Waiting for D-Day

Will he or won’t he announce, before he goes to address the joint session of parliament, something to appease those who are demanding that the president give up his COAS cap?

Some say he will announce a cut-off date for his retirement, say September 2003 or 2004, before convening the joint session. But others who are known to be chronic optimists believe that he may even announce his retirement before he enters parliament to address the joint session! On the other hand, the chronic pessimists do not believe the general has any intention of taking off his uniform for quite some time.

Those who believe that he will retire sometime in September 2003 or 2004 say the president will perhaps time his decision to coincide with the retirement of most or all of those who were in senior positions when he took over the reins of the country in October 1999. The logic here is perhaps to leave the institution in the hands of officers totally unencumbered by the ‘costs and benefits’ of the 1999 ‘take-over’.

But this logic does not appeal to the chronic pessimists. They argue that in Pakistan the real power does not flow from the constitution but from the baton of the COAS. If General Musharraf were to retire from the army while he is still holding the office of president, the real power, they say, will then shift overnight from him to the new COAS. We all know from past experience what happens in such situations.

Field Marshal Ayub Khan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif had tried to cover their backs by choosing for the post, men they thought were most unlikely to betray them. But when the crunch came, all the three were kicked out by their own chosen army chiefs. General Zia was more cunning. He managed to die with his boots on.

But then General Zia had one very clear advantage which General Musharraf does not enjoy. Zia’s was a non-party parliament stuffed with hand picked members elected through a totally one-sided contest and having a 10-member loyal opposition which he had faced when he went to make his obligatory address to the joint sitting. Naturally nobody from among the elected representatives had the spunk to question the presence of the army chief inside parliament. In any case, he had his name mentioned with his army rank in the constitution saying that President General Ziaul Haq would remain the president of Pakistan for the next five years, though he too like General Musharraf, was elected to the post through a dubious referendum.

President Musharraf’s parliament with a very strong and highly vociferous opposition, however, is a different kettle of fish and the LFO also does not seem to be helping him. In fact the opposition has on its side more experienced parliamentarians than the treasury benches and many of them have very powerful vocal chords. All of them led by MMA’s stalwarts have been demanding that the president remove his uniform, present himself for election according to rules laid down in the constitution and bring the LFO to parliament for approval.

So, it is highly likely that the president if he comes to address the joint session without first making some kind of announcement about his uniform and the LFO, he will face a very hostile opposition. Such situations were also faced by former presidents Ghulam Ishaq Khan and Farooq Ahmed Leghari. But then they were civilian politicians and in the case of Leghari he had seen it all by the time he was elected to the highest political office in the country. When the opposition tried to be awkward while they were addressing the joint sessions the scene did look bad, but was taken as part of the game.

But if the opposition decided to do a ‘Go-Baba-go’ and a ‘No-Baba-No’ with suitable paraphrasing when President Musharraf would be addressing the joint session, it would be a totally new ball game. And secondly, it would not be a very good thing for the morale of the nation and for his institution if Pakistan’s army chief is being seen to be shouted down by the elected members of the parliament.

That is the reason why these days the issue of the president’s uniform has become the major topic of discussion among the chattering classes of Islamabad. And one does get the feeling that the ruling alliance is fully conversant with the matter and is visibly worried. It has already started using what looks like the carrot-and-stick-method with the help of representatives of the civil and military establishment to somehow avert such a showdown. Trade-offs are being offered where such a thing is expected to work. Coercion is being used where inducements have so far failed to yield the desired result. The MMA during its negotiations with the PML-Q prior to government formation had indicated that it was willing to vote for latter’s candidate for the PM’s office if the president promised to give up his COAS cap after six months and agreed to immediately bring the LFO to parliament for approval. It is possible that the religio-political alliance will settle for the same even today. Anything short of this is likely to result in the MMA creating problems for the ruling alliance and the president on the day of joint sitting. And they are likely to be fully supported by the PPP and the PML-N.

