How to confront Empire?

[Following is the text of the speech that eminent Indian writer and social activist Arundhati Roy, the winner of 1997 Booker Prize, delivered at this year’s World Social Forum held late last month at Porto Alegre in Brazil.]

I’VE been asked to speak about “How to confront Empire?” It’s a huge question, and I have no easy answers. When we speak of confronting “Empire,” we need to identify what “Empire” means. Does it mean the US government (and its European satellites), the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, and multinational corporations? Or is it something more than that?

In many countries, Empire has sprouted other subsidiary heads, some dangerous byproducts — nationalism, religious bigotry, fascism and, of course, terrorism. All these march arm in arm with the project of corporate globalization.

Let me illustrate what I mean. India — the world’s biggest democracy — is currently at the forefront of the corporate globalization project. Its “market” of one billion people is being prised open by the WTO. Corporatization and privatization are being welcomed by the government and the Indian elite.

It is not a coincidence that the prime minister, the home minister, the disinvestment minister — the men who signed the deal with Enron in India, the men who are selling the country’s infrastructure to corporate multinationals, the men who want to privatize water, electricity, oil, coal, steel, health, education and telecommunication — are all members or admirers of the RSS. The RSS is a right-wing, ultra-nationalist Hindu guild which has openly admired Hitler and his methods.

The dismantling of democracy is proceeding with the speed and efficiency of a structural adjustment programme. While the project of corporate globalization rips through people’s lives in India, massive privatization, and labour “reforms” are pushing people off their land and out of their jobs. Hundreds of impoverished farmers are committing suicide by consuming pesticide. Reports of starvation deaths are coming in from all over the country.

The two arms of the Indian government have evolved the perfect pincer action. While one arm is busy selling India off in chunks, the other, to divert attention, is orchestrating a howling, baying chorus of Hindu nationalism and religious fascism. It is conducting nuclear tests, rewriting history books, burning churches, and demolishing mosques. Censorship, surveillance, the suspension of civil liberties and human rights, the definition of who is an Indian citizen and who is not, particularly with regard to religious minorities, is becoming common practice now.

Last March, in the state of Gujarat, two thousand Muslims were butchered in a state-sponsored pogrom. Muslim women were specially targeted. They were stripped, and gang-raped, before being burned alive. Arsonists burned and looted shops, homes, textiles mills, and mosques. More than a hundred and fifty thousand Muslims have been driven from their homes. The economic base of the Muslim community has been devastated.

While Gujarat burned, the Indian prime minister was on MTV promoting his new poems. In January this year, the government that orchestrated the killing was voted back into office with a comfortable majority. Nobody has been punished for the genocide. Narendra Modi, architect of the pogrom, proud member of the RSS, has embarked on his second term as the chief minister of Gujarat. If he were Saddam Hussein, of course each atrocity would have been on CNN. But since he’s not — and since the Indian “market” is open to global investors — the massacre is not even an embarrassing inconvenience.

There are more than one hundred million Muslims in India. A time bomb is ticking in our ancient land. All this to say that it is a myth that the free market breaks down national barriers. The free market does not threaten national sovereignty, it undermines democracy.

As the disparity between the rich and the poor grows, the fight to corner resources is intensifying. To push through their “sweetheart deals,” to corporatize the crops we grow, the water we drink, the air we breathe, and the dreams we dream, corporate globalization needs an international confederation of loyal, corrupt, authoritarian governments in poorer countries to push through unpopular reforms and quell the mutinies.

Corporate Globalization — or shall we call it by its name? — Imperialism — needs a press that pretends to be free. It needs courts that pretend to dispense justice.

Meanwhile, the countries of the North harden their borders and stockpile weapons of mass destruction. After all, they have to make sure that it’s only money, goods, patents and services that are globalized. Not the free movement of people. Not respect for human rights. Not international treaties on racial discrimination or chemical and nuclear weapons or greenhouse gas emissions or climate change, or — god forbid — justice.

So this — all this — is “empire.” This loyal confederation, this obscene accumulation of power, this greatly increased distance between those who make the decisions and those who have to suffer them. Our fight, our goal, our vision of Another World must be to eliminate that distance.

So how do we resist “Empire”?

The good news is that we’re not doing too badly. There have been major victories. Here in Latin America you have had so many — in Bolivia, you have Cochabamba. In Peru, there was the uprising in Arequipa, In Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez is holding on, despite the US government’s best efforts. And the world’s gaze is on the people of Argentina, who are trying to refashion a country from the ashes of the havoc wrought by the IMF. In India the movement against corporate globalization is gathering momentum and is poised to become the only real political force to counter religious fascism.

