LET me return for a moment to the Zia period in order to go forward with the analysis I began to offer in this space last week. The third takeover by the military was poorly timed; in fact, the country would have benefited from the political accommodation that seemed on the way between the government headed by Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and the forces of opposition. Military intervention set back the process of political maturation.

Was it political ambition that propelled General Ziaul Haq to take over power? Or, had the military senior command, given the rapid deterioration of law and order on the street, become too restive to be ignored by the chief of staff? I asked these questions in several conversations I had with President Zia but he always maintained that the law and order situation had deteriorated to the point where the military had no choice but to intervene.

It is interesting that of the four generals who have led the military into Pakistan’s political space only the first, Muhammad Ayub Khan, admitted that he had planned that action for a long time. All others have pleaded that they reacted to extraordinary circumstances. The position they took reflected the thinking on political development at the time of their intervention. In the late 1950s, there was a widely accepted view among political and economic experts that military rule could hasten development in developing societies. That view changed after the spectacular failure of military regimes in many parts of the world in the half century after Ayub Khan’s coup d’etat.

How did the military governments fare in Pakistan? This is an important question and I will attempt to provide some tentative answers for the fourth regime, the one headed by General Pervez Musharraf. However, before getting into the subject, I should mention one conclusion that is clear from an examination of the performance of the military in politics. The legacies left by military governments in Pakistan had more to do with the personality, thinking and beliefs of the leader in charge and little to do with the military as an institution. The Zia government is a particularly good example of that.

The Zia administration succeeded in some areas such as bringing growth back to the economy but, in retrospect, his legacy was extremely negative. Zia’s one contribution was to bring fundamentalist Islam to the country that had lived comfortably for centuries with a considerably more benign form of the religion. Pakistan is still dealing with the plants that sprouted from the seeds sown by General Ziaul Haq.

What about the fourth intervention by the military? Would General Pervez Musharraf have taken over the country’s administration had Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif not made the clumsy attempt to change once again the military’s top command? Did the military incursion into Indian held Kashmir and the way the aftermath of the Kargil episode was handled by the political authorities create so much tension between the civilian government and the military command that only a takeover by the army could resolve it? General Musharraf knows the answers to these questions but he continues to maintain that it was the attempt to hijack his plane that provoked his colleagues to intervene. What would have happened had he not taken over the administration?

I can think of many answers to these questions. Pakistan would have continued the headlong plunge towards Islamization, choosing the interpretation of the religion favoured by the more conservative elements of the Muslim would. Prime Minister Sharif would have succeeded in imposing a new political order which would have introduced religious authoritarianism into the country. His 15th amendment had not been abandoned; it was placed on the back-burner waiting to be brought forward once a Senate that he controlled had been elected. The prime minister would have continued with the task of turning the military into a deeply religious institution, ready to achieve the goals of the ummah.

The economy would have continued its march towards bankruptcy, hastened by the sanctions that were imposed on the country following the explosions of nuclear bombs in the Balochistan desert. And, confronted with the choice given to his successor by the administration in Washington after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the prime minister would have most probably wavered before committing himself fully to the American led war on terrorism.

According to my way of looking at Pakistan’s history, the country was heading towards an abyss when the military chose to intervene. In October 1999, the economy was in shambles, the political system was in disarray, dozens of Islamic groups that espoused all kinds of radical causes were on the loose, the law and order situation was fast deteriorating, and a worried world had begun to fear the worst. A number of foreign analysts had already begun to call Pakistan a failed state; those who were a trifle more generous were prepared to settle for the description of a failing state.

Has General Musharraf pulled the country back from the abyss; can we be certain that Pakistan under his direction will move towards his cherished goal of “enlightened moderation”? Has he brought the Islamic groups under the control of the state, winning back for the government the right to determine in which direction the country should proceed? Has the economy been set on the course to high levels of sustained growth?