— M. Ziauddin

Freedom in Chains

I HAVE a nephew who now lives in the United States. Some months ago, when I wasn’t any too well, he sent me a book to read in my sick bed. Titled Freedom in Chains: The prise of the State and the Demise of the citizen, it is the most op cit book I have read in recent months.

The author, James Bovard, writes beautifully but in order to be able to write beautifully, he had to collect all the most beautiful references he could lay his hands on and then present them to his readers. In his introduction, he begins by quoting from Hans Morgenthau:

“The history of political thought is the history of the moral evolution of political power.”

And then he says:Pervasive confusion over the nature of government and freedom has opened the gates to perhaps the greatest, most widespread increase in political power in history. If we are to regain and safeguard our liberty, we must re-examine the tenets of modern political thinking. We must reconsider the moral presumption and prerogatives that have allowed some people to vastly expand their power over other people.

The State has been by far the largest recipient of intellectual charity in the twentieth century. The issue of government coercion has been taken of the radar screen of politically correct thought. The more government power has grown, the more unfashionable it becomes to discuss or recognize government abuses —- as if it were bad form to count the dead from government interventions. There seems to be a gentleman’s agreement among some contemporary political philosophers to pretend that government is something loftier than it actually is —- to practise noblesse oblige and to wear white gloves when discussing the nature of the State.

The great political issue of our times is not liberalism verses conservatism, or capitalism versus socialism, but statism —- the belief that government is inherently superior to the citizenry, that progress consists of extending the realm of compulsion, that vesting arbitrary power in government officials will make the people happy —- eventually. What type of entity is the state? Is it a highly efficient, purring engine, like a hovercraft sailing deftly above the lives of ordinary citizens? Or is it a lumbering giant bulldozer that rips open the soil and ends up clear-cutting the lives of people it was created to help?

The effort to find a political mechanism to force government to serve the people is the modern search for the Holy Grail. Though no such mechanism has been found, government power has been relentlessly expanded anyhow. Yet, to base political philosophy on the assumption that government is inherently benevolent makes as much sense as basing geography on the assumption that the earth is flat. Too many political thinkers treat government like some wizard of Oz, ordaining great things, enunciating high ideals, and symbolizing all that is good in society.

However, for political philosophy to have any value, it must begin by pulling back the curtain to bare the nature of the State.

For many politicians and political commentators, government is not the problem; instead the problem is people who don’t appreciate government or who are insufficiently docile to its commands. President Bill Clinton declared in January, 1997, that people can “make (America) better if we will suspend our cynicism about government and politicians. This is the Peter Pan theory of good government; government would be wonderful if only people would believe that it has magical powers.

Trusting contemporary governments means dividing humanity into two classes; those who can be trusted to run other people’s lives and those who cannot even be trusted to run their own lives. Modern Leviathans give some people the power to play God with other people’s lives, property and domestic tranquillity. Modern political thinking presumes that restraints are bad for the government but good for the people. The first duty of the citizen is to assume the best of the government, while government officials assume the worst of him. Congressmen are far more fretful about private gun ownership than about the federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) using 54-ton tanks to gas the children of gun owners.

The history of the rise of the idealistic conception of the State is inevitably also the history of the decline of liberty. We cannot put the State on a pedestal without putting the people under the heel of the politician and bureaucrat. To glorify the State is to glorify correction —- the subjugation of some people to others people’s wills and dictates.

The notion of the citizen’s inviolable right to liberty —- the underlying principle of the Declaration of Independence —- has vanished from the American political landscape. Attorney-General Janet Reno, in a 1995 speech vindicating federal actions at Waco, informed a group of federal law enforcement officers, “You are part of a government that has given its people more freedom .... than any other government in the history of the world.” If freedom is a gift from the government to the people then government can take freedom away at its pleasure. Reno’s comment epitomizes the shift in American political thinking away from the individual and towards the State as the fount of all good and all rights.

