PAKISTAN has assiduously pursued the policy of confrontation and competition with India since 1947. The advice of president Musharraf in his press conference on March 5 to his countrymen was to shun India-centricity and, instead, concentrate on the reduction of poverty through economic development.

The advice came as a surprise to Pakistanis at large who had over the past 58 years read in textbooks and listened to lectures and sermons about Indian jingoism and the security threat from it.

However, this does not come as a surprise for a selected group of people who have closely watched political developments in South Asia over the past few years. It began with the sudden attempt of the US to resuscitate the South Asia Association of Regional Cooperation (Saarc), formed in 1985 for the promotion of the well-being of the populations of South Asia but lying in a state of inactivity. With the tacit but active support of the US the Saarc summit held in Kathmandu in January 2002 set a far- reaching goal for South Asia: a free trade area by 2006, a South Asian customs union by 2015 and South Asian economic union by 2020.

Pakistan became a signatory to this declaration and committed itself to its goals. We should not forget that it was in the background of this very declaration that Atal Behari Vajpayee the then prime minister of India during the Saarc summit held in Islamabad in January 2004, proposed a common currency for the region.

An economic union, as is the case with the European Union, inevitably leads to a loose political union, allowing free movement of goods, services and people across each other’s borders without any barriers. In essence, it implies a common trade and monetary policy and, to some extent, a similar, if not identical, fiscal policy and a common response to political issues. The resolution of the European Parliament, supporting the stand taken by the Danish government over the issue of publication of the sacrilegious cartoons, represents the political galvanization to which an economic union ultimately leads.

Consistent with the Saarc declaration, a change in our relationship with India started taking place in the last past few years. A composite dialogue with India was set in motion and a number of steps have already been taken to normalize our relationship with India. These include the opening of bus routes, shipping, train services, the establishment of a bank branch by a Pakistani bank in Mumbai, business relations between Pakistan insurance companies and General Insurance Corporation of India, exchange of cultural troupes and an ambience of friendship.

Former US president Bill Clinton who visited Pakistan and India in February, in a statement on February 19, at Delhi had not only revealed the purpose of the visit of the president of the US well in advance but also spelled out the US vision of South Asia. I quote from this statement: “We are going to have a level of security cooperation that we have never known before. And hopefully we will be friends in the context of an even, more integrated South Asia where the past problems between India and Pakistan will diminish over time... And economic, political and security cooperation within South Asia will increase. I think we are key partners as on the big picture here.”

This hurry and worry of the US to integrate South Asia into a formidable counter-balancing power under the leadership of India arises from the concern about the growing economic might of China and its sustained GDP growth of well over 9.5 per cent per annum over the past two decades and trade surpluses which in 2005 alone stood at $102 billion. It is no wonder that at the World Economic Forum meeting held in January one of the sub-themes which came up for intense discussion was the far reaching consequence of China becoming “the workshop of the world and India its back office”.

Under the aegis of the US we have been trekking the path of normalization of our ties with India, within the context of South Asia. It is, therefore, not understandable that in the post-Bush visit to Islamabad on March 4, why we should be ruefully ruminating the outcome of the visit, without taking the public into confidence.

The US has preferred India over other member-countries of Saarc including Pakistan for the leadership of South Asia. India is much larger than the combined area of the Saarc member-states three thousand times more populous, its GDP is eight hundred times greater than that of the smallest country, Maldives and seven and half times more than Pakistan’s.

Numerically speaking, India has 72.58 per cent of land area 75.49 per cent of population and 78.98 per cent of the GDP of the Saarc. The sheer physical size of India alone does not make it central to the region. It is her status as an emerging economic superpower which has qualified her in the eyes of the US as the leader of South Asia.

Its GDP growth rate hovers around eight per cent as against three to six per cent in other member-states. Its gross domestic investment at more than 25 per cent is mainly financed by domestic savings and direct foreign investment unlike other countries of the region which largely bank upon foreign loans from multilateral financial institutions and bilateral donors for financing their domestic investment and find it difficult to service their debts.

