Potemkin villages

Potemkin village or relief camp

ever heard of Potemkin villages? they were a myth.

but the PPP government set up something that could be called a potemkin village, sort of. so its not a myth.

how about a new idiom: Gilani’s relief camp

for those of you too lazy to click on that link, read the full story below:

UMERKOT: Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani visited a fake relief camp set up in Kunri on Monday only for the visit.

The prime minister, who was accompanied by federal ministers Syed Naveed Qamar and Syed Khursheed Shah and Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah, arrived by helicopter at the Benazir Government Girls College in Kunri where a `temporary relief camp` had been set up by the administration on Sunday night.

According to sources, the camp housed peasants belonging to areas of some PPP legislators. A number of rain-hit people, including women, who have been living on the road outside the school for the past few days, were barred from entering the premises and were allowed only when some journalists intervened.

The prime minister and his team waved from a distance to people in the camp and the rain-affected people. He shook hands with PPP MPA Nawab Taimoor Talpur and returned to the helicopter.

The people who were expecting to get some relief goods or an announcement in this regard from the prime minister received nothing except the dust raised by the helicopter while landing and taking off.

After the prime minister left the area, the affected people tried to pull out tents but they were attacked by PPP workers with sticks.

beggars are not choosers

American government has threatened to cut the Aid for Pakistani government if they dont release Raymond Davis.

foreign aid never comes with no strings attached. thats why people who want to become powerful are advised to despise the free lunch.

in the case of Raymond Davis, Pakistan is being asked to give back the American who killed two Pakistanis. the question here is not who was right and who was wrong. the question is who is feeding whom? without aid Pakistasn will clearly falter economically. that this nation can not afford.

speedy changes dont work…

…atleast in the beginning, anyway. and here is one more ; the bigger the change, the bigger the confusion. and here is one more; if you try to change the lifestyles of people in one day, you will surely get  “f**k you”  from them.

atleast that is what is happening in NYC where a new speedy bus has been introduced by the Transportation Authority on the pattern of the European buses.

 

can we apply this lesson to something in Pakistan? hmm… lets see… how about the reforms in bureaucracy. they are still bewildering the people in this country. and the reforms have only lead to more confusion and chaos.

Our General Psychology, our heroes, our villains

someone sent me this text message today:

a man died and went to heaven . there he saw a large wall of clocks.
Man: “what are these for?”.
Angel: ” these are ‘lie clocks’.every person has a lie clock. every time you lie, the clock moves.
Man:” whose clock is that?”
Angel: “that is Muhammad Bin Qasim’s clock. its never moved, showing that he never lied”.
Man: “where is Zardari’s clock?”
Angel: ” that is in our office. we use that as a CEILING FAN”.

regardless of going into the humor of this joke, I Was looking at it from another angle. it portrays the general psychology of our nation. it shows us several things about our nations attitude towards world in general.

the first thing is to thrash everyone and anyone who is running the country at the present moment. be it Ayub Khan, Nawaz Sharif, Musharraf, or any other person we have always criticised without giving any alternatives.the personality does not matter. had it been any other person other than Zardari, the joke would have simply replaced his name with that of the other. our whole energies are wasted on getting the incumbant out of the office and getting someone new into it. and once that has happened, the circus repeats.

the second thing is the way we dont really have any Heroes and we try to snatch them from other nations, usually Arabs. to become a hero, the test is simple. one, he should be an Muslim. two, he should have been an Army man.think about Ghaznavis, the MB Qasims etc. little wonder that  Armymen have enjoyed the most ruling time in this country. psychologically we are prepared for an Army man to be our hero.

the third thing is that we dont have heroes of our own. so we have to borrow them from other nations. and if we produced someone in this nation, we have made sure that they either go into self-exile (Dr. Salam) or are imprisoned ( Dr. Qadeer). I mean as far as the above joke goes, we could have replaced the name of Muhammad bin Qasim with someone who was much more relevent. I am going to tell you his name: Malik Miraj Khalid. he was from PPP, he had humble backgrounds, and he was an honest man. if you just want to see a former president, try  Ghulam Ishaq. whatever his flaws, the truth is that he was an honest man who never made single penny for himself while he was in the government. even his opponents his do not have anything bad to say about his fiscal responsibility. so we have our heroes. we just ignore them and dont give them the proper respect they deserve.

