| June 10, 2006 | Saturday | Jumadi-ul-Awwal 13, 1427 |
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No need for parity
Abu Musab Zarqawi
Iqbal and the Muslim state
Kashmir problem
A hidden holocaust
Medical treatment for pensioners
Banners at crossroads
Flight delays
Budget anomalies
Pigs: a health hazard
Traffic mess
Wastage
AS power disruptions, coming on the heels of the KESC’s privatisation, are adversely affecting citizens’ lives, we held a meeting with its new managing director from Germany, which may be of interest to your readers so as to be aware of what is in store for citizens for the next 18 months.
Contrary to the people’s expectations that with privatisation a magic wand has been handed to the KESC and all problems will go away, the new MD was frank in admitting that the power shortage problems in Karachi would take at least some years to overcome. He showed us charts detailing power shortage till 2009.
Failure to conduct regular maintenance of installed power plants in the past has aggravated the issue as their power generation capacity has been reduced by 50 per cent. They will have to be shut down to perform maintenance and improve their generating capacity. The KESC will also invest funds to improve the distribution infrastructure.
Even after the Hub power link is completed, shortages will not end. We, therefore, suggested that the KESC should inform Karachiites that power shortages will remain, thus bringing down false expectations which have been raised without taking ground realities into consideration.
The director pointed out that in European countries when load shedding is planned, timetables are issued so that everybody is prepared for power cuts. We suggested that this should be done in Karachi and hope that through this letter, he will be reminded that load shedding timetables should be available in all areas of Karachi and published in newspapers.
In answer to our question regarding errors in billing, the director of the KESC admitted that in the past some glaring mistakes had been made. Without going into details, we hope that citizens will get some compensation in the future for wrongs committed by previous managements.
Since the task of reforming and improving the KESC is gigantic, we would like to suggest that one man alone cannot accomplish it, specially considering the sabotage which is occurring regularly. After all, it is difficult to believe that fires in grid stations, shutting down of generating stations and theft of high-tension lines, etc., taking place suddenly at regular intervals are coincidences. A bigger team needs to be deputed by the new owners of the KESC, otherwise conditions will worsen. Karachiites should, therefore, prepare for the worst in the long hot summer.
AZIZ SUHARWARDY
General secretary, Defence Associations Coordination Committee, Karachi
I disagree with former ambassador Tariq Fatemi’s conclusion (‘Revisiting ’98 nuclear tests’, June 3) that for genuine normalisation of relations between India and Pakistan there is a need for strategic parity between the two. In has also emphasised the need to checkmate India’s ambitions.
Nothing can be further from the truth. The fact is that India does not have territorial ambitions, unless of course the writer believes that India wishes to annex what Pakistan calls Azad Kashmir.
India and Indians are too preoccupied with economic and social issues for any politician to believe that aggression towards a neighbour would be politically savvy.
The best hedge, therefore, against any such ambition alleged by the writer is the fact that India is a democracy and our worthy (and many unworthy) politicians are firmly on the populist path. No politician would be successful in conceptualising a territorial expansionary policy or a religious one that has the potential to develop into nationalist aggression. Just consider how Indians threw out the supposedly Hindu-oriented BJP in the 2004 elections and the party’s steady loss of political clout thereafter.
For most Indians, other than those who live in Kashmir, Kashmir is a non-issue except when there are terrorist attacks that affect them. The sort of hysteria that Pakistani TV channels whip up is simply not there on Indian channels where Bollywood, soap operas and financial analysis are the priority for viewers.
Also, if the writer was inferring to the need for strategic parity in a wider context where does that parity exist in other parts of the world between neighbouring countries? Does it exist between Canada and the US or between Singapore and China? Yet both Canada and Singapore have nothing to complain about as far as their place in the sun is concerned.
RANJIT JATAR
Haryana, India
ACCORDING to a statement by the Iraqi government, the man responsible for the Iraqi insurgency has been killed. He was painted as a terror mastermind and was blamed by the western media for the massacre of Iraqi civilians. He was described as the head of ‘the Sunni insurgency’ and ’the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq’.
The killing of Zarqawi has occurred at a time when Bush’s public support is at an all-time low, as confirmed by the opinion polls.
The question is who was Abu Musab al Zarqawi? The world came to know about him when a terror attack was thwarted at the Radisson SAS hotel in Amman, Jordan in 1999.
According to reports, he received military training in Afghanistan, in camps that were established during the Reagan administration. Everyone knows that these camps were set up with the support of the CIA. So it is obvious that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was the creation of the US intelligence apparatus.
According leaked US military documents, Zarqawi’s image was magnified by the Pentagon with a view to galvanising public support for the US-UK led ‘war on terrorism’.
