TO KILL A MOCKING BIRD

this was printed in PT in hardcopy but not online

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD?

By Rabia Ahmed

How right is it to install blockades against a helpless country?

Eid in Pakistan will of course take place when the relevant departments succeed in sighting the moon. While those attempts to spot the moon are ongoing, in a world that has studied the moon’s effect on the magnetic field of the Earth, on emotions, the universe and landed on it too, the government has announced a three day holiday for Eid. Comments on this announcement ranged from ‘Well done!’ to ‘Good job!’

Yay for a government able to achieve so much.

Meantime Saudi Arabia has already performed the incredible feat of spotting the moon, meaning it is Eid in that country today, Sunday. On Eid, the Saudis, already given to taking it easy will be taking it easier still.

While all this happens, Yemen is facing the world’s worst outbreak of cholera.

Yemen the second largest country in the Arabian Peninsula is the poorest country in the Middle East. As an ultimate irony, in ancient times Yemen was called ‘happy Arabia’ by the Romans, as opposed to ‘deserted Arabia’ for the rest of the peninsula. The Romans seem to have been skilled at puns. And Yemen has clearly seen better days.

Cholera is an infectious disease caused by infected water. It leads to severe watery diarrhea due to which patients become badly dehydrated. In the worst cases this leads to death. It is mostly children who are affected. In India between the years 1900 and 1920 around eight million people died of cholera.

Risk factors for cholera include poor sanitation and poverty. Yemen as a desperately poor country proves this is true.

Yemen has been subject to political crises including civil war for the past five or six years. Mr. Hadi the President of Yemen has had a tumultuous tenure. In 2015 he fled to Riyadh  but after a bombing campaign conducted by a nine member coalition led by Saudi Arabia in his support, he was able to return to Yemen a few months later.  

This coalition led by Saudi Arabia is composed of mostly Sunni Arab states who have been alarmed by the rise of an opposing group (Houthis) who, the coalition believes, is backed by Shia Iran. The reason behind this coalition’s existence is therefore mainly sectarian, its aim is to restore a Sunni leader, Mr. Hadi of course being Sunni.

According to the BBC, the coalition receives logistical and intelligence support from the US, the UK, and France.

Air strikes by this coalition have led to the death of almost 8,000 Yemenis since 2015. The air strikes, the crises, and the blockades put in place by the coalition have led to a massive humanitarian disaster in Yemen.

A blockade should not be confused with an embargo, or sanctions, which are legally imposed trade barriers. A blockade is ‘an effort to cut off supplies, war material or communications from a particular area by force,’ a prevention of all ingress and egress into and from that area. Blockades lead to famine and medical epidemics since food and medicines are not able to come into the country. It is what happened in Iraq when children died untreated, and it is happening now in Yemen.

Historically there have been many, many instances of blockades around the world. Some blockades in the recent past were the Indian blockade of East Pakistan during the Bangladesh War in 1971, the American, British and French no-fly zones against Iraq 1991 - 2003, and the 2001 - 2007 attempt by the Australian Maritime Border Protection agencies to ‘disrupt, deter, and deny’ the entry of boat people into Australia.

None of these blockades were popular internationally, with a substantial number of opponents even in the countries that set these blockades in place. All these blockades were condemned in Pakistan by those who were aware of the news. None of these blockades were humane and none of them produced any positive results. The only results were death, destruction and misery. In short, they led to humanitarian disasters. The blockade in Yemen which began in 2015 and is ongoing is no different. With this fresh humanitarian disaster in the shape of the massive cholera epidemic, it is time we re-examined our priorities.

Saudi foreign aid to Pakistan since that country came out of the desert so to speak has been substantial.  In the ten years since 1976 it was USD 49 billion, second only to the aid provided by the US, although at present they both face competition in the shape of China.

In a blog written a couple of years ago for the Rand Corporation by Jonah Blank, Mr. Blank says that Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have major reasons for seeking each other’s friendship. Pakistan’s seems to be financial aid (isn’t it always?) while Saudi Arabia views Pakistan as a major ally against Shia, oil rich Iran.

But in the case of Yemen when the Saudis asked for Pakistan’s support in fighting against the Houthis two years ago, Blank mentions that Pakistan refused.

