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| December 06, 2007 | Thursday | Ziqa'ad 25, 1428 |
PR exercises abroad
Annapolis sabotaged
Impact of elections on the economy
OTHER VOICES - Middle East Press
THE election period in Pakistan is, in fact, a season of promises, some of them very strident. The more the political parties, the more the promises and the more coalition groups contesting the elections, far more the number of promises.
FOLLOWING the US intelligence agencies’ admission that Iran halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003, Tehran has won at least temporary respite from mounting western pressure to stop uranium enrichment. Indeed, the National Intelligence Estimate report’s revelation is consistent with what the International Atomic Energy Agency has been saying for some time — that it has no proof that Iran was producing bomb-grade uranium. Western intelligence has often proved faulty, particularly in the case of Iraq which the Americans invaded in 2003 on the grounds that Baghdad possessed weapons of mass destruction. There is every reason, then, to conclude that the spy agencies have got it wrong again — even though the news is good. However, reports say that stung by criticism over their previous failure in Iraq and in view of vital information received some months ago, this time the intelligence units were more careful in their assessments. Their findings were not haphazardly and hastily put together as they were in the months before the Iraqi invasion, with the result that they can be viewed with greater credibility.
Although he has put on a brave face, President George Bush, who had earlier warned of a Third World War if Iran continued with its alleged nuclear programme, is upset by the report. He still maintains that Iran, if it knows how to build a bomb, continues to be a threat. But with his presidency approaching its final months, Mr Bush would be best advised to bring to an end his anti-Iran rhetoric. The president’s popularity has been steadily sliding and the Democrats have been finding fault with his Iran policy and lamenting the loss of face for America. Indeed, this is the time for the EU and America to discard the carrot-and-stick approach and try softer means. They might find Iran responding positively to friendly overtures such as refraining from imposing another set of sanctions and diluting the previous ones. Lessening its hostility in this way will lead to greater peace dividends in the region as an Iran which is no longer treated like a pariah state might be prevailed upon to exert its influence on elements inside Iraq to stop them from fomenting trouble.
But Iran must also show reciprocity. Although under the NPT it has every right to develop its nuclear assets for civilian use, it is the brazen attitude of its leadership that has caused more damage to Tehran’s relations with the West than actual deeds. It must come clean on its nuclear programme so that all are satisfied that it is enriching fuel solely for energy use. Equally important, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad must stop his anti-West and anti-Israel rhetoric and sincerely attempt to mend fences with those he has put off. Leaving the past behind and getting on with the future would be in the interest of all parties.
A GENERAL going to a democratic country to plead another general’s case for his political credentials is indeed bizarre. This retired general happens to be a former spy chief, General Javed Ashraf Qazi, who was accompanied by Mr Tariq Azim. They provoked counter-demonstrations by Pakistani and British journalists, lawyers, politicians and human rights activists. Another team has gone to the United States to do the same job and justify the unjustifiable. The very idea that a general should suspend a country’s constitution, promulgate a new one, sack judges, suspend fundamental rights and gag the press goes against the very grain of democracy. Granted that the country needs stability, and it goes without saying that terrorism must be crushed. But the intelligentsia in democratic countries would find it difficult to believe that these aims cannot be achieved within the democratic framework. In fact, democratic tools are an asset in the fight against terrorism and a source of stability rather than instruments of chaos and political instability.
The image of a country cannot be improved by PR exercises abroad. How the world perceives a country is determined by some hard truths. This image — positive or negative — is created not just by the government but by all actors on the national scene, the level of science and technology, education, the quality of its institutions of learning, the political and cultural freedoms the people enjoy, the position of women, minorities and the disadvantaged groups, the affluence or poverty of the people, and whether its nationals identify themselves with their country which they struggle to develop or whether they seek to flee from their homes to improve their own economic lot. Our former prime ministers have no qualms of conscience about visiting foreign capitals to plead for an aid cut-off when a rival is in power, and it goes without saying that the roles are reversed when there is a regime change. As the coalition of Pakistani journalists in New York said aptly, the delegation’s visit amounted merely to a waste of public money. The government and the opposition both should realise it is their joint responsibility to foster an image that is better than what the world at present has of Pakistan.
