ONE among the many promises made by the prime minister in his long-winded maiden address to the National Assembly was to encourage the use of CNG buses. Hopefully, he had in mind the broader problem of expanding and modernising urban public transport, more particularly in the national and provincial capitals.

If that is what the promise is about, one feels compelled instantly to advise him not to leave its implementation to the central planners, the provincial ministers or the district nazims. They have all been incessantly talking about it for years now, but not one new commuter bus is seen plying the streets of any city.

Instead, the prime minister should persuade Shahbaz Sharif to make a commuter transport plan for every large city of the country while he is marking time to become Punjab’s chief minister once again. I am making this proposal because he is the only politician, or administrator, that I know of who made and implemented such a plan for Lahore, Rawalpindi-Islamabad and some other cities of the province when he was chief minister. All others before and after him, despite knowing the enormity of the problem, have been casual and even callous in their solutions and approach.Seven years ago — almost to the day — I wrote in this paper that Shahbaz Sharif should be allowed to return from exile (nothing was held against him except that he was Nawaz Sharif’s brother) provided he agreed to become the non-political administrator of Karachi to set its civic affairs, especially public transport, right. His response was unexpectedly cordial. The proposal, however, did not get past Musharraf’s minions who were scared of having amid them a former chief minister.The urban bus fleets that were introduced on Shahbaz Sharif’s initiative in the 1990s started dwindling after his departure because of the indifference of the policymakers, harassment by field officials and the intervention of the courts. The Rawalpindi-Islamabad fleet of 200 buses vanished altogether. The commuters of the capital are back in the grip of polluting and noisy wagons.

Karachi also made a start with a fleet much smaller than Lahore’s. That too has been shrinking because of an indifferent and inefficient administration. This sprawling city of 16 million must be the only one in the world not to have a public transport system. A survey conducted by the Karachi police some time ago revealed that every bus or minibus plying Karachi’s roads was more than 15 years old. Some were as old as 50 years. The commuters have no choice.

View that situation against the boasts made by ministers and nazims. Here is an example. The city’s first nazim, Niamatullah Khan, told a public gathering that 500 CNG buses were on the high seas. His younger and more resourceful successor has been raising that number at intervals — the latest being 2,500. Not a single bus has arrived from anywhere. The local manufacturers of buses too have been waiting in vain all this while for a customer to turn up.

Not lagging behind in boasts have been the ministers. For instance, newspapers in April last year carried advertisements with pictures of a beaming Musharraf, Shaukat Aziz and Sheikh Rashid, announcing the revival of Karachi’s circular railway and the introduction of mass transit trains in eight big cities.

Shamefully, the KCR track and stations have since then decayed further, and the transit trains, it appears, were no more than an election stunt. The only part of the then railway minister’s advertised package that surely will be implemented one day is the leasing out of railway land for hotels and petrol pumps.

Now a quick look at what our planners and policymakers had to say or do. A scheme for 500 CNG buses for Karachi was approved in March 2007. It took six months to get through Ecnec. For almost two years now, the approved scheme is making the rounds of government offices but has yet to reach the prospective investors.

While such is the state of public transport which the prime minister hopes can be made to “provide economic travelling to poor people besides improving the environment”, the thinking of Karachi’s planners is riveted on seven mass transit corridors (each would cost no less than $500m) and elevated expressways. Let it be said here that while we pay lip service to the poor and to a clean environment, most money and effort is directed at projects that yield profits for the lenders, planners and contractors. Those who cannot or do not wish to partake of the profit are content to put up memorial plaques.If the prime minister sincerely intends to reduce the suffering of city commuters (rural folk can make do with our worn-out railway and passable inter-city bus service) here is the bare outline of a doable plan:

· Motorcycle rickshaws (their number is said to be 50,000 in Karachi and half of that in Lahore) should be converted to CNG. Delhi has done it. Why can’t we?

· All buses plying the cities and which are more than 15 years old should be replaced with new, low-emission Euro-II diesel buses through a yearly cycle.

· Given the constraints of gas and costs (the price of a CNG bus is about 30 per cent more than a diesel bus) a realistic target would be to induct 2,000 CNG buses every year in urban fleets.

It is easy to make an urban transport scheme. We have been doing it for 50 years, only to make it worse. The difficult question that we refuse to tackle is how to make it profitable for the investors and affordable for the commuters at the same time.