It will remain one of Pakistan’s few sensible decisions.

Since then, Gen Raheel Sharif, Pakistan’s retired Chief of Army Staff has this year taken over command of the forty one nation Saudi led military coalition.

Any Saudi led coalition is likely to have an anti-Iran thrust, and these days also an anti-Qatar thrust. And it is also likely to have a major patron in the shape of the US, which is as mentioned before, a major financial donor to Pakistan. It is a complicated swirl of khichri (kedgeree) with one flavor supporting the other in a myriad ways.

Given this new involvement in a Saudi led coalition...how many different coalitions can a country have with how many different aims...it will be difficult for Pakistan to make a choice based on what is right. The chances are high that as usual it will pick what is expedient. That has always been this country’s ultimate tragedy. In the end it is the mockingbird the innocent, helpless segment of humanity that suffers. And to kill a mockingbird is not just a crime, it is a sin. It is not just Harper Lee who said that.

THE VARIOUS OUTPOSTS OF TYRANNY

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2017/06/20/the-various-outposts-of-tyranny/

A little sickening all around

Political doublespeak is sickening. And Republican doublespeak doubly so, not that Democrats are much better. But in this truly nauseating respect they stink a little less.

In 2004 when George W Bush, a Republican, was re-elected to office, his Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice described Cuba as one of the few ‘outposts of tyranny’ remaining in the world. How well the term evokes old Western movies where the good guys (now a Trumpism) fight the bad guys (ditto) somewhere in some cavalry outpost…in fact wasn’t there a film,  ‘The Last Outpost’, starring, why what a coincidence, Ronald Reagan, another star on the Conservative horizon?

So, Cuba is one of the few remaining outposts of tyranny in the world?

Cuba remained under Spanish rule until the Spanish American War in 1898, when, as a result of the Treaty of Paris it became an American Protectorate which gave the US economic and political dominance over Cuba. But then along came the Cuban Revolution in 1953, led by Che Guvevara and Fidel Castro, and in 1959 Batista, Cuba’s authoritarian President, was ousted and replaced with a socialist state, organised along communist lines.

The Revolution had important repercussions on the country, and also on its powerful neighbour to the north because it meant an end to the economic and political benefits enjoyed by the US in Cuba.

However, Batista returned to power once again by means of a military coup in 1952. Once again American organisations were given preferential treatment. This time around Batista was far less responsive to public welfare. He even established organised links to criminal groups that were unabashedly in his personal interests and to his benefit. Yet it seemed that the outpost of tyranny had become suddenly less tyrannical.

Batista’s government fell again in 1958, and this is when, following a revolution, Fidel Castro became Premier.

Castro’s government introduced antiracist laws. It made strides in crucial fields, health, communications, employment and education – for all citizens regardless of race. All races in the country became functionally literate. Corruption dropped, and the country enjoyed better sanitation. The government also supported arts and entertainment.

Castro considered biases such as gender and racial bias hypocritical. Woman participated strongly in the revolution. Contemporary Cuba provides equal constitutional rights to women. Women hold 48.9% seats in the National Assembly, they represent almost half the scientific and technical sector, and more than half of bank employees are women. ‘The National Association of Innovators and Rationalizes sees the contribution and participation of women on the rise.’

According to geographer and Cuban Commandant Antonio Jimenez, at the time of the revolution the bulk of Cuba’s arable agricultural land was foreign owned, mostly by American companies. The government implemented land reforms and nationalized all U.S. property in Cuba in August 1960 leading to greater social equality.

In response, the Eishenhower administration froze all Cuban assets on American soil, severed diplomatic ties and slammed a trade and economic embargo on Cuba, including a travel embargo. In case anyone is interested, Eisenhower was Republican.

It was Obama who tried to roll back this embargo but it appears since to be rescinded by his successor, whose favourite solution to world problems takes the shape of travel bans – generally bans, reminiscent of the most bearded of extremists in Pakistan.

So, if the prime villain Cuba is tyrannical, let’s take a look at Saudi Arabia, the prime favourite.