It is unfortunate that while we pursued the US interest in the region by normalizing our relations with India under the umbrella of Saarc, the people of Pakistan were not taken into confidence about the global implications of this policy. It is also regrettable that the government chose not to elicit the will of people by having open discussions and debates on a fundamental issue.

There is still time to debate the issue in parliament, the press, the electronic media and all other available forums in order to elicit the views of the people. This suggestion follows John Stuart Mill’s advice: “All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility”.

The author is a former additional secretary to the federal government.

TEACHING the history of revolutions has been easy at Harvard this semester. As if to illustrate exactly how these strange historical upheavals work, the university has obligingly staged a revolution of its own.

The outside world is under the impression that one of two things has happened at Harvard: Either a reactionary despot has been deposed by faculty freedom fighters, or a bold reformer has been thwarted by vested interests. Most revolutions get written up in these contrary ways.

In reality, revolutions usually begin with rather obscure disputes, like how to pay for a standing army in the colonies. They burst out of political channels only when the grievances against the monarch reach a critical mass and the monarch alienates one too many of his own supporters.

Thus it was at Harvard. The question I found myself pondering last week was whether the same thing is happening in Washington. Could the next president to fall victim to an unruly representative body be George W. Bush?

Like Harvard’s Larry Summers, Bush is a president with a bold vision. Summers wanted to move Harvard science to Allston; Bush wanted to bring freedom to the Middle East. But, also like Summers, Bush has a style problem. Not the abrasive contrariness that alienated professors but a reserve verging on introversion that has cut him off from his own party in Congress.

Ten days ago, I paid a visit to the imposing Russell Building on Capitol Hill, where senators have their offices. What I saw there was a timely reminder of just how much power the Constitution vests in the legislative branch. The senators I spoke with made it abundantly clear that Bush’s political capital — about which he boasted after securing reelection — is all used up. The phrase I kept hearing was lame duck.

It’s not hard to see why. With his approval ratings down to 37 per cent, Bush is now as unpopular as his father was in the year before his defeat by Bill Clinton. As midterm elections approach, the political hunting season has begun. Republicans and Democrats alike are taking potshots at the president as if merely having a lame duck is not enough. They want this duck dead.

Last week they got him with both barrels. The House Appropriations Committee voted 62 to 2 to block the acquisition by Dubai Ports World of the US subsidiary of Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co., a deal that the president had unequivocally backed. Before Bush could even reach for the presidential veto — a weapon he has never had to use thanks to his own party’s dominance in Congress - Dubai World folded, announcing that it would “transfer fully” P&O Ports North America to “a US entity.” This is the biggest humiliation Bush has suffered since entering the White House. It is unlikely to be the last.

Grievances in an assembly have a way of multiplying. There was already unease among GOP lawmakers on a number of issues, notably the administration’s insistence that torture, detention without charge and phone-tapping without warrants are all legitimate weapons in the war on terrorism. The idea of Arabs running American ports was the last straw.

But there is a difference between Harvard and Washington. Last year, I listened aghast as Summers abased himself before the faculty with the most abject apology (for his remarks about women scientists) I think I have ever heard. He had forgotten British Adm. Jackie Fisher’s words: “Never apologize, never explain.” Saying sorry was like dripping blood into a pool full of sharks; it only made them hungrier.

This is not a mistake I expect Bush to make; he is likely to be more cussed than contrite. After all, it makes no sense to cast aspersions on the reliability of a Middle Eastern ally like the United Arab Emirates — especially at a time when the US needs all the foreign investment it can get to finance its yawning budget and trade deficits.

Members of Congress should beware of underestimating this president, as others have done in the past. They should remember that a second-term president is not necessarily a lame duck - he is also a man with nothing to lose.

— Los Angeles Times