ROZs linked to polls?

The government has reportedly conveyed its desire to the US Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia, Richard Boucher, who visited Pakistan last week, that Islamabad wants to see the US-proposed Reconstruction Opportunity Zones (ROZs) in the tribal belt operational before the forthcoming general election in the country.
According to a Recorder Report quoting official sources, Islamabad has informed the Bush Administration that tangible progress on ROZs before the election will help Islamabad establish its writ in the impoverished and semi-autonomous tribal regions, which have come to be viewed in the West as al Qaeda and Taliban strongholds.
Another argument advanced by Islamabad is that the establishment and operationalization of ROZs ahead of the election will make it difficult for the anti-US parties in the tribal belt to repeat their electoral performance of 2002.
Islamabad's request comes after an announcement Washington made last week that it would provide financial assistance amounting to $750 million to Pakistan over the next five years for setting up the ROZs.
The items produced at the ROZs, which will have industrial units of marble, leather, gems, jewellery, surgical equipment, textiles and sports goods, etc will have duty-free access to the US markets. According to the blueprint unveiled during President Bush's visit to Pakistan last March, the ROZs would be carved out of the economically backward regions of Pakistan to help alleviate deprivation in the tribal belt and the adjoining areas.
A related angle to the project cited at the time of its unveiling last year was that the employment opportunities these ROZs will throw up will also help counter extremism which has become a major drain on Pakistan's economy.
Although conceived as a US-funded project to extend economic support to AJK, NWFP, Fata and Balochistan, particularly in areas devastated by the October 8 earthquake, the government apparently believes that the ROZs can also be used as part of its larger strategy to counter extremism in the tribal belt.
This amounts to an argument that extremism currently enveloping the region has its roots in economic deprivation. A second plank of the government's strategy seems to be to secure the victory of moderate or like-minded elements in the forthcoming polls.
Although the government has already initiated 138 mega projects in Balochistan at an estimated cost of Rs 164 billion, the announcement does not seem to have made much impact on the sense of alienation of the common man there. This clearly calls for ensuring availability of prompt succour in areas that are most deprived. In this context, grant of special subsidies can be considered to ease the economic burden on the people, simultaneously with the execution of work on ROZs. (However, the government's request to Washington to make ROZs operational before the polls may not go down well with the opposition which may term it as an indirect attempt at "pre-poll rigging!")
It would obviously be unrealistic for anyone to expect narrowing of the gap between poverty levels in different federating units in months or even years, though efforts in this direction seem to be going apace. No one can deny that inter-provincial income and development disparities exist in Pakistan, just as in any other country of the world.
However, the high rate of inflation triggered by a fast growth trajectory, particularly in the absence of normal social safety nets, has further widened these disparities. As inflation particularly hurts the poor and the fixed income groups, its incidence, combined with the difficulties of gaining access to social services, ie health, education etc has added to the miseries of low-income groups, particularly in the tribal belt and its adjoining areas.
Incidentally, despite the manifold increase in revenue achieved on the back of a rapid economic growth, there has not been a commensurate rise in social sector spending. According to a World Bank study as many as 56 percent of the people in Pakistan run the risk of falling into the poverty trap.
The study has advised the government to evolve an effective distribution mechanism, which should be an amalgam of growth maximalization, and pro-poor economic policies.
The ROZs, though essentially meant for earthquake-devastated areas, can be set up in the entire tribal belt and its adjoining areas, provided the spirit behind the construction of these citadels of succour is pursued earnestly. Secondly, while the US is keenly interested in ROZs, it is apparently disinclined to sign FTA with Pakistan unless the bilateral investment treaty (BIT) is signed first, which is geared towards protecting US investors and their investment in Pakistan.
But some of the clauses of BIT are said to be harshly against Pakistan's interests, and Islamabad has been trying to convince the Bush Administration to remove these clauses. We believe that the establishment of ROZs or similar other useful initiatives can deliver only in conjunction with grant of political rights as guaranteed under the constitution. Let the government ensure co-option of people's elected representatives in the whole process, to make the project a success.