Is the large pool of poverty created in the reckless 1990s beginning to shrink in size? Has the country begun to gain the respect of the international community? Is the economy getting integrated into the global economic system and the system of international production that is redefining the way the world operates? Is the large and rapidly growing population being educated and trained to participate in the international system of production?

It is difficult to answer these questions unambiguously. It is difficult to state unequivocally that General Musharraf has succeeded in the tasks which he has defined for himself on several different occasions. Some of his successes and failings are now becoming apparent. The economy is healthier today than it was six years ago but it is still not set on a course on which it can grow and sustain at a rate of growth that would bring a perceptible decrease in the incidence of poverty. Very little has been accomplished to improve the system of education and train the work force. Women have not received their rights that were taken away so crudely by a number of laws put on the statutory books by President Ziaul Haq. Even less has been done to prepare the country to become a full participant in the new global economy. Pakistan remains disconnected with the world. For instance, only one European airline operates a service to Pakistan and even that is only three times a week. None has dared to operate from the United States.

All this notwithstanding it should be recognized that some brave steps have been taken to reverse the disastrous policies of the past. The economy has been saved from bankruptcy and government’s budget has been brought under control. There are growing contacts with India and somewhat better relations with Afghanistan. There is a tentative opening to the state of Israel and some overtures have been made to start a dialogue with the Jewish community of the United States.

President Musharraf has begun to explain more clearly to the world that his country is equally resistant to giving support to the stateless people who are determined to upset the global order in the name of Islam. He is becoming increasingly more open in condemning Islamic extremism and all that it stands for. These steps — some small, some large — have been noticed by the world but they have not fully dispelled the scepticism with which Pakistan continues to be looked at by the global community.

To understand how far Pakistan has been left behind and to appreciate the distance it has to travel, one needs to visit India or read what is being written about the country. I compare Pakistan’s situation with India for the reason that there is so much that is common between the two countries. Nonetheless for reasons that need to be explored India is now regarded with great favour while Pakistan continues to be seen with fear and suspicion. For President Musharraf to succeed in his project he will have to work hard to change the country’s image.

There can be no doubt about the great interest the world has in India and great confidence in its future. During my most recent visit to the country, I took a flight out of Munich to Delhi which was full of Europeans going to India for business, for sightseeing, for various academic pursuits. I went through Munich for the reason that no seats were available from points such as London, Frankfurt and Paris from where I would have preferred to start my journey.

The plane landed at Delhi’s shabby airport but offloaded the passengers to be taken by bus to the terminal. All the available gates were taken by aircrafts that had come in from Europe, the United States and East Asia. The hotels were full, again with foreigners. It was obvious that India for several reasons was the favoured destination for tens — if not hundreds — of thousands people.

For a good example of what is being written about the country I would recommend Thomas Friedman’s latest book on globalization. The book, The World is Flat uses India as the example of a country and, an economy that is reshaping the global production system. I’ll quote one passage from the many that celebrate India in the book. “August 15 commemorates freedom at midnight. Y2K (the need to convert computer programmes on the eve of the 21st century) made possible employment at midnight — but not any employment, employment for India’s best knowledge workers. August 15 gave independence to India. But Y2K gave independence to Indians — not all by any stretch of the imagination, but many of them from the most productive segments of the population. In that sense India was lucky, but it also reaped what it had sowed through hard work and the wisdom of its elders who built all those IITs, the Indian Institutes of Technology.”

A letter published recently in the correspondence columns of this newspaper spoke of a discussion on a TV channel in which representatives of the Association of Builders and Developers and the Karachi Building Control Authority had been invited.

The correspondent said that the discussion was presumably organized keeping in mind the post-earthquake situation with special reference to Karachi. The only problem, though, he wrote, was that both parties praised each other, with the moderator not holding either side accountable for the haphazardly planned and shoddily constructed high-rise buildings that have come to dominate Karachi’s skyline.