ISRAEL has proceeded to sabotage the Annapolis agreement even before the ink has dried on it. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has told his cabinet he was not going to abide by the deadline given under the agreement that visualises the emergence of an independent Palestinian state before the end of 2008. The accord was signed last week at Maryland’s capital with great fanfare by President George Bush, Mr Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the presence of delegates from 22 countries. Now Mr Olmert says that Israel is not bound by the agreement and that progress in the negotiations depends on Palestine reining in its militants. This volte-face by Israel is nothing new. It has a track record of violating solemn pacts on the slightest pretext. That is how it has maintained its hold over the occupied territories and strengthened its stranglehold on the West Bank — and until recently on Gaza.
The irony of the document signed on Nov 27 is that it contains repeated references to the 2003 road map unveiled by President Bush and approved by the Quartet — the other three of its members being Russia, the EU and the UN. The road map was itself never implemented with the tacit agreement of Washington and Tel Aviv. The road map had provided for the emergence of a Palestinian state ‘by 2005’ but President Bush had scuttled it by saying that 2005 was an unrealistic date for a Palestinian state to come into being. Whatever possibility was there for the road map’s success had disappeared when, on one of his visits to the White House, the Israeli prime minister had prevailed upon Mr Bush to let Israel retain ‘some’ land in the West Bank. President Bush went public with the acceptance of this demand. The road map was dead. Now within a week of the signing of an international accord at Annapolis, Mr Olmert has made his intentions known. He is confident that Israel will get away with his intransigence because in an American presidential election year no one in the US media or Congress will have the courage to tell the truth and hold the Jewish state guilty of violating an agreement to which America is a party.
Elections in Pakistan are rare and few and the campaign period is usually limited to three months. At the end of the campaign, there is no certainty if the elections would take place at all. In the United States, the election campaign lasts for two years and since basically it is a non-partisan contest, the number of promises made by the candidates and their parties are a few in number.
The unusually large caretaker government, which keeps on expanding, has decided not to increase the POL rates despite the soaring world prices at least before the elections. President Musharraf is also reported to be not wanting higher POL prices as his first gift to the people after his re-election as president, this time as a civilian.
If the oil price is not raised officially, the government may lose Rs101 billion as revenues but may make up for that loss by charging the people sales tax on petroleum as well as development surcharge which will mobilise Rs90 billion. The consumer will be crushed in the process while the government may eventually walk off with a small liability after it chooses to raise prices at any time.
Simultaneously the proposed 21 per cent raise in power rates and five percent rise in gas rates are to be put off. It will be an awkward task for the newly elected government to come up with a heavy increase in the POL, power and gas rates with all their impact on inflation.
Meanwhile, the furnace oil price has been cut by Rs1035 per tonne and the LPG has been totally deregulated. There is speculation that the forthcoming Opec meeting in Dubai may decide to increase its oil output while noting the sustained fall in the exchange rate of the dollar which is used for trading oil. Meanwhile, the Gulf Cooperation Council has decided to introduce a common currency for the region from 2010 also for fixing prices of their oil.
Prices of cement, wheat, flour, oil and vanaspati have risen in the market along with many other edible items. There was fear that the next wheat crop may fall far short of the target and create a new crisis but the recent rains in the Barani areas have improved the situation.
Iran now wants increase in trade with Pakistan to reach a billion dollars. Turkey wants the same in the face of the small trade between the two friendly countries. The Afghan leaders have been talking of a billion dollar trade target for a long time. We should try to have greater trade with our neighbours instead of being content with the five billion dollar trade we expect in the wake of the FTA agreement with China.
Meanwhile Ms Benazir Bhutto, chairman of the PPP, has come up with a five-point election manifesto promising employment, education, energy, environment and equality. Along with that the old PPP commitment of Roti, Kapra, Makaan has been revived but more as a slogan than as a commitment. Providing jobs to the unemployed, particularly the young and educated, will cost a great deal of money but after the government’s outlay on energy which has to be tremendous, little will be left for creating employment and promote education.
The government will have to rely a great deal on the private sector and revive its old strategy of public private partnership which it advocated but could not practise it. For promoting long term prospects of employment, large scale industries will have to be promoted along with SMEs and the system of micro credit on a large scale. The Shaukat Aziz government gave a free hand to the businessmen so that they could invest more and some of them responded to an extent. Some such policy will have to be followed by the new government.
PPPs commitments include employment for the educated young up to the graduate level, micro credit for five million persons and monetary relief for persons above sixty five years who have no income of their own. All this will cost a great deal of.