Welfare state freedom is based on the illusion that government can financially strip mine the citizens’ lives without undermining people’s ability to stand on their own two feet. Citizens are assured that dependence on government is the same as self-reliance, only better.

The Supreme Court declared in a 1988 decision “Servitude means ‘a condition in which a person lacks liberty, especially to determine one’s course of action or way of life”. Yet, despite the vast increase in the number of government decrees restricting people’s “course of action or way of life,” there is little recognition of the growing servitude of the American people to the federal government. Lives are made up of choices. In so far as government confiscates, nullifies, or decimates the choices that people can make, it effectively confiscates part of their lives.

STOP PRESS: With Australia beating England in a dramatic Pool-A match of the World Cup, it all now depends on the run rate because even if Pakistan beat Zimbabwe, they will end with twelve points, the same as Zimbabwe and England. At present, England have a better run rate and they look likely to make it to the Super Sixes phase of the tournament. So until Tuesday, here is another steeples night for you. Keep your fingers crossed.

Give ‘crime map’ a chance

For the most part, the police in this subcontinent remain rooted in the system evolved by Lord Thomas Babington Maucauly (1800-1859) for the East India Company. It pre-dates the British conquest of Delhi. Where it is not quite what that system then was are those of its features today that represent not improvement but distortions of the original. With all its perceived or real faults, the police under the imperial administration functioned a hundred times better in crime control, detection and prosecution.

If it had any political bias, it was in favour of the imperial order. Between one citizen and another, the police were impartial. Its strongest point was discipline and efficiency. Over the 55 years of independence, all governments, without exception, have worked overtime to pervert, indeed actually subvert the system down to its core. Today, it is the law-abiding citizen who is more afraid of the police than the criminal.

With this at the back of the citizen’s mind, Governor Ishratul Ibad’s suggestion that every police station should have its ‘crime map’ would receive unanimous public support. What would no doubt dampen any hope that this idea will ever be materialized is the experience that good ideas seldom get implemented.

There was a time when the then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif declared that every SHO shall be answerable for crime committed in his precincts. A natural presumption was that serious crime not properly investigated and prosecuted will be seen as a black spot on his service record. Nothing came of that prime ministerial fiat.

The idea of a ‘crime map’ is manifestly sensible. But it is most certainly not a very new idea. Again, let us recall that there was a time when every police station had a huge blackboard displaying detailed statistics of crimes reported,investigated, forwarded to courts and results of prosecution. This kind of board was always so placed as to be on view for anyone entering the police station. That was the ‘crime map.’ When that wholesome practice was discontinued and why remains a mystery.

For most of the flaws in the structure and functioning of the police throughout the country, the one factor that is most to be blamed is intrusion of meddling by the political element, for the time being running the government. If recruitment to the force be taken as the starting point, then we shall see that the system gets flawed ab initio.

One cannot say anything about the record of the present government in Sindh, because it has yet to have a record. But all previous governments had played havoc with recruitment. In this respect the Benazir government and the Nawaz Government may have been the worst culprits in Pakistan’s history. In respect of Karachi it would be hard to say who was worse. Both went about perverting the Karachi police with a vengeance.

The most intractable problem that any police chief in Sindh finds on his hands is the legacy within the ranks of the police personnel. Persons of dubious character and wholly flawed antecedents were inducted into the police by the hundreds, may be by the thousands. There is no way the police chief can rid the force of these tainted men in the force who may already have put in so many years of ‘service’ - service only to themselves.

Given this sub-standard chemistry of the force, the surprising part is not that there is so much of crime around us but that there is not more of it. In any part of the world, or in any other part of Pakistan, such high incidence car and motorcycle theft / lifting / snatching would be unthinkable as is the daily routine in Karachi. Even in Karachi it would be unthinkable were a mere criminal activity unbacked by forces stronger than the police itself.