A principle now universally acknowledged is that the government must not manage city transport but subsidise it. By ignoring this principle, state corporations incurred huge losses. Now the service is in private hands but fares are controlled and the situation has become worse. Pollution in our cities — 90 per cent of it caused by vehicles — is three to four times higher than the level considered safe by WHO. The cost of treatment of related diseases is put at Rs25bn a year.

The solution is neither easy nor cheap. With his experience, guts and a powerful post awaiting him, no one is in a better position than Shahbaz Sharif to find a solution based on profit for the investor and fare subsidy by the government. Boastful visionaries need to be reminded that for a common man to get to his place of work expeditiously, safely and cheaply is next only to food and shelter.

THE PPP elders have been declaring their resolve to carry forward the late Ms Benazir Bhutto’s legacy. What they do in this regard will depend on what they find her legacy to be. Looking for the legacy of a public figure, one would want to identify her/his professed ideals and goals and the actions she/he took to accomplish them.

Her/his accomplishment is likely to have been modest if her/his goals included the remaking of society in her/his own image.

It is one thing for folks to admire a legacy, another to follow it in their practice. Attainment in full measure of high ideals is for most of us an ever receding goal.

Many a prophet left a glorious code of life and splendid examples of personal behaviour, but most of those who subscribed to the faith he had brought ignored his legacy in the actual conduct of their affairs. This is not to say that legacies of venerable men are of no consequence. If we did not have ideals, rules of morality, and laws, life would become chaotic and, as Thomas Hobbes had said, a “war of every man against every man”.

Let us look at the legacies of a few tall men of history from our own region and see what we find. Take, for instance, ‘Mahatma’ Gandhi, who is believed to have personified ‘simple living and high thinking’. He did not work to make money, did not covet material possessions, and lived in a rural, rustic environment, which his wealthy admirers had created for him. He dressed scantily and went about sockless in wooden sandals. A deeply religious Hindu, and an ascetic, he gave up pleasures of the flesh fairly early in his married life.

Gandhi preached and practised non-violence. He waged a long struggle for India’s independence, launched movements of civil disobedience and passive resistance in opposition to British rule, and went to jail for extended periods of time. A man of the people, a mass leader, he mingled with the poor and adopted their idiom, style and symbols in his interaction with them.

Indians, especially the Hindus, venerated Gandhi and answered his call enthusiastically when it came to the struggle for independence. One might have expected that they would also adopt his values and lifestyle. That they did not do, not even his close associates such as Jawaharlal Nehru. Born an aristocrat, he remained one all his life. He did not accept Gandhi’s religious inclinations or his social and economic preferences. Post-independence India let go of Gandhi’s politics, even his stress on non-violence.

Very unlike Gandhi was that other great Indian leader, the man who changed the course of history, the founder of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah. He made no claim to spirituality. He and his concerns were primarily worldly.

One of the most illustrious lawyers and politicians in the country, he had many enhancing qualities. He was: industrious, persevering, thorough, attentive to detail; courageous, candid, confident, determined, willful; orderly; man of honour, keeper of his covenants, eloquent, tough negotiator; wealthy, elegant, one of the world’s best dressed men; generous contributor to charities and noble causes; constitutionalist, law-abiding, honest, incorruptible; believer in the primacy of the public interest over the personal and private; unwavering guardian of Muslim interests; secular minded; advocate of equal rights for all citizens.

Pakistanis think of Mr Jinnah as the Quaid-i-Azam (great leader). They are proud of his credentials, attainments and victories over his opponents. But in their actual practice, they ignore his public philosophy (as much as the Indians do Gandhi’s), particularly with regard to probity, primacy of the public interest, respect for law, equal rights for women and the minorities, and tolerance of the dissident.

PPP notables claim that Benazir followed and implemented her father’s legacy. His record as a ruler is blemished with arbitrariness, violation of democratic norms, persecution of opponents and dissidents. It is not a model to be commended to others. He was a master of the modes and techniques of mobilising the masses and building a rapport with them. He was a relentless campaigner. He went to cities, towns and villages across the country, mingled with the people, and talked with them about their problems and concerns. He was an eloquent public speaker and an effective user of body language.

He devised inviting slogans, responding to the basic needs of the poor. This was not mere show. He had a genuine regard for the poor and wanted to improve their lives. He urged them to participate in politics and gave them a sense of personal dignity and political efficacy. In his record as mass leader there is much for others to study and emulate.