According to Reuters, only 30-40 % of working Saudi’s hold jobs, and as few even wish to seek jobs. Most of those working are employed by the government. The IMF has warned that the wage bill is not viable in the long run. The workforce in the private sector consists of 90 % non-Saudis.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights expects every person to possess the right to leave any country including his own. Anyone working in Saudi Arabia however must possess a sponsor. This sponsor is empowered to permit the worker to enter or to leave the country, to the extent that the worker’s passport is retained by the sponsor. At times the sponsor also holds the passports belonging to the worker’s entire family if they reside within the country.

The first time women voted in elections in the Kingdom was in 2015.

Women’s employment options are severely restricted in Saudi Arabia. It was only in 2003 that a woman did not require her male supporter’s testimony to obtain an identity card. Now, although women do not require that testimony to obtain an identity, they still require it to travel abroad. Domestic violence was legally criminalized for the first time in the country in 2013. And Saudi women are not allowed to drive. Manal-al Sharif, a woman’s rights activist started a right to drive campaign in 2011. She was jailed for nine days for driving a car.  Also in 2011 a court sentenced a woman to ten lashes for driving. The ruling was overturned by the King. The Kingdom considers women drivers to be a threat to security, employment and morality, not to mention a well-publicized fatwa that said women who drove were no longer virgins.

Despite all these factors, Saudi Arabia and the United States remain close allies, and enjoy a ‘special relationship.’ They have, according to Wiki, been allies in opposition to communism, in support of stable oil prices, stability in the oil fields and shipping, and in the economies of Western Countries where Saudis have invested  – which is of course the crux of the matter.

There is no mention of the two supporting democracy around the world (Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy) or any talk of human rights (think sponsor keeping the passport), or human rights (remember the lashings for a female driver). So whither outpost of tyranny, in this case?

Certainly it is about all about money, which is not to make a new or shrewd observation by any means.

An interesting point is whether by supporting tyranny a country becomes tyrannical itself, or itself an outpost of tyranny?

Political doublespeak is sickening. And Republican doublespeak doubly so, not that Democrats are much better. But in this truly nauseating respect they stink a little less.

Pakistan’s friendships in the region, for all our moralizing in the public arena are as two faced as any Republican government’s. Meantime it serves the Saudis to have a huge Pakistani workforce working for them.

But even petro dollars have their limits. Has anyone prepared for a time when they are not as readily available? Also, it will be interesting to see Pakistan’s stance with regards to the sudden fiasco surrounding Qatar. Will Pakistan choose its position based on its Saudi and American advantages, or will it base its stance on what is right?

MORE PIOUS THAN THE POPE?

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2017/06/13/more-pious-than-the-pope/

What are our laws achieving today?

The Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) believed in and lived up to everything God taught him, the teachings of Islam. Seeing that all but one chapter of the Quran began with the words ‘In the name of Allah, the Beneficent and the Merciful,’ he tried to be incorporate those attributes of Allah within himself as much as humanly possible, to be himself beneficial and merciful towards everyone who crossed his path in every way he could. Therefore when he was once asked to pray for the destruction of a people who were being more than usually vindictive against the Muslims, as well as being cruel to him personally, he refused. The reason he gave for his refusal was that he was sent as a blessing and a mercy for mankind, not as a curse.

What a man. Who could fail to admire him?

There are countless examples of the Prophet’s mercy (PBUH), and his forgiveness. There is a short video doing the rounds which details just five such examples.

Thumama Ibn Uthal was one of the most powerful men at the time of the Prophet (PBUH). He was the leader of Al Yamamah, an area east of what is now Saudi Arabia, and one of eight leaders who were sent letters, inviting them to accept Islam. Thumama responded by killing several of the Prophet (PBUH)’s followers. Yet the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) forgave Thumama Ibn Uthal. Thumama converted to Islam following the Prophet’s forgiveness.

Safwan Ibn Umayyah belonged to the Qurraysh tribe of Mecca. Both he and his father opposed the Prophet (pbuh), and tried to assassinate him. After the battle at Badr, Safwan paid someone to assassinate the Prophet but the plot failed and Safwan himself was captured alive. Yet the Prophet (pbuh) gave him amnesty after the conquest of Mecca and in fact gifted him several camels. Safwan too, converted to Islam.

