Sense of direction

IT HAS become a ritual for newspapers to write editorials and publish supplements on March 23, the day the Pakistan Resolution was adopted in 1940; each year there seems more to lament than to rejoice in. Pakistan’s first constitution was also adopted on this day 50 years ago, and this year’s anniversary thus has a particularly poignant message to convey — the nation’s failure to evolve a stable system of governance that is constitutional, democratic and responsive to the needs of the people. No constitution is perfect — the 1956 constitution was far from being one — or unchanging. But the experience of other democratic countries is that while the basic constitutional framework remains the same, it evolves as time passes. In our case, even the basics remain undefined, and we have in many ways regressed even from that flawed document that was adopted by the constituent assembly in 1956, nine years after independence. The initial delay in framing a constitution was to have serious consequences for nation-building. Lack of foresight on the part of the political leadership to hold a general election shortly after the state came into being eventually created the space for the bureaucracy and the military to consolidate their grip on the structure of power at the cost of political and representative institutions.

How the military-bureaucracy axis has since played ducks and drakes with both constitutionalism and responsive governance is history. The most deleterious effect that this has had is to create a feeling of frustration and despondency. Pakistan appears to limp along from day to day without a sense of direction, tossed from one crisis to another. Federalism, which right from the beginning has been the central problem for the country, has remained unaddressed, with results that are there before us. All national institutions have been eroded. Political parties are in disarray, with the official decision to celebrate the centenary of the Muslim League little more than an effort to mock at the original party of independence. Progress has of course been made, notably so in many areas: time doesn’t stand still. Our unpredictability, helped by our strategic location, keeps the international community engaged with us.

The point is how to arrest the trend and create hope for the future. Three generations since independence, millions of Pakistanis have grown up knowing of no other country or identity. Their trust in their own country is absolute. We should not shake it more than we already have. We must stop being at war with the world, and give up our notions of superiority and our irredentism. A settlement with India, crucial to the development of democracy in Pakistan and to check the menace of extremism, must be earnestly sought (and it is, ironically, the present military regime that can perhaps deliver on this). The unrest in Balochistan and Waziristan must be tackled politically. The military must stop telling us they know best how we should be governed and what kind of constitution we need: they don’t, as history has proved. We must earnestly work towards a broad political consensus before next year’s elections, which must be free and fair and held under an independent election commission answerable to parliament. The level of awareness in the country is greater than ever before; this capital must not be wasted.

Dealing with bird flu

NOW that an EU laboratory in London has confirmed the H5N1 virus strain in poultry samples from two farms in the NWFP, livestock and health authorities in the country would be well advised to face up to a potential avian flu outbreak and take responsible steps. Neighbouring countries such as Iran, India, Afghanistan and China have all reported cases of the dangerous virus strain in poultry. There have also been human cases of bird flu in China. So far, it appears that direct contact with sick poultry has caused infections in people in the affected countries. But experts say that virus mutations could lead to human-to-human transmissions, triggering a flu pandemic for which there is no preventive vaccine and that could result in millions of deaths.

With the end of the bird migratory season, the threat from wildfowl may have receded somewhat, but there is still good reason to fear that cross-border as well as inter-provincial poultry traffic could contribute to the spread of the virus for which there are few testing facilities in the country. Moreover, the economic loss to the poultry industry has given rise to apprehensions that some farms might try to cover up signs of the disease among their flocks. These concerns reflect poorly on the government’s state of preparedness to contain a possible outbreak of avian flu. While it has banned the import of poultry products where bird flu has been reported, it will have to do much more to limit the movement of poultry across the borders as well as within the country, besides ensuring that testing facilities at laboratories are up to date so that poultry samples do not have to be sent to foreign labs. A more difficult task is to keep a strict eye on farms throughout the country to ensure that cases of infection do not go undetected and that infected flocks are culled immediately. These measures are only the first line of defence against the disease and must be reinforced with a vigorous campaign to educate the public about bird flu. While there is no need to panic yet, public ignorance could worsen an already worrying situation.