There is nothing remarkably positive in Benazir Bhutto’s experience as this country’s prime minister. We may have to explore her record as an opposition leader to find noteworthy actions. We know that she was well-educated, articulate, eloquent, amazingly energetic and hardworking. We know also that she was a shrewd and perceptive politician, determined, persevering, brave and for the right cause willing to risk her life.

More of her legacy is to be found in her professed values, principles and commitments. She inherited her father’s sympathetic concern for the poor and oppressed. Like him, she mingled and built rapport with them. She had also begun to declare her support for their right to the basic amenities of life, and she asserted the government’s obligation to provide them. She endorsed the demand of the smaller provinces for a larger measure of autonomy, and she emerged as a champion of democracy.

It should, however, be noted that democracy and provincial autonomy were not Ms Bhutto’s exclusive or peculiar concerns. Most other political leaders had been voicing them over the years. (Recall MRD, ARD, Charter of Democracy, PDM.) These concerns have become part of the Pakistani political culture. It goes to Benazir’s credit that she voiced them and struggled for their realisation more persistently and vigorously than others.

History does things with its more notable characters which they, and the men of their generation, had not anticipated. Mythmaking has always been a flourishing industry. With the passage of time qualities and accomplishments, of which her contemporaries have no awareness, will probably be attributed to her and she will be elevated to sainthood. But that is history’s business, not mine.

The writer, professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts, is currently a visiting professor at the Lahore School of Economics.

anwars@lahoreschool.edu.pk

DURING the French presidential election last year, Nicolas Sarkozy and Segolene Royale went head to head in a famous televised debate. One moment stood out. The temperature was rising, and Sarkozy thought to take the initiative.

He advised Royale to calm down. After all, he said, you cannot be a good president and be angry. Royale snapped back: “There is such a thing as righteous anger!” The papers were divided as to who was in the right. Sarkozy, of course, went on to win the election. However, Royale had a point. If it takes anger to fire up the energy necessary to overcome complacency and fight injustice, then anger can be a good and necessary thing.

The UK’s Mental Health Foundation would apparently beg to differ. In a report, it argues that anger is the cause of much distress and damage in human society. Moreover, the services available for helping people manage their anger are inadequate. There’s no doubt some truth to this. But I do wonder whether anger is quite the right target for our concern. For sometimes anger illuminates. Its heat can prompt action. Maybe a better question is how can you distinguish between righteous anger and blind rage.

It was certainly one debated by the ancients. Aristotle argued that anger has a place in the good life. He asked how a soldier could face the charge of the enemy unless he had anger in his blood. Anger is driven by pain, he said. And when that pain stems from the consciousness of being wronged, it can be the midwife of virtue. Clearly anger can boil over; the angry individual risks losing control. But that is not to deny its value. It is to say that the wise learn to direct their anger correctly.Seneca disagreed. He thought anger itself was the enemy, and perhaps an even more deadly one than wickedness. The trouble is that anger loses touch with reason, he wrote in his essay, On Anger. So it is naive to think it can be controlled. “It is equally devoid of decency, unmindful of ties, persistent and diligent in whatever it begins.” Like a fire in a forest, it should be quenched before it can speed through the undergrowth. Directly challenging Aristotle, he went on: “Anger is not expedient even in battle or in war; for it is prone to rashness, and while it seeks to bring about danger, does not guard against it.”

But there is a weakness in Seneca’s argument. He puts great faith in reason. Reason achieves everything that anger can, he thought, and with none of the collateral damage. But is reason really more powerful than passion?

Interestingly, the Bible suggests not –– and not because it is irrational. Think of the last week in the life of Jesus, which Christians in the west remembered last week. It is called the Passion, and features Jesus displaying righteous anger: for instance, there is the incident in the temple when he overturns the tables of the money changers. Anger can not only be righteous, it might be of God.

So, if anger has a place in life, how might it be not managed or contained but nurtured? Plato provides a hint. He advised against directing anger at others and suggested turning it towards real problems. He also thought that anger should be directed towards finding answers, not fuelling excuses. A thought of Mark Twain takes the analysis further: “A man is about as big as the things that make him angry.” Thus road rage is not likely to be on the side of right. But the individual who, prompted by anger, sacrifices his life for a greater cause, is.

In short, the value of anger lies in focus and discernment. And if people are becoming more angry in our society, the remedy might not be therapies but learning something about modern life.

— The Guardian, London