Strange are the times our country is passing through - perhaps more depressing than strange! Take railways, for instance. The British rulers left a highly functional, relatively safe and reliable transport system linking all important cities and towns. Now over 64 years on since independence, (how the word turns around to bite!), far from being a system further enhanced or improved, its very existence at least in its present form is in serious doubt. A train carrying hundreds of commuters comes to a halt because the engine runs out of fuel.
Railways workers are not paid their salary for one or more months and they lie down on the tracks till the authorities come up with the required cash (to last only until the next crisis), hundreds of railway engines are lying out of use due to obsolescence or damage, which no one has bothered to rectify or replace. All this on the top of pilferage - petty and scandalously huge - going on all the time right under the noses of heavyweight ministers, bureaucrats and officials enjoying fat salaries and associated perks and privileges associated with the job they fail to measure up to.
Not like you and me!Not that the ruin of a once highly functional transport service like Pakistan Railways is a sudden development. Signs of serious sickness were visible for months past in the shape of hours-long delays and cancellations on the top of pilferage of railway goods as well as illegal occupation of precious railway lands by various mafias. For months now we have been hearing of trains suddenly stopping in their tracks because the engine ran out of fuel oil or had developed a major defect! Just like you and me running out of petrol in our motorbike or car and trying to get mobile again? But there is a big difference. Whereas it would serve us right for not having made sure before starting out that we had enough fuel for the journey ahead, what was the fault of hundreds of fare paying commuters suddenly stranded, may be hundreds of miles from their destination where anxious relatives might be waiting on tenterhooks for them, apart from loss of time and business multiplied hundreds of times? Things were allowed to get steadily worse.
Outsourcing governance itself!When the next salary crisis comes, the railway workers (like others in the same situation) would know exactly what to do to get attention. Is this a way to govern? Have our ministers no idea how to plan medium and long-term. Now there is some confused "high level" talk of getting the private sector or individual entrepreneurs to help with resurrecting the ailing railway system. Apparently the system has now been made sick enough to be sold for peanuts to a messiah! People may be excused for thinking along those lines: they have bitter remembrances of past experience. In fact Hafiz Salman Butt, President Pakistan Railways Employees Union (PREM), identified corruption "within the PR management" as the cause of Pakistan Railways' ruin. We have not heard of any resignations nor seen any visibly red, repentant faces!
Not Railways alone Though disturbances in the rail traffic in the form of insufferable delays, abandoned and cancelled trips get good media coverage because of the number of people adversely affected, signs of government's failures in redressing grievances continue to be visible everywhere. Teachers burning tyres on the streets for non-payment of salaries and health workers likewise, owners of small enterprises in places like Gujranwala (the home of our cottage industry), hardest hit by loadshedding, attacking offices responsible for power distribution, are all a common phenomenon reported as regularly as routine weather reports!
Cronyism is a curse What relevant background Ahmad Mukhtar, businessman and factory owner has to qualify him for the Ministry of Defence he holds now. For that matter, what entitles Hina Rabbani Khar, till recently occupying a second level position in the Finance Ministry, to be catapulted to the Foreign Minister position at a very crucial time in our history? While it is understood that ministerial appointments have to be from among elected politicians who need not be technocrats, it is nevertheless imperative that they have had some grooming in the subject of their responsibility. The concept of a shadow cabinet very well understood and practiced in many countries today, appears to be alien to PPP culture in which personal closeness and loyalty to the party chief appear to be the main qualification required instead, for being rewarded with high office in the government. As for Babar Awan (till recently) the Federal Minister for Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs and Rehman Malik as minister in-charge of security, the less said the better!
Credibility loss at home and abroad With such criteria in practice for appointing people to high national offices, is it surprising that we have lost credibility both at national and international levels. Have you ever seen or heard Ahmad Mukhtar, our Minister of Defence, in serious dialogue with our own army leave alone with the Defence Secretary or Army Brass of the United States? It is commonly believed that most matters concerning defence are settled between American officials and our own Army people. Likewise, it is doubtful if our Foreign Minister is taken very seriously by the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Their very body language seen in photo sessions shows that the seasoned American politician and old time strategist and campaigner treats our Foreign Minister more like an adolescent politician that she is than an equal in function or stature. Having "outsourced" to our own army people, the fight against terror as well as dealing with American army and intelligence people, it is too much for our rulers to expect that American officials of the CIA or State Department would take seriously anything Ahmad Mukhtar or Khar may propose or project without corroboration from those who count in the actual decision-making process in Pakistan.
Ministers are like buttons on a shirt! That is the impression you get from reading about the tug-of-war between the coalition partners in the Sindh government. A reasonable limit to the number of ministers envisaged in the 18th Amendment was slyly deferred to the cabinets to be formed after the next general elections! One hears daily reports about ministries demanded by this or that just-joining coalition partner with the implied threat of opting out of the coalition. One also hears of parties presently holding those portfolios refusing to oblige. Suitability of persons for holding a particular portfolio on the strength of his qualification, professional background and experience does not appear to a factor worth considering at all. Like buttons and buttonholes on a shirt, it seems, any minister could fit into any ministerial slot!
(owajid@yahoo.com)