Accountability: how fair and reliable?

OUR failure can be expressed in a few words — our inability to implement anything in a systemic fashion. Whatever the number of variables in law there are countless more in the implementation process. Further, the judicial aspects enter the picture after the event. We need to go in for a new approach to holding those accountable who head the implementation agencies — government or semi-government.

That justice is blind has been dinned into our ears for ages. However, neither equity nor morality can ever be blind as they demand a careful look at man-crafted laws which are imperfect and cannot take into account new problems arising out of technological advancements.

Towards the end of the year 1200, England started exporting wool to Europe to be processed into cloth, where the relevant technology had been developed. The problems that arose on account of litigation at that time as also those introduced by change in technology, were unable to be resolved satisfactorily by the Common Law Courts in England. Rules had proliferated and the blind application of the law led to injustices.

A new approach was required to deal with such cases. These cases were shifted over to the chancellor who was not bound by due process, hence could cut through it and exercise his common sense, based on equity and morality, to arrive at a judgment. This process went on for 200 years, when the chancellor’s court was absorbed into the judicial system of England. Such courts are now known as the ‘chancery division.’

There are two disciplines that must stick to precedent and not make violent changes in their ways of work i.e. law and audit. When very quick changes are made in audit it leads to innovative accounting which spells disaster. Where judicial activism comes into being we get the “doctrine of necessity.” The late Chief Justice Munir in his book From Jinnah to Zia admitted that it was not quite the right thing to have been done. We are suffering from its consequences to this day.

In the recently conducted NAB workshop in Islamabad on the many faces of corruption it was generally agreed that there are several difficulties, making it impossible in many cases, in implementing court judgments. It is clear, the law to be effective must go beyond the determination of the rights and obligations of individual and collective bodies and move on to a definition of how such rights and obligations can actually be enforced. Such enforcement must be done in a systematic, consistent and transparent manner to avoid nepotism.

This shows that the implementation processes are not functioning properly in Pakistan. Take the example of most of our five-year plans. We have difficulty in implementing even a bad policy consistently.

There are three aspects that need recognition: the first, that in order to implement a judgment a decision or a plan, the organization must have a structure to enable it to do so. Force can only be transmitted through a structure. In Pakistan we have found that the existing structures or restructuring the same has not helped. Recall ‘One Unit’ which was a change of structure. It did not work. The reasons had more to do with the third aspect. The second aspect is the human element. Whenever a new regime comes in, a big shuffle takes place, the faces remain the same.

The third aspect is the systems and procedures of an organization (S&P), which represents the organic side of an organization. Systems are wholesale dealing with strategies and procedures are the retail aspect where the physical movements take place. This is the level where implementation is proven to be successful or unsuccessful.

Should we not, therefore, pay attention to the procedurals? In government, since the formation of Pakistan very little work has been done in the systematic modification of procedurals (SOPs). That is not to say that changes have not been made, of course, they have. Look at the new Income Tax Ordinance 2001 which has replaced the Income Tax Ordinance (ITO) 1979, now updated by introducing more than 100 amendments through the Finance Ordinance 2002. This speaks volumes on the inadequacies of the original ITO of 2001 which was finalized after throwing it open for discussions and seeking public opinion.

Experts were happy that their concerns would, therefore, be addressed particularly on the complexities they had been expressing about ITO 1979. However, they were more than disappointed to see that the new ordinance had created new confusion rather than clarifying the existing ones. The plethora of amendments in the newly born ordinance, with back and forth references to the ITO of 1979, has helped to make matters worse.

The ordinary tax payer will still be requiring the help of experts for dealing with the taxation matters and will continue to be hounded by the taxation authorities. With 20 per cent computer selected cases for detailed investigations per year, in just five years all tax payers will have been investigated, as in the past.

In over half a century of our existence we have often gone in for restructuring. The mother of all restructuring was ‘One Unit’, the latest: the district administration. Creating conditions for successful restructuring calls for something new. The terms right/downsizing, streamlining, corporatization, decentralizing, outsourcing, rationalization etc, etc are meaningless unless the restructured skeleton is clothed with the required organics (nervous and blood systems) in the form of the essential procedurals (SOPs), which tells one how to operate.

The procedurals (operative/tactical level) must be made consistent with the system (policy-strategy level). Therefore feedback is required to ensure that no procedurals develop antagonistic to the system. This is easier said than done, because no crime is committed by not doing anything. Our system of accountability ensures this. This means the sins of administrative omission which are extremely harmful will continue unabated. This must be changed if we are to make the new district administration (DA) effective.

