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| May 25, 2007 | Friday | Jamadi-ul-Awwal 08, 1428 |
The wheat fiasco
A good decision
Social justice in Islam
Crisis of identity
THERE are several translations of the Quran. There is the familiar transformation of Yusuf Ali and also the translation of Muhammad Asad. The basic approach in these translations is to get involved in the meaning and interpretation of certain words in the Quran.
WITH Gordon Brown preparing to take over as prime minister, we can expect to hear a lot more about Britishness and integration. Could his premiership even signal the death knell for multiculturalism in our public life? For some time Brown, and recently his campaign manager, Jack Straw, have argued for the need to revive and revalue British national identity. They seek to derive a set of core values (liberty, fairness, enterprise and so on) from a historical narrative.
THE government has been painting a rosy picture of the population scene in Pakistan. But a document prepared by some donor agencies has exploded the myth propagated by the prime minister that the population growth rate has come down to 1.8 per cent and will be further reduced to 1.3 per cent by 2020. The document obtained by this newspaper says that the population is growing at the rate of two per cent per annum. The Unicef puts it at 2.2 per cent. Not much will be gained by juggling with figures to deceive people since erroneous calculations will only result in lopsided planning. Besides, it lulls the population policymakers into a false sense of complacency with no effort being made to analyse the factors that are contributing to such a high population growth rate in Pakistan and rectify these.
There are basically two reasons which have pushed up the demographic growth rate. One is the usual story of failures in the delivery of contraceptive services. As has been the practice in other areas of the social sector, the government has been disengaging itself from the population welfare programme leaving it to the NGOs — 264 of them have been registered with the National Trust for Population Welfare — to attend to this sector. Although many of the NGOs are doing excellent work, their reach is limited. They have 479 outlets when the government has nearly 2,500 centres. Again, as is the case with the health and education departments, the performance of the family welfare centres is below par and they have failed to make the impact they were expected to make. There has been talk of an appropriate strategy for the future with special emphasis on advocacy programmes, participation of communities in service delivery, and reducing unmet need for contraceptives. All this sounds impressive, but without efficient monitoring, it is unlikely that these family welfare centres will be activated and mobilised.
There is something more that needs to be looked into. This is the issue of gender equality which is directly linked to the success of a programme seeking to regulate the family size. Surveys have now clearly established that the key factor in determining people’s choice of the number of children they want to have is not so much religious beliefs as was the case once, but their expectations from their offspring. Considering the low status of women in Pakistan, the preference for the male offspring is usually pronounced. Their birth is seen to be an insurance policy for the parents for their future and a factor of social standing for the family. Therefore, the gender of the children and the order of their birth generally determine the family size. A country, where male prejudices are strong and women constitute the neglected section of the community, cannot succeed in curbing the galloping population growth rate. Now is the time to address the male biases in our society to change the attitudes of the people. This must be done at every level — in education, through the media, through political reforms, as has been done to some extent, by empowering women economically and socially, legislating pro-women laws and making the legal system women-friendly. If undertaken in earnest, such measures can bring about changes in the national status of women and thereby have an impact on the demographic factor.
MISMANAGEMENT and profiteering have turned a time of plenty into a problem that could fuel food price inflation even further. Although the country is expecting a bumper wheat crop this year of about 23 million tonnes, up six per cent from last year’s harvest, millers are complaining of higher prices, and flour too is becoming costlier at the retail level. Responding in characteristic ad-hoc fashion, the government has ordered the immediate suspension of wheat exports — a move that smacks more of damage control than an attempt to tackle root causes. This is yet another volte-face in what has long been an inconsistent wheat export policy. The government’s decision to allow wheat exports came less than five months ago, and the scope of this facility was formally extended to neighbouring countries, including India and Afghanistan, as recently as May 3. But now, with a bumper harvest on the way and official carry-over stocks from last year of over two million tonnes, the decision to export has been put on hold and the price of both wheat and flour is increasing. Why this on-again, off-again approach?
Released in December last year, the State Bank had warned in its annual report for 2005-06 that wheat prices may rise even in the event of a bumper crop. The reason: market manipulation, speculation and hoarding by profiteers. The central bank had further advised the government not to allow exports until it had procured and stocked enough wheat with which to counter market manipulation. No heed was paid to this counsel and Islamabad went ahead with the decision to export wheat. Now, while the hoarders continue to operate without let or hindrance, genuine exporters — through no fault of their own — suddenly find themselves unable to meet their commitments with international buyers. Reliability is everything in business and Pakistan’s image as a trading partner is not helped by such ad-hoc measures. Building strategic reserves of staple food crops such as wheat is of critical importance, as are storage facilities that are pest-free and protected from the elements. The profiteers cannot be allowed to inflict further misery on the poor in the name of free enterprise.