PTA’s ham-handed action

In response to a petition filed in the Supreme Court, and acting on the court’s order, the telecom industry regulator, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, has blocked 12 websites which it says are hosting the blasphemous cartoons. The Supreme Court was assured on Monday by the attorney-general that this had been done. The court also asked the AG how those who had built these websites could be brought under its jurisdiction to which it was told that a senior lawyer should be appointed to assist in the matter. While the decision of the Supreme Court, acting on the petition filed by a citizen and ordering that the websites be blocked may be welcomed by many people, the whole episode has shown the technological incompetence of the PTA.

What the authority has done is to block access to 12 ‘domain names’ and not websites. The domains in turn host thousands of different websites and the 12 banned are among these. But by banning the domains altogether, the PTA action has rendered inaccessible thousands of other websites that have nothing to do with the cartoons. A better approach — if the blocking was deemed necessary in the first place — would have been to block access to the specific websites in question rather than the whole domain. Thousands of net users have been greatly inconvenienced by the PTA’s ham-handed action. Unfortunately, this is bound to happen when industry regulators are staffed by people who have little technical expertise of the job required of them. As for the Supreme Court’s query from the AG asking how to bring in those behind the offensive websites under its jurisdiction, one would like to point out that most such sites are hosted in foreign countries, usually the US, where laws banning such cartoons do not exist. The matter is perhaps better left there or the PTA should have done a precise job of blocking as the court ordered.

Our globe-trotting rulers

CHINA, if not already there, is well on its way to becoming a superpower. It attracts the highest foreign investment in the world and its growth rate is double its own projections. All seems to be well; nevertheless, when a Chinese government functionary was asked why they did not make more foreign visits and play a prominent role in the community of nations, the reply was that there yet remained some domestic matters to be attended to.

As opposed to this, conditions in Pakistan are desperately bad; the classic maladies of lawlessness, corruption, maladministration, increasing poverty, unemployment and rising prices seem incurable. The administrative machinery cannot even maintain a pretence at effective governance. The people, finding conditions unbearable, are often out in the streets, venting their anger at an increasingly unpopular government which they feel has never had any link with them. People are being shot at and killed in Waziristan and Balochistan. Even the smugness of the rulers, based on American patronage and the collaboration of the bureaucracy, together with disreputable politicians, is only a veneer.

The rulers’ practice of ignoring all this and globe trotting to an extent never witnessed before in this country has become purely expensive holiday-making. Decked out in suits, accompanied by a planeload of hangers-on, they venture forth all the way to Australia at one end and Argentina at the other, stopping off at places like Norway in the middle, for what purpose one is compelled to ask. A joint security pact with Australia? This must be the biggest joke since the last Bushism. And not even that much came out of the Argentinean odyssey, which at best resulted in the issue of those hackneyed cliche-ridden statements that amount to nothing. The Norwegian visit, too, although more recent, is already forgotten.

The only tangible outcome of such joyrides is the fat bill that is slapped upon the exchequer. It is no wonder that the expenses of the presidency and the prime minister’s house are double the budgeted amount which, no doubt, is made up by diverting funds from allocation for development, as is usual in such cases.

Our peripatetic prime minister went off to the UK, having just returned from his pilgrimage to Washington. Our rulers did not have the gall to protest over American rocket attacks on Bajaur, which left 18 innocent citizens dead, leave alone ask for an apology and compensation. But on top of that, for our prime minister to go to Washington and shake hands with George W. Bush, whom the people of the world have labelled the biggest terrorist and war criminal in history, is nothing short of a disgrace.

There is, of course, much poetic justice in the fact that the prime minister’s team of freeloaders was frisked at Washington airport. Some dignity may have been salvaged had all of them turned around on the spot and returned home. But, alas, such is only the way of men like Dr Jawaid Iqbal, who are made of sterner stuff. The humiliation did not end there. The Washington Post was vicious in its onslaught on the prime minister, questioning his credentials as an elected leader and finding him undeserving of VIP status.

Trips to the United States by our rulers are most frequent and the net result may be gauged from President Bush’s recent surreptitious visit to Islamabad. He clearly refused to uphold the balance and equal treatment with India that the Pakistan government has always insisted upon, did not even mention Kashmir, said Gen Musharaf must lay the foundations of democracy, implying that no such thing exists at present, and that elections must be honest.