Foreign governments who are backing Benazir Bhutto as the voice of moderation will step up their aid if she comes to power. But the increase will not be much particularly for education as a good deal of money has been wasted in the manner education was promoted. So, she will have to generate more resources from within the country. At the moment the budgetary income is good, the revenue collection during the first five months of the new financial year exceeds the target by 12.5 per cent but as the industrialists wait for the new government to come in, the revenues can drop.
The PPP in achieving what it seeks or delivering what it promises depends on its ability to achieve high output with moderate input and to mobilise the private sector to perform its social role. But it is also for the businessmen to be realistic instead of hoping to make more money the easy way and the banks to thrive through consumer credit at high interest rates.
If the foreign investors are holding back their fresh investments, it is not surprising. It happens in every country on the eve of general elections or when there is a transition from the military set-up to a civilian regime.
Businessmen want to ensure whether pro-business policies of Musharraf would continue and that they would still have a free hand. But they must fulfil their social role in the country where 30 per cent of the people live below the poverty line of a dollar a day. Foreign investors are bound to be watchful during the transition period.
Meanwhile, the Shell group has opted out of the offshore project which was earlier welcomed by the government and the Dubai international authority has said it is no longer interested in the 450-500 MW power project located in a small town of Punjab.
Foreign investors had serious complaints about the judicial process in Pakistan. They hired the best lawyers when they had a case against the government or a private party but the judgments came too late and then they were not enforced often.
Bomb that was not
After the lies and manipulation of intelligence concerning Saddam’s WMD that preceded Washington’s Iraq adventure, there were always reasonable grounds for doubting George Bush’s similar sabre-rattling assertions about Iran’s supposed nuclear weapons’ programme.
Now the revelations of the US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) prove how justified those doubts were. Bush who had, among other things, claimed — completely against the record — that Iran had declared it wanted to build a nuclear weapons arsenal, is shown once again to be creating a fabric of misinformation, which he may well have been planning to use as justification for US air strikes on Iran.
The 16 US spy agencies that contribute to the NIE are, however, now saying that Iran halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003, even though in 2005, the NIE asserted that the drive for nuclear armament was continuing. It is easy to believe that the CIA, which Bush made the fall guy for the false intelligence on Iraq’s WMD, is determined not to be manipulated this way again…
A Bush spokesman has insisted that pressure on Iran must be maintained. Predictably, the British government has echoed this stance. It is more of a surprise that France’s President Sarkozy has delivered a similar judgment.
Why has he chosen to rubberstamp the risky Bush policy when the facts on which it is based have been shown to be wrong? The NIE estimates that if Iran resumed its atomic weapons programme today, the country could not build its first bomb until 2015.
This may, however, itself prove to be as wrong as its 2005 assertion that the programme was continuing…The responsibility now rests with Tehran to honour its international treaty obligations and let IAEA officials perform the full range of inspections they are entitled to make…. — (Dec 5)
Bring them home, gradually
Since the separation fence was built, thousands of settlers who live east of it find themselves in an unclear situation. Having to wait for a political settlement to determine the permanent border is nerve-racking for those who wish to lead a normal life. Polls show that some 20,000 settlers at least would at this point like to vacate communities east of the fence, if they receive enough compensation to buy a new home.
The “compensation for evacuation” bill, which was brought before the Knesset half a year ago… proposes a mechanism for immediate compensation for anyone who wants to leave his or her home right now. Labour Party Chairman Ehud Barak announced this week that his party will support this legislation, thereby giving the private members’ bill a renewed boost.
Construction of the separation fence has created a conjectural border between Israel and the Palestinians, and anyone who knows how to read the map understands that under any future agreement, there will not be Israeli sovereignty beyond this line. A fair arrangement for evacuation-compensation on an individual basis will provide a solution for those who wish to leave right now, and will also generate a political atmosphere for converging in the direction of the Green Line.
It is safe to presume that the ideologues of Greater Israel will always remain in situ, but all the others will be able to transfer ownership of their homes to the government and receive compensation that will enable them to build a new life…
Beginning an actual evacuation would signal to the world and the Israeli public that the Annapolis speeches were not just speeches. There is no reason to turn the settlers in the West Bank into bargaining chips in peace talks, when everyone knows that a majority of Israelis is not in favour of continuing to maintain settlements in the heart of a Palestinian population…— (Dec 4)