ONE must welcome the Pakhtun Action Committee’s decision to defer the three-day strike after assurances from the Sindh government “high-ups” that PAC’s demands would be considered sympathetically. Addressing a press conference on Wednesday, PAC chief Shahi Syed said that the decision to defer the strike to June 8-10 had been taken in the best interest of the city. Even though he did not specify who precisely had promised to consider its demands, he said some “senior officials” had done so. The press conference was held after Sindh Governor Ishratul Ibad called on ANP leader Asfandyar Wali Khan at Mardan House to express his condolences over the death of 12 ANP workers. There is no doubt the postponement of the strike will help improve the situation in the city, which has still to recover from the May 12 trauma. Coming after the May 12 bloodbath, the three-day strike had the potential to rekindle the fire of ethnic violence.
The governor’s meeting with Mr Wali Khan and later with MMA leader Ghafoor Ahmad means the coming together of leaders representing various political parties and should help dispel fears of ethnic violence that has been haunting the city since May 12. The governor, according to Mr Syed, told Mr Wali Khan that Karachi belonged to all those who lived in the city and, for that reason, he sought the Pakhtun leaders’ cooperation in maintaining peace. We have no doubt that PAC’s demands will be given due consideration and accepted where justifiable. Its demands are of a non-political nature and revolve round financial compensations to families affected by the May 12 disturbances. The Sindh government’s inept handling of the situation on May 12 has caused incalculable harm to Karachi’s social fabric, and it will take sustained efforts to bring the city back to the pre-May 12 status provided all sides apply themselves to the task with sincerity and devotion.
Unlike such translations is the interpretation of the Quran put forward by Prof A.J. Arberry. Prof Arberry tries to go to the central message that the Quran is putting forward rather than getting involved in the detailed meaning of words or phrases. An example is Chapter 90 entitled “The Land” where the Quran establishes the central point “we created man in trouble”. What, does he think none has power over him, saying
I have consumed wealth abundant?...
Have we not appointed to him two eyes, and a tongue, and two lips and guided him on the two highways? Yet he has not assaulted the steep; and what shall teach thee what is the steep?
The freeing of a slave, or giving food upon a day of hunger to an orphan near of kin or a needy man in misery; then that he become of those who believe and counsel each other to be steadfast, and counsel each other to be merciful.
Those are the companions of the Right Hand.
The above passage from the Quran explains why the second Caliph Omar Ibn al Khattab beckoned his slave or servant to ride the camel when he entered Jerusalem as the conqueror while the caliph was leading the camel. Such a sight startled the onlookers.Obviously, the message was that the Quran advocated the social transformation of a society. The Quran was not merely emphasising that the believer should worship one true god. This worship of one true god implied in the next step the social transformation of the Muslim society. This explains why Omar Ibn al Khattab emphasised that the central message of Islam was designed to weaken the rich and improve the well-being of the poor. This was social justice.
This explains why Allama Iqbal, who advocated the formation of the state of Pakistan, wrote to Mr Mohammad Ali Jinnah in 1937, ten years before the state was established, that if the state of Pakistan were to follow social justice as its central policy it would be returning to the cardinal message of Islam.
Ever since Pakistan was established Muslims under the guidance of the Muslim League or other parties have not adhered to the central Islamic policy prescription.
They tend to follow some of the ideas regarding the establishment of democracy by merely emphasising that the electorate needs to have certain basic qualifications of literacy or dividing itself into political parties. These are the outward manifestations of democracy.
Mr Dag Hammarskjold who was secretary-general of the United Nations, kept a diary recording his messages to Christ. These were published as Markings. In one of these messages he wrote “Your position never gives you the right to command. It only imposes on you the duty of so living your life that others can receive your orders without being humiliated.”
Markings suggests that this is what democracy is all about and this is precisely what the British had in mind when they thought that democracy was progressive realisation of responsible government.
Many reformers and educators in the developing world think that their fellow human beings need to be educated to become literates and improve their skills in areas like arithmetic. They don’t realise that this does not necessarily lead to the social transformation of society. If you follow the road to democracy through literacy and arithmetic, the road tends to be a long one.