Investigate this crime by a ‘reverse strategy.’ Try to find out where these stolen vehicles actually land. And work your way backwards. It is utterly incredible that investigating this activity should be beyond the police wisdom and capability to control. This is, in essence, a very special kind of commercial activity carried out by criminal tactics. To say that car and motorcycle related crime is now a billion rupee industry would be an understatement. It is unique because there is no investment, no taxes, only profit. If it did not have some unassailable backing it would not survive for a day.

If Governor Ishratul Ibad’s orders about ‘crime map’ of every police station is implemented with full force and followed up by its logical corollary - the liability of the SHO to answer for the uninvestigated crime - positive results would be visible sooner than anyone would expect. Give the idea a real chance.

Let it be fully understood that if the police functioning is to be improved in Karachi, the country’s most educated city, first the quality of the force has to be improved. This will need some intra-force cleansing. One dead fish defiles the whole pond. One black sheep is enough to spoil the whole flock. There is no dearth of dead fish and black sheep in the police forces across the country. In Karachi this malady may be more widespread and deep-rooted.

Now that the Governor has taken notice of the need to upgrade police performance, let us hope he will make sure that his first orders regarding the ‘crime map’ are implement pronto. This may be followed by the required action in cases of strong evidence of inefficiency reflecting in the ‘crime map.’

One is not being unnecessarily censorious if it is suggested that supervision by officers above the SHO level seems to be in need of qualitative improvement. If a ‘crime map’ indicates repetition of lapses at the SHO level, then ipso facto the supervisory officers will have something to explain for their performance. This process should continue to move upwards where at the lower level improvement remains unavailable.

Eternal vigilance should be the constant concern.

Lights for the Mohatta palace

The Mohatta Palace is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful buildings in Karachi, but sadly, its visual splendour can only be witnessed in the daytime. Unlike much uglier Karachi landmarks (like various bank buildings...let them remain nameless in case we have to ask them for sponsorship anytime soon), the palace isn’t lit up at night.

The delicate pink cupolas and other notable features fashioned by architect Ahmed Hussain Agha (who also designed the Hindu Gymkhana) lie bathed in darkness once the sun sets except for those rare occasions when the grounds are utilized for some ceremony or launch.

The Notebook called the palace number given in the museum schedule published daily in this paper to inquire why passersby are deprived of even the very sight of it at night and was given quite a curious explanation. The gentleman at the other end of the line was kind enough to explain that there wasn’t anyone in the palace at night who needed lights hence there weren’t any. What about passersby? Tourists? Night owls looking for another reason to love the city? He said if they left the lights on every night people might think the museum was open and come in.

We pushed further. Wasn’t it in fact an important and beautiful Karachi landmark worthy of being highlighted at night like other historical buildings? Yes it was, the gentleman replied, but like he’d mentioned earlier they really couldn’t leave the lights on because no one was around and they didn’t want people coming in thinking it was open. Do landmarks across the world have the same problem, or especially attractive homes, but the man on the phone was obviously not in a position to influence policy.

Who is? Who has decided that the museum should not be lit up at night? Are we to take the security concerns voiced by whoever picked up the phone seriously? Is it not lit up at night because lighting wasn’t included in the renovation process? How can that be considering the whole process was undetaken by professionals?

The museum administration has added great value to Karachi’s educational entertainment resources with their work so far, but perhaps its time the question of to light or not to light is re-examined. An acquaintance commented while passing the other day “I think I’m going to write them a letter saying I know a whole lot of people willing to do the lighting for free”. A pertinent question/ offer. It’s probably not wise to have a budgetary constraint in these days of high utility costs? Time for beauty sleep so the pale blush on the towers can be reapplied to a fresh face every morning?

Just light the place, please. Set up a fund if the budget doesn’t allow it. If anything, the Mohatta Palace museum will look even more lovely with a few artfully placed spots. And, in case the operator gets upset about this open invitation to nefarious night crawlers, tell him anyone who wishes to enter it at night for ‘dastardly’ reasons will probably be helped rather than hindered by the absence of any kind of illumination.

