Pakistan: Where Losing Became an Option
By Mohammad Ashraf Chaudhry
Pittsburg, CA
Players and politicians play to win, or at least they aim so. In Pakistan, they play only to lose, and they lose only because they play. And the dilemma is that they do not stop playing. Of the two, the politicians had been worse. Age, perforce, retires players, but in the case of politicians, it just acts adversely: it perfects them in their craft. The country could not dislodge them in the early fifties when their number was no more than a couple of dozens. Now they are there with their extended families.
Forget democracy or the rule of law in any foreseeable future in Pakistan. The country stands totally hijacked by these losers. And in the words of populist poet Habib Jalib “these ten crore asses… popularly known as people… they are happy to be in the prison of their own homes at their own expenses, their demise has already taken place”. No Voltaire ever came to tell them to wake up and rid themselves of their claws.
Rejoice, O people of Pakistan. Look, how well-dressed is our prime minister! Does it not please you to behold him attired in a finely tailored suit with a contrasting tie? It does to me. It is so re-assuring to see Mr. Zardari and Mian Nawaz Sharif meet each other in their farm houses; in their villas at Dubai and London. Rejoice, fellow Pakistanis. The country has come from ‘this’ to ‘this’.
And what is this second “this”? A father of five kills himself by taking poison because he could not buy food for his hungry children. Three girls get killed in broad daylight in a Karakari rite and no police report is registered, because according to the DPO, “Nobody came forward to report the matter”. Hence no murder ever took place.
According to Hamdard Organization, working on poverty alleviation, “11 heads of family have committed suicide since May 1, 2008”. A widowed mother of three killed herself after giving poisoned milk to her three children. In recent months, 138 girl schools have been blown off by the Talibaan, 155 Maliks have been killed, and they are working hard to demolish whatever comes in their way, and their brand of Islam. “We are waiting for the order of Baitul Masood to take over Karachi… it is a strategic city and Talibaan cannot ignore it”, says Mullah Omar.
Government stands warned of the ‘dire consequences’ and the leadership of Pakistan needs to be convinced that ‘terrorism is a real threat to Pakistan’. Since they could not learn anything from America or Britain how to deal with those who pose a threat to their countries; they could very well learn from India how it dealt with the Sikhs in 1984. Redress of grievances does not mean committing acts of treason and getting away with it.
In 1998-99, in Pakistan about 13.4% people lived below $1 a day, now it is over 17%. More than 72% people live below $2 a day, according to a CIA report on poverty ranking. Of the 175 countries, Pakistan stands at 144 on Human Development Index (HDI) according to the UNDP. Pakistan is the lowest in South Asia. Countries like Maldives (86), Sri Lanka (99), India (127), Bhutan (136), Bangladesh (139) and Nepal (143), are all doing better than Pakistan in diminishing poverty.
What should these leaders know how a common Pakistani is keeping his body and soul together? According to the latest figures issued by Pakistan’s Federal Bureau of Statistics, inflation ran over 31% in the last week of July, 2008, a record high in the entire history of Pakistan. Prices of goods and services for the lowest income group have increased as much as 31.6% to 300%. The US dollar-rupee parity stands at 72 and is getting worst. Last December one kilogram rice was sold at Rs 55; today it is over Rs. 120. The stock market gets nose-dived, eliminating investors every time these well-fed and well-attired leaders open their mouths.
The main leadership consists of such inept, tunnel visioned, greedy, arrogant and egoistic politicians whom in open competition, you would not trust even with a menial job. After all job-history and character verification are the two basic steps in any kind of hiring. They get hired to run a nuclear country, not once, not twice, but all the time. Has the country become intellectually so bankrupt that it cannot produce even a dozen bright, honest and capable people who can set this house in order? Yasser Arafat once was forced by the donor countries to fire his cabinet twice on the charges of corruption and nepotism because the only merit of his ministers was that they had stayed in jail for many a year. At least they had a merit in their claim. They went to jail for a cause. What for Pakistan’s main leadership went to jail or in exile?
Altaf Gauhar reports in his book “Lakhte Rahae Janun Ki Hakayat”, pp 57 that once a list of the cabinet ministers of Punjab was shown to Justice Cornelius. He looked at it and then promptly retorted, “The names are familiar because once they used to appear in the police FIRs”.
Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in jail under such conditions that even the cry of a baby would not reach his ears. After his release in February, 1990, he went to see his old friend and President of African National Congress, Mr. Oliver Tambo, under treatment in Sweden. Appearing on the Sweden TV there, the interviewer asked him one pertinent question, “Mr. Mandela, in the 27 years jail, do you remember any particular incident or moment that you would characterize as unforgettable?” A gentle smile spread on his face and he replied, “Yes, the moment when I was running high fever, and was shivering with cold, that I asked the white jailer to get me another blanket”. Under the jail laws, a prisoner was entitled to have only one blanket. The white jailer violated the law, risked his job and provided him with a second blanket. “I could never forget that act of kindness of the white jailer”.
Nelson Mandela forgot all the bitterness of apartheid and the loss of his 27 year life under the impact of that little goodness. His greatness lay in the fact that he discovered the presence of goodness in his former oppressors. Today, he is deemed as a ‘Secular Saint’ of the modern times, and is ranked as the most respectful person in the world.
South Africa is the only country in the African continent where the former “enemies” live in a most peaceful, congenial and harmonious manner, in an atmosphere that is devoid of any ill feelings. And Nelson Mandela did not stick to power like Mugabe of Zimbabwe who has been president since 1980. And so is the leadership in Pakistan. Since 1988, which is 33% of the country’s history, only three names have mattered in politics. They are: Ms. Benazir/Asif Ali Zardari, Mian Nawaz Sharif and General Pervez Musharraf. There is no sign on the horizon, suggesting that they intend to disappear in any foreseeable future.
Be it the office of Mr. Altaf Hussain in London, or the galleries of the PPP leadership or of Mr. Nawaz Sharif, their walls are decked with photographs, showing the victims that got killed in extra-judicial killings or that receiving lashes on their backs. Great leaders do not keep enmities alive and fresh; they like Mandela take measures that make people forget them, by setting before them examples of how to discover the presence of goodness even in their worst enemies. Did PPP, or Mian Nawaz Sharif, take even one step in that direction? The ideal situation existed just after the February 18, 2008 elections. They could have worked out a consensus with Musharraf and should have focused on the well-being of the country and of people. Good governance would have dealt a deadly blow to Musharraf and to the former turn-coats.
They wasted this opportunity because they failed to rise above their malice and vendetta. They chose the course of ‘tit for tat’. Musharraf had humbled Mian Sahib, and so he must humble him. Mr. Asif Ali Zardari and late Ms. Benazir struck a secret deal, and as the saying goes, to save their assets through the withdrawal of corruption charges, or on the behest of a super power. The judges could have been reinstated, had there been a desire to do so. The deal and the reinstatement of the judges could not go hand in hand. Had the scope of the deal to withdraw corruption charges been extended to Mian Sahib as well, the matter of reinstating the judges could not have become as complicated as it did because of its one-sidedness. President Musharraf did not commit one wrong in October, 1999; he committed even worse than that in subsequent years. He must be ready to get burnt because he played with fire too long. Now the PPP stands exposed after its failure to deliver good governance (and it was set to fail from the very beginning because you cannot win Olympics with a team that doesn’t even play well in its own back-yard). Mian Sahib is now just trying to escape the ignominy under one pretext or another. He played two times, at least once with a heavy mandate, and each time flunked and fumbled worse than before. Why go for the same for another time? Let some new players come on the scene.
Whether Musharraf lives or dies; whether the judges get re-instated or not; whether this coalition of odds survives or not, who cares? If all the things happen the way the main players are demanding them to happen, the country would not be out of the woods. These are old tactics. The real game is that they gloat to see each other fall. And with their fall, the country is falling too. They just do not know what good governance means. Give them hundred chances, with absolute majority to govern, and yet they would fail to deliver. The reason is obvious. They are not long-distance runners; but are just sprinters who can run only 50 yards, or at maximum 100 yards. After that they just drop flat on their bellies, and crawl. Air Marshal Nur Khan is right when he is heard saying on TV, “The government does not know what good governance is?.
Is there a solution to the problems confronting Pakistan? We will discuss those in concrete terms with concrete examples, following which Pakistan can very easily with 100% warrantee be as prosperous and peaceful as Singapore is. (To be continued)