The Quran is emphasising that man, in order to get out of the trouble that God has placed him in, has to assault the steep highway and assaulting the steep highway lies through creation of social justice and social transformation of society. In this sense the Quran suggests that the Islamic path through social transformation is a revolutionary path. In a very well known poem in Iqbal’s Baal-i-Jibreel, there is a dialogue between God and Lenin and towards the end of the dialogue God issues commands to His angels in which He declares:
“Arise and awaken the poor people of my world and shake the doors and walls of the palaces of the rich where a peasant cannot get his living from the land he tills that land should be destroyed.” (translation from Baal-i-Jibreel).
It is obvious that the upper and middle classes in Pakistan have not followed the guidelines that Iqbal put forward so eloquently before them. The main cause of the deviant and different path that the middle and upper classes in Pakistan have followed is that they do not realise that the central message of Islam is social transformation.
The problem is that such values, even if they could be given a distinctive British take, are too complex, and their interpretation too contested, to be set into a series of meaningful definitions. Every public culture must operate through shared values, which are both embodied in and used to criticise its institutions and practices. Their meaning is grasped as old interpretations are dropped and new circumstances unsettle one consensus and another is built up. Simply saying that freedom or equality is a core British value is unlikely to settle any controversy or tell us, for example, what is hate speech and how it should be handled. Definitions of core values will be too bland or too divisive.
The idea that there has to be a schedule of "non-negotiable" value statements to which every citizen is expected to sign up is not in the spirit of an open, plural citizenship. National identity should be woven in debate and discussion, not reduced to a list. For central to it is a citizenship and the right of all, especially previously marginalised or newly admitted groups, to make a claim on the national identity. In this way, racism and other forms of stigmatised identities can be challenged and supplanted by a positive politics of mutual respect and inclusion. Being black or Muslim is then no longer seen as something to be tolerated but part of what it is to be British today.
Such an inclusive and work-in-progress concept of national identity helps to also clarify that the recent emphasis on citizenship, common values and community cohesion has taken two forms. For some, like Trevor Phillips and David Goodhart, it means that multiculturalism is an idea that, once helpful, must now be left behind. For others, it means re-emphasising an aspect of multiculturalism that was always there, albeit sometimes in a muted or half-hearted way.
The latter are surely right, though we in Europe sometimes think the national and the multicultural are incompatible. In other parts of the world where multiculturalism has been accepted and worked –– Canada, Australia and Malaysia, for example –– it has not just been coincidental with but integral to nation-building. Even in the US, where the federal state has had a much lesser role in the multicultural project, the incorporation of ethno-religious diversity and hyphenated Americans (such as Italian-American) has been about country-making, civic inclusion and making a claim upon the national identity. It is Europeans who are likely to think of multiculturalism as antithetical to rather than as a reformer of national citizenship.
It does not make sense to encourage strong multicultural or minority identities and weak common or national identities; strong multicultural identities are a good thing - they are not intrinsically divisive or reactionary - but they need a framework of vibrant, dynamic, national narratives, and the ceremonies and rituals which give expression to a national identity. It is clear that minority identities are capable of having an emotional pull for the individuals for whom they are important. Multicultural citizenship requires, therefore, if it is to be equally attractive to the same individuals, a comparable counter-balancing emotional pull.
National identity can play this role. Many Britons, for example, say they are worried about disaffection among some young Muslim men and a lack of identification with Britain among many Muslims. In fact, surveys over many years show Muslims have been reaching out to identify with Britain. For example, in a Channel 4 NOP survey in spring last year, 82 per cent of a national sample of Muslims said they felt very strongly (45 per cent) or fairly strongly (37 per cent) they belonged to Britain. Yet the survey also found that many Muslims did not feel comfortable in Britain. For example, 58 per cent thought that extreme religious persecution of Muslims was very likely (23 per cent) or fairly likely (35 per cent). Similarly, a recent Gallup poll of Londoners found that 57 per cent of Muslims identified strongly with Britain compared with 48 per cent of non-Muslims, yet 54 per cent think more should be done to accommodate their religion.
We cannot afford to leave out multicultural citizenship from social reform and justice in the 21st century. Rather, the turning of negative difference into positive affirmation of difference should be one of the tests of social justice. It is at the centre of democratic citizenship. That citizens enjoy more rights than non-citizens is justifiable and a better basis for considering entitlements than Margaret Hodge's racialised suggestion of "indigenousness". —The Guardian, London