When a system has not worked at all for half a century, why should it be expected to work tomorrow? In fact, with the devolution and the frequent modifications made by the NRB, the avenues for corruption will open up further, because no attempt has been made to build a foundation of prevention. In the final analysis it is prevention that will bring success, not simply increasing incessantly, penal measures.

Sole reliance on punishment leads to the generation of immunity. At one time it was news if a motor car was hijacked at gun point, now we take it in our stride without batting an eyelid even if someone is killed. We have to make a break with the past if we are to get out of the corruption syndrome.

Lack of preventive measures has led to disjointed increase in procedures, many of them adding up to administrative problems. As a result there has been the tendency to centralize the authority because delegation becomes the equivalent of abdication.

On account of the lack of systems analysis, the devolution plan has given rise to a lot of adhockery. The policy decision to delegate financial autonomy to meet district administration responsibilities has not been translated into practice via the necessary procedures as no manuals have been produced. A time-table is necessary to ensure that financial matters are dealt with systematically. The milestones require definition.

The first casualty is the lack of coordination between various interlinked agencies. This leads to different approaches by different officials at the same level in similar departments. Over a period of time there will be a patchwork of conflicting approaches.

We need to understand that the driving force is technology. With technology change comes inevitably. Unless there is adaptation to change we reap failure. The essential characteristic of technology is of incremental improvements, but in accord with an overall strategy. This approach is the only way for us to adopt so as to adapt or later to go in for another round of tumultuous turbulence and turmoil. Given our economic situation, which includes lack of job opportunities to the growing number of educated unemployed, do we have any alternative? Just being happy with seven billion dollars reserves is like having a lot of water stored at a height but cannot be converted into electricity because there are no means to move the water through turbines to a lower level.

Our problems are going to increase further when the international playing field is going in for further levelling with reduction of tariffs, and imposition of ISO 14000. We need to increase the productivity of existing assets including agricultural land and processing units because the initial capital investment has already been made.

The canker that is eating up from within in a termite-like fashion is that of corruption of all sorts. Can our rulers deliver the goods by using the old processes to getting the business of government carried out? It can be helped if the processes are made transparent. Do our rulers have the courage to get the civil bureaucracy to have their departments ISO 9000 certified? An affirmative answer with equally affirmative action taken will help to boost our flagging morale.

email: emmay@pol.com.pk

In light of WB reports

THERE is a dramatic change in the way the World Bank currently views Pakistan’s economic prospects. A sense of gloom surrounded much of its analysis in the mid- and late-nineties. That dark cloud has now lifted and a great deal of sunlight has begun to shine through. Before asking — and then answering — a number of questions about the Bank’s view of Pakistan over the last one decade, we should, perhaps, start with a more general question. Why should we pay a great deal of attention to what the Bank thinks about Pakistan?

The Bank’s thinking matters not only for the reason that it influences its programmes in the countries in which it is actively involved. It also matters since the Bank’s analysis of country situations are read carefully by all donors, bilateral and multilateral. No other donor can match the amount of resources — both staff and money — the Bank can commit to analyzing the economies and societies of member countries.

The most comprehensive statement on the Bank’s view of a country is spelt in a document called Country Assistance Strategy (CAS). It is prepared at regular intervals and is read carefully around the world. It is also debated at length in the institution’s board in which 24 executive directors represent nearly 200 countries that are now the members of the Bank. What they say at the board meeting reflects not only the thinking of the staff working in the offices of the executive directors; they also reflect the views of the people in the capitals of the countries they represent.

However, the Bank produces a great number of other documents that fall under several categories. As a part of what the institution at one point used to call economic and sector work, the Bank staff write treatises on a number of subjects. Among those that have received attention in recent years include the status of women in Pakistan, education, health, civil service reform, reform of the financial sector, public expenditure review in Punjab, and so on.

The institution’s project work also provides a great deal of insight into the sector for which the Bank lending is being proposed. Although the practice of preparing what used to be called the staff appraisal report has been abandoned, project documentation still includes a great amount of information on the institutions that function in the sector for which lending is being contemplated; the environmental impact of the project; the impact the project might have on the status of women, incidence of poverty, and distribution of income.

Let me now ask some of the more important questions about the Bank’s thinking about the situation in Pakistan.

