| October 21, 2005 | Friday | Ramzan 16, 1426 |
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Managing crisis
Islamabad’s planner
‘Wars of the 21st century’
Militant camps
‘Where are they?’
Graduate assembly
Israel’s double standards
Sunday bazaar theft
Enlightened modernization
PTCL clarifies
I HAPPENED to visit the quake affected areas a couple of days back, taking relief goods like blankets, warm clothes and food with the aim to distribute these items along with our team. Regrettably, the visit was disappointing and painful.
It was practically impossible to distribute any kind of relief to the really needy people, since there were many who did not really need it but were present in large numbers to snatch the relief away from us. In the end, we decided to hand over all the relief goods we had collected to an army unit who would then transport them via helicopter.
To my shock and disbelief, on the way the scene seemed reminiscent of a grand mela with people sitting on the roof-tops of buses and trucks. It was also shocking to see that many of those who had come there to help the survivors were more interested in publicity. The moment one enters Mansehra one gets to see a huge banner telling all and sundry that a politician-in-exile (the one in Saudi Arabia) is praying for the survivors.
The banner was very large and the cloth used could have easily made several items of clothing for the survivors who were shivering in the cold or could have been used as a shroud to bury the dead.
There seemed an unlimited number of trucks, vans and containers carrying relief goods and each had a banner identifying the organization which had sent the aid.
Many of these banners were from various district and city governments of Punjab. I did see the ambulances of the Edhi foundation and his volunteers who were quietly busy in helping the affected.
From what I saw a lot of the relief goods are not reaching the might really needy. I think the best way is to contact the Edhi people and ask them what is required and then hand your donations to them.
Also, I will request people to stop criticizing the government and the army because they are doing whatever is humanly possible.
AAMIR AQIL
Lahore
While I am grateful to see the extensive coverage of the earthquake and its aftermath on television, I must strongly object to the use of music when showing images of dead bodies and destruction by some TV channels and some advertisers. What is prompting the use of music while showing such pictures.
The tragedy — which is still unfolding — is not an event which we need to understand with music.
The pictures and footage speak for themselves and do not need any musical accompaniment. Our affected bothers and sisters deserve more dignity.
NAVEED AHMED
London
THE nation has been shocked by the terrible earthquake tragedy. It is impossible for the government to meet the challenge alone. The foreign rescue teams in Pakistan are locating trapped children and other victims.
As a Pakistani one appreciates all foreign volunteers who are helping the people of the affected areas.
They left their families and countries for a noble cause. They deserve our appreciation. However, the attitude of our transporters is regrettable. They are overcharging the donors and have no qualms in this regard.
ZAFAR AMAR
Lahore
THE way the people rallied to the site of the collapsed Margalla Towers in Islamabad and started rescuing survivors even before the government and private relief agencies could reach the place gives us hope that the Pakistani nation can overcome any crisis and survive.
LATIF QURESHI
Lahore
IT has pained me to see some of the earthquake-related coverage shown on some TV channels. Government officials in the affected area were shown offering Friday prayers while non-Muslims were carrying out rescue missions.
Both Ayaz Amir and Murtaza Razvi have mirrored the government’s negligence as the army stood by as onlookers while Kashmiris used their hands to dig and search for survivors. There initially seemed more concern for the Margalla Towers than for Muzzaffarabad or Balakot.
SURAYA ASGHAR
St. Petersburg, FL, US
ACCORDING to one report, a minister took some relief items that students had collected at a stall outside PIMS in Islamabad and began giving it out as if he had collected them. Another minister reportedly delayed the delivery of relief supplies so that he could be photographed.
All ministers are also requested to stop announcing salary deductions for their departmental employees and let the latter pay whatever they want to and to whom. It would be interesting to learn how much our politicians and ministers have donated from their own pockets.
DR OBAIDULLAH
Peshawar
FOLLOWING the earthquake, Information Minister Sheikh Rashid was reported to be angry at some private TV channels saying that they were “sensationalizing” their coverage of the earthquake-hit areas. Could the minister elaborate a little on what he means by “sensationalization”?
If the channels are showing scenes that present the reality on the ground — no matter how grim or disturbing — then they need to be commended for doing so and in fact the minister should thank them because they will have helped the government in its relief and rescue efforts.
The fact is that it was largely because of the coverage of the private channels that the world came to know of the real situation on the ground. If it was left to the honourable minister, he would have still been calculating as to what to tell the nation and what not to tell. PTV has no doubt improved, but it still has to go a long way to establish its credibility.
A PAKISTANI
Islamabad
THERE are reports circulating among Pakistanis living in London saying that that the reason why Islamabad’s CDA is reluctant to carry out an investigation into the Margalla Towers tragedy is because that would unearth another scam under which a builder was permitted to build a 21-storey building in Sector E-11.
Will the CDA care to elaborate on this and confirm or deny such reports?
DR GHAYUR AYUB
London
UNLIKE other calamities, earthquakes are very difficult to predict. My humble request is that two divisions of the Army should be trained for special calamities (earthquake, floods, tsunami, etc).
