Another Visit to Pakistan

To Tania and and others:
There is no simple solution to Pakistan`s problems. No prescription that you can administer to corrupt politicians, power hungry generals, greedy feudals, callous bureaucrats and frothing maulanas that will set things right.The solution lies in yourseves whereever you are, provided you get involved in the struggle to change things. And the first step in such struggle is to look at the reality in all its messiness objectively, and make an attempt to understand it. To shoot the messenger is no solution. Swallowing paliatives whether they come in the form of pills or supernatural beliefs is even worse.

#35 by Tania on January 26. The fact of the matter is that Pakistan is chaotic. It is a country full of poor illiterate masses whos primary concern is where their next meal will come from.

Many politicians are not at all ignorant, but may appear to be so because their focus is on the immediate local issues rather than the broader perspective.

Unfortunately the systems in Pakistan are so weak that a lot of energy is spent on getting routine work done. The people as well as their elected representatives get so embroiled in the day to day mundane work, that it is very difficult for them to see the big picture.

There are very few ``educated clans`` in Pakistan and even those that are there will find it very difficult to come into a position of power. Remember that in Paksitan you have to be fairly mediocre to get elected.

The primary issue of course is that of corruption, which has become almost impossible to get rid of.

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

#9 Urstruly: Great observation :) ahahahah. I think you describe the good professor well in a few short lines then what the Left-out professor was trying to describe about Pakistan.
This article was more about the left-out people ``bitching`` about their loss then anything else.

``I was invited to speak at a largely attended seminar... ...By the end of the two hour seminar a consensus had developed among the participants that the only viable resistance to American unilateralism can come from a unity of peace and left forces on a global level. ``

Sounds more like a secret little Red Party meeting then a ``Seminar``, Prof. Khrushchev. Pepper the leftist talk with a cute `Oh the Paki traffic` speech, one has an intellectual article dripping with enlightenment!

The article was devoid of any real substance.

The author Responds

To Amjad, # 1: I am not sure if Pakistanis in general are ``more united in their dislike of India`` (Some middle and upper classes are), but you are quite right that religion as such has failed to unite Pakistanis. In fact religion has been a dangerously divisive force.
No, I am afraid, hostility towards India, on official level at least, has not been difused or displaced by developments in Afghanistan. If anything, the Afghan jehad has been shifted to Kashmir, keeping the hostility alive. Tariq is doing fine.

To freethinker, #4: Yes, it is de ja vu all over again, with somewhat different nuances and ballances of political forces.
Bourgeois electoral politics is no where clean, but it is particularly dirty in Pakistan.
Yes, there are some redeemable elements among Pakistan`s people and cultures that still pulsate under the rubble of broken hopes and dreams, on the margins of the big rush to go nowhere.

To Romair, #6: Yes, the paliamentary democracy should work better if the party leaders come from lower and middle classes. But the ``elitist feudal`` classes will not allow that to happen easily. Z.A. Bhutto relied on some known lower/middle class leaders but quickly got rid of them. When Benazir took over the PPP, she was asked by a journalist, why the Party`s woking class cadres were not given tickets to run in the elections. Her reply: ``un ko vote nahiN miltay,`` they will not be voted for.
The MQM did have the composition of lower/middle class leaders, but its mohajir chauvinism, has restricted its appeal to Urban Sindh.
The problem with PTI is that it cannot outdo the mullahs at their game. People are simply not fooled by the feinged pieties and pathan (male) ghairat of its leader Imran Khan.

To urstruly, #9: I would not mind celebrating the LEFTOUT with you, if the RIGHTIN phenomenon had not brought so much shame to Pakistan.

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

Re: romair
``...the military is the most respected institution in Pakistan...``
Respected or FEARED? Beat constables in India also obtain free service from paanwallahs and cigarette vendors. That does not mean that they are respected, but they are feared. In the subcontinent, fear is often disguised as feigned respect.

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

Ref Field Marshal #22

[For example, when the Gujrat riots were going on, if an Indian Army General had disobyed orders from politicians, and protected the public, he would be subject to court martial. But I would support such actions.]

Were there any riots or threat to public order in October 1999 when Gen. Musharraf did not accept his lawful dismissal from the post of COAS?

=== Interact Filtered ===
view this users filtered interacts

ali87 # 20, romair # 17

Nice try blaming the feudals !!!

The only sector feudals control in Pakistan is agriculture. Pakistani agricultural sector has done okay. It has not been a disater like Somalia, Ethiopia etc.

feudals do not control banking, education, industry. The poor performance in the these sectors cannot be blamed on feudalism.