Within a couple of days of imposition of the state of emergency by President General Pervez Musharraf, prices of daily use articles have further surged making it more difficult for the people with meagre resources to feed their families properly.
All Federal and Provincial Governments' tall claims of keeping control on prices and supply of daily use articles during Ramazan and even now have proved a total failure. This is indeed a matter of great concern. Even the much trumpeted promise of providing a network of the Utility Stores down to the Union Council level remains a dream.
President General Pervez Musharraf will continue to be at the helm of national affairs even if the caretakers come, hold general election, hand over power to the new civilian governments at the federal and provincial levels. If nothing is done on concrete basis to check the rising trend of prices and the hoarders and blackmarketeers are not taken to task then the ruled ones may whither away sooner than expected and the rulers left without the people whom they were supposed to rule.
Irrespective of who forms the new governments at the federal and provincial levels after the general elections, it remains the prime obligation of General Pervez Musharraf to come to the rescue of the people, and come down hard and harsh on the hoarders and blackmarketeers, showing them no mercy as he is doing in the case of extremists, militants and terrorists.
He should better differentiate in who are his friends and foes. In fact, his enemies are not media and judiciary people, but the hoarders and blackmarketeers who are forcing the ruled ones to raise hostile slogans against the ruler if they do not get enough to eat and live. He should act in this regard on priority basis.