so, this in a nutshell, shows the dilemma of our nation. we have not been able to tell whether we are Pakistanis first or muslims first. we have not sorted out our priorities. we dont know whether we want to be secular or religious. and if religious, what kind of sect?  and i think that is the reason we have been behind all the nations.

certainly we have failed in helping to catapult ourselves to the top tier of nations. God has not been of much help either, because after all he says that he helps those who help themselves.

crystal clear words

the Supreme Court of Pakistan has suspended that the appointment of the judges of the Supreme court by the President that was done recently is ultra vires to the constitution.

the Court said that it was said in the constitution article 177 that the president would appoint with the due consultation of the Chief Justice of Paksitan (CJP)

we went to the text of the constitution and found the following in the Article 177:

(1) The Chief Justice of Pakistan shall be appointed by the President, and each of the other Judges shall be appointed by the President after consultation with the Chief Justice.

if we look at the words in their proper context, it is seen that the word “consultation” and not “advice” is used. when the president is “advised” by the Prime Minister (PM), he is bound to dissolve the assemblies. but in the case of “consultation” no such binding is necessary. the President, according to the article, makes the appointments. and that is his power to do so.

that is our inference from this article. people might want to make their own conclusions.

a tale of two cities

Karachi and Peshawar are situated at the Extreme ends of Pakistan. the attitude shown by the people of both cities to the recent suicide attacks have also been extreme.

Peshawar has been the harder hit of the two cities. yet the people of Peshawar have shown extreme restraint. one suicide bomb blasted in Karachi today. and the reaction to that was that people started burning markets and vehicles. over 400 shops and 40 vehicles were burnt, according to one TV channel. it was as if there were animals waiting in these people for this mayhem.

I am left to wonder: what is the difference between those terrorists who went with this attack, and the general public who committed the act of arson.

is burning public property the only way we can extinguish the fires within ourselves?

think about it.

or maybe we are not capable of thinking anymore.

salekhanathropy

The operation is Swat has made many of the civilians flee their homes. they have been left to take refuge in far off areas. some of them are being assisted by the world organisations, some by NGOs. but they are not doing it for any good. they are simply doing it becuause they are making money in the process.

fortunately not all people are here to make money. one of the examples of that is the spirit shown by the people of a village called SalehKhana. Saleh Khana is located in the district of Nowshera.

when people started coming in from Swat to the JaloZai camp, the people of SalehKhana started a fund and sheltered some 22 families. they have a capacity of upto 30 families.

the displaced people are being provided every thing free of cost, be it medicines, or food or clothing. an old market with shops have been allocated as the shelter. each family has been housed in one of the shops.

not only that, separate bathrooms for women have already been built. while bathrooms for men are being built. quite an extraordnary work there.

the Swat operation

The Swat operation continues with full vigor. and the secrity forces are claiming that they have been eliminating the Taliban threat. in the new reports, the Army has cleared the Peochar area of these militants, which was their strongest place.

Why do we need the approval of the United States for everything? why does the US have to be the judge of the what we are doing right or wrong? I still can not understand that.

learning from Sri Lanka

the defeat of the Sri Lankan LTTE tells us one thing; if you are persistent enough, you can defeat anything. the Sri Lankans were able to hold off the secessionists. I think Pakistan has lessons to learn from here. after all Pakistan faces similar threats in the form of Talibans etc.

how our values are being killed

the funeral of our values?

something is happening and that is not good. through slow poisoning, with or without intent, our values will be killed.

the Bomb blast in swat on the day of the by elections is how they are being killed. the bomber asked people to come to his car, supposedly broken down, for a push start. as people gathered around to push it, he blew it up.

so now no one will even help someone whose car REALLY has broken down. thus the death of one good value i.e. of helping someone in the hour of need.

what is happening will surely turn us into barbarians.