FROM A RINGSIDE SEAT

Sugar is sweet, but, paradoxically, it badly soured the proceedings of the Senate Wednesday night. A question by Anwer Bhinder about the price at which the sugar mills purchased the sugarcane from the growers generated so much heat that the concerned minister, Sikandar Hayat Bosan, earned the unenviable epithet that he is the "spokesman of the sugar mills mafia." But there was also an intriguing dimension to the debate on sugar crisis that merits mentioning, more so, in the light of the fact that the treasury senators had just come to the House after attending a meeting with President Musharraf.
One after the other they came hard on the official policy about sugar, with Khalid Ranjha accusing the government of carrying out the "murder" of the growers and Naeem Chattha insisting that the current sugar crisis is because of wrong policies of the Shaukat Aziz government. If that what the voices that arose from the treasury benches it would be naive to think that the opposition would be charitable. With hindsight one would say sugar crisis could potentially spell disaster for a government: Towards the end of Ayub era nominal raise in sugar price triggered the demise of the government of the day.
The proceedings started late by an hour. Foreign Minister Kasuri was probably not quite prepared to answer the follow-up supplementary questions, despite frequent use of his sonorous capacity. In fact, most of the questions asked from him related to human smuggling and why the guilty were not being punished-- which fall in the domain of interior minister, who was not present in the House.
As the house resumed business after the Maghrib prayers, leader of the opposition, in agreement with the government, moved a resolution seeking prompt implementation of journalists 7th wage board award and linking it up with distribution of government ads. The House passed the resolution after a brief debate, the highlight of which was the statement by Information Minister Sheikh Rashid. The implementation of the Award is being opposed by a group of six newspaper houses, who " accuse me of being an ally of the journalists. Now that quantum of government ads is becoming insignificant as compared to the ads of the multinationals placed in the newspapers his leverage over the press barons has weakened, he maintained. "Not a line of what took place on the floor of the senate would appear in tomorrow's papers." If the federal cabinet approved linking of ads with implementation of Award, he said he would move in instantaneously.
As soon as the resolution for prompt implementation of 7th wage board award was adopted the reporters in the gallery announced walkout--but for another reason. They were protesting the killing of two journalists in the Fata the other day. As they reached the press lounge, the information minister and state minister for interior, Wasim Shahzad reached there. They assured the protestors of the government's best efforts to catch the culprits, while the information minister later announced on the floor compensation and plots to the families of the deceased.
The House came to its enlisted business rather belatedly, when it started discussing an adjournment motion by Raza Rabbani about the privatisation of the Karachi Electric Supply Company. Disputing the government's stated position on privatisation of the KESC, he maintained that it would compromise Pakistan's economic sovereignty and undermine Kanupp's security. He also challenged the concerned minister's assertion that the new owners would retain all employees. His sharp focus, however, was on the official line that the entity was incurring huge losses and had to be heavily subsidised.
Building up his argument for a review of the decision to privatise the KESC, the opposition leader reminded the House of a report presented to one of its committees last year by the managing director of the concern. The MD who happened to be a military officer had presented figures which suggested that the subsidy to the KESC was gradually decreasing and was expected to be zero by 2005-6.
In fact, the report had projected a profit of Rs 1.6 billion by 2006-7. He also demanded restoration of the KESC workers union. Professor Ghafoor Ahmad and Safdar Abbasi stoutly supported Raza Rabbani. But Ilyas Bilour endorsed privatisation of the KESC and so did Amjad Abbas who gave credit to the military management for restoring its financial health.
Concerned minister Hafeez Sheikh was all set to defend the KESC privatisation but put it off for Thursday because by then the attendance had considerably thinned and the House was short of quorum although it was not pointed out.