Abu Sufyan Sakhr Ibn Harb was a leader of the Qurraysh of Mecca, as a result he was one of the most powerful persons in Mecca. When they were boys, Abu Sufyan and Muhammad (PBUH) were friends. When Muhammad (pbuh) declared prophet hood Abu Sufyan’s enmity began. He showed it in several ways, writing satirical poems against his childhood friend and his people and leading military campaigns against the Muslims, including the battle at Uhud. He tried to assassinate the Prophet on several occasions. He too was forgiven by the Prophet (PBUH), and afterwards when he became Muslim, granted a pension.

Wahshi Ibn Harb was appointed by Hind bint Utbah to kill one or all three men, the Prophet himself (pbuh), his cousin Ali, and his Uncle Hamza. During the battle of Uhud Wahshi succeed in killing Hamza, the Prophet’s beloved uncle. The Prophet (PBUH), in spite of his grief, forgave Wahshi when he repented, although as with Hind, he asked Washi not to appear in front of him, presumably because the thought of the desecration Hamza’s body had suffered after he was assassinated was painful to him.

Hind bint Utbah ordered Hamza killed in retaliation for the death of her uncle. Afterwards, when Hamza was martyred by Wahshi during the battle, Hind climbed on to a rock and shrieked out her triumph. She and some of the other women mutilated the dead bodies and hung the ears and noses around their necks. Hind also cut out Hamza’s liver and tried to eat it. When she could not, she spat out what she had bitten into. And yet the Prophet forgave her at the time of the conquest of Mecca, although the sight of her was so painful to him that as with Washi he requested her never to come before him.

Today, we like to think that we carry the torch on the Prophet’s behalf (PBUH), and believe we are spreading the light of Islam in the world.

…really?

On the 9th of June, just a few days ago, an Anti-Terrorism Court sentenced a man belonging to the Shia sect living in Okara to death for posting something blasphemous against Islam on Facebook. The man, apparently posted something derogatory against certain prominent Sunni persons, the Prophet (PBUH), and his wives.

We like to practice Islam today by paying flowery compliments to its prominent figures while paying no heed whatsoever to their teachings. In a glaring example, if the Prophet (PBUH) forgave people who tried to assassinate him, fought against him, wrote against him, against his people, his family and his teachings, it is interesting that we can sentence a man to death for doing something as silly as posting derogatory comments on social media. Surely, that would be classified as being more pious than the Pope, or as the Persian saying goes, the bowl being hotter than the soup?

The people the Prophet (PBUH) forgave were invariably so impressed by his magnanimity and dignity that they accepted Islam, going on to become important figures within the religion they once rejected.

What are our laws achieving today? Is anyone impressed by their dignity and magnanimity?

THE PLAGUE IN KARACHI

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2017/06/06/the-plague-in-karachi/

The mind boggling idea of plague in Karachi

There’s a story about a wife who tots up her husband’s total spending on beer for twenty years and tells him he could have bought an airplane with that money. He asks how much beer she’s had in the past twenty years to which she proudly responds: “None!” So he asks her “Where’s your airplane then?”

You’re reminded of that story when the PPP…and another P’s juvenile political aspirant Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and his less than salubrious parent sneer about the PML-N. Without in any way shape or form being a PML-N supporter, one nevertheless feels that criticism from the PPP’s leadership is a bit rich, when having had their stint in government not once but several times with Karachi as their ‘home base’ as Lahore is for the Sharif family they managed to do squat for its welfare. Well, look at that port city, once the capital of the entire country. Or smell it. And this does not refer to the recent worse than usual stench that has been enveloping that city, which as the WWF informs us is due to the decaying ‘bloom’ of a marine species, which occurs twice a year, and has occurred a bit earlier and much smellier than usual this time. No, that ‘look at Karachi and smell it’ referred to the usual every day muck, also composed of dead and decaying matter in which that city is mired and is mired all year round, and the increasingly higher piles of that dead and decaying matter that have accumulated in every available spot, and the particular smells that arise from them.

Karachi used to be a wonderful city. It still is, despite its lack of leadership. Or even simply despite its leadership. Sir Charles Napier, the first governor of Sindh is quoted as saying:

‘You will be the Glory of the East; Would that I come

 Again to see you, Karachi, in your grandeur!’