The Washington Post acknowledged this in an article published on April 10: “The Zarqawi campaign is discussed in several of the internal military documents. Villainise Zarqawi/leverage xenophobia response, one US military briefing from 2004 stated. It listed three methods: media operations, Special Ops 626 (a reference to Task Force 626, an elite US military unit assigned primarily to hunt in Iraq for senior officials in Hussein’s government) and PSYOP, the US military term for propaganda work.”
The Pentagon used Zarqawi to justify its activities in Iraq, and the American media played a major role in spreading lies about him.
M. MUNAEEM JAMAL
Karachi
THIS is with reference to the letter entitled ‘Correcting the fact’ by A.M Syed (May 22) who wrote: “Those interested in history should try to visit the British Museum in London where the original text of Dr Iqbal’s address in Allahabad is preserved. There is no mention in it of either a Muslim state or the division of India.”
There is no need to go to the British Museum to see the original text of Iqbal’s address, as many books have been published on that historic speech before and after the partition of India. The following are excerpts from the presidential address of Dr Mohammad Iqbal from the book Foundations of Pakistan by S. Sharifuddin Pirzada:
“I would like to see the Punjab, the North-West frontier Province, Sind and Balochistan amalgamated into a single state. Self–government within the British Empire, or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated North-West Indian Muslim State appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of North-West India…
“I have already indicated to you the meaning of the word religion, as applied to Islam. The truth is that Islam is not a Church. It is a state, conceived as a contractual organism and animated by an ethical ideal.
“I, therefore, demand the formation of a consolidated Muslim state in the best interests of India and Islam. For India, it means security and peace resulting from an internal balance of power; for Islam, an opportunity to rid itself of the stamp that Arabian imperialism was forced to give it, to mobilise its laws, its education, its culture, and to bring them into closer contact with its own original spirit and with the spirit of modern times.”
Also refer to this excerpt from the speech made by M.A. Jinnah in Lahore on Dec 9, 1944: “To the cherished memory of Iqbal with his firm conviction and faith in the ideals of Islam, he was one of the few who originally thought over the feasibility of carving out of India an Islamic state in the North-West which are the historical homelands of Muslims.”
KHAWAJA RAZI HAIDER
Quaid-i-Azam Academy Karachi
I FULLY support the main idea behind the solution proposed by Nasir Siddique (June 6) and Tariq Shaikh (June 8) to the Kashmir problem. However, there is a caveat: most of our rivers flow from Kashmir. If we just let go of it, it would make it harder for us to manage our water resources and meet our needs.
The best solution is to accept the status quo. After all, despite our best efforts we have not been able to change the status quo since 1948. We tried a military solution in 1965. We tried to force India to the negotiating table by sending our troops into Kargil in 1999. And since 1989 we have been supporting the insurgency in Kashmir. All these efforts on our part have little served our purpose.
Looking into the future, given the political and economic clout that India enjoys in the world today and the obvious signs that it will only grow over time, there is no hope that if we continue with our present Kashmir policy, we are going to make any progress on the issue.
Our present Kashmir policy is a failure because despite sticking to it for the last 58 years, we have gained nothing.
The best strategy for us is to unilaterally declare LoC the international border, make Azad Kashmir our fifth province, reduce the size of our army and focus on building our nation. It is a brave solution and will take a lot of courage to implement.
AAMIR RAFIQUE HASHMI
Toronto, Canada
DESPITE being one of the first countries in South Asia to make a commitment to fertility reduction as a national planning objective, Pakistan’s family planning has a long, expensive and unsuccessful history. Problems related to the utilisation of budget and funds, as well as institutional capacity, have hindered success.
Issues of sustainability of health system, human resource development and allocation of finances have routinely been addressed by planners but only with short-term gains in mind.
A study indicates that the need for family planning among poor urban residents in developing countries is becoming increasingly important for several reasons. Especially smaller cities experienced a marked disadvantage in the provision of basic amenities and are underserved in terms of access to reproductive health services. Thus ratio can further fall when we compare the provision of services with the developed and rich cities.
Furthermore, the urban poor in smaller cities often have higher levels of fertility and unmet need for contraception than those in large urban centres. Researchers often neglect to investigate the health and services issues among residents of smaller cities.
Khuzdar is a rural district in Balochistan, the least developed province of Pakistan. It is estimated that the maternal mortality ratio is about 700 per 100,000 live births in Khuzdar which is amongst the highest in the world.
More than 90 per cent of all deliveries are conducted by untrained traditional birth attendants. A situational analysis of governmental health services and assessment of 25 primary health clinics and two secondary-care hospitals was carried out through a baseline household survey and qualitative research. It was found that the fertility rate is still high and use of health-care services is low. In Khuzdar 97 per cent of births are delivered at home and 91 per cent are attended by untrained ‘dais’ or family members. Women generally know about modern methods of family planning but they don’t consider contraceptives safe and healthy.
It is necessary to find out why contraception use rate is so low in Pakistan. What are the reason for the acceptability and non-acceptability of contraceptive methods? Research has suggested that the socio-economic conditions, religious beliefs, and lack of education in Pakistan are the reasons for not availing the opportunities of referral system and contraceptive use.