While bombs rain down on us, and cruise missiles skid across the skies, we know that contracts are being signed, patents are being registered, oil pipelines are being laid, natural resources are being plundered, water is being privatized, and George Bush is planning to go to war against Iraq.

If we look at this conflict as a straightforward eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation between “Empire” and those of us who are resisting it, it might seem that we are losing. But there is another way of looking at it. We, all of us gathered here, have, each in our own way, laid siege to “Empire.” We may not have stopped it in its tracks — yet, but we have stripped it down. We have made it drop its mask. We have forced it into the open. It now stands before us on the world’s stage in all it’s brutish, iniquitous nakedness.

Empire may well go to war, but it’s out in the open now — too ugly to behold its own reflection. Too ugly even to rally its own people. It won’t be long before the majority of American people become our allies. Only a few days ago in Washington, a quarter of a million people marched against the war on Iraq. Each month, the protest is gathering momentum.

Before September 11, 2001, America had a secret history. Secret especially from its own people. But now America’s secrets are history, and its history is public knowledge. It’s street talk. Today, we know that every argument that is being used to escalate the war against Iraq is a lie. The most ludicrous of them being the US government’s deep commitment to bring democracy to Iraq. Killing people to save them from dictatorship or ideological corruption is, of course, an old US government sport. Here in Latin America, you know that better than most.

Nobody doubts that Saddam Hussein is a ruthless dictator, a murderer (whose worst excesses were supported by the governments of the United States and Great Britain). There’s no doubt that Iraqis would be better off without him. But, then, the whole world would be better off without a certain Mr Bush. In fact, he is far more dangerous than Saddam Hussein. So, should we bomb Bush out of the White House?

But for all intents and purposes, the New War against Iraq has begun. What can we do? We can hone our memory, we can learn from our history. We can continue to build public opinion until it becomes a deafening roar. We can turn the war on Iraq into a fishbowl of the US government’s excesses. When George Bush says “you’re either with us, or you are with the terrorists” we can say “No thank you.” We can let him know that the people of the world do not need to choose between a Malevolent Mickey Mouse and the Mad Mullahs.

Our strategy should be not only to confront empire, but to lay siege to it. To deprive it of oxygen. To shame it. To mock it. With our art, our music, our literature, our stubbornness, our joy, our brilliance, our sheer relentlessness — and our ability to tell our own stories. Stories that are different from the ones we’re being brainwashed to believe.

The corporate revolution will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling — their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability.

Remember this: We be many and they be few. They need us more than we need them. Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.

—Courtesy: ZNet

What’s behind US game?

US Secretary of State Colin Powell has put the UN Security Council on notice telling it to stand by its resolution on Iraq’s disarmament or risk becoming irrelevant. According to him, there was irrefutable evidence against Iraq that it possessed mobile bio-weapons laboratories and that it was concealing evidence of its efforts to produce weapons of mass destruction.

Colin Powell also spoke of Iraqi government having links with Al Qaeda. Apparently, Washington has come to the conclusion that it does not need UN any more and that it could strike at will at any power that it did not like. Such an attitude indicates that the US favours a unipolar world in which its military and economic power is unrivalled. Invading Iraq is meant above all else as a demonstration of what will happen to states which do not recognize, or challenge the US supremacy.

As an immediate response to the address by the US Secretary of State, China’s foreign minister told the Security Council that it should allow UN arms inspectors in Iraq to carry on with their work. “We should respect the views of the two (UN inspection) agencies and support the continuation of their work. The UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency have been working very hard and it is their view that now they are not in a position to draw conclusions”. Iraq’s ambassador Mohammad Al Deuri, when asked what message he would like to deliver, said, “it is a message of peace.”

Only the US and Britain have indicated support for an invasion of Iraq. The other members of the Security Council want to wait for the final report of the inspectors, for which they think more time is needed. In a meeting between Tony Blair, French President Jacques Chirac declared war as the worst of solutions. Similarly, Russia and Germany too are opposed to an attack on Iraq. Pakistan has asked Iraq to fully cooperate with a UN weapons inspectors to avoid war in the region. More and more people throughout the world are calling for more time to be given to the weapons inspectors. Even in the United States there are large sections of the people who call for caution and point out the drawbacks of the military option and plead for a chance to be given to options other than war.

