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| December 29, 2006 | Friday | Zilhaj 07, 1427 |
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Trade in endangered species
Karachi’s sewerage problem
The last and lasting message
The state of economy
OF the many aspects and features of the Quran, the most salient is that, unlike any other book, it is believed by the faithful to be the direct word of God in Arabic language.
THE YEAR 2007 will begin with a vast divergence between the popular view of global risks and the risks as priced in financial markets. While the commentariat has been more alarmed about the state of the world than global markets for some years, the gap increased in 2006 as markets became more serene and everyone else grew more anxious.
IT is now becoming increasingly clear that the next presidential election will not at all be what one normally expects of an election. On Wednesday, State Minister for Information Tariq Azeem scuttled these hopes when he said the existing assemblies would re-elect Gen Pervez Musharraf as president shortly before their term expires. He also said that the ruling party would again field Mr Shaukat Aziz as its candidate for prime minister. With Gen Musharraf ‘re-elected’ as president for another five-year term, it wouldn’t really matter whether it is Mr Aziz or someone else who becomes a lame duck prime minister. The general’s continuation as both head of state and army chief will ensure an extension of the present semi-democratic, civilian-military mix for another five years, and with that the general election will lose all value in the sense that the people of Pakistan will not get a chance to have a government of their choice, for that is what elections are all about.
The opposition is as divided as ever. The PML-N and the PPP, basically two incompatible allies, have not managed to adopt a common strategy for the general election even after signing the Charter of Democracy. The split in the MMA over resignations in the aftermath of the women’s bill has come to the fore, and it remains to be seen whether the six-party alliance will stay together for the general election due next year. The PPP’s threat to boycott the polls sounds empty, and unless something out of the ordinary happens, there is little doubt that the party will contest the election. After all, it did take part in the 2002 general election and secured the highest number of votes, even though Gen Musharraf was at the helm of affairs. The PML-N and sections of the MMA continue to claim that they will boycott the polls if President Musharraf were in charge. That the ARD and the MMA will finally adopt a common attitude toward the polls appears highly unlikely, and that may gladden the ruling party. However, there is nothing to be happy about so far as the people of Pakistan are concerned.
What the hour demands is a government truly representing the people, for a glance at the gargantuan problems the country is facing will alarm any observer of the national scene. There is first the monster of terrorism that strikes every now and then; religious extremists are as strong as ever and enjoy the support of some elements in the establishment; Balochistan remains unsettled, and Akbar Bugti’s death has not led to the normality one had hoped for; the tribal area is the focus of world attention for reasons which are obvious; and a consensus on the proposed dams has eluded the government. Above all, the benefits of the economic boom we have been hearing about have not seeped down to the masses. Rural poverty continues to be the cause of an unending trek to the cities, creating further pressures on the already overstretched urban utilities. Making a dent in these problems is not possible without a broader national consensus on the strategies to be adopted, and regretfully the talk about the existing assemblies re-electing Gen Musharraf as president appears to be the very antithesis of the democratic way of tackling national problems. The general election next year, it seems, has already been fixed.
IN a country where human rights are flouted with impunity by both individuals and institutions, matters relating to the welfare of animals tend to be ignored in conventional discourse. Occasionally, however, cases of serious oversight do come to notice through the media. It was reported on Thursday that endangered species, including green turtles, are readily available in at least two markets in Karachi. Other turtle species and exotic birds are also on sale at these pet shops. All the more disturbing is the fact that there is nothing clandestine about this trade, which is taking place in full view of the public as well as the relevant authorities. Besides apathy, part of the problem lies in the impotence of wildlife laws that apply primarily to the hunting, catching or trapping of ‘protected’ animals. Without legislation that deals specifically with the buying and selling of endangered species — as currently defined — efforts to check this thriving business will inevitably falter. Also, laws by themselves are unlikely to make a difference if enforcement is lacking. At the same time, the government ought to consider Pakistan’s commitments under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES), which Islamabad signed 30 years ago. Yet the trade in non-local endangered species continues to this day. Even if they are now being bred within Pakistan, it can be assumed that the original stock was brought into the country in the not-too-distant past.
Mistreatment of animals is common in Pakistan, and this is not surprising. The frustrations of daily life are taking so heavy a toll on the human psyche that minor altercations degenerate into assault and some see murder as fitting retribution for a slight. This stressful environment fosters a mentality where anger is vented on those who are weaker — and animals clearly lie at the bottom of the heap. Even if they are not abused, they are considered by many to be of no importance. A change in mindsets is perhaps impossible to effect without a change in the human condition. The government, however, cannot be absolved of its responsibility to check activities that are not only abhorrent but may also run contrary to the country’s international commitments.