Karachi remains Pakistan’s most diverse city. It is also Pakistan’s most liberal city. And although Lahore was once that, it is now Pakistan’s most intellectual and culturally vibrant city. Most of all, believe it or not, Karachi was once Pakistan’s cleanest city, perhaps the cleanest city in all of Asia. No kidding.

Plague, the disease, was not restricted to seventeenth century London. In London about a 100,000 people died during the Great Plague, almost a quarter of that city’s population. Two centuries later, at the end of the nineteenth century, the citizens of Karachi were faced by the results of lack of sanitation in the shape of another epidemic of bubonic plague. The fleas carrying the disease found a congenial environment in the city’s filth, and thousands of citizens of Karachi died, presenting a very real challenge for the British, then the rulers. But that government rose to the challenge. The plague was contained in a few years, largely because henceforth the British provided the city with an effective garbage collection system, and once it was collected with an efficient garbage disposal system. And they constructed decent sewage, and made sure the city was regularly cleaned. Which is, you know, the sort of stuff governments are supposed to do.

All that however is in the past. Today, Karachi is a garbage dump. Rather an egalitarian one because it isn’t just the ‘lower class’ areas (nasty phrase) that have the rubbish problem, it is also the ‘upper class’ areas (another nasty phrase) that do. There are piles of rubbish bang in front of Bilawal House, in fact. Clearly the inmates are among those who chuck their rubbish over the doorstep, happy so long as the mansion is clean.

So now some expensive garbage collection equipment has been imported by the government in power in Sindh, no doubt with the usual kickbacks. This equipment apparently includes tricycle refuse vehicles, handcarts, dustbins, tree cleaning showers, mechanical sweepers and street-washing vehicles. Whether Pakistan makes mechanical sweepers and street washing vehicles is a moot point, but it is incredible that equipment such as handcarts and dustbins were also imported, but we’ll let that pass. A Chinese firm is to be paid…wait for this…Rs2 billion a year to lift and process the incredible amounts of waste produced by this massive city. But we’ll let that pass too. Anyone who has an idea of the scale of work involved would agree that that is a justifiable and unavoidable price to pay. Garbage disposal is a crucial and integral aspect of life in any city, small or large. In a place Karachi’s size it assumes imperative dimensions.

The thing is that if the plague could strike once, it could strike again. The various components are all there: absence, and I mean ABSENCE of sanitation, rats, ignorance, and close living as a result of poverty. Is a government that was unable to perform a function as basic as waste disposal without foreign aid equipped to handle a health crisis of the dimensions one would assume if it (God forbid) struck the largest city of Pakistan? It is a question that the Department of Health should add onto its agenda on a priority basis, as well as looking into some kind of cooperation with sanitation units.  Hospitals in Karachi are doing a good job, with several run philanthropically offering wonderful service to citizens. But the plague…?

NO SUCCESS WITHOUT ACCOUNTABILITY

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2017/05/29/no-success-without-accountability/

Greased palms make the world go round

When members of the National Assembly gathered on Friday the 26th of May this year to hear the Finance Minister Ishaq Dar announce the Federal Budget 2017-18, the opposition walked out in protest against physical mistreatment of farmers who had gathered to protest earlier that day in D Chowk, in Islamabad. Farmers undoubtedly have much to complain about, as do people from almost every sector of life in Pakistan, but when the national budget was being read out was surely the time to focus on that important matter then at hand. This inability to organise and sort out priorities is a trait that actively lends itself to corruption, and is at the heart of the chaos that is Pakistan today.

A case that further illustrates this point is the non-payment of salaries to the employees of the National AIDS Control Program (NACP). These employees were not paid their salaries since June last year. It is only now that the Ministry of Health Services, Regulation and Coordination (NHSRC) has issued a notification for the salaries to be paid – and a very fuzzy notification it is – which could create legal problems, and further non-payment of dues. There were various reasons at different stages for the non-payment of salaries for this unconscionable period of time. The latest this year in March was the merger of three programmes, those dealing with HIV, TB and malaria into one program now called ‘Common Unit’, and a dispute as to who should head this merged program.

The three diseases mentioned (HIV, TB and malaria) are among the worst health scourges in the world. You wonder why the fourth major disease, polio, was left out of this group, but that is another matter.

The figures for these three diseases are damning.

