: What’s the principal dilemma of Pakistan?
Answer: It isn’t so much the current scourge of terrorism as is its age-old, morbid, psyche best illustrated by that vintage Punjabi phrase: Na khelange na khelan dengey (Will neither play nor let anyone else play!)
The new budget of Pakistan, unveiled by Nawaz Sharif’s alter-ego, the accountant-turned-economist Ishaq Dar, has evoked exactly the sentiments expected by any Pakistan- watcher, jaded or freshman.
It has been the vogue—for years on end—that any new budget must be welcomed by votaries and partisans of the government-in-power as pro-common man. By the same token, those occupying the Nay isles, on the other side of the floor, must denounce it as people-enemy. The poor ‘common man’ remains as askance and befuddled by the heavy-weight politicos’ misappropriation of his name as ever. What else could he do?
Opposing for opposition’s sake is a disease rampant among our politicos. Of course most of them don’t have the ability—that comes from schooling and self-training—to understand the basics of a national budget. I can bet that hardly any of them may have studied the budget outlines, much less its details, before they mount the podium, or stand smug in front of TV cameras, to denounce and castigate its provisions.
The Pakistani politicos, without exception, have arrogated to themselves the right to speak on behalf of the ‘common man’ irrespective of it that the poor common man doesn’t want them to speak on his behalf. Why he doesn’t want it? Because hardly any of the self-styled champions of the people have any inkling of what the common man’s problems are and how he perceives to shoot his way out of them.
How many budgets of Pakistan have been people-friendly? Or, for that matter, how many budgets were ever crafted with the ‘common man’ or their welfare figuring anywhere on the priority list of the makers of budget?
The present rulers—or the minions executing their orders and acting according to their agenda—are no exception to the rule established long ago in Pakistan. The rule is that priority must, invariably, belong to the special interest groups at the hard core of their power. In simple words, they cater to their partisans’ interest, first and foremost.
Standing in the vanguard of the ‘people’s interest’ is a good slogan. It catches attraction, makes good copy in the press, brings out TV cameras and throngs of eager-beaver reporters and hacks. It’s good stuff to make glowing headlines and dominate the mini-screen. It’s a panacea to cover up for a lot of ills. Hence it’s the one that every ruler makes full use of. What has Nawaz Sharif done so terribly wrong or outrageous using it to garnish his budget? Why should the Sharif clan and its acolytes and cohorts be condemned so vociferously, if not ferociously, for dishing out the same old menu on this occasion, too?
I should personally be unhappy with Dar’s niggardly increase of only 7.5 % in my pension. I was expecting a 10 % increase, at the very least. But I’d lump it because my 2.5 % loss may add up to the nation’s defense capability.
Eye-brows are being raised—in particular among our self-styled champions of civic interests, although these champions are mostly arm-chair breed used to throwing darts from the safety of their plush refuges abroad—about the 11 % increase in the defence budget. But is 11 % hike really too much and intolerable in times like this when the army is fighting the Battle of Pakistan? Keep inflation in mind and the increase wouldn’t look so alarming. In dollar terms the new defense budget is around $ 7.5 billion which looks peanuts compared to a whopping $ 40 billion for the Indian armed forces next door. And, on top of it, India isn’t engaged in the kind of life-or-death internal struggle as is the Pakistan army.
To me the proposal to build a Metro bus system in Karachi is the most edifying feature of the new budget. Dar has let it be known that every rupee for this costly project will be a gift from the federal government to the people of Karachi. Dar and his boss couldn’t be more charitable to the people of Karachi.
For decades, a mass transit system for millions of Karachi’s harried and bewildered commuters has been a matter of utmost concern to the denizens of the mega-city. Karachi is, perhaps, the only mega-polis in the world without a mass-transit system, or anything even remotely akin to it.
However, for those who have been Karachi’s political masters—from PPP Waderas to that upstart commando Musharraf to his MQM acolytes and minions—this primordial civic amenity has been nothing more than a political football. None of these smart alecks was ever serious about solving Karachi’s most distressing problem of a workable transit system. So shameless have been these bumbling political actors that since a long time ago they even stopped pretending about doing something to bail out Karachi’s harassed commuters from the trauma of their daily grind.
Why there was no serious effort to rescue Karachi’s commuters from the jaws of private bus owners who set their own rules—and fares—and lorded over the commuters as if the hapless lot was made up of slaves? Because most of these operators, if not all of them, owed allegiance o this or that political mafia and shared their take, from the commuters’ pockets, with their politician patrons.
The two Sharif Brothers—Nawaz and Shahbaz—have been regularly sniped at by both PPP and MQM for their alleged loot of resources, for their apparently insatiable lust for pelf and power. Fine; they may be all these things and more. But they have, nevertheless, worked for the welfare of the common man, if not all over Pakistan, if not all over Punjab—their bastion of power—then certainly in big cities, like Lahore and Rawalpindi-Islamabad.
The two, allegedly thieving, Sharif brothers have delivered mass transit systems to Lahore and, lately, the twin cities of Rawalpindi-Islamabad in less than three years. What they’ve delivered is there, for envious eyes to see, if not admire. It’s a civic welfare thing to benefit millions of people living in and around these three cities. The benefits of these projects will be accruing to the people for generations to come—if some vengeful successor to the duo doesn’t uproot the system in the years ahead.
Compare this to the thieves who have been lording over Karachi for the past so many years. What has the Zardari-Altaf pair of highway robbers given to the people of Karachi except blood and tears. Karachi, in particular, has been picked clean by these rascals, so much so that it has earned the reputation on their watch of being one of the deadliest—if not the deadliest—cities of the world.
What has that doddering buffoon, Qaim Ali Shah, done for Karachi other than disgracing the position of Sindh’s Chief Minister for the past eight years as an accomplice in the wholesale loot of Karachi’s resources as Zardari’s agent?
It’s an insult to the collective intelligence of Pakistan’s most enlightened city to have a poltroon like Qaim Ali Shah as the city’s chief executive; he doesn’t have the ability to run a cattle-farm let alone a city of 20 million people with a plethora of civic problems.
But sniping at the ‘intentions’ of Nawaz was kicked off the moment after Dar’s announcement of the PM’s gift to Karachi. They are caviling that Islamabad has launched the project off its own bat without consulting, or taking on-board, Karachi’s stake-holders. What stake-holders? Zardari and Altaf who’d first demand their ‘cut’ into the project before doing anything for it!
This metro bus system for Karachi will see the light of the day only if it’s completed by the federal government as proposed. The Sindh government is all poison and any touch of it would be lethal for the completion of it. Let there be no fancy notion that the thieves and robbers presiding over Sindh could be expected of anything good. The people of Karachi should know it better because they are the ones at the receiving end of a brutal exploitation of their city’s resources by the mafias run under the patronage of Zardari and Altaf.
The Karachi-walas should be grateful to Nawaz that he has thought of doing something concrete and viable for them. Yes, he may be seeking political windfall from it at the next polls. But why shouldn’t he? Isn’t every politician, anywhere in the world, into the arcane world of politics for that goal only? Have a heart, folks, Nawaz is not being a devil to be scared of for getting his sights set on Karachi. And come to think of it, wouldn’t it be a blessing in disguise for the denizens of Karachi hobbled for so long by Zardari and Altaf? (The writer is a former ambassador and career diplomat)
K_K_ghori@hotmail.com
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