What were the Bank’s feelings about the country a few years ago, say in the nineties? Why has the perception about the situation in Pakistan changed so dramatically? Will the change translate into a large flow of much needed capital into the country? Will the Bank’s active re-engagement with Pakistan encourage other official donors to follow its example? Will the private sector also begin to regard Pakistan as a safe and attractive place in which to invest money? What is expected of the government scheduled to take office following the elections of October 2002 in terms of a policy stance towards economic and social reform?

These six questions are important and we will take them up one by one. Let us start with how the Bank felt about Pakistan half a dozen years ago.

The Bank’s impressions about Pakistan are spelt out in some detail in the “Country Assistance Strategy for 1996.” The CAS from which I quote extensively below was an important document. It was written in November 1995 when the government headed by Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto had begun to badly slip in the area of governance. Corruption was rampant in the country. The rate of economic growth had slowed down, the result of a sharp decline in investment, which in turn was the consequence of the loss of confidence in the economy on the part of both domestic and external investors.

The CAS began with an assessment of what it described as Pakistan’s persistent structural problems. “Long years of neglect in human resource development have placed Pakistan among countries with the world’s poorest social indicators, especially for women and poor families. As a result, many people are ill-equipped to seize new economic opportunities and participate in the modern economy.” That poverty remained a major problem was not the only issue policy makers had to confront in Islamabad. “Infrastructural shortages, weak institutions, low savings and investment rates, as well as limited administrative capacity, also constrain economic growth.”

According to the Bank, all sectors of the economy were under strain. “Agriculture is operating below its potential, and its future is clouded by deterioration of the natural resource base. Industrial diversification is only beginning. While the private sector is acknowledged to be the primary source of future growth, signals are mixed and bureaucratic suspicion remains strong at the working levels. These conditions, combined with a population growth rate of three per cent, limit the extent to which Pakistan can stem the trend of falling further behind its more successful Asian neighbours. Without a major push to accelerate both economic reforms and investment in its people, growth with equity will elude Pakistan.”

The 1996 CAS discussed in some detail the non-economic constraints on economic development. The Bank had, by now, shed some of its earlier inhibition in talking about politics while making economic assessments. “The country’s political fabric and governance problems continue to complicate its development tasks. Pakistan is still a young democracy, having emerged from a long period of military rule only in 1988. While demonstrating a certain degree of resiliency at the national level in recent years, democratic institutions and practices will take time to penetrate to lower levels of government and society.

“In the process of transition from authoritarian to democratic political structures, governing effectively is made difficult by ethnic diversity (including a number of unassimilated tribal peoples), interprovincial rivalries, the deteriorating law and order situation in Karachi (the main commercial centre), and the continued political dominance of large landowners.

“The landowners’ influence in particular makes taxation of agricultural incomes politically difficult. Frequent changes in government and the traditional unwillingness of opposition parties to cooperate with those in power further hinder the development of a stable democratic political culture. One manifestation of these governance issues is the problem of corruption, which imposes political and economic consequences that the government recognizes its policies must address.”

In two recent reports, “Pakistan Development Policy Review: A New Dawn?” and “Country Assistance Strategy for the Islamic Republic of Pakistan,” both issued in the first half of 2002, the World Bank has changed its perception of Pakistan’s economic prospects. According to the Country Assistance Strategy, “Pakistan has started the new millennium with more hope at the end of 1990s. It has achieved a remarkable turnaround. A major factor behind this turnaround is strong leadership in the country with internal cohesion and a clear sense of direction... The government is engaged in fundamental political, institutional, economic, social and gender transformation for Pakistan’s transition to a modern state”

The report — “A New Dawn?” — looked back at Pakistan’s development record over the last forty years, pointing wistfully to the expectation with which the country’s future was then viewed. “In the first 20 years after independence, Pakistan had the highest growth rate in South Asia. In 1965 it exported more manufactures than Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, and Turkey combined. It would have made anyone’s list of the Asian countries most likely to enjoy miracle-level growth rates over the ensuing decades. This did not happen. While the growth rate in the 1980s was still over six per cent per year, after the early part of the 1990s it fell to around four per cent a year.

“Pakistan became the slowest growing country in South Asia, an exact reversal of its previous role. Chronic fiscal deficits fed into mounting debt and rising interest spending, which combined with defence expenditures to cut sharply into development spending. The incidence of poverty, which declined from 46 per cent in the mid-1980s to 34 per cent in the early 1990s, has largely stagnated since, especially in rural areas, leading to a further widening of the rural-urban gap.”