The manpower, dedication and resources are all there. All we need is specialized training.
I am sure the Army would take up this challenge.
S. JAMEEL HUSSAIN
Karachi
DESPITE being of such magnitude and despite the fact that Islamabad is a mere 90 kilometres from the earthquake’s epicentre, it is almost a miracle that only one building collapsed in the city. Imagine what might have happened if the quake had hit Karachi or Lahore. And for that there is one person we need to thank: the Greek architect Constantinos A. Doxiadis who designed Islamabad.
It was Mr Doxiadis who realized that the site picked for Islamabad was in an earthquake zone. It was he who realized that tall buildings should not be built at such a site. Thus, there were no three-storey houses in Islamabad. It was also he who realized that human beings have the right to live a decent life and a right to privacy. That is why most houses built in Islamabad have lawns and are separated from each other by a distance of 10 feet.
Islamabad has no traffic jams, no water or sewage problems and has a low crime rate when compared to other cities. We thank him for all this too.
There is talk of building new cites in place of the ones that have been destroyed. And apparently Gwadar is also located on an earthquake fault line. The unfortunate aspect of all this is that the private sector will take the lead in this construction. How will it be ensured that it builds safe housing?
General Musharraf must surely hold Ayub Khan in high regard, and should learn a thing or two from him. Ayub Khan realized that a city must have one central architect. He understood that architects are not just people who build buildings but are also philosophers. He realized that the land for Islamabad should be bought by the government and then sold to citizens once the city infrastructure (roads, water and gas connections) was in place.
This requires learning from the past — something that our rulers have yet to learnt.
WASEEM AZIZ
Ottawa, Canada
I REFER to the letters by Mr K. Hussain Zia and Prof (Dr) Arifa Farid (Oct 2 and 12).
Dr Farid declares that “bin Laden is only a bogey man or hobgoblin of the West. At best a myth kept alive to downplay the main issues that confront the Muslim world, i.e., Palestine, Kashmir, Bosnia, etc”.
For Mr Zia, Al Qaeda is a collection of “rag tag and bob-tall (presumably tail) fugitives hiding in remote caves ... with their leader depending on a kidney dialysis machine for survival”.
Let us assume for a moment that the correspondents’ appreciations are correct. Then how does one explain that bin Laden has fired (albeit wrongly) the imagination of young Muslims from Birmingham to Bali?
Whether bin Laden is dead or alive in “caves” matters not; the man has metamorphozed into an “ism” and the “rag tag and bob-tail fugitives” of his “invisible army” have not only changed the contours of democracy in the western world, but cost billions of dollars around the world to ward off terror.
Bin Ladenism has also deeply influenced the hitherto moderate stream among the Muslims. Notwithstanding Mr Hussain Zia’s disclaimer that “no one wants terrorism”, he wants to “reason” with those involved in 9/11 and 7/7 and the like. Well, good luck to him.
My subjective view remains — and I have no means to divine the truth -– that bin Ladenism is or will be in the future intelligent enough to realize that terrorism usually results in the random slaughter of innocents and will not promote the causes of the Muslim world listed by Dr Arifa Hussain. It sets world opinion against them and Muslims as a community. This barbarism has no chance of success.
It sets all our causes back.
If bin Ladenism is to be a serious player on the world stage, the route lies to control the assets below the sands of Arabia. To control the world’s largest reservoir of oil and energy gives it the power to influence and mould the West that can never be achieved by terrorism.
And, if wisdom is granted to whosoever controls these assets, to use this untold wealth is to forge the only weapon that can succeed against the West, which is knowledge. Alas! this is what the Japanese, Chinese and the Koreans have learnt in the 20th century and the Indians and hopefully the Pakistanis will learn in the 21st.
M.P. BHANDARA
Rawalpindi
MR Abu Hashir, after quoting an AP report that the massive earthquake in Kashmir has wrecked the militants’ network of camps, safe houses and weapons caches, says: “Hopefully Kashmir will now be free of bigoted zealots (Oct. 15).”
I wish to ask him whether if had been living in an area occupied by a hostile foreign power and was compelled, along with a number of fellow citizens, to struggle to end the occupation, persecution, rapes of relatives, burning of houses, torture, disappearances, etc., he would call himself a “bigoted zealot” or would like others to label him as such.
One must learn to empathize with oppressed people instead of bashing them.
We should not unthinkingly buy the clever Indian propaganda, spread further by western media, designed to malign the legitimate freedom struggle of our Kashmiri brethren nor recycle it by blaming them instead of India for the reign of terror let loose on the hapless Kashmiris.
If the Indians were really innocent, they would have accepted Pakistan’s longstanding demand of allowing United Nations observers and international human rights organizations to monitor the situation in held Kashmir, but they have never agreed to it, which exposes their hypocrisy.
If a few misguided freedom-fighters commit acts of terrorism — which cannot be condoned — it doesn’t mean that the other 95 per cent colleagues of theirs should be unfairly stereotyped.