Earlier, the chief UN arms inspector, Dr Hans Blix, had stated that he had not found anything as yet that would support Washington’s accusations against Baghdad. The progress report submitted to the Security Council on January 27 clearly states that the situation does not justify going to war. According to Dr Blix, Baghdad had not committed any material breach of UN resolution 1441. He did however concede that diplomacy needs to be backed by force sometimes and inspections need to be backed by pressure. He further stated that he had not seen any hard evidence to suggest that Iraqi government had links with the Al Qaeda terrorist network.

Husain Mohammad Amin, the head of Iraq’s national monitoring directorate, declared that Baghdad was keen to resolve any pending disarmament issue when top UN inspectors visit Iraq next week. He said, “We are keen to resolve any pending issues from UNMOVIC’s point of view.” The UN monitoring, verification and inspection chief, Hans Blix, and Mohammad ElBaradei of the international Atomic Agency have confirmed they would visit Baghdad before reporting back to the Security Council on February 14. In the light of the progress report submitted to the Security Council and Iraq’s preparedness to resolve any pending issues from UNMOVIC’s point of view, the elimination of Saddam Hussein’s presumed arsenal of weapons of mass destruction can hardly be an acceptable ground for invading Iraq.

Yet Bush has put everyone on notice that diplomacy will give way to a decision on war in “weeks, not months.” He is not in a mood to trust or rely on the UN inspectors’ report and insists that Saddam must disarm or be damned. The hawks in Washington are pushing for instant action without waiting for the UN inspectors’ final report or even a final decision by the UN Security Council. President Bush believes that hitting Iraq fast and hard would save lives in the end. According to an American journalist, a former CIA director had told him that a decision to attack Iraq had already been taken on September 17, 2001. It is therefore pointless to pretend that a decision on war is yet to be taken.

Today everyone knows that the build-up towards war is speeding up. The feeling that events are moving faster and faster is palpable. One can see that war can erupt any time these days. With a sense of foreboding spreading all around, few governments seem capable of realizing the immediate and longer-term consequences of war. If the UN weapons inspectors say over the last two months of intensive search and scrutiny, they found no “smoking gun” and detected no “material breach” by Iraq, what then in the need and justification for a military move against that country?

Is oil a factor? One is reminded of remarks made by US Vice President Cheney way back in 1990. “Whoever controls the Gulf oil enjoys a strangle hold not only on our economy but also on that of the other nations of the world as well.” Is this the intention of the US? Is getting undisputed control of Gulf oil the real aim? Or is it sending a message to China whose economy will depend increasingly on Gulf oil?

In a sense Secretary of State Colin Powell has let the cat out of the bag by saying that overthrowing the Iraqi government could reshape the Middle East in ways that would enhance US interests. Is the idea then to implement the old Zionist plan to extend the boundaries of Israel to include Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Suez Canal area and even part of Saudi Arabia? It started with the emigration of Jews from all over the world to create a homeland of their own in Palestine more than a century ago. The fragmentation of Arab areas into small states at the end of the First World War facilitated the creation of Israel. Now the intention seems to be to turn Israel into a regional leviathan with dominant military power.

The daily life of Americans is the fastest-paced in the world — people whose time horizons are truncated. For them history vanishes into itself very quickly, leaving only the immediate instant to be concerned with. This time consciousness affects strategic thinking about war. This American impatience could lead them into war without realizing its consequences and without waiting for other options to solve the problem at hand. Such a mindset seems set on a course of action which is bound to create political, social and economic turmoil, not only in the Middle East but also further afield.

Do we know that between 150 and 160 wars of varying durations and intensities have raged around the world since 1945, the so-called post-war era? An estimated 7,200,000 soldiers were killed in the process. The wounded, tortured or mutilated were in addition to that. A far larger number of civilians perished in these conflicts.

In the end, one would like to recall what Mr Blix is reported to have said. He said “the world was safer now than it was during the cold war. I think it would be terrible if this comes to an end by force, and I wish for this process of disarmament through the peaceful avenue.”

The writer is a retired major-general of the Pakistan army.

Politics of intervention

THE confidence with which the designers of the Iraq project present it to the world is unsettling. There is more here than the familiar division between doers and doubters which manifests itself whenever serious action is contemplated, especially if it involves war.

