What I Saw In Okara

a report based on what pervez hoodbhoy has said in this interview and in fact more has already appeared in dawn last week --

IT IS IMF AGAIN,

It is nice to know that the army is evicting the poor because of IMF. Jihadists are crossing to india because of indians, al quida men are in pakistan because US bombed afghanistan. Can any pakistani assume responsibility for anything.

...where is that omar_r_quraishi kid?...so much for his ranting about pak media...


{The false propaganda of Pakistan TV stood exposed yet again when the channel claimed that voters were dragged out of their houses in Lolab assembly constituency in Kupwara district without realising that elections were countermanded there after the assassination of Jammu and Kashmir minister Mushtaq Ahmed Lone.

Elections to Lolab will be held on October 8. }

Dear people, a question...

Since everyone`s talking about IMF and the World Bank etc. etc., is there a pathway or system by which the politicians can be conmpletely by- passed and the loans handed directly to those who actually need them?

Thank you.
Umer M.

PM# 20

Thank you. Probably, the last few lines of my post caught your attention. In fact, this assertion is not made on mere assumptions, the engine of change is already in motion. I know, at least Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman has explicitly asked people to not to pay taxes (that includes income taxes, aabyana, and other direct tax on agriculture) to the government, because this government has become a revenue collector for someone else.

I agree with Maulana. The acceptance of any tax structure that does not guarantee the return of revenue back to the community is unjust and thus un-Islamic.

Umer,

Excellent point. But the philosophy of IMF and WB, behind this concept of ``aid through debt`` is to create sustainable development in the third world countries. In other words it is an ``aid`` to develop an infrastructure or a base on which the development will take place. At conceptual level this idea is correct - most of the IMF advertisements in third world countries deliver the message that it is better to give someone seeds rather than beans, or a fishnet is better than the fish etc.

Most of the thrid world countries however, do not have a system of check and balance in place to check the corruption that followes with such aid - this includes the countries that even have democracy.

Another form of ``aid`` is that which is given to the local NGOs but through the local governments. This opens up another avenue of corruption, where bhanjas and bhateejas of powers that be open up NGOs and skim money. In concept, this kind of aid is used to develop human resources, but in practice it developes only certain kinds of humans :). The foreign NGOs are another menace, which I call trojan horses, which are unleashed on us to prolestyze among us the Western system of values and they are committed to change the social order according to the Western system of values. Please read my article on Globalization to understand this phenomenon.

In theory and in practice I am utterly against the concept of getting ``aid`` (in fact debt). It simply means that we are living beyond our means. This gives western colonial powers a strong foothold right on our chest. They can suffocate us anytime they want.

What we need at this time from the perspective of our nation is to stop our rulers from getting further aid. Period. Internal system of generation of revenue like a just tax system must be developed. Unfortunately, under pressure from colonial powers we are building a tax system to pay the return on investment that colonial powers have made in our land. How can such system be just when all that people pay does not come back to them as in any civilized society, instead it goes to soodkhors who invested. That is exactly the reason riba was prohibited in Islam because creates new avenues to exploit human beings. In this case it has turned into an all encompassing global evil.

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Urstruly is absolutley right in his earlier post describing the undercurrents that are stirring the pot here. It is an attempt to document the agriculture economy with owners, without any question, benefiting from it. The owner-tiller relationship is turned into an employer-employee relationship without consideringt the obligations of the owners in terms of retirement package, holidays, work hours, housing, insurance and medical etc. The old crop sharing system accommodated all these in lump sum crop share for tiller. In the new system, tiller is treated more like a temporary worker with no power to negotiate contract.
It will decrease the motivation for production as well as opening gates to competition from migrant and cheap workers from arid lands and even Afghanistan. It may be even beneficial for owner to not cultivate at all if the benefits of drought are better than poor harvest, in the form of tax breaks or subsidies.

link to this on all dawn pages as an `ad`
____________________________________________

Chairman Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, Imran Khan appeals to all Pakistanis at home and abroad
Fellow Pakistanis,

Assalam Alaikum

This is the first time in my life that I am approaching you through a letter. When I embarked on my mission to eradicate Cancer, and went to every nook and corner of Pakistan, I realized that various injustices had shackled my countrymen.

During my campaign against cancer, I had come to fully realize that more than individual cancer, what needed to be addressed was the cancer of an unjust system that was eating away at the vitals of our nation. This collective cancer was destroying our country, and needed as drastic a treatment as does an individual suffering from this dread disease.