According to a report published by one of the newspapers in Pakistan, in a comparison of the years 2005 to 2015 (ten years), there has been a 14.41% increasing in deaths due to HIV/AIDS in Pakistan. A 17.6% increase in the number of people living with HIV/AIDS in Pakistan. Compare that to a 2000 to 2015 (fifteen year) increase around the world of people living with HIV/AIDS, at just 2%.

According to the WHO, Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the major public health problems in Pakistan, which ranks fifth amongst TB high-burden countries worldwide. Approximately 420, 000 new TB cases emerge every year in Pakistan which is also estimated to have the fourth highest prevalence of multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) globally.

As for Malaria, the disease has re-emerged as a major cause of morbidity in Pakistan. With an estimated burden of 1.5 million cases annually, Pakistan has been categorised by WHO in the Group 3 countries of the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Region, along with Afghanistan, Djibouti, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Yemen. These Group 3 countries share 95% of the total regional cases of malaria.

It is obvious that Pakistan is doing something wrong with regards to this matter. Could it be that one of those things is the non-payment of dues to persons dealing with the issue?

Obviously, it was not enough to reorganise the organisations working against these diseases or set up new ones if in the end those departments are to be rendered ineffectual, since no department can function if its workers are not paid their salary – just as no sector in the country can function if people involved in that sector are harassed.

And they are harassed.

It seems almost cheeky for a government labouring under the Panama-gate allegations to spell out details of property tax, but that is part of the government’s job, to set taxes and collect them. But at least, you wish, that those who pay their dues would not be harassed after their payments are cleared. Instead we are told that tax collected on the consumption of electricity by industrial or commercial users is adjustable, which is almost comical because it is so adjustable that if you pay a certain amount to the thugs who come around to check your meter, you will have to pay no more each month for electricity. That in fact is the offer that is made.

Nothing works unless a system of accountability exists and works as well. That people are not paid their dues, that consumers are overcharged and actually offered free electricity if they grease certain palms… and there is no recourse for justice following such events is what makes this country a third world country. If there were some accountability in this country the finance minister’s claim of Pakistan becoming ‘one of the largest economies by 2020’ would not be as laughable as it is at present.

No government can aim at any degree of success let alone a ‘large economy’ unless it makes provision for justice and a certain degree of law and order. The results of such a move would far outdo any investments, social interventions, taxation, rebates, loans or credits that any budget can promise.

CALLING A SPADE A SPADE

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2017/05/22/calling-a-spade-a-spade-4/

Sometimes it really is black and white

One gets used to hypocrisy being a sizeable factor in politics, but sometimes things get nauseating.  Obviously, this refers to Donald Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia, a kingdom of hypocrites as big as the dignitaries visiting them this week. It is hypocrisy whichever way you look at it. Even the term ‘visit to Saudi Arabia’ might be better called an escape, taking into account the hangama the President of the United States leaves behind in the country his ancestors chose to migrate to, particularly since the firing of the FBI Director, the ‘nut job’ James Comey who is now to testify before a Senate Intelligence Committee against his former boss.

Saudi Arabia’s biggest export is not oil but Wahhabism, the extremist, intolerant, violent ideology which has nothing to do with Islam, but claims to have everything to do with it. Donald Trump, who has no clue as to what either is about, only a couple of months ago called for a total shutdown of Muslims entering the US, and claimed that ‘Islam hated Americans.’ And now this visit. And this is the man who was welcomed into the country by the King of Saudi Arabia, bent almost double…okay, okay, that’s because he is old and bent, but he was bent double in other ways as well.

The Saudis in their wisdom restrict women in many ways. Women are not allowed to drive, to work, or to dress according to the heat in that country. They are certainly not allowed to *gasp* shake hands with males. If they put a foot out of line they are punished severely, and that includes being whipped by the religious police patrolling the city of Riyadh.

And yet there was the King and everyone else shaking hands with Melania Trump when she arrived in Riyadh with her husband, and no doubt Ivanka had her hand *gasp* touched by *gasp* men as well.  It is understandable that visiting female dignitaries cannot be dictated where their clothing is concerned, but why go out and *gasp* shake hands with them when an alternative, a courteously pleasant nod would suffice, seeing as the Saudis subscribe to the ‘Look Ma! No hands!’ creed? Either you believe in not doing something, or you do.