Put simply, in the case of the Bush administration and Iraq, we don’t have confidence in their confidence. They do not seem to know enough or care enough about the risks of what they are doing. But the harder question is whether it is too much to ask that policies be wholly justifiable in advance, too much to demand that risk be so wholly excluded as some seem to expect and even too much to demand a high degree of coherence from leaders.

They, some would say, will as always make a stab at things and then react to the consequences, which will usually not be the ones they had envisaged. That is how history happens. But can it continue to “happen” that way?

Last week something called Yugoslavia finally disappeared, when the last entity to use that name was renamed simply Serbia and Montenegro. The decade of intervention in the Balkans was an object lesson in bad policy-making, as solutions were devised and applied, failed, and were uselessly tried again. In the end, Europe and America backed themselves into a series of decisions which, although much contested at the time, did “work” in the sense that fighting stopped, Kosovo was liberated, and the Serbian and Croatian regimes changed. But nobody could possibly describe the reaction of Europe and the US to Yugoslavia’s descent into war as a planned policy which eventually led to a successful outcome.

It was a mess, a mess which, after much wasted time and many wasted lives, was partially cleared up. In international affairs, there are messes which result from inattention, procrastination and timidity, like that in the Balkans, and then there are messes which result from too much boldness and too much risk-taking. It is into this second category that the Iraq adventure — Schroeder was not wrong about the word — could eventually be seen to fall.

Although arising from a determination rather than a disinclination to take action, it could well follow the same lurching pattern of ill-determined moves, unintended results and muddled responses that we saw in the Balkans. We couldn’t depend on eventually getting it right, or half right, with relatively limited damage to one small region, as we did in south-eastern Europe. Almost everybody sees that an Iraq failure, or, rather, a failure of the new and as yet only half-formed Middle East policy of the US of which an Iraq war is a part, could have terrible consequences.

Yet to state this problem in terms of possibly deluded, foolish or malign decision-makers watched and warned against by wise critics is in some ways an evasion. There has to be an admission of a common perplexity. What should the West, or the “north” if we include Russia, do about the problems of Muslim and particularly Middle Eastern societies — problems which, for obvious reasons, present dangers to us as well to the peoples of those countries?

The history of overbearing and ignorant past interventions there lies all around, as full of disasters and miscalculations as anything in the record. But the Muslim lands are so vital — politically, economically and culturally — to the world balance that turning away is not an option.

The calls for intervention, after all, come from there as well as from the capitals of western states. The Palestinians demand help from the outside, as do many Iraqis. Elsewhere we may believe that there is a constituency for change, although it may not want democracy of the kind we recognize.

Our own debates turn on what we should do to change things, including withdrawing support from bad governments, an issue that illustrates our confusion. Continue that support, and for some it is oppression by proxy. Withdraw it, or work against such regimes, and suddenly we are overturning other peoples’ governments. Yet surely there should be a new plan to replace the cobbled together amalgam of Oslo for Israel and Palestine, dual containment for Iran and Iraq, cool relations with Syria and other quasi-enemies, and acquiescent relations with the imperfect governments of Arab “friends”.

Some propose a European-American grand project to democratize the Arab world, an idea long on ambition and short on detail. In most versions, it is supposed to be blasted into orbit by an invasion of Iraq, a proposition many find dubious. This is not to say that it might not somehow help lead to the result intended. It was a commonplace to suggest this in the aftermath of the last Gulf war, when it seemed Saddam might soon fall, or to note that the Saudis feared a democratic contagion. But that was then, and this is now, and much has changed.

Sometimes it seems as if we have not progressed in our understanding of international affairs beyond the stage represented in the treatment of mental disorder by such techniques as electro-convulsive therapy. Apply some huge trauma to the patient, and maybe the pain and shock will effect a cure. Almost these very terms were employed by the Iraqi exile Kenan Makiya at a meeting in London last year.

The Arab world, to his mind, needs some enormous jolt of change. It could have come from a settlement between Palestinians and Israelis, but, failing that and in any case worth doing on its own merits, it could come from the use of military force to bring down the Iraqi regime.

Fouad Ajami, the Arab-American academic whose eloquent studies of Arab ills are widely read in the US, argued more recently in Foreign Affairs magazine that: “In the end, the battle for a secular, modernist order in the Arab world is an endeavour for the Arabs themselves. But power matters, and a great power’s will and prestige can help tip the scales.” Especially if, he adds, America follows up a victory in Iraq by breaking with its history of “relationships of convenience with the autocracies in the saddle, tolerating the cultural and political malignancies of the Arab world”. But even then, he concludes: “The Arab world could whittle down, even devour, an American victory. This is a difficult, perhaps impossible, political landscape.”