THE nazim of Karachi has promised to complete the Rs165 million stormwater drain being constructed in the city’s Bath Island area in four months. He has also assured citizens that this project will resolve the drainage problems of the locality for a hundred years. While all this sounds impressive, one hopes that the civic authorities understand the basic sewerage-related problems that have led to so much hardship for the people, apart from causing insanitation of the worst kind. The basic fact is that the city has had a network of stormwater drains — quite contrary to what the nazim says — but these have been misused as sewers. They have not been properly maintained either, since cleaning and dredging have not been a regular feature of their upkeep.
Land hunger in the city has led to massive encroachments in every locality where the stormwater drains have been handed over to various parties with no effort being made to observe rules and by-laws. Thus every covered drain does not have provisions for big manholes to allow seasonal cleaning. That is why so much demolition had to be carried out in Bath Island where many houses had taken over large tracts of the drain in their vicinity. In other areas of the city, drains have been given to the land mafia to build shopping plazas and housing complexes on. There is also the anomaly of stormwater drains being used as sewers because the city lacks an adequate sewerage system. It is time the master plan the city government is supposedly working on is drawn up and the sewerage system is planned accordingly and implemented so that no sewage is discharged untreated into the sea. Builders and developers are known to grease palms, and instead of obtaining a proper connection to the sewerage network — not adequate in every case — use the stormwater drains for emptying household effluent. This kind of corruption has to stop.
Secondly, no other religious scripture has retained its original form and text. Thirdly, no other sacred writing of any other religion has kept the various nationalities and sects knit together over the last fourteen centuries.
Michael Hart’s verdict (author of ‘The Hundred’) about the Holy Quran is quotable: “No such detailed compilation of the teachings of Christ has survived... The influence of Mohammad through the medium of the Koran has been enormous.”
Detractors of the Quran call the Book a rehash of Judeo-Christian Scriptures, only because it contains many of the narratives connected with Biblical prophets and personages which fact is already mentioned in the Quran that it “confirms all that which was revealed before it in the Torah and the Gospels (3:3-4).”
The Quran, while confirming what is true has refuted the innovations, like the theory of Trinity and the Divinity of Christ which were not there in the Gospel compiled by Barnabas, duly recognised as the canonical Gospel till 325 A.D. in the churches of Egypt, Palestine and Syria. That is why the Quran calls itself ‘Al-Furqan’ — “making distinction between good and not good.”
It presents the first human couple (Adam and Eve) as Prophets sent down to earth with full knowledge and wisdom and not as primitive cavemen, living in darkness and ignorance. They were sent with firm faith in pure, unalloyed monotheism and belief in the Hereafter for reward for good and punishment for evil deeds.
The Quran rebuts polytheism and atheism with full force and cites Abraham (peace be upon him) as the greatest preacher of monotheism in what is recognised as ‘cradle of human civilisation’ in the post-Noah historical period. It is the result of the Quranic preaching of unadulterated monotheism that anyone who is not atheist and believes in one religion or the other claims to be a monotheist — Christians, generally believe in Jesus as the son of God in the figurative sense and enlightened Hindus do not treat the idols as really worshipful beings but as objects representing the Divine attributes merely to help concentration during meditational prayers. The God of the Quran is “the forgiver of sin and the acceptor of repentance and severe in punishing (40:3).” It, therefore, corrects the notion that all sins will go unpunished because of the faith in Christ as the Messiah (New testament — Roman 5:12-19) similarly, it rejects the Jews’ racist belief of their being God’s chosen people, immune from eternal punishment even if heinous crimes are committed by them. This religious conviction is at the back of all cruelties and inhuman acts of the present Israelites who have, after a lapse of two millennia, become a military power, with nuclear weapons to boot.
The Quran also turns down the heathen concept of trans-migration of the soul which arose from the apparently logical argument that the outcome of sin being inevitable every sinful act committed in life has to be atoned for in the rebirth cycle till Nirvan (Salvation) is attained. The Quran suggests afterlife instead of the continuous life on earth, thus bifurcating one’s life span into two distinct phases: one for action and the other for reaction, i.e. reward or punishment, as the case may be.
The Quran has been claimed, right from the beginning, to be the ‘word of God’ and that it was compiled in the present form at the holy Prophet’s instance. Sir Edmund Ross, in his Introduction to Sale’s translation of the Quran, records: “It is well for all who study the Quran to realise that the actual text is never the composition of the Prophet, but it is the word of God addressed to the Prophet.”