ABDUL ALEEM
Karachi
THIS is with reference to Murtaza Razvi’s article (“Where are they at this hour of need?”) on Oct 15. I am afraid Mr Razvi got his information wrong about religious or jihadi organizations not contributing to relief efforts in the quake-hit areas. The fact is that they are actively involved in helping people and in providing relief in the affected areas. May be they are not making as much of a noise as others, but one only needs to visit the devastated areas to see that they are actively involved in the field.
In fact, an article in another English-language daily reports that religious organizations involved in relief efforts outnumber others in Balakot. In this time of grief and sorrow, all Pakistanis, irrespective of ideology, religion, gender or ethnicity, need to be united.
WAQAR AHMAD KHAN
Haripur
I AGREE with the views expressed by Dr M. Yaqoob Bhatti in his letter, “Graduate assembly” (Oct 11). He is right when he says that “to prescribe a condition of being a graduate for the chosen representative of the people disenfranchises the majority from being chosen”. It is most unfair to impose such qualification on a parliamentary candidate in a country where the majority of the people is illiterate, and university graduates constitute hardly two per cent of the population.
What should be required of a candidate for parliamentary election are political acumen, robust commonsense and closeness to the electorate, and not a university degree. It is a fallacy to think that a graduate will be more honest and responsible as compared to a non-graduate. This is amply borne out by the record of the current assembly where even producing a quorum is a problem.
It is relevant to mention here that former British prime minister John Major was not a university graduate. None can say that he was incompetent and incapable. One of his eminent predecessors, Clement Atlee, was not a degree-holder either. The British national hero and twice prime minister of the UK, Winston Churchill, who was awarded the Nobel prize for literature, did not have a university degree.
Now coming home, the late Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan, the best prime minister Punjab ever had, was a non-graduate. So was his immediate successor Sir Khizar Hayat Khan Tiwana, considered to be a very capable administrator. After partition, eminent central ministers like Nawab Mushtaq Ahmed Gurmani and Khwaja Shahabuddin were non-graduates.
Former prime minister Muhammad Khan Juenjo, too, was not a university graduate. Prominent politicians such as Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi, Abdul Wali Khan, Ataullah Mengal, Air Marshal Asghar Khan and Sardar Sher Baz Mazari do not hold any university degrees. The last named is the author of an excellent book of over 500 pages. It explodes the myth that a university degree is necessary to become a capable parliamentarian.
Even in our neighbouring country, outstanding politicians/parliamentarians like Mrs Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi and Giani Zail Singh, who were the occupants of the exalted office of prime minister and president, respectively, did not have any university degree.
The imposition of the degree conditionality was a clever move on the part of the powers that be to keep some seasoned politicians out of the assemblies. The condition needs to be removed at the earliest in the public interest.
R.R. ALVI
Lahore
SOME Israeli members of parliament have urged the US and its allies to use force to stop Iran’s nuclear programme and one of them has said Israel “will not live under the threat of an Iranian nuclear bomb” (Oct 2).
The many neighbours of the Zionist state have been living under the shadow of its atomic arsenal for many decades, which seems not to bother Israel or its western supporters. While one favours global nuclear disarmament, until that happens it would only be fair if Iran or Arab country acquires such a capability so that there is a balance of terror and the Israelis get to know what it is like to live under such a threat.
That is probably the only way of making them more accommodating towards the Palestinian and other victims of their aggression and state terrorism.
ADIL ABDULLAH
Karachi
MY car’s stereo was stolen on Oct. 16 from the parking lot of the Karachi DHA Sunday bazaar. It seems that such incidents are on the rise at these popular shopping bazaars.
Security guards need to be posted. A nominal charge of five rupees can be levied by the DHA on all vehicles that come to the bazaar to pay for this service.
The DHA should also introduce uniforms for the loaders who throng the bazaar. Those visitors who want to hire the services of a loader should be made to pay in advance at the bazaar management’s office.
UMAIR MOHSIN
Karachi
ENLIGHTENED moderation is being advanced these days as the password for progress in Pakistan. It has almost assumed the title of a new fangled cult which in fact it is not. Islam in its essence preaches enlightened moderation. Numerous ayats of the Holy Quran state that it brings people from darkness into light.
So is the case with moderation in life which is repeatedly enjoined in the Holy Quran to be adopted as a way of life. The Ummah is described as Umma-tul-Wusta standing between the old and the new.
As such pristine values of Islam have at their core the concept of enlightened moderation. So why not revert to pristine Islam as such instead of counterfeiting the universal values of Islam in a catchy terminology which may not last after its author passes away? Let us not be apologetic about Islam to divide it between extremism, fundamentalism, enlightenment and moderation. Islam is universal, balanced and everlasting.
Let us hold the rope of Allah extended in the form of the Holy Quran which alone can be our salvation in this world and the next rather than self concocted slogans endorsed by the sole superpower of the world.
DR. M. YAQOOB BHATTI
Lahore
APROPOS of the letter (Sept 14) regarding dead phone # 4993517, it is clarified that no complaint had been registered through the “centralized fault management system” or “18” by the customer before the publication of the letter. The complaint was rectified the day the letter was published.
SALEEM KHAN PRO STR-III
Karachi
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