| January 14, 2003 | Tuesday | Ziqa'ad 10, 1423 |
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Dissent from within
Adulterated food items
EVER so evasive and ambiguous, Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali has made what comes close to being his first political speech. At a Rawalpindi public meeting on Sunday, he locked horns with the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, the religious parties’ conglomerate that rules the Frontier province and is part of the coalition government in Balochistan. He said that the MMA leaders were not the sole custodians of religion, and advised the people to keep away from “self-styled champions of Islam.” His remarks may have been made in the context of the byelections coming up tomorrow for 10 National Assembly and 19 provincial assembly seats. But they are also an indication, as well as an admission, of the problems being created by the MMA for the federal government in dealing with many sensitive matters.
The MMA registered significant gains in the October polls, with 60 seats in the National Assembly and a strong presence in the provincial legislatures. This has won for it the right to be a major political player on the national stage. The Senate elections, whenever they are held, will consolidate its position. The question is how the MMA is going to exercise its newly acquired political clout. Will it use its influence with the voters to educate them about the realities of today’s Pakistan and the need for realistic compromises or will it simply ignore social and economic issues and take the easy way out by relying on cosmetic religious slogans? The experience of the past two or three months shows that the MMA may be opting for the latter course. The Frontier government particularly has been going out on a limb in enforcing measures in the name of religion that impinge on the personal lives of citizens and threaten to deepen political and social divisions in society. Unnecessary acrimony has been created with regard to settled issues. On the foreign policy front, too, the effort is to engage in a discourse that is religious, not political, in character. No wonder Mr Jamali feels exasperated.
However, the MMA or its constituent parties alone cannot be blamed for exploiting religion for political and partisan purposes. Successive civilian and military governments have been equally guilty on this score. The state itself has often behaved as if it is more Islamic than other, older Muslim countries. Placating religious parties has been part of the strategy of many administrations (with the October results being partly an outcome of the same policy). A self-righteous, crusading zeal has become part of the establishment’s overall psyche. Laws discriminating against women and minorities have been framed in the name of Islam. We have seen the strange paradox of some people in an overwhelmingly Muslim country being described as “Islam pasand” (lovers of Islam) and others denigrated as being outside the pale. The military since Ziaul Haq’s days and the religious parties have worked closely in fostering the “jihadi” culture. The sanctity of religion has been violated by using it to score points in petty power games and to justify irrational decisions. If sanity is any consideration, there must be an end to adding to our already bewildering array of contradictions and to the prevalent confusion in our politics. Governing justly to address economic inequalities, creating a society tolerant of a diversity of opinion and ways, and respecting the rule of law — that would be the best service to religion without making it a subject of emotive public controversy.
ANTI-WAR sentiments seem to be growing in the west, including the United States itself. In Britain, opinion polls show that 58 per cent of those polled are against an attack on Iraq, while only 28 per cent favour it. The latest expression of dissent with the Blair government on the issue came from a Labour minister, Clare Short, who said Britain should not join a unilateral attack on Iraq. Instead, the Secretary for International Development said that London should try to restrain Washington. The minister’s statement speaks of serious differences on the issue within the Labour government, or else a minister would not have gone public with her dissent. More to the point, she said Britain should follow “the UN route” and try to “keep the US within the UN process.” Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has often given an impression that he is more American than Donald Rumsfeld, seems now to have woken up to the strong opposition his Iraq policy has aroused in Britain and Europe. Last week, he backtracked partly on his hawkish stance when he said the UN arms inspectors should be given more “time and space” to do their job. Press reports have also spoken of Britain having delayed the dispatch of an armoured division to the Gulf region.
Most of Britain’s Nato partners do not see eye to eye with Blair on the issue. In addition to the reservations expressed by France and Germany, the Czech republic is the latest to have come on the side of peace. In a statement, President Vaclav Havel has pleaded for a common Nato stand on the issue and cautioned America against following an isolating course. One hopes the Bush administration will take note of the ever-increasing international opposition to war. As pointed out by Havel, an American attack on Iraq without UN authorization could find the US in “a sort of war of civilizations” with the Arab and Muslim world. There could be no stronger words of caution.
ONE long-standing problem staring the authorities in the face is the growing number of adulterated food items of everyday use that have proliferated in the market. These include spices, tea, edible oil, ghee, bottled water and other household items of daily use. Authorities in Karachi have seized large quantities of substandard food items in raids around the city over the past few months. According to an official estimate, some 80 unlicensed manufacturers are still selling substandard and adulterated edible oil and ghee in Karachi alone. The situation elsewhere in the country is not much different either.
The proliferation of adulterated food items on such a vast scale should be a serious cause for public concern. And because loose tea, edible oil, ghee and spices are used by the less affluent sections of society, one can well imagine the nature and scale of the harm being done to people’s health and physical well-being. Surely, traditional negligence and corruption on the part of the food inspectors, whose job it is to keep an eye on bad and hazardous food products, is partly to blame for this kind of blatant and rampant adulteration in essential food items and their sale. It is time higher city and provincial authorities took notice of the problem and initiated the necessary preventive and punitive steps. To start with, food inspectors must be asked to discharge their duties consistently and more diligently to keep contaminated or otherwise unsafe food items off the market, and instructed to come down hard on all those found producing or selling adulterated commodities. The drive must be strengthened by putting more teeth in the existing food laws and making their enforcement more effective.