Family planning should find out ways to convince women to reduce their ideal family size and what services can be offered to make it easier for them to use contraceptive method. Almost 50 per cent of women had an unmet need for family planning, much higher than the national figure for unmet need of 28 per cent.
The impact of providing family planning clinics in these urban poor environments has shown a clear effect on women’s knowledge of contraception, unmet need for family planning and has identified important distinctions between groups of users of the new clinics.
BUSHRA MUMTAZ
Islamabad
SOME time back, a think-tank had made certain useful suggestions to the government for improving the lot of its employees and pensioners. One of the suggestions related to medical treatment for employees through health insurance instead of the government hospitals as at present. Such a measure, if undertaken, is likely to result in large savings to the government.
The suggestion is worth consideration, keeping in view the fact that the so-called free medical treatment at government hospitals does not, in particular, suit pensioners. It is a well-known fact that medicines are not available at government hospitals. The pensioners are, therefore, obliged to buy medicines from their own pocket. The procedure for getting reimbursement for the purchase of medicines is quite lengthy and cumbersome.
The claim duly certified by the authorised medical attendant (which is itself a ticklish job) is filed by a pensioner with his department from where he had retired. The claim is sent to the ministry of health at Islamabad for final approval. Due to red tape the settlement of claims can take a considerable length of time.
It may be appreciated that pensioners are financially hard up and cannot afford to purchase costly medicines themselves.
A patient should get medicines without any botheration. The best course, under the circumstances, is to entrust medical treatment for pensioners to insurance companies.
Alternatively, for minor illnesses the pensioners may be given a medical allowance equivalent to 30 per cent of their pension.
As for indoor treatment, hospitals should provide medicines and claim the expenditure incurred from the government.
H. KHURSHID HASAN
Karachi
WHILST passing through Numaish chowrangi I saw a number of banners hanging around the traffic island. The banners were blocking the view of most of the drivers. This situation instantly reminded me of the Water Pump traffic signal where in 2005 a lot of lives were lost in traffic accidents because the view was blocked by the high walls erected around the traffic island. Immediate action is required to discard banners from the Numaish chowrangi. The public should also cooperate by not hosting any banners around such places.
JAVAID ANJUM
Karachi
APROPOS of the letter ‘Flight delays’ (May 30), PIA would like to say that it has been offering standby fares for some time now, where a passenger wanting to travel at short notice can get a ticket at the airport on domestic routes if there is a seat available on the flight he wants.
The airline’s call centre operates 24 hours, where PIA passengers can learn the status of a particular flight by calling 111-786-786 from all major cities of Pakistan and 9203873-76 from Quetta.
As far as punctuality is concerned, PIA’s record in 2005 was 87 per cent and in 2006 it achieved 92 per cent mark. Its target is 95 per cent.
CAPT. HASSAN JAFFERY
General manager, Public Affairs & Communication, PIA Karachi
The news item entitled ‘Funny side of new budget’ (June 7) highlighted some of the new budget’s most interesting anomalies. It appears that the writer missed the most interesting one of all. To please his top imported bankers, our finance-cum-prime minister has revised the maximum income tax slab of 30 per cent downward to 20 per cent. This is unheard of in any civilised land. By doing this the prime minister has benefited his cronies by as much as Rs10 million each, while offering his poor countrymen a net annual subsidy of Rs30 only.
All hail the second coming of the East India Company.
NOT AFFECTED BY BUDGET
Lahore
MR Kamran Shafi ( May 22) is bang on the spot when he states that there is a large population of pigs in Islamabad and they need to be shot down.
Not long ago, the tourism department and private tour operators included wild boar hunting tours in the itineraries of tourists visiting Islamabad. One German tourist came regularly only to Islamabad all the way from Germany, just to shoot pigs there and had a field day doing so. If tourists are encouraged to renew this activity, we may be able to solve this worrisome pig issue.
TALAT RAHIM
Karachi
I AM all for the building of infrastructure in Karachi’s Hasan Square Chowrangi areas since my route daily from work passes through here, but the traffic chaos during rush hours is just unbearable. Since the traffic lights are not working, traffic police try their best to control vehicles but even with this the wait can be up to 45-50 minutes.
After work, one just wants to go straight home to either relax or undertake other responsibilities at home. But due to construction the ride home gets extended and one extremely tiring. The solution may be to divert traffic to manageable routes that separate the small and big vehicles so that congestions do not occur.
My only concern now is that the monsoon season is right around the corner. So will all the effort in construction go in vain?
NADA AHSAN
Karachi
WHILE passing through Aishah Manzil chowrangi during the day, I saw that some streetlights were turned on. As we all know there is shortage of electricity in the city right now and loadshedding has become routine. I hope the authorities concerned will pay more attention to avoiding wastage of precious electricity.
FAYSAL MEGHANI
Karachi
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