The prime minister went to London to break bread with a man who has cases registered against him. This was followed by a meeting with Prince Charles, which does not even serve as a cover-up. This came not only in the wake of the president’s phone call to London to congratulate the same politician on winning a government-facilitated and hugely rigged local election, but also in continuation of the visit of the principal secretary of the National Security Council to the same altar.

The latter is reported to have returned with a long list of complaints and demands requiring, inter alia, the replacement of the Sindh chief minister. What the fate of the chief minister could have been was fleetingly indicated by the Mahar group’s supportive outburst on the Kalabagh dam, which they could not maintain for more than a day because of the hostile reaction of even their own minions.

The only possible justification for globe-trotting which our rulers may offer is that they are canvassing for foreign investment. But this would be a rather lame explanation, to say the least. The Chinese and the Indians do not go about scrounging all over the world, and it is now known to all that the only way to attract investment from abroad is to produce a conducive climate and infrastructure at home. No one will bring capital to a country where the government is at war with its own people, where bombs are exploding and rockets and bullets flying, where the president and prime minister live at a high risk, where the American president comes only behind an iron curtain of unprecedented security, and where the bureaucracy has a separate price tag and practice of its own.

To attract foreign investment it is imperative that the rulers stay at home and put things right. It is also necessary to work out an effective foreign policy based on pragmatism and stark realities. There is nothing more important than having the best of relations first with neighbours and then with those across the oceans. But this government has gone in the opposite direction, losing whatever goodwill that existed on the borders. After trumpeting improving relations with India for the last two years, the president has stated that the Indians are sponsoring insurgency in Balochistan, while the Indians have accused Pakistan of causing explosions in their temples.

While the Indians continue to ignore Pakistan’s objections on Baglihar dam, they have, in turn, raised objections to the Bhasha dam. Similarly, relations with Afghanistan have become strained with the two presidents engaged in accusations and counter accusations. The Chinese, who have been our close friends, are not happy with the total Americanisation of the Pakistan government which is unable to even protect Chinese engineers working on various projects here.

There is also the matter of Chinese involvement with Gwadar, which neither the Americans nor the Indians are pleased about, not to speak of the apprehensions of the Gulf states. Then there is the matter of the estrangement with Iran in which also our government’s bonding with Americans is an irritant. In short, our foreign policy is a confused and complicated mess which makes any investment in Pakistan an unattractive proposition.

The government is sinking in a quagmire of problems and is taking the country with it. The rulers have not only wasted six-and-a-half years but have established practices in governance and politics that are dangerous for Pakistan. In the obsession to remain in power by any means, the standard and calibre of what is proper and correct has been reduced to rock bottom. Thus when our rulers go abroad they go with no merit and fail to impress anyone. All this raises the urgent need for basic steps to save the ship of state from sinking, which cannot be done by globe trotting.

Reason for hope

THE news that the US envoy in Iraq is to hold talks about that country’s future with a delegation from Tehran came on the same day that Iran was officially described in a new American national security document as the single most important obstacle to American goals in the world.

The contradictions increasingly evident in Washington are illustrated by the fact that the United States is both working to isolate Iran because of its pursuit of a nuclear weapons option and reaching out to it for help in bringing order to Iraq. Although American spokesmen would have it otherwise, there is no way the two issues can be rigidly separated. It is almost certainly the case that Iran has finally responded to an American request for consultations about Iraq, apparently on the table for some months, because it expects by this means to ease the pressure building on the nuclear front.

America wants Iran to help persuade Iraqi Shia political parties to make concessions that will allow the formation of a stable government of national unity. The new Iraqi parliament opened this week with such a government notably lacking.

Without one there is no chance of lessening the Sunni alienation which feeds the insurgency, threatens civil war, and prevents the adoption of a timetable for the reduction of US forces and, eventually, a respectable withdrawal. Iran wants the US to cease pushing so hard on the question of its nuclear programmes, which America and Europe have recently managed to place on the agenda of the Security Council where they are being, or soon will be, discussed.

Of course there is no chance of a deep rapprochement and the talks may well lead nowhere. The Bush administration could never give a green light for Iranian nuclear weapons, while the Iranian regime, opposed to American purposes both in Iraq and in the Middle East as a whole, could only go so far in assisting the US.

—The Guardian, London