Notwithstanding the recent poor performance, the World Bank expects Pakistan to reverse the trend and begin to move towards a better economic and social future. Why? The question is answered in the concluding paragraph of the report. “Today Pakistan is making a major effort to reverse the mistakes of the early 1970s. It has adopted a policy stance that in most respects seems well designed to do that, although only time will permit a judgment on whether it is delivering all that is hoped.

“But the main message to Pakistani policymakers is to stay the course, maintaining a balance between the competing priorities of increasing development spending and exiting the debt trap, and restoring democracy while trying to avoid the corruption and populism that so marred its reputation in the past. So long as Pakistan’s policymakers pursue that agenda, the country deserves the continuing support of the international community in its quest for a new dawn.”

These two reports laid the ground for a series of large operations by the IDA, the World Bank’s soft lending arm. In June 2002, the IDA provided a single tranche adjustment credit for $500 million, the largest operation ever approved for Pakistan. A few weeks later, as the World Bank went into the new fiscal year, the IDA followed with two more single-tranche adjustment operations, one for the North-West Frontier Province (for $90 million) and the other for Sindh (for $100 million).

Within a few weeks the Bank Group had disbursed close to $700 million to Pakistan. Since single-tranche operations are meant to reward the clients for the policies they have already put in place, the Bank, by letting such a large amount of resources to be made available to the country, was clearly signalling a high level of satisfaction on its part with what the policymakers in Islamabad had accomplished.

This level of quick disbursing lending indicates that the Bank’s confidence in Pakistan has been restored. There is an expectation that the complex political dance in which General Pervez Musharraf is currently engaged in will be choreographed in a way that his partners, the politicians, will not walk away from. They will not start a jingle of their own. The way the Bank staff look at Pakistan is very different from the way they viewed the country half a dozen years ago.

Nikahnama or else!: ALL OVER THE PLACE

A.B.S. JAFRI chronicles the woes of Karachi in this newspaper. He does so with educated indignation rather than reckless rage.

Last week, he wrote about the harassment of couples by police who demand to see the Nikahnama or else. A.B.S. writes, as if, this is something new. It isn’t. It is possible that the practice (!) had been discontinued and has re-surfaced but it all goes back to the cleansing of our society by Ziaul Haq, the imposition of righteousness as a state policy.

We were expected to lead moral lives and seen to be doing so. Some members of the police saw this an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. Not only would morality be enforced but a few bucks could be made. The erring couple had the option of paying a ‘fine’ and because we were being nudged towards free enterprise, the police kept the ‘fine’ instead of depositing it in the exchequer.

I wrote a column about this in May 1993 when the non-production of a Nikahnama was a contributory cause of shooting dead of a businessman who was motoring down from Murree to Islamabad. He was accompanied by a lady. He was topped at the Bara Kahu police checkpost, and when the lady claimed to be his wife, he was asked to produce the nikahnama. Let me quote at some length from that column:

“The police version only makes it worse. According to them, the deceased when signalled to stop did not do so but tried to run over the police party and broke the barrier. When nabbed he was asked to show the documents of the car which he refused. He repeatedly misbehaved with the police. One of the constables received injuries and fired at the fleeing vehicle to ‘puncture the tires’ but the bullet hit the deceased. If there is even a trace of creditability in this version, the behaviour of the deceased was certainly strange but it would still not justify him being shot dead even though death came about because of poor marksmanship.

“According to the Traders Action Committee secretary-general, the SHO ‘openly tried to place cheap liquor in the trunk of the car.’ When some 500 of the deceased’s relatives and friends rushed to the place of killing to ask for the handing over of the body, the police hid the body in the police station’s basement. The Vice-President of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry has accused the police of mudslinging by suggesting that the deceased was having illicit relations with the lady who had accompanied him but who happens to be a relative of the deceased... It is more than bizarre. It is messy. It seems to be a shake-down that went horribly wrong.”

In that 1993 column I had asked, what A.B.S. Jafri and an editorial in this newspaper are asking: “Is it the law of the land that married persons must carry their nikahnama with them at all times? To be made available to the police on demand should you be accompanied by a lady who could be your wife or your sister or even your mother?”

There cannot be a civil society if there is no rule of law. But neither can there be, if there is too much law or the pretence of it. If it is mandatory for married couples to carry their nikahnama with them at all times, then the public is certainly not aware of it.

I suggest that this particular ‘law’ be given the widest publicity. Along with the publicity, a proper and lawful procedure should be set down. For instance if you are being challaned for a traffic offence and are accompanied by a lady, is the traffic cop entitled to see your nikahnama in addition to the car’s documents? Am I descending into the realm of the absurd? I am not sure that I am.

