Imran Khan's Political Campaign in Social Media
By Riaz Haq
CA
Prior to his recent successful rally in Lahore that drew at least 100,000 people, Imran Khan’s energized young supporters employed social media to spread his message, and the participants and observers offered play-by-play accounts of the rally on Twitter. This is a first in Pakistan's political history for a serious contender for high office.
With near 364,000 Facebook fans, Imran Khan is only surpassed by former President Pervez Musharraf's 433,000 fans. None of the other politicians come close.
Half the population of Pakistan is below 20 years and 60 per cent is below 30 years. With this youthful population and rapidly expanding Internet access, the use of social media is growing in the country. Over 5,000,000 people in Pakistan use the Facebook. Although this only targets about 3% of the population, this translates into more than a quarter of the Internet users in Pakistan having a Facebook account.
Half of them are between the ages of 18-24, and an additional quarter are between ages 25-34.
It appears that Pakistan's political campaigns are entering a new and exciting phase. The youth no longer feel stifled by the heavily censored state electronic media which dominated the national landscape for most of Pakistan's existence, nor are they intimidated by the old and powerful politicians. In fact, the new talent does not rely even on the corporate-owned commercial media that have emerged and become powerful during the last decade of President Musharraf's rule. With the growth of the Internet in Pakistan, the rapidly expanding online population is feeling more empowered than ever to engage in free expression as part of their growing political and social activism.
With expanding educational opportunities, rising middle class and growing access and use of the modern social media by the nation's youth, Pakistan is now in the midst of a dramatic social and political transformation that is likely to change the face of politics in the coming decades. The arrival of this new era has the potential to eventually end the old feudal style politics of patronage, and replace it with a truly participatory democracy and vastly improved governance.
Pakistan's Employment Growth Highest in South Asia in 2000-2010
Pakistan's employment growth has been the highest in South Asia region since 2000, followed by Nepal, Bangladesh, India, and Sri Lanka in that order, according to a recent World Bank report titled "More and Better Jobs in South Asia".
Total employment in South Asia (excluding Afghanistan and Bhutan) rose from 473 million in 2000 to 568 million in 2010, creating an average of just under 800,000 new jobs a month. In all countries except Maldives and Sri Lanka, the largest share of the employed are the low-end self-employed.
The report says that nearly a third of workers in India and a fifth of workers in Bangladesh and Pakistan are casual laborers. Regular wage and salaried workers represent a fifth or less of total employment.
Analysis of the labor productivity data indicates that growth in TFP (total factor productivity) made a larger relative contribution to the growth of aggregate labor productivity in South Asia during 1980–2008 than did physical and human capital accumulation. In fact, the contribution of TFP growth was higher than in the high-performing East Asian economies excluding China.
India's labor productivity growth since 1980 has been the highest in South Asia, followed by Sri Lanka and Pakistan. This was particularly the case in India where TFP rose by 2.6% versus 1.4% in Pakistan during that period.
Although the World Bank report does not address it, the anecdotal evidence suggests that most of Pakistan's job growth for the decade occurred from 2000-2007 when the economy showed robust GDP growth. During 2000-2007, Pakistan's economy became one of the four fastest growing economies in Asia with its growth rate averaging 7.0 per cent per year for most of this period.
As a result of strong economic growth, Pakistan succeeded in reducing poverty by one-half, creating almost 13 million jobs, halving the country's debt burden, raising foreign exchange reserves to a comfortable position and propping the country's exchange rate, restoring investors' confidence and most importantly, taking Pakistan out of the IMF Program. Contrary to its public criticism of the Musharraf-era economy, the preceding facts were acknowledged by the current government in a Memorandum of Economic and Financial Policies (MEFP) for 2008/09-2009/10, while signing agreement with the IMF on November 20, 2008.
It's important for Pakistani government to seriously address the energy and security crises to restore investor confidence and bring back the strong economic growth necessary for creating millions of jobs for its growing youth population entering the workforce. The consequences of inaction on this front would be far more disastrous than the negative effects of the current Taliban insurgency.
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