The note is the right one to strike: action in a perhaps impossible political landscape using imperfect means. Not much of this is apparent in the demeanour of most members of the Bush administration, although perhaps we can see it in Tony Blair’s drawn face between smiles.

We may ask too much when we demand of our governments an insulation against risk and a certainty of good outcomes that is just not available in the real world. But we can ask that they be truly aware of risk, and, harder, insist that the new dangers demand of government levels of consistency and competence over time not often demonstrated in the past. —Dawn/Guardian Service

Whose reality is it?

TELEVISION keeps getting better and better. At one point, it was just an entertainment medium, but now it deals with all the problems of our society.

You can find a wife on TV and also a husband. You can get therapy for any mental illness—from depression to bed-wetting. The network shows feature couples who have committed adultery and daughters who hate their mothers.

If that isn’t enough, there are shows where you can get a divorce and ones that have a judge decide a legal dispute between a claimant and his landlady or determine if someone got diddled by his car mechanic.

There are child custody shows and ones for people with bulimia.

And there are, of course, reality shows.

Where do the producers get the people to appear on their shows?

We have to assume the people want to air their troubles for their 15 minutes of fame. Also, It’s cheaper to wash their dirty linen in public.

There are talent agents who book people for these programmes.

I sat in the office of Sam Starquest, one of the hottest flesh-peddlers in the business.

A secretary came in and asked, “There is a lady outside who was abused by a priest and is willing to talk about it on the air. Do you want to see her?

“No, I’ve already got too many people abused by priests. They’re very hard to place now.”

The phone rang. Sam, on his end said, “You need two women who hate each other and want to tear out each other’s hair on the ‘Jerry Springer Show’? I have a pair. One woman accused the other of stealing her husband. They won’t be faking it. Right. I’ll send them over, but have your bodyguards on call in case anything happens.”

The secretary came back in, “Maury Povich is doing a show on incest. What can we offer him?”

Sam said, “Tell him we’ll get back to him. I know a brother and sister who may be willing to talk about it.”

I said, “You’re one busy guy.”

“You better believe it. I am now looking for 20 beautiful girls who want to win a guy whom they think is a millionaire. They all have to be beautiful. The theme of the programme is how greedy women can be.”

“I like the shows where the judge sternly chews out both the plaintiff and the defendant in the courtroom,” I said.

“TV is overloaded with those kinds of shows. I have a stable of judges in the waiting room.”

The secretary reappeared. “There’s a couple outside who want to get a divorce on the air and they have a lady with them who committed adultery with the husband.”

Sam said, “I’ll call the divorce court. In the meantime, stick them in separate offices in case they lose their tempers.”

“I can’t think of anything they won’t put on TV,” I said.

Sam replied, “Not as long as it appeals to the 18-to-45 year-old age group.”—Dawn/Tribune Media Services

Charity begins at home

EVER since one can remember it has been open season for the corrupt in Pakistan. And one never ceases to be amazed at the engrossing variety of tricks and dodges employed by bureaucrats, politicians and men in uniform to defraud the citizens of the country. The only thing that these unscrupulous people have in common is that they are cloistered in wombs of the same sly mould.

If one made a documentary for Transparency International of all the scams, defaults and crooked deals with their built-in kickbacks that take place on a regular basis in Pakistan, it would turn out to be a cinematic nightmare — a grim black comedy, a poem of lost time and the coming darkness.

There is enough material in Pakistan to produce a serial as long as ‘The Forsythe Saga’, with a cast of thousands. There is no shortage of contenders for the title role. A popular choice would be a former official of the customs service who wangled his way into civil administration, became the indispensable confidant of two successive prime ministers, and who ultimately left behind 76 residential and commercial plots registered in the names of relatives and close friends.

Or perhaps, an ex-admiral of the navy who discovered the periscope of his submarine was turned the wrong way and used his negotiating skills to great advantage when he struck a deal with the National Accountability Bureau.

If, however, the script writer is faced with the problem of not knowing where to start, all he has to do is read the papers on a daily basis. Stories abound there of people who have strayed from the straight and narrow and who outdo one another in novelty. On February 2, there was a little light relief in an article published in this paper. It was pointed out that Ahmed Bilal Soofi, the NAB representative in the Pakistan delegation to the UN moot on corruption , which was being held in New York called for an effective provision for freezing the assets of corrupt citizens who flee the country while the process of their repatriation is pending.