A lawful society is one in which the overwhelming number are law-abiding, not through the coercive apparatus of the government but voluntarily because the law is seen as being in the public good. Law-enforcers should be seen as friends of the public and to whom one turns in times of stress or need. We are a long way from achieving this. Instead, the relationship is an adversarial one.

Matters are not improving because of the security environment and which makes Karachi look like an armed camp. All the more reason that those who are patrolling the streets and checking vehicles, do so with courtesy. It should be an act of reassurance and not of suspicion. I have never resented the checks that the Airport Security Force carries out on passengers because I see myself as a beneficiary of those checks. That’s the way I see the presence of the police and the Rangers on the streets. But they have a limited function and it is not a licence to harass the general public.

A good law will be obeyed. But the production of a nikahnama is a whimsical law, if indeed it is a law at all. The public is entitled to a clarification. An over-documented society is an oppressive one. It puts power in the wrong hands and even saints can’t be trusted with too much power, what to say of those who are not saints.

August’s inflated news

THE videotapes showing al-Qaeda poisoning dogs and training for terrorism were trumpeted by CNN as exclusives, over and over — at least until another network started airing one of them. CNN also said it did not pay for the tapes. Later it said it did.

But aside from exclusivity and money, the tapes must be incredibly important because they’re broadcast endlessly, right? Not necessarily. August often is slow for the media, with newsmakers being out of town. Sometimes there are stories in August that would not be featured as prominently in November.

Remember last August, with the frenzy over Rep. Gary A. Condit, D-Calif., and the then-missing former intern from his district, Chandra Levy? How about nine Augusts ago, when Heidi Fleiss was all over the newspapers and television screens after she was accused of procuring prostitutes for celebrities? The al-Qaeda tapes at least compare favourably in news value with either of these.

This week, CNN is showing excerpts from the 64 tapes it bought, selected from more than 100 offered by a seller it did not identify. Monday’s video featured, again and again, short and long versions of the moment-by-moment poisoning of a dog, apparently the subject of testing of chemical agents to see whether they could be made into weapons.

It was a sight that no doubt had parents everywhere lunging for the off button. Last week, we saw Osama bin Laden conducting a press conference with Pakistani journalists several years ago. Another instalment showed techniques for kidnapping or assassination. Then, a day was billed as explosives-manufacturing day.

Experts in terrorism say the tapes do not contain startling new information, though they are a reminder of the danger of the organization that declared war on the United States and caused havoc Sept. 11. The videos did represent a coup for CNN, which had seen its ratings decline thanks to stiff competition from other cable networks.

After CNN acknowledged it paid for the tapes, reportedly about $30,000, it insisted that none of the money went to al-Qaeda or anyone connected with bin Laden. It did not say how it could know that. CBS News, which also showed a version of the tape of the poisoned dog, said it too paid a fee.

Some tapes were made several years ago, and at least one was made on or just after Sept. 11. They are good television, or, as the CNN anchors keep saying, “fascinating bits of tape.” They also may help to identify al-Qaeda members. However, CNN says it registered only a modest increase in ratings, so folks at the beach apparently concluded they did not have to rush inside and turn on the set.

—Los Angeles Times

Private & public tragedy

FOR the past three weeks Britain has been gripped by a tragedy. It is a personal tragedy, involving two families, yet it has aroused emotions and sympathy in the whole nation.

By pure coincidence, it comes on the anniversary of that previous great outpouring of mass British grief — the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. There is much in the British public’s response to both events that is to be admired, but there is also much that raises disturbing questions.

For those few readers unfamiliar with the sad saga, a quick recap. Two ten-year old girls, Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells, left Jessica’s house apparently to go to the local shop and buy some sweets. Their failure to come back triggered a huge search, involving police, the local community and eventually nation-wide appeals by their distraught parents. Speculation and fear about their fate was rife: had they run away? Fallen into nearby marshland? Gone to meet someone they got to know over the internet? Been abducted?

Such was the sense of wonder and amazement at their disappearance that a huge media circus descended on their Cambridgeshire village of Soham to keep the public informed of every development in the search for the girls. Eventually, after thirteen agonizing days, police announced that human remains of two young girls had been found in woodland in the neighbouring county. Subsequent tests confirmed the identity of the bodies: Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells.

