| March 24, 2003 | Monday | Muharram 20, 1424 |
BNP, AL’s deafening silence: DATELINE DHAKA
An untenable division of labour: VIEW FROM MARGALLA
Standing tall but not proud: DATELINE ISLAMABAD
Did Australia win or did India lose?
Overawed Indians were no match for world champions: COMMENT
Poetry against war
Is KCR on its way?: KARACHI FILE
LONDON: In hearings in the Senate in Washington last week, Richard Lugar, the Republican chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, recalled the words of President Teddy Roosevelt. “Roosevelt prescribed that America should ‘speak softly and carry a big stick’,” Lugar said. “In the present age, we are carrying an incredibly big stick, but we must be willing to spend more resources on the ability to speak softly.”
DHAKA city, especially its traditional protest venues like Paltan Maidan, Muktangan and Shaheed Minar, were resounding to anti-imperialist slogans for weeks as various social, political and cultural groups demonstrated against the US-UK plans for war against Iraq. When news of the actual invasion broke, almost all the major city streets witnessed hundreds of angry processions participated in by men, women and children from all walks of life.
IT has been fourteen months since the 17-storey Shaheed-i-Millat Secretariat building was destroyed by a fire caused by short- circuiting. Neither has the still standing, burnt out building been demolished to make way for a new one, nor has repair and renovation work been started to give the blackened building a new face.
IN his hotel room on Sunday night Saurav Ganguly must have been thinking what mistake did he commit for which his bowlers were treated so ruthlessly by Ricky Ponting and company in the World Cup 2003 final at the Wanderers in Johannesburg. Is KCR on its way?: KARACHI FILE
SOMETIMES one is led to believe that the expression “many a slip between the cup and the lip” was actually meant to describe the fate of the Karachi Circular Railway (KCR). It was born in the late ‘50s during the Ayub era. Ironically enough, Ayub’s right-hand man, the Nawab of Kalabagh, led a mini-revolution of his type of mindset. He urged the Punjab feudals to participate in urban economy. Road transport was, and still is, the most primitive of forms of modest investment and massive return. That suited the genius of his proteges.
A few thousand miles away in the upstairs drawing room of 1 Carlton Gardens, London, Robin Cook, former Cabinet member, former Foreign Secretary and the first person to resign from Tony Blair’s Cabinet on a point of principle, sat and considered the wreckage of a political career.
Next to him on a small table was a stuffed stoat, given to him during the arms to Iraq scandal of the Nineties. Cook led the opposition assault on the Conservative government when the Scott Report revealed that ministers had turned a blind eye to possible weapons exports to Iraq without bothering to inform the public.
In his first major interview since he resigned last Monday, he looked at the dead animal and said: “It’s my good luck charm. I suppose there is a symmetry to it all. I gained my reputation on the issue of Iraq and I have left the government over the issue of Iraq.”
Cook’s position is based on more than a disagreement over whether and when military action should have been taken against Saddam. He questions the legitimacy of the war, arguing that with more time for inspectors it could have been avoided.
But there is also the larger issue of America’s role in the world and how Britain should relate to the elephant over the water. Cook believes he is seeing a crisis in the world order, once based on an acceptance that the UN was the ultimate custodian of international law and now replaced by the desires of the world’s first hyper-power. “America is a hyper-power, it can afford to go it alone,” Cook said. “Britain is not a superpower. It is not in our interests to contribute to a weakening and a sidelining of international bodies like the Security Council. The Security Council and the system of world order governed by rules has been badly damaged.
“There is a suspicion that the speed with which this has moved has been dictated by American military preparations rather than by the needs of Britain’s diplomatic campaign. That is why it has been so difficult for Tony to mobilise public opinion and indeed international opinion.”
Cook makes it clear that he supports the troops. “Now the conflict has started I hope that the operation is successful and that all our troops will come back,” he says.
After walking the Norfolk Broads last month and deciding that without a second UN resolution he could not stay in Cabinet, he says he ‘has been at peace’. There was a clarity, finally, to what he was doing.
“Britain must heal the wounds with Europe, particularly France and Germany, for any chance of creating a balance to hyper-power politics,” he says. Britain was bounced into a conflict in Iraq because of an American military imperative, he says. The Bush administration does not share the values of Britain or Europe, he says. If Britain does not find a way to say no to the US then the concept of international solidarity is dead.
Cook knows the world is dealing with a new reality of ‘pre-emptive diplomacy’, the new American doctrine held dear by Bush and his inner circle.