It’s not often that one can come away from a robbery with a funny tale to tell. One of our regular contributors sent in a piece describing exactly such an episode. She wrote:

“One recent evening, outside a weekly bazaar at around 7.30 pm a young girl was waiting in a car for her sister and mother. They had gone inside the bazar for some quick shopping. Just then, a man, probably in his late twenties, opened the unlocked door of the car and sat in the driver’s seat. He was wearing a shirt and trousers, and looked quite educated, so it was natural for her to take him not as a robber but someone who had mistakenly come to the wrong car. ‘Excuse me, but this is our car,’ she told the man as he rolled up the car windows. He then took out a pistol, placed it against the girl’s shoulder and asked for the car keys.

“She didn’t have the keys with her and she tried to shout and attract attention but he told her to stop. It was quite dark by then and there weren’t too many people around so she sat there and watched the man try and use his own bunch of keys to start the car. He tried several keys but they didn’t go in. He then asked the girl for her wallet, gold chain and wristwatch.

“That is when the unusual thing happened. Just as he took her wallet, the robber held up her chin and said “Tum aik smart larki ho, is tarha akailey gaaree mein darwazey lock keeaye baghair nahin baitha karo” (‘You are a smart girl. Don’t sit in the car like this without locking the door’). Before she could react, the man left the car. Before going he patted her shoulder. And, he also forgot to take her chain and watch. The wallet wasn’t apparently such a great loss because it had three hundred rupees.

There is this very prestigious school in the city. Some accuse it of being very elitist, some say it is snobbish, and there are some who would probably die — I suppose metaphorically — to defend it’s good name.

An interesting incident happened recently at its junior section. One of the students happens to be the grandchild of the country’s most powerful man (henceforth called MPM).

Now, the kid told his grandfather that other students’ grandparents would come every so often to pick up their grandchildren from the school and why couldn’t he, as in MPM, do the same?

Well, MPM called up the school administration and asked whether it would be all right with her since his coming to school would mean a lot of security hassles. The school agreed and said it would be all right. The security measures were put in place and we had MPM come during the agreed time and pick up his grandchild.

MPM went inside the school and visited several classrooms and met the students and teachers. And, it is said, they were all very thrilled to have in their midst the country’s most powerful person.

We as a country to take the cake when it comes to misleading advertising. And since there is no council of standards or any other body to regulate and monitor the veracity of claims made in advertising, consumers continue to be taken for a royal ride.

Just this past week, one of the biggest commercial banks in the country had a front-page ad in all the major newspapers. Readers were told that they could be given personal loans of up to three times their salary and that the repayment period could be anywhere from one to thirty-six months. They were told to contact the branch from where they received their salaries, since that’s the way most large organizations pay their employees: by directly transferring the salary into their bank account.

A colleague thought that this was the perfect opportunity to take a loan worth three times his salary and go on a short but much-needed holiday. He contacted his “salary-disbursing” branch, as the ad had said only to have his hopes shattered. The official at the other end of the phone told him that the offer was valid only if you were a government employee. The colleague, quite rightly, pointed out to the bank official that nowhere in the ad was it mentioned that only government employees were eligible. But the official stuck to his line saying that he was acting only in accordance with the instructions received from the bank’s head office.

Another colleague, also greatly attracted by this offer, was also told the same story. He even contacted the bank’s head office to be told that the offer was good only for government employees.

Ok, that’s not really a problem, both of them say. The only problem is that this detail should have been mentioned in the front-page advert and should not be left to be told to prospective applicants much later when they decide to pay a visit to the bank or call for details.

One of the colleagues said that if this happened in a country like Britain then the company that issued the misleading advert could be sued into giving a loan, since the main condition had been left out.

Tailpiece: Now, even robbers have become of the anti-imperialist bent. According to this paper’s crime reporter, a group of robbers left the following written on a wall after they stole Rs8 million worth valuables from an America-returned family in Gulistan-i-Jauhar: “Die you Americans die!”