Police have since charged the caretaker of Soham Village College, Ian Huntley, with murder and his girlfriend, Maxine Carr, with perverting the course of justice. Huntley has been sectioned under the Mental Health Act, and is being assessed by psychiatrists to determine whether he is fit to stand trial.

What the above facts do not convey is the incredible national interest generated by the girls’ disappearance and the collective sense of loss felt when the search ended with what everyone had dreaded: news of their deaths. More than thirteen thousand candles were lit for the girls in the small village church. Several books of condolence have been filled, and an e-mail condolence facility has registered more than 100,000 messages of sympathy. On Saturday all football games throughout the country were preceded by a minute’s silence in honour of Jessica and Holly — ardent Manchester United fans.

The national mood of grief is comparable with that following the Paris car crash that killed Princess Diana. Then too we saw acres of floral tributes, columns and columns of newspaper space extolling the virtues of the dead, sympathy for the bereaved (in this case the parents, in Diana’s case her sons). All quite admirable, one would have thought.

But is it? What is it about the death of the two girls that struck such a chord with the British public? And what of the nature of the pubic response? Is it entirely healthy?

Taking the latter question first, flowers, cards and messages of condolence are a touching and appropriate manner in which to express grief over the girls’ death and sympathy for their families. But with sympathy has come intrusion. People are not satisfied with imagining the nightmare Jessica’s and Holly’s parents are going through: they want visual proof of it on their faces, they want interviews in which that nightmare is spelt out.

The media responds to that craving. Over the past three weeks newspapers have covered the Soham tragedy in exhaustive detail. Anyone even remotely connected with the case has been interviewed. One report described a scene in Holly’s house: her brother playing in the garden, her father talking on the phone, her mother standing with her head in her hands. Is such reporting sympathy or is it intrusion?

Public sympathy and grief stems from the fact that they can relate to Holly and Jessica: those two ten-year olds could have been any of millions of ten-year olds in Britain. As such, their tragic fate could have been that of millions of others. There is a palpable sense of fear and relief in the public response: ‘that could have been us: thank God it isn’t’.

But there is also a palpable sense of ‘enjoyment’. The tragedy of Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells is a real-life ‘soap opera’, one to which the ‘viewing public’ is absolutely riveted. Grief can be expressed without having to know all the details of where the bodies were found, how decomposed they were, how the girls were killed. Sympathy can be conveyed to the families without having to know their reaction to every new development. The craving for such ‘information’ betrays the public’s ghoulish voyeurism. Police are already warning that Soham could end up as a ‘sick tourism’ destination.

By behaving in this manner, the people end up hurting those they supposedly empathize with. Jessica and Holly’s parents had to ask the media to leave their village; they had to ask the public and media to allow them to bury their daughters in private. Shielding themselves from a curious public is the last thing the parents should have to deal with at this time. Yet that is precisely what they are doing.

If the public is culpable in adding to the misery in Soham, so too are the media. For the media do not simply respond to the public craving for detail: they fuel it. Several tabloid papers created headlines when there was nothing new to report by criticizing the police inquiry (a criticism not shared by the families) or offering rewards for information about the girls’ whereabouts. These rewards actually hampered the police because thousands of people called up with false leads, each of which then had to be followed up.

The people grieve because they feel they know Jessica and Holly. Why? Because the media — by publishing details of their lives — have made them familiar figures. Why isn’t there the same outpouring of grief for children dying of cancer or in car accidents? Because those children are strangers. By giving victims a human face, the media conditions the public’s response to their death.

Soham might seem an isolated incident in a small English village, but it has lessons that are global in their implications. In the 21st century ‘instant and constant news’ era, CNN, Fox, Sky and even the more refined BBC, play a pivotal role in shaping public perceptions about events. Their coverage makes the murder of two girls a national tragedy. Their lack of coverage makes the murder of many hundreds of innocents in trouble spots like Palestine, Chechnya and Afghanistan, and the death from AIDS and poverty of thousands in Africa, a non-event.

The modern news-viewing audience is more interested in such ‘personal’ stories than in the impersonal but far more far-reaching developments in international relations. Compare the public interest in the O J. Simpson trial, or the fate of the nine trapped American miners, to that in Africa’s AIDS epidemic or the conflict in Sri Lanka.

Both the media and the public need to reassess their values and priorities. They need to differentiate between what is important and deserving of their attention, and what is not. Soham is a private tragedy that needs to be left that way. Afghanistan, the Middle East, Africa — these are mass tragedies that have been kept private for too long. Redress the imbalance.