The policy is clear: America will act whenever and wherever it believes that the target threatens US interests. And the biggest threat is the support for international terrorism. Any rogue state is now a legitimate target.
Within this doctrine is the argument that, if affairs are left to international institutions such as the UN, there is a greater chance of prevarication and diplomatic stalemate. America wants to act, and quickly. Every day that a dictator is left in power, runs the argument of the American conservatives, is another day when the very fabric of America is at stake. America will act — with a coalition of the willing if necessary. On its own if not. Impatience runs through the thinking.
“The events of September 11 created an entirely new sense, not only in America but around the world, of the priority and urgency of dealing with international terrorism,” Cook said. “It had a particularly powerful effect on American society because they are not accustomed to war coming to them.
“But, if you take a response to 9/11 as being a driving force of the American approach to international affairs, I would strongly argue that one of the greatest assets that came out of that was the extraordinarily rich and powerfully diverse coalition against international terrorism.”
That coalition, according to Cook, has now been shattered on the altar of pre-emptive diplomacy. America has long planned to attack Iraq and splits in the UN, Nato and in the European Union were a price worth paying.
“Now, I’m not an American politician but if I was I would be inveighing against the extent to which the Bush administration had allowed that terrific asset to disintegrate,” Cook said.
“Instead the US is left embarking on military action from a position of diplomatic weakness, unable to get any major international organization to agree with it. We are heading for a very serious risk of a big gulf between the Western and Muslim world. That seems to me to have thrown away a powerful asset for the US which relates to its number one security concern.”
He believes there were a number of years of progress when Blair shared a world vision with Bill Clinton, whose administration agreed with Britain’s ‘fundamental values’. But Britain’s closeness to the Bush administration over Iraq is flawed.
“What changed in the last two years is that we are dealing with the Bush administration and there are people in that administration who don’t care for any multilateral system committed to security and development,” he said.
“The State Department is very weak. The Rice, Cheney, Rumsfeld axis is the motor of the Bush administration. They do not allow much space for Colin Powell.”
Of Bush’s ‘Axis of Evil’ speech, when he named Iraq, Iran and North Korea as the enemies of the free world, Cook says, archly, that ‘whoever wrote it’ was ignorant of the realities.
“The immediate effect of the speech was to achieve a major reverse for the reformers in Iran,” he said, pointing out that the Ayatollahs used the speech to attack America and democratic forces at home. “If we are going to have a multilateral system we’ve all got to have ownership of what the priorities are going to be.”
Cook says that Britain now finds itself in a diplomatic position “that it will come to regret”. Too close to America, too far away from Europe.
“One lesson is that although we must maintain our traditional alliance with America while it has an administration which does not share our world view or our values we have to make sure that we keep enough distance, that there is an option for Britain to come to a different conclusion,” Cook remarked.—Dawn/The Guardian News Service.
The situation reached its climax on Friday, with thousands of people attending Juma prayer in the city’s several hundred mosques coming out in the streets, chanting slogans against the US-led aggression. The protesters eventually assembled in front of the Baitul Mukarram, the national mosque, to be addressed by some leaders of religious parties. Earlier, on Thursday afternoon, there was a big citizens’ rally, attended largely by left and liberal democratic groups and individuals.
There has been no procession by either of the two mainstream political parties, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and the Awami League (AL), which have enjoyed state power turn by turn, over the last decade. The common no-protest stance by the two parties has puzzled the people. The two have never before seen to agree on any issue. Understandably, the ruling BNP is reluctant to displease the US for fear of losing power. The BNP secretary- general, Mr. Abdul Mannan Bhuuiyan, told the press after the invasion on Thursday. “The incident is very unfortunate. We still urge the US administration to take steps to solve the crisis through UN-mediated dialogue.” He even refused comment as to whether his party considered the attack as “aggression” against Iraq.
The Jamat-i-Islami, a component of the ruling BNP-led alliance, finds the war an act of aggression, but endorses the government’s stance on the issue, which is considered ambiguous by leftists and liberals.
The government of Begum Khaleda Zia did not even allow the Iraqi Charge de Affaires in Dhaka to talk to the local press while allowing the US ambassador in Dhaka to speak anything at any place.
The Awami League has also been reasonable this time. “We are always against any kind of war. We are always for peace and we believe that any problem can be solved through peaceful means and dialogue” was all what Mr Abdul Jalil, general secretary of the AL, had to say over the Anglo-American invasion. Like his counterpart in the BNP, Mr. Jalil also preferred to reserve his comment as to whether his party considered the attack as an act of aggression. He also did not find anything wrong with the government disallowing the Iraqi envoy from speaking. After all, the AL is a party waiting for power, said a reporter.
