Checking smuggling

Pakistan would do well to take notice of a report by the Asian Development Bank which pointedly blames ineffective government policies for "spurring" smuggling.

The report highlights the failure of the regional governments to effectively monitor border trade and looks into the way smuggling is distorting trade and tariff regimes in Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Central Asian states.

Data released about Pakistan's trade with its western neighbour is especially revealing, for it informs us that nearly 90 per cent of Afghanistan's $1.2 billion exports and about 46 per cent of its $600 million imports are routed through Pakistan.

What the ADB report points out is that a significant portion of Afghanistan's re-exports constitutes exports of imports from Pakistan. In lay man's terms, this means that a large percentage of goods that pass through Pakistan under the Afghan Transit Trade Agreement find their way back into Pakistan through smuggling.

The misuse of ATTA and the smuggling of items from Afghanistan into Pakistan are not a new phenomenon. What is worrisome, however, is that the government has been unable to check this activity, which denies Islamabad a huge amount of money in terms of revenue losses.

The most the Pakistan government has done to discourage smuggling in this sector is to put a number of items imported under ATTA on a negative list from time to time. Recently, 24 items which were seen as potentially viable for smuggling were put on the negative list.

But protests from the Afghan government and pressures from various quarters within Pakistan once again forced the Central Board of Revenue to take eight items off that list and allow their passage under ATTA.

Putting items on a negative list or making changes in the terms of the transit trade agreement are short-term solutions to a problem that is widespread and endemic.

While ineffective government policies and rampant corruption in the lower ranks of the customs staff have served to encourage what the ADB report calls "extensive smuggling" operations, the finance minister's repeated promises to control this menace have failed to effect a change for the better in the situation.

Instead, what we have witnessed over the past few years is a menacing rise in both the extent and the scale of the practice. The favourite these days are Chinese consumer items, which are very much in demand on account of their quality and low prices.

This kind of "informal trade", however, comes at a price. Denial of revenues to the state is one obvious result of smuggling; more important, smuggling eats away at local industries, which eventually shut down in the wake of this unfair competition, causing job losses and incurring other economic and social costs.

It is about time the government drew up a comprehensive policy to fight this problem. The first place to start would be to ensure that agreements like ATTA, which have become a major source of smuggling in the country, are not misused.

Only bona fide goods meant for Afghanistan should be allowed a free passage through Pakistan. If this is not done, the problem will remain. In this regard, a recent meeting between the finance ministers of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran focused on how to control smuggling across their borders.

It is hoped that these three countries will be able to hammer out some understanding that improves on the present system so that all the three countries stand to benefit from it.

Kerry as challenger

Bagging a decisive win in nine out of ten states' Democrat primaries, Senator John Kerry is now the official challenger to President George Bush in the November election. The Massachusetts senator has a record for demonstrating clear-headedness on key issues at the right time.

He answered the call to duty in the Vietnam war but soon turned anti-war when it became clear that the justification given for that war was based on faulty assumptions. Similarly, he was among the Democratic senators who voted for Bush's war on Iraq, but has been very critical of American policy in that country since the fall of the Saddam regime.

The change in his stance was prompted by revelations that Mr Bush may have misled Americans into believing that Saddam Hussein had stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction and posed a threat to the US.

Senator Kerry has generally held liberal views on domestic policy, including social issues, the environment, health care and abortion, while adopting a conservative stance on foreign policy issues and voting according to his convictions and conscience.

Generally, Islamabad has found it easy to work with a Republican president in the White House. However, this should not mean that a Democratic president would be a disaster, for foreign policy in America is a bi-partisan and complex phenomenon.

There may be differences in shades and emphasis in foreign policy, but basically it is domestic issues on which Republicans and Democrats differ sharply. For that reason, a succeeding president has never been in a hurry to repudiate his predecessor's foreign policy commitments.

Also, America is perhaps the only country where the legislature plays such a key role in foreign affairs, especially when it comes to aid and military sales. In the case of Pakistan, it is clear that there is a national commitment to work with Islamabad in the war on terror.

One hopes that whosoever triumphs in the November election, Washington would maintain its current South Asia policy and help encourage the policy of detente between Pakistan and India.

Obstructing women candidates

It is indeed shocking that most political parties in lower Dir in the NWFP have decided not to field women candidates for the local bodies by-elections scheduled toward the end of this month.

Citing "cultural reasons" for their decision, these parties, which include the Jamaat-i-Islami and the PPP, have said that they would not allow women to cast votes on polling day.

In the past, too, pressure tactics have been adopted to prevent women from filing nomination papers. The result is that only six out of the 136 seats reserved for women in the district are currently occupied while the rest have been lying vacant.

While the NWFP is generally regarded as a conservative region, it is a crying shame that even those parties that otherwise have broad-based support all over the country have colluded with rightwing elements to take such a retrogressive step.

Their blinkered vision does not allow them to see that, by disenfranchising women and discouraging them from participating in politics they are, in effect, depriving half the population of its constitutional rights.

Some of these political parties pride themselves on their "liberal" values, and they have women office-bearers in their hierarchy, and women representatives in the Senate and the National Assembly.

For them to side with politicians whose outlook on the empowerment of women can only be termed primitive is indeed reprehensible. One hopes that the central leaderships of these parties will make their Dir branches take back this decision.

While the deadline for filing nomination papers is nearly over, the Election Commission must take serious notice of what is happening in lower Dir and elsewhere in the province.

It must also call upon the government to take stern action against those who are obstructing women from taking part in the forthcoming polls. Meanwhile, the government would do well to form a committee with the task of looking into the grievances of women who are being actively prevented by religious and tribal elements from participating in the local government elections.