Education and the Nazim

The idea of local governments was good in theory, but I don`t really agree with the implementation part. The government has created a mess where no one is sure of responsibilities and rights anymore. Personally, I think our provinces are too large, and they should be split into smaller (and more autonomous) administrative units. Under current system, lack of good communication infrastructure makes it very hard for common people in rural areas to get their problems solved in efficient and timely manner. Also, controversial issues like Islamic laws etc. should be left to the units of the federation under framework of a broader constitution which must ensure basic human rights.

There were a couple of interesting ideas proposed by some NGO`s for improving conditions of government schools. One of them was creation of boards comprising parents of students to oversee affairs of such schools, because they have the greatest interest in quality of education their kids are getting. Another one was to bring uniformity in syllabi across public and private schools. I am not sure how seriously those ideas are being considered by the ministry of education. From what I have seen, Higher Education Commission has been somewhat active to improve conditions of universities. But probably that discussion is beyond the scope of this comment.

tahmed32:
What`s the state of democracy at the sub-district level? Is there a level of elected govt. at the village/tehsil level, such as panchayats? Are they given any resources?

Salam to every body. I have joined the forum for a short duration taking some time off from a family reunion.

Like Tauheed has pointed out, the success of local bodies will be more pronounced in regions where the two tiers come from the same political parties. Any present imbalances between the two tiers will be sorted out by local bodies elections of next year. As I have said many times before, the success of any program can only be measured by the results.

The results this far have shown that the current Musharraf/Jamali Government is on course for providing economic prosperity to the country.

The Government of Punjab has launched an educational incentivization program for girls that will surely be followed in Sindh and non MMA domination areas of the NWFP. On other fronts, the Government is addressing short-term, medium term and long-term issues. It is trying to boost construction for providing more jobs to people (short-term), is trying desparately to make Pakistan a member of various regional organizations (short-term/medium-term), is looking to develop water resources (medium-term), is looking into energy resources that will be needed by a developed Pakistan say 25 years from now (long-term), etc.

I bet you a hundred pounds that by post number 20 Jay has made an appearence on this thread that starts with the lines:

another pathetic article by the mullah tahmed trying to deny the TNT and K for Kaffir blah blah blah

;-)

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This is unbelievably simplistic view of an an unbelievably enormous mess in what is termed as ``local governments`` of Pakistan. The merits of Nazim-ism aside, who really concocted this new form of democracy? When was there a national debate on the principles and guidelines that would determine the responsibilities of Nazim? The man who is the Army Chief, the President, and has several other posts to his name, and who single handedly came up with these ideas with no national debate allowed, is lecturing the nation on power sharing. What a freakin` joke !

Lets stop painting this pig in pink color - pig being the ``democracy`` the Field Marshal has blessed us with - by highlighting any positive news and overlooking the major existential issues the country faces.

Lets talk about how we can bring true democracy at the federal level. Once we have that, the local democracies will take roots without much fanfare.

We have been listening too much about the feudal nature of Pakistani society. Nice to learn about a serious effort to decentralize power.

This is not an article that it`s trying to be. It`s merely thoughts based on whimsical hopes. It should have been in your i-log entry or something like that. All this piece does is state the obvious- and this obvious was only relevant three years ago when people were first discussing the implementation of local governments and the hopes placed on them. Today, people know far more and this article doesn`t even try to add anything more.

``The central government can, of course play a major role in determining the outcome of these tensions.``

Unfortunately, the local governments, though potentially a great concept, will continue to be used and manipulated by the central government- ie faujiz- in the fight for power. Ideally provincial level governments should be gotten rid of and local governments be given financial as well as some legislative powers. But the presence of provincial government is necesary to create the multi-layered governance set-up vital for allowing the military to manipulate the country which ever way they want. Thus the intentional confusion created with holding non-party elections on one level, and allowing party-based elections on another and blurring the distinctions between who weilds what power with respect to bureaucracy and the local governments and provincial government as well. This blurring and confusion could easily have been avoided but instead was intentionally pursued. It has successfully crippled any process from taking shape.

Just like the 60`s, the current half-hearted bad-intentioned local government scheme has not fooled the majority. It has only fooled those few like the writer of this article.

Although the idea to give local councils more power is great and it will work in the long term, in the short term they need to solve the overlapping issues. Here is an interview with a local Nazim ( of N. Nazimabad )

http://www.pakistaneconomist.com/page/issue07/etc1.htm

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Right after the inception of Pak the religion was inserted in education system. Since then every leader has used this institution for his/her benefit. It is very unfortunate that this took place because Pak had bright prospects in 1947. It was the biggest muslim country, and had diversity that India and United States has. However, regrettably the novice leaders were in no position to understand sensitive differences among different groups in the two wings. Which appeared in a big way in 1971. At present i advice Pak to invest in education. India invests in education and, though it`s not in the best form it still is education. Ay form of education, in my opinion, i sbetter than mullah form of education. Since Pak is a small country it obviously does not have as big assets as United States or India to spend on educatio, however it could divert money from military budget for education. This, i think. is a critical phase in the survival of this most hospitable nation (people are so warm and welcoming), and the better job Pak does the better its future would be. Mullahs are friends of no one and as we have seen they could turn against anyone whoever refuses to live by their doctrine. Co-existance is not in their dictionary. If anyone has doubts please look in Pak backyard, Iran or read the book ``Reading Lolita in Tehran.`` Down with mullahs!!