Ironically, where the BNP and the AL are united in silence, the left and Islamic forces both find themselves at one in strongly and publicly announcing the war. However, there are visible differences of attitude between them, especially in terms of interpreting the crisis.
Left and liberal democratic groups argue that the US attack on Iraq is a naked attempt to snatch the inherent democratic rights of the peoples of small countries and determine the mode of governance in their territories. They, therefore, argue that it is the responsibility of all the democratic peoples, irrespective of their religious/racial identity, to actively oppose the US aggression, not only to support the Iraqi people, but also to defend their own freedom and sovereignty.
But the Islamic groups argue that the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq is a part of a Christian-Zionist master plan to destroy the Islamic world. These groups conveniently turn a blind eye to the fact that millions of democracy-loving Christians and Jews have been demonstrating across the world against the aggression. They also ignore that many Islamic states are not very enthusiastic about opposing the American invasion of Iraq. Many, however, believe that the Islamic groups in question are looking the other way deliberately, only to advance their parochial political agenda against a secular democratic Bangladesh.
The political attitudes that characterize Bangladeshi society over the US attack on Iraq might eventually have broader political implications in the days to come.
AN all-powerful president in uniform, a political supremo heading the PML-Q and a chief executive sandwiched between the two do make a strange threesome. The three are required by circumstances to develop a trouble-free working relationship.
President Musharraf is still calling the shots in all substantive government matters. He does not seem to have any intention of spending his time in playing golf as he had promised he would do after he had transferred power to the elected government.
And for the first time in perhaps over 50 years, the prime minister of the day has been deprived of the leadership of his own party. And now this job has gone to a person who does not hold any office in the government. In a genuine democratic dispensation, such a division of labour would appear to be an acceptable norm. But when an all-powerful president in uniform is all the time breathing down the neck of the elected government and the party hierarchy is shaped in what clearly appears to be a feudal network, the chances of things coming to a standstill cannot be ruled out if the prime minister is made to look totally powerless.
This perhaps is the reason why the prime minister’s own province, Balochistan, has turned into the most unmanageable of them all. An anarchical situation seems to have emerged in Balochistan since the elections. In one of his early meetings with senior journalists, the prime minister had expressed his desire to use tribal remedies for tribal problems in Balochistan. But so far neither tribal cures nor secular administrative methods have been able to restore the writ of the government in the province, especially in those areas where tribal sardars are still holding the whip hand.
The dispute between the Bugti and Mazari tribes has turned into a running battle, with the gas pipeline going to Punjab frequently getting caught in the cross-fire which has disrupted supplies to the north in the past. And there appears to be no guarantee against recurrence. One cannot rule out a planned link between these frequent disruptions in gas supplies to Punjab and as frequent demands of Sardar Akber Khan Bugti for ‘compensation’. In fact he has been asking foreign oil and gas companies operating in his area to directly pay him a generous royalty.
The governor of Balochistan, a former general of the Pakistan army but also a Baloch, is said beholden to Sardar Bugti for a number of reasons. Therefore, delay in restoring the writ of the government in the area, allege detractors of the Sardar.
Of course, no one wants to see Balochistan short changed. But there are civilized ways to settle such matters. The party supremo, Chaudhry Shujaat, does not have enough political presence in the province to influence such matters and the premier having no say in party matters is already out of the picture. In such a situation, it is hardly surprising that things have continued to deteriorate in Balochistan.
The trio, the president, the prime minister and the party chief, would do well to look into the matter rather urgently because the neglect of this very important problem of this province has in fact caused a slackening of the hold of the elected provincial government as well. As a result everyone with clout in the province is said to be on a money-making bash. Foreign companies are reportedly being blackmailed by politically influential people into settling for regular payments of ‘protection’ fee.
The way the Balochistan government was put together is also said to have affected its effectiveness. No party had a clear majority in the provincial house. So, by the time a PML(Q)-led coalition government with the MMA was formed, a lot of compromises had to be made which are said to have opened the floodgates of greed in the province.
And since the provincial political leadership knows that the prime minister’s powers to cut political deals are limited, they are said to have gone on their own and opened their own individual shops.
The happenings in Balochistan have not come into the national focus so far because of the dust kicked up by the Iraqi crisis and the dispute over the LFO. But then the Iraqi crisis is about to come to its logical end. And on the LFO, things are likely to take a turn for the better after the March 23 protest rallies of the opposition. So, after the Iraq-LFO dust settles, the situation in Balochistan will become too real to be ignored any more. But then without some political clout in hand, the PM would hardly be in a position to make any headway on this front.