— By Karachian

email: karachi_notebook@hotmail.com

Stewing in its own juices

THE historical city of Hyderabad is stewing in its own juices. The recent, off-season, heavy downpour on February 17 has played havoc with sewerage and sanitation systems of the three talukas of Hyderabad — City, Latifabad and Qasimabad.

“Hyderabad is a doomed city”, lamented a former deputy commissioner of Hyderabad, who was the last commissioner and the first DCO of Karachi and has lived in Hyderabad for more than a quarter of a century. Another former deputy commissioner of Hyderabad and the last before the devolution of power, who was born and brought up in the city, nearly wept before the provincial ombudsman at a “Save Hyderabad” seminar sponsored by the latter. He appealed to the ombudsman to use his suo motu powers to restore the glory of Hyderabad.

As far back as the 70s, a former Sindh chief minister had dubbed Hyderabad as Masailistan (City of Problems). Much water has flowed under the Kotri Bridge since then. Its sewerage system has completely collapsed, its roads have turned into potholes, gutter water has entered the homes in Latifabad, and even graveyards lie submerged under dirty water. People are forced to drink contaminated water as water pipes and drainage system have got mixed up. The district government and taluka administrations are bankrupt as their only source of income is the federal government which had abolished the octroi duty and export tax and levied a 2.5 per cent GST as quid pro quo the tax.

This amount is seldom released on time and district government employees, more often than not, take to the streets for the payment of their salaries. More than 75 per cent of this amount accounts for the salaries of district government and local councils employees. The local councils do not even have money to buy petrol for their refuse vans, leave alone for development work. Protest demonstrations by the beleaguered citizens have become the order of the day, so much so that such events are now seldom reported in the press. The government only pays lip service.

One year back, the Sindh governor had proudly announced a special package of Rs500 million for the improvement of the sewerage system and for the restoration of roads, but only Rs125 million has been released so far. One shudders to think what would happen to Hyderabad during the monsoon season. The question is who is responsible for this messy situation?.

The present district and taluka administrations are certainly not responsible for the destruction of the infrastructure. The responsibility rests squarely on the shoulders of past planners and administrators most of whom are dead and buried after filling their coffers. Those who are alive cannot be touched. The multi- storey buildings and plazas which were raised and are being raised in violation of building plans, in connivance with the building control department, have destroyed the city. A former commissioner of Hyderabad and the currently education secretary, Nazar Hussain Mahar, had sealed 37 such buildings but as soon as he left, work was restarted.

The builders mafia recovers “development charges” in advance, gives a pound of flesh to the HDA authorities, and violates every rule in the book. The result is that gutters and drains, designed for 50 houses, carry the filth of a 100 flats, naturally they overflow on to the roads, making the lives of the people miserable.

Take the case of the city taluka. Ninety per cent of its sewerage system comprises drains while 10 per cent are sewers. The sewers were laid in 1973 and have already outlived their life. Moreover, the already overburdened sewers have been connected with unapproved drains, resulting in an overflow.

The duality of the controlling authority has also contributed towards the collapse of the sewerage system as the drains are under the control of the taluka administration and sewers fall within the jurisdiction of Wasa. The nullahs are seldom desilted, hampering the flow of effluents, while plastic bags do the greatest damage — thanks to the civic sense of the citizens. No screening system has been installed at the connecting point of the nullahs/drains with the sewers which results in the blockage of the flow and choking of the gutters. The Cantonment Board seldom obtains an NOC from Wasa for disposal of sewage from its high rise buildings.

Long-term measures are needed to overhaul the entire system, but for the time being it is of paramount importance that a ban should be imposed on the construction of high rise buildings till the existing water supply and sewerage network is improved to a satisfactory level. It is equally important that the mode of collection and disposal of street garbage/refuse, which is usually thrown in the nullahs and drains, is upgraded. But funds are most important of all — Rs500 million for the restoration of infrastructure in the three talukas of Hyderabad is peanut. The city needs a massive package from the federal government because apparently it is beyond the powers of the provincial government to rescue this unfortunate metropolis from total destruction.