This can only be possible if the factors responsible for the spread of this cancer can be removed…they being none other than the professional politicians and the corrupt administration. Only their removal can breathe life into the system.

This is the basic conviction of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, and this is why we have shunned professional politicians, because the need of the hour is a clean, unstained leadership that can rein in the arrogance of the bureaucracy in an attempt to save this country.

This is my aim and objective. I am fully aware of the fact that this is an onerous task, and there will be many hurdles along the way in the shape of professional politicians and corrupt officials but I give you my word that I shall not be thwarted by them and will do everything in my power to root out this cancer from the body politic of Pakistan.

This is something, however, that I will not be able to achieve without your cooperation. Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf needs financial assistance to be an effective force in Elections 2002. Its members and office bearers do not have access to funds like the professional politicians, as they belong to the cadre which earns its living in an honest manner.

Rid your country of the cancer of corruption and injustice. Extend a helping hand to Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf.

Pakistan Zindabad

Allah Hafiz

Imran Khan


You can contribute to our political party by any of the following methods

Click here for Payment by Credit Card, Online Electronic Transfer

Payment via Bank Draft:

For donations in Pak Rupees:
Name of Account: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf
Account Number 8-9091-01
Bank Name Platinum Commercial Bank
Address of Bank Blue Area Islamabad

Military Farms in Okara were setup by the British in the 20`s and are part of Army`s corporate empire now.

All agricultural land must belong to the tillers. Fuedalism in all its forms and manifistations is evil and must be abolished...... who will bell the cat remains the million $$$ question.

Urstruly,
No, it wasn`t the last bit of your #15 that caught my attention at all. Between the religious parties and the feudals, I`ll take the former anyday I think. Surprised? Well, Least to least number prinicple :)
PM

Hey anny
Looks like the Quisling League has gone all out against Imran Khan. The worry of an election without mudslinging has ended lol! Omairrrr comments please!
http://www.syberwurx.com/nation/daily/today/national/lhr2.htm

Reviews of recent books on Pakistan
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15740

rsaxena: shut up already ! hahah -- for other readers this might be relevant -- editorial in today`s dawn on the issue --

Negotiate they must



The Punjab government`s refusal to talk to the tenants of military-managed farms in Okara and its insistence on posting paramilitary troops to deal with the situation there is only adding to the tension and resentment in the area. On Tuesday, tenants working on these lands again accused the Rangers of forcibly making them sign new land contracts which the tillers say will compromise their tenancy rights and interests. The Punjab government is not even ready to listen to the grievances of the tenants, and instead is relying on coercive power to keep them under check. However, as the events of recent weeks should have amply shown by now, this approach simply cannot resolve the conflict. To make matters worse, the head of the Pakistan Rangers in Punjab was quoted last week as saying that ``illegal`` and ``anti-state`` NGOs were creating rifts between the tenants and the military farm administration. The officer, a two-star general, had also said that after the elections in October he would recommend to the government to check the accounts of these NGOs and to take note of their ``other activities``. These allegations were repeated by representatives of a hitherto unknown tenants` organization saying that the Indian intelligence agency RAW was taking advantage of the situation and instigating a section of tenants to agitate.

The role of the Rangers in this whole affair, coupled with the repeated allegations that tenants were being forced to sign the new contracts, has been most counter-productive. The paramilitary forces seems to have become involved in the dispute as if it were a directly affected party. The Rangers do have a role but that should be confined only to the maintenance of law and order. For it to become involved in something as substantive as signing of new contracts by the farmers is something quite counter-productive. The tenants have time and again said that they would be more than willing to discuss the matter with the Punjab government, the actual owner of the lands. The provincial government must have realized by now that it is important to talk directly to the representatives of the tenants and try to resolve the problem in a spirit of mutual accommodation. It is pointless to pretend that it is merely a law and order problem that can be tackled only by more effective use of police and Rangers.

We as a nation are proned to the excesses of our so called protectors, as Dr hoodbhoy rightly said, it is our fear of the being in a state of perpetual war that keeps us from pointing the finger at the real cause of our dismay. We are a militarised nation, where we can have a gun battle between revolting minorities and suave Military Exhibitions in the same city on a single day. From Okara to Gwador the story is the same. The colonialist did have the last laughs as they bestowed upon us a murky and delirious set of bourgeosie. Democracy is only a utopia in this autocratic world of ours.