Meanwhile, the president is said to have decided to take the risk and address the joint sitting of parliament without acceding to the demands of the opposition. He is said to have made it very clear to his advisers that he had no intention of taking off his uniform in a hurry and neither does he intend to take the LFO to parliament for approval.
Once he weathers the ordeal of what is expected to be a stormy joint sitting, the president is likely to become even more assertive as, according to his close friends, those whom he had made partners in power by getting them elected have failed to deliver.
—ONLOOKER
The twenty-three year old Shaheed-i-Millat building — which prided itself to be the first high-rise structure to come up in Islamabad — is now an eyesore. Not only is it situated right in the centre of the capital’s prime commercial area but also along a major thoroughfare, the Shahriah-i-Quaid-i-Azam.
The building was built in 1980 by the House Building Finance Corporation, which had then planned to shift its headquarters from Karachi to Islamabad. But the plan did not materialize and in 1986, the building was bought over by the Ministry of Housing and Works. Until the fire in January 2002, the Shaheed-i-Millat had housed the departmental offices and records of some ten different ministries.
A day after the fire, it was reported in the press that preliminary reports by a “technical committee” had recommended that the building be repaired and renovated instead of demolished. Despite this quick recommendation, there were some who were in favour of demolishing and razing the damaged building to the ground and constructing a totally new building in its place, says a senior official in the federal government. Their reasoning was that the gutted building was beyond meaningful repair. The fire had completely destroyed the electrical wiring concealed within the walls and may have damaged the steel framework of the building as well. They were of the opinion that mere repairs might not be able to ensure that the overall structure would be durably safe thereafter.
On the other hand, those who were in favour of repairs said that building a completely new structure on the site would be too costly an undertaking for the government. Their argument for repairs rather than demolishment was supported by the fact that the foundation of the building had remained intact since the first three storeys of the building were not touched by the fire, which started from the top storey.
Their suggestion, says the senior federal government official, was to dismantle only those floors that had been burnt leaving the first three storeys intact, and then build more storeys on top of the original first three. This work was projected to take two to three years.
It became obvious that those in favour of repairs won the upper hand when the PC-1 of the project to repair and renovate the Shaheed-i-Millat was submitted and approved by the competent authorities, and Rs100 million was sanctioned for this purpose in the current financial year, with another Rs100 million allotted in the next financial year.
But the last quarter of the current financial year has already begun and there is no sign that repair work on the building has started.
The delay, says the official, is due in part to the fact that allotted funds for the project has yet to be released. It is not just a matter of installing a new air-conditioning system or a smoke-detecting and fire escape system in the building, says the above federal official. There has to be absolute certainty that the overall structure of the building will be durably safe after the repairs.
The government will only be courting an even worse disaster if a mere patchwork kind of repair job rather than a thorough one is done on the building, he says.
Another consideration, says an official in the Capital Development Authority, should be the finished look of the repaired building. Most of the buildings along that side of the Shahriah-i-Quaid-i-Azam are tall, high-rise structures. The tallest is the Habib Bank Tower, 18 storeys high. The OGDCL building is 17 storeys; the State Life building, the Saudi-Pak Tower, UBL building and the NIC Building which houses the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan - are all 16 storeys high. The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) building is 15 storeys high.
The new look of the Shaheed-i-Millat should blend with and compliment the existing architectural scenario, says the CDA official.
Whatever the decision about the Shaheed-i-Millat building, it ought to be implemented as soon as possible, remarks Shahrukh, an executive of a private firm whose office is in the State Life building just opposite the burnt Shaheed-i-Millat. It is an ugly sight that sticks out like a sore thumb, he adds.
The building shouldn’t become another concrete victim of neglect, abandoned to long years of non-occupancy and disuse, just like the fate of the Pakistan Times building, remarks Nasim, another executive whose office is also situated in Blue Area within sight of the Shaheed-i-Millat.
The Pakistan Times building is a three-storey tinted glass structure located at Zero Point in the vicinity where the offices of several other national dailies and news agencies are situated. It has been deserted since February 1996 when this once glorious National Trust Paper was privatized and its printing press sold to a private newspaper group.
The building technically still belongs to the NPT, but the NPT is, in practical terms, defunct. Abandoned for seven years now - except for the presence of a chowkidar-cum-mali who tries to keep the lawn and grounds in a decent shape - the building needs to be repaired and renovated before it can be reoccupied by any other media organization.