One of the basic tenets of Islam is that the Quran is the last of the revealed guidance for mankind. Islam, among the world religions, is the latest in time scale.
This is an indisputable historical fact that, among the world religions, Islam is, chronologically, the latest and the last. “No great new religion has swept into world prominence since Islam some 1300 years ago,” wrote the editorial staff of Life magazine’s special issue on ‘World’s Great Religions’ published in 1959.
Thus, the Quran is the last of the revealed Books not merely as an article of Muslim faith but as a historical fact. No book has been produced in any language claiming direct Divine authorship. Equally true is the fact that no person, leaving out those few imposters or sectarian reformers who have left little following behind, has so far emerged as a Prophet challenging the finality of the prophethood of Hazrat Muhammad (SAW).
The Quran differs from all other sacred scriptures of the world’s living religions in three distinct ways: None of the holy scriptures is the exact word of God in the original language of revelation; None of them can be claimed, for historical reasons, to have been preserved intact and in the original text; None of them has been so arranged and compiled, as the Quran, after piecemeal revelations as to have a Preface (Sura Al-Fatiha) and a chapter following it indicating the Divine intention that the revealed words would be set down and compiled in the form of a book.
The headlines and opinion writers focus on how the US is badly bogged down in wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; on an increasingly unstable Middle East and dangerous energy dependence; on nuclear proliferation that has already occurred in North Korea and that is coming in Iran; on the potential weakness of lame-duck political leaders; on record global trade imbalances and rising protectionist pressures; on increased levels of public and private-sector borrowing combined with record low saving in the United States; and on falling home prices and middle-class economic insecurity.
At the same time, financial markets are pricing in an expectation of tranquillity as far as the eye can see. Stock prices in the US are at all-time highs. The risk premiums that corporations or developing countries have to pay to borrow money are at or near historic lows. In addition, estimates of the volatility of the stock, bond and foreign exchange markets inferred from the prices of options are near record lows.
Why the divergence between the headlines and the markets? Will the journalists or the investors be proved right about the state of the world? Or will the divergence continue?
First, in spite of all the adverse news, the world economy in aggregate grew more during the last five years than in any five-year period since World War II. The United States is enjoying a rare combination of low inflation and 4.5 per cent unemployment and has not suffered a deep recession in a quarter of a century. Given the natural tendency of markets to extrapolate from experience, optimism is to be expected and is to some extent justified.
Second, some of the divergence reflects the markets’ narrower focus. Sept. 11, 2001, was an epochal event, but not one that had a great impact on the cash flows of most corporations — and it did not have an enduring impact on market valuations. Those who liquidated positions during the transitory dip in the aftermath of the attacks probably regret having done so. Whether markets are right to be so narrowly focused is less clear. They are surely right to recognize that even events of great historic importance may not affect the value of particular securities. On the other hand, there is the real possibility that they are myopic about the effects geopolitical events can have on the global economy. A turn toward protectionism, for example, would be unlikely to affect the ability of companies or nations to service their debt next year, but history suggests that over time such a turn would have profound effects on the ability of businesses to profit and countries to pay off debts.
Third, changes in the structure of financial markets have enhanced their ability to handle risk in normal times. The percentage of any loan a given institution has to hold has been reduced, and associated risk premiums have declined. Greatly enlarged pools of speculative capital can also reduce volatility by pouncing any time an asset price gets significantly out of line. Financial innovation through derivatives has made the hedging of risk much easier.
We do not yet have enough experience to judge what happens in abnormal times. As we observed in 1987 and again in 1998, some of the same innovations that contribute to risk spreading in normal times can become sources of instability following shocks to the system as large-scale liquidations take place. How will dramatic increases in speculative capital and the use of credit derivatives affect the system’s response to the next large shock?
We will know much more about whether the market view and the general view can converge a year from now. In the meantime, it is fair for those who look to markets to point out that the easy path for the commentariat is to foretell disaster. If disaster occurs, it was foretold. If it does not, credit can be given for timely warning. Anyone who liquidated stock holdings a decade ago when Alan Greenspan, former Federal Reserve chairman, worried about “irrational exuberance” learned painfully that for those who put money behind their convictions, unwarranted pessimism can be very expensive.
Over the last 20 years, the world has confronted the 1987 market meltdown, the banking crisis of the early 1990s, the Mexican near-default in early 1995, the Asian financial crisis in 1997, the collapse of hedge fund Long Term Capital Management in 1998 and the Nasdaq decline and 9/11 in this decade. While each of these events was unique, the record does suggest that crises of some variety occur in about one of every three years. — Dawn/Los Angeles Times Service