All of this was of course made legitimate by the promulgation by the then Sindh governor (and now chairman of the Senate) Mohammadmian Soomro of an ordinance which sought to ‘regularize’ all buildings in Karachi that had been built in violation of the prescribed building code — on payment of a prescribed fine. The building code that is applied to Karachi is called UBC for short, or ‘uniform building code’ and is adapted from a similar code in the US.

According to columnist Ardeshir Cowasjee, writing in this newspaper on Oct. 30, the number of buildings that have been ‘regularized’ under this ordinance is in the region of 5,000.

This ordinance was wrong to begin with and, as has been pointed out, was strongly resisted by the private members of the KBCA’s then governing body (not in place anymore) which said that this was tantamount to legalizing illegally built buildings and that, instead of taking action against such errant builders, the ordinance would end up rewarding them for their violation of the KBCA’s rules and regulations. In fact, it would not be an exaggeration to say that the ordinance was an instance of the government putting at grave risk the lives of those living in unsafe apartment buildings.

According to the UBC rules, the builder of any structure of ground plus four storeys must submit the building’s plan to the KBCA which will then have it scrutinized by a panel of engineers. This rule is in place because Karachi is included in Zone 2-B of the seismic hazard map of the country, which places the city in an area of moderate seismic activity.

According to the building code, any high-rise should be so designed that it is able to withstand an earthquake of intensity between six and 6.5 on the Richter scale. In the presence of the ordinance, it is most likely that all those buildings which did not conform to the requirements of the building code were ‘regularized’ on payment of a fine. This means that many of these buildings might actually be dangerous to live in given that the city is situated in a zone where a moderate earthquake could strike.

What is perhaps even more disturbing is that the regulatory body concerned with ensuring that buildings are safe to live in has done just the opposite with this ‘regularization’ charade. In fact, not only had it ignored the building violations; it had also directly profited from them in a sense given that the ordinance allows buildings with violations to be ‘regularized’ on payment of a fine.

Of course, part of the blame for this state of affairs is to be borne by the builders who make such buildings and even by those who live in them knowing fully well that they are not built according to proper standards. However, the greater responsibility clearly lies with the KBCA since it has the authority to check violations and to ensure that the structures are built according to the prescribed code.

The standard practice of the KBCA seems to be that from time to time it issues advertisements in newspapers saying that the completion plan for such and such building has been approved. The ad also contains information as to how many storeys and covered area the building is supposed to have. On occasions it has also cautioned prospective buyers against purchasing flats in buildings which have not been issued a ‘no-objection certificate’ by it. However, other than this it hasn’t really done much, although in a few rare cases some structures built illegally have been demolished — but mostly on court orders.

So one wonders of what use are these ‘public service’ ads when so many of Karachi’s buildings are manifestly built in a manner that violates building regulations and would most likely not withstand the jolt of even a moderate earthquake? In the past, some cynics referred this whole exercise to some form of ‘noora kushti’ which means a wrestling match in which everything is fixed but the audience thinks the contestants are actually engaged in a tough fight. Such practices, one hopes, will come to an end in the light of the devastation caused by Oct 8 earthquake in the north.

As for the ‘regularization’ ordinance, the total number of buildings that have been regularized and the amount collected under the head of ‘regularization’ remain classified information so far. These figures should be made public. Also, there is the issue — brought to the fore after the Oct. 8 earthquake — of launching a survey of all buildings that may have been built in violation of the rules and hence may present a danger to their occupants. The KBCA has been directed to carry out this survey but that hardly makes any sense since it was the KBCA itself which did not carry out its regulatory task properly and allowed such illegal structures to be built in the first place. It would be far better if such a survey was carried out by a commission set up by the government and comprising independent design and engineering experts and whose report and recommendations should then be made public. Otherwise, the post-quake survey may also turn out to be another act of deception with many of Karachi’s high-rise buildings remaining as dangerous and prone to earthquakes as at present.

In addition to this, it remains unclear what exactly will be done if a building is deemed vulnerable to seismic activity. Last but by no means the least, those who allowed these illegally- built structures to come up the first place should also be held answerable.

Email: omarq@cyber.net.pk