People who see the defaced Shaheed-i-Millat building every day, like Shahrukh and Nasim above, are hoping very much that it will not be left standing as it is for as long as the Pakistan Times building has been.
I CONCLUDED this piece on Sunday night after the end of the World Cup Final in Johannesburg which, as you will read elsewhere in the paper today, has been won by Australia. I should have said retained because the Aussies had won top honours in 1999 by beating Pakistan hollow.
Sunday’s final began with the Indian captain putting Australia in after winning the toss. The very first over by Zaheer Khan showed it was going to be Australia’s day who never looked back after Adam Gilchrist’s rollicking fifty. The Indian bowling was, frankly, not worthy of the occasion. I have never seen more full tosses and long hops bowled in a one day international. The Indian response was over before it actually began. When Tendulkar gets out the fight goes out of India. It was not Australia who won but the Indians who lost. As in 1999 against Pakistan so this year against India. Australia were unstoppable and more power to their elbow.
I LIKE reading old newspapers. There is, I suppose, no law against this innocent pastime. However, Naeem Bokhari, my lawyer friend who looks younger than his years and is at times frivolous beyond all reasonable limits of endurance, thinks otherwise. About Bokhari I will talk to you some other time.
Today I will confine myself to my old habit — reading old newspapers. Now on December 23 last my own paper had relegated the following story to its last by one page. It shows you how well in advance do the Israelis (and of course the Indians) think of all eventualities. It had a bland headline and it read:
Israel has stepped up measures against a possible strike by Iraq in case of a US-led war on Baghdad, scheduling joint exercises with US forces and gas mask lessons for children, Israeli officials said ..... Some 1,000 US troops are expected in Israel .... for an exercise involving US-made Patriot missiles, which were largely ineffective in intercepting the 39 Scud missiles that Iraq fired at Israel in the 1991 Gulf War. The Patriot has since been upgraded and Israel has developed and deployed the Arrow anti-missile system, designed to intercept Scuds at a higher altitude.
The preparation came amid growing talk of war since the United States last week condemned Iraq’s UN-ordered declaration of its weapons programmes as a “material breach” of Security Council Resolution 1441 on Iraqi disarmament.
Israeli media reported it would go on high alert from January 15 in anticipation that hostilities would erupt in the month following January 27, date of a report to the security council by UN arms inspection chiefs. Israel’s defence ministry would not confirm the date. Israel is concerned that Saddam will respond to any US strike by launching missiles armed with chemical or biological warheads against the Jewish State.
GAS MASKS: Ronit Tirosh, director-general of the Education Ministry, told Israeli Radio that teachers had been instructed by soldiers on how to handle a possible missile attack during school hours and undergone training to help anxious children.
“The next stage, which will start in about a week, will be to train the youth and children on how to use gas masks and to instruct them what should be done at each stage,” she said.
The United States is forging ahead with a military build-up in the Gulf region.
SORRY for having missed out last week. Before that I was reading James Bovard’s book, Freedom in Chains with you.
The idea was to tell you how easy it is to write books these days. Ancient philosophers, teachers and other wise men had very few references to go by but not so the modern author. Among the hundreds of quotations given by Bovard, the following may be instructive:
The more powerful the State, the more freedom. — Tito.
To accept a benefit is to sell one’s liberty. — Publilus Syrus.
The people are the bosses in this country and it’s time they stopped blaming everybody else for what they don’t know. — Bill Clinton, November 2, 1994.
A man is none the less a slave because he is allowed to choose new masters once in a term of years .... what makes them slaves is the fact that they now are, and are always hereafter to be, in the hands of men whose power over them is and always is to be, absolute and irresponsible. — Lysander Spooner, 1867.
Democracy: two wolves and one lamb voting on what to eat for dinner. — common unpatriotic saying, 1990s.
People dream of making the virtuous powerful, so they can depend on them. Since they cannot do that, people choose to make the powerful virtuous, glorifying in becoming victimized by them. — Thomas Szasz.
The majesty of the State is due not to its command of an unlimited force, but to its ethical nature, its supreme necessity as an indispensable instrument for the growth of the spiritual nature of man. — A.R. Wadia
Now the country suffered from its laws, as it had hitherto suffered from its vices. — Tacitus
Captains normally are keen to win tosses. But Ganguly must have been a concerned man when he won the toss. He was in a Catch 22 situation. Under normal circumstances he would have in all probability, opted to bat first.