This was great stuff, and it must have impressed the Nigerian and Indonesian participants even if the Pakistani delegate sounded rather like a man who was two coupons short of a special offer. One wishes him well. But, and here is the nub. What is the point in throwing one’s rod and tackle in foreign waters when the fishing net used at home has holes large enough for sharks to slip through?

Newspaper columnists in Pakistan have repeatedly drawn the attention of NAB to defaults committed by a prime minister, the Chaudhrys of Gujrat and a political turncoat from Jhang — all good citizens dedicated to the task of ensuring that in Sindh the will of the people is not to be respected. But the authorities have maintained a stony silence. As a retired policeman confided to me, it is a much greater challenge catching people who are living in luxurious exile abroad. It would give the sleuths an opportunity to spend million of rupees in order to recover half that amount. Besides, charity begins at home.

The day before A.B. Soofi was busy hatching a plan to spirit away the ill-gotten wealth of Pakistanis who for years have been skimming off the cream from a variety of projects, four sensational news items appeared in some Karachi eveningers. The first pointed to a 12-billion rupee loss in a bank, the cause of which has been attributed to “mismanagement in recent restructuring.” This is, of course, nothing but a euphemism for gross incompetence.

The latest balance sheet of the bank, duly approved by its board of directors, has underlined a record provision of 10.84 billion rupees for non-performing loans and advances “against the diminution in the value of investments made by the bank and other assets.” The bank’s business operations deteriorated during 2002, resulting in a loss of 8.48 billion rupees before restructuring, which these days usually means getting rid of employees through what is commonly referred to as a golden handshake, or in local parlance, just a handshake. During the last two years there have been dozens of such handshakes in Karachi, throwing lots of people out of work.

The second bit of sensational news which trickled in from a district town in Punjab on the same day was the detection of a 40-million-rupee fraud in the distribution of the Zakat fund. Apparently, a large part of the 40 million rupees released from the fund by the government to the district Zakat committee has not reached the deserving persons and seems to have feathered the nests of the Zakat committee functionaries.

The question is, how could this massive embezzlement have taken place without the active connivance of the district Zakat chairman and his members? That is not all. Investigations have uncovered two other interesting facts. Zakat funds have been disbursed to people many of whom do not exist in the deh in which the cheques were distributed. They were handled by influential people who lord it over a vast illiterate population.

This is only one of numerous examples of how a bunch of unscrupulous men whose appointment is the result of political favour, exploit the unwary. If there was a complaint book in the Sindh assembly, it would be simply littered with examples such as this. I cornered a member of the provincial assembly at a reception and asked him what he and his colleagues proposed to do about such irregularities. His face registered an expression of shocked incredulity. He was reduced to a mumbling of inanities, and produced an oriental flummery reminiscent of the Bible of King James. The message that I received was, this is not really our responsibility.

The third missile was fired by the Pakistan Medical Association whose executive has accused the federal and provincial health ministries of misappropriation of millions of rupees given by the international community to curb the spread of AIDS in Pakistan. Where has all this money gone? A spokesman of the PMA told me that on the government level a vaccination system does not exist in this country.

Stories like these really make one think. Whenever one speaks to people who are in a position to do something about this sort of loot and plunder, one is told that the concerned officials are working on it and one must be patient. And then the usual cliches are spouted — ‘you must remember, we’ve just taken over after three years of army rule and need time... I don’t know which side you are on, but we’ve just scraped through by the skin of our teeth... We’ve got to complete the Senate elections and then we can take up the problem of water supply... politics is a matter of give and take and compromise’. All I know is that it is the poor people who have been giving and the politicians, bureaucrats and landlords who have been taking.

All it takes is one phone call to remove the corrupt station house officers entrenched in the interior of Sindh who are in a sense perpetuating the feudal system. It took a hari whose family had been abducted by a landlord with the connivance and assistance of the police, three weeks to finally get through to the Sindh governor. Once the latter got the message he acted with alacrity.

One wishes that he would spend more time in the interior visiting victims of oppression, now that people are not expecting very much from members of the provincial assembly, who, ever since Prime Minister Jamali waved his magic wand, are looking forward to the five million-rupee hand-out which will be coming their way.