But Sunday was not a normal day — it a was World Cup final — an event which comes only once in four years. In the back of his mind must have been that demoralising nine-wicket defeat at the hands of the Australians in the preliminary round tie at Centurion when he had opted to bat first. To add to his predicament was the rain forecast for the afternoon. Another factor was the Saturday night downpour which had left the pitch damp and both sides which must have prompted the Indian captain to field first in the hope that the moisture and swing would help his attacking bowlers to make early inroads. But that was not to be. Ponting’s post-toss comment that he would have opted to bat had he won the toss must have further confused Ganguly.
On the other hand he would not have taken the risk of surrendering the advantage to the opposition, knowing well that Glenn McGrath and Brett Lee were better equipped to exploit the surface and conditions at the Wanderers on Sunday morning than Javagal Srinath and Zaheer Khan. But all this apart, it was obvious that the Indians were not playing to their full potential — or in other words the way they played in the last eight matches of this contest. The appeared overawed and under pressure of the big occasion and at no stage during the Australian innings they were able to rally around. To say that they had not done their homework would be injustice but I got a feeling that they entered the final without more than one options. Taking cue from the performance of Zaheer and Ashish Nehra in the earlier matches — particularly against Pakistan, England and Zimbabwe — Ganguly and his think-tank failed to reckon that they were facing the most professional, meticulous and organised team in present day cricket. On the other hand the Australians came to bat with a very clear-cut target: to neutralize the Indian strike bowlers as early as possible, preferably before the 15 overs were completed. It goes to their credit and proves that the defending champions had a better game plan, Adam Gilchrist and Matthew Hayden succeeded in rendering Srinath and Zaheer useless within the first five overs. Ganguly had no option to switch over to Nehra and Harbhajan Singh, the off-spinner, but without success. Such was his predicament that he had to resort to calling his part time bowlers earlier than he would normally.
After Harbhajan had got rid of both the Australian openers the logical option should have been to apply “pressure” on the new batsmen. But the Indian skipper committed the same mistake Waqar Younis had committed in the match against Australia — persisting with the bits and pieces bowlers, allowing the new batsmen to settle down.
I think Ganguly used Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Dinesh Mongia and briefly Yuvraj Singh for a longer period than was advisable. No doubt the spinners managed to apply some breaks to the hurricane hitting and bring down the run rate from 7-plus to 6-plus. But this strategy helped Ponting and Damien Martyn to entrench themselves which came in handy in the last 15 overs of the innings to slog at will.
A very obvious weakness noticed was that the Indian bowlers were bowling all over the place. To quote former England and Yorkshire opener and a great admirer of the Indian team, Geoffrey Boycott, their bowling was “simply rubbish”.
One could see that all the four bowlers were under pressure from the first over or maybe be “too pumped up” for the occasion. Instead of using brains, they were trying to use brute power, and were in the process bowling all over the place. Forgetting the importance of accuracy and proper length against the likes of Gilchrist, Ponting, Martyn and Hayden amounts to suicide. All this, however, should not take credit from the Australians. who by winning the 17th One-day International in succession, proved that they are the best side in business and should have taken on any side from among the 12 others in this World Cup with the same confidence and professional manner.
All in all, this final turned out to be as one-sided and lacklustre — from the viewers point of view — as was the one in 1999 between Pakistan and Australia at Lord’s.
Two teachers from a local school organized an anti-war poetry and reading session on Friday evening at Indus Valley.
A friend who went to the event, attended by around 70 people, sent this in:
“World Poetry Day, a day internationally dedicated to poetry of “peace, non-violence and tolerance” fell on March 21, the same day that America chose to launch the ‘shock and awe’ bombing campaign over Baghdad. But this ironic possibility had already occurred to the Poets Against the War (PAW), a loose international network spearheaded by its web site www.poetsagainstthewar.org. Initiated by noted American poets in protest against a poetry symposium organized by the White House, PAW asked its supporters to commemorate World Poetry Day by organizing readings around the world in support of peace.
“Two teachers, Kaukab Jhumra Smith and Iftikhar Zaidi, decided to take up the cause. Poetry for Peace, the Karachi event for Poets Against the War, was held at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture, and was attended by a diverse array of people, poets, students, scholars and other concerned people. The organizers’ philosophy was that that everyone should have an equal chance to participate.
“Muneeza Shamsie, the noted literary journalist, read the first poem. Her daughter Kamila Shamsie, author of three novels including Kartography, read a poem by a Palestinian poet, translated into English by Agha Shahid Ali. Hussain Naqvi, winner of the Phelam Prize awarded by the Academy of American Poets, whose poetry has been broadcast on National Public Radio in the US and on BBC World Service, read one of his own poems. Nargis Rahman, the chairperson of the Karachi Women’s Peace Committee, read a moving poem that captured the love of a mother for her son sent off to war. Mehdi Masud, a former diplomat and foreign affairs analyst, recited several couplets and nazms. He spoke of the value of tolerance, adding that it was the key to diplomacy.
“Providing counterpoint to the adult speakers throughout were students from the Karachi Grammar School, some even from class eight, who read poems they had written themselves or poems written by other authors during previous wars. Selections ranged from Wilfred Owen to a poem by a Vietnamese teacher about a student crippled in the Vietnam War.
“Put together in a matter of days, Poetry for Peace effectively showed that one does not have to resort to violent protests and strikes in order to make one’s voice heard. In the introduction to the proceedings, Kaukab Jhumra asked the question that has vexed many poets in the West, ‘Can poetry make anything happen?’ We, the citizens of a country that was first conceived as a dream of a poet, should surely be able to answer this question, and in answering it, use poetry to make other dreams, such as peace, come true.”
Khaled Ahmed also spoke powerfully.
Obtaining a driver’s licence in Karachi can be extremely difficult, and unfortunately all for the wrong reasons. It’s not because the driving test is too tough or that the eligibility criteria too steep but rather that bureaucracy and mismanagement is so much that any sensible person would think long and hard before venturing to the driving licence branch in Clifton. In fact, it would be fair to say that this experience can be nothing short of surviving the depths of hell. The whole process is so time-consuming and nerve-wracking that at times one thinks of just driving without a licence.
Keeping in line with the hallowed tradition that is the bureaucracy’s hallmark — tangling itself and others in its sticky ball of red tape — the folks at the licence issuing office in Clifton have stayed faithful to the team philosophy. The shady, tree-lined, almost serene approach to the office belies the chaos that is playing itself out behind its wrought iron gates.
Each day, the sweating multitudes come, push, shove and jostle over each other in the hope of getting that elusive piece of plastic. Each day the irate, underpaid, over-stressed coppers scream, shout and occasionally manhandle overexcited would-be drivers. Also every day, without fail, come rain, hail or any other natural inclemency, this gory ritual, this circus of miserable misadventures, plays itself out and repeats just like the rerun of a bad Indian soap opera.
You’ve read the letters from concerned citizens pleading for the reform of this bloated ball of bureaucracy. You’ve seen the ample amounts of column space dedicated to pinpointing the deficiencies that plague this process and the suggestions put forth to alleviate the sufferings of those who go to get a licence. Still, not an iota of difference does all this well-intentioned haranguing make. Do the commissars of the traffic department not see the incredible stress common people have to put up with everyday just to get a driver’s licence? There must be an easier, more streamlined way to get a licence.
For starters, why can’t we have more driving licence offices? Is there a law that says that a city of over 12 million people, and at last count well over a million vehicles, should have just one driving licence issuing office? Ideally, each of the towns (Saddar Town, Nazimabad Town, Gulshan Town, and so on) should have their licence issuing office.
Unless the traffic department finds some sort of sick pleasure in watching the hapless masses descend on this accursed place in Clifton to secure the measly licence, something should be done to turn the whole process upside down and make it friendlier to everyone. Either that, or Karachiites should seriously consider lessons in horseback riding.
A frequent contributor sent in a piece about a bomb scare recently. She said it happened at the Awami Markaz building (rechristened as the EOBI building) last week. However, she says, this hardly created any panic. Perhaps people living in Karachi have become so accustomed to violence that such incidents hardly make them fearful.
“The security guards went around telling everyone to leave after a person called and said that a bomb had been placed on the premises. However, no one really panicked at all. In fact, they vacated the building in such an orderly and calm fashion that one would have thought it had more to do with fumigation rather than the possibility that a bomb could explode any given moment.
“A young man who did not leave his office without first making a call and collecting some important documents said that the bomb scare was more a source of tafreeh than fear. The next day the incident was mentioned not in a single newspaper leading one to think that perhaps a bomb scare is too common these days.
Much has been written and said about Maisoon Hussein who died this past week of cancer and so this will be short. She was a regular contributor to the Notebook and wrote mostly on issues close to her heart: the state of the city’s children, prisoners and women.
Even after she had formally left Dawn one would run into her at various functions, book launches and seminars. She was also a regular at the Toastmasters fortnightly meeting where she used to come as a guest speaker. For those who don’t know, this is a public speaking club, which started in America but now has a thriving Karachi chapter. In fact, they have a sub-chapter in Nazimabad which holds meetings regularly.
Maisoon used to come quite regularly to their meeting and would sit right at the back of the room in her usual unassuming manner. The couple of times that one went to the Toastmasters meeting — just to see and appreciate the good work they do — Maisoon would be sitting taking notes and planning for her next speaking opportunity.
As a contributor, and this hardly needs saying, she was a stickler for deadlines. Her work was crisp and well-researched and did not need much editing. The best part was that she didn’t wear her predicament on her sleeve. And, she was that kind of person that even if you didn’t know her all that well, her death made you feel hollow and very dispirited.
She will be missed. May her soul rest in peace. Amen.— By Karachian
email: karachi_notebook@hotmail.com
At the time of independence Punjab had an excellent road transport service, headed by an Englishman. It worked with the efficiency of a precision clock. Kalabagh saw to it that the Punjab Road Transport Corporation (PRTC) did disintegrate, decompose and disappear. In those days Karachi, too, had an excellent road transport set-up, the KRTC.
In addition, Karachi could then claim with pride a service that Lahore did not have. Indeed, no other city in the country had. It was the tram service. This facility was the nearest thing to being free. Both came under the searing Kalabagh shadows. Both the road transport (the bus and tram) services were systematically throttled. In their place came the curse that we now have — the private buses. This entire network has an unmistakable Kalabagh stamp.
One should not be unnecessarily shy of stating the truth. The road transport that we have in Karachi today has no Karachi input. Nor the output has anything at all to do with Karachi. These buses, their ownership and their operators do not belong here. The legends painted on the bodies of these unlovely transports speak volumes about whoever owns them. Even the names in Urdu are not correctly painted. What kind of service would you expect from entrepreneurs who cannot spell their own names correctly? It gives no one much pleasure to point out the ugly spots. But if these are to be given proper treatment, somebody has to focus attention on them.
Now let us turn to what happened to KCR. It was a fairly efficient service. First, its efficiency was sabotaged. Instead of promoting it, those managing it went about wrecking it from inside. Why? Because without destroying the KCR, the road mafia was going to find it hard to mint money. The excuse invented to kill the KCR was that it was not paying its way.
It is hard to imagine of a more atrocious pretext to shut down a vital public facility. If urban rail transport is prospering all over the world, why the managers of the KCR could not turn it into a viable public service? That question is begging for a plausible answer. The only way to obtain the needed answer is to institute a thorough inquiry into the failure — rather murder — of the KCR.
It is never too late to establish the truth about a public disaster. We have the National Accountability Bureau. The KCR scandal should be referred to the NAB and an investigation instituted in right earnest. This is a matter of urgent public interest and concern. Already much time has been lost. This time loss, too, is a part of the conspiracy. The governor of Sindh can refer this case to the NAB. Quite possibly, the City Nazim, Naimatullah Khan, too, should be able to find his way to set up a thorough probe.
The racket of feasibility studies also should be looked into. Millions of rupees have gone into these exercises and there is absolutely nothing tangible to show for them. Of late, there have been some apparently positive developments on the KCR front. We are told that a Chinese firm has been persuaded to set up a joint enterprise. With the Chinese participation, the prospect of revival of the KCR in viable shape and form has begun to look like something anyone would like to put his money on. One should hope that there is due realization of the fact that if the KCR is beginning to look like a feasible proposition, it is largely because of the noises persistently made in a section of the Karachi press. But there is still much that remains to be done. You never know how powerful a deeply entrenched and corrupt mafia in our society can be.
The road mafia had all but done Pakistan’s national railway network to death. It is only during the last few years that the PR has begun to breathe normally. It has still many wounds that need to be attended to before the PR would expect to receive a clean bill of health. In this sphere, too, owe so much to the assistance we have been able to mobilize from our Chinese friends.
Karachi claims to be the most literate, if not exactly educated, city of the country. It is also the largest city. It has the distinction of making the largest single contribution to the nation’s economy. But with all these impressive antecedents, the citizens of Karachi have not distinguished themselves for social consciousness and activism. An inexplicable inertia pervades over this otherwise mercurial city.
It is a bout time the citizens woke up and took up cudgels for their rights. To be served by an efficient, adequate and reasonably priced urban transport is the citizen’s right, and by all standards a primary right it is. Let the citizens stand up and demand a proper urban railway network. The KCR should not only be revived but also put into operation that meets the highest standards of such a service anywhere in the world.