Melania Trump, by the way was dressed in a jump suit with the most loathsome belt circling her midriff. The jumpsuit failed to conceal her *gasp* crotch. Several other visiting female dignitaries have refused to subscribe to the hijab, but have at least worn something that conceals their *gasp* crotch.

But all of this pales into insignificance when we have Mr. Trump’s Sunday speech in Saudi Arabia to look forward to. By the time this goes to print, it will have been aired. It must be obvious by now that one is no fan of the Saudis but the temerity of this President of the United States (or any other) to presume to talk to anyone about Islam is breathtaking. If it makes moderates so angry I can’t help wonder what take extremist quarters have on the matter. Let’s pray that whatever that take is includes no violent repercussions on a sickened world.

Saudi Arabia is a rich neighbour that has stumbled on a pile of riches, not acquired them in any other way, and it is well on its way to wasting the opportunity in spectacular fashion. The country is good for a sizeable bankroll when required. We give you labour, you give us cash. Thank you kindly. Let’s call a spade a spade and nothing else, unless it is something uncomplimentary, and that would be undiplomatic.  It is hard to choose the United States over the Saudis any time, given the United States’ intolerant, terrorising, bombing segment which is not small, and given the Saudi’s support of regimes that are leading to starvation and death around the world. Intolerant, terrorising, bombing segments anywhere in the world are fundamentally the same, and we do not lack our own share.

Let’s learn to recognise what is right and what is wrong, and admit that we are all, them, us, and anyone else, here to get the best for ourselves, wherever we find it. Let’s learn to live with everyone whether we go to Saudi Arabia, the US or wherever else to make a living, seeing that it is easier to make a living in countries other than the land of the pure. Undoubtedly the Saudis have some good points. Certainly the Americans have many. The Chinese are welcome to Pakistan because it is clearly profitable for them. It is certainly so for us. But let’s not bend over backwards for anyone, and definitely let no one presume to lecture anyone else about something they don’t know quack about.

AN ANALOGY FOR PAKISTAN?

The Indus Valley School for Art and Architecture

The Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture in Karachi is a singularity. It stands in the midst of Karachi, another singularity, both of them not just survivors, but vibrant survivors of neglect.

Rarely, outside of Karachi, do you encounter a woman like Anjum (not her actual name), who picked up three younger sisters out of nine and moved to Pakistan from India after the war of 1971. The sisters never saw their Indian family again, although their mother sends them home-made achar whenever she can. Anjum rebuilt their lives sweaty brow by tear until now she owns a small house, and her sisters are married and settled in their own homes.

Nor do you meet a person like Bilal (not his real name) who drives a cab, and belongs to KP. He married a girl from a rival tribe in Karachi and daren’t go back again. “Life is hard in Karachi, and I’m in danger here,” he told me. “But there,” he said, speaking of KP, “I’m dead.” Bilal has an income his family survives upon, and although he drives all day in the heat and hectic traffic of the massive metropolis with little to show for it, at least, as he says, he and his wife are alive. He is luckier than many others.

The School of Architecture too is in danger, from the salt sea air that kills the substandard construction material in the buildings around it. It is in danger from the environmental pollution that covers everything in a grey shroud. But where the building stood before, it was dead already.

The group of people who planned to build a school of art and architecture in Karachi using the National College of Art in Lahore as a model were already running a school in temporary premises, while looking for something more permanent. They had also been allotted a piece of land in Clifton.

The website of the Indus Valley School for Art and Architecture (IVS) contains a segment on the school’s history, written by Noor Jehan Bilgrami, herself a designer, and the wife of Akeel Bilgrami, a leading architect and one of the founders of the IVS. She describes the original building as a ‘Victorian style warehouse in Kharadar, built about a hundred years ago by Nusserwanjee Mehta, father of Jamshed Nusserwanjee, philanthropist, social worker and outstanding citizen, the first Mayor of Karachi. The four-story stone structure was to be demolished to make way for a concrete high riser.’ Probably another of the nightmare high rise buildings which may be seen everywhere in Karachi today, rising like malignant growths upon the landscape. ‘This Victorian style warehouse housed one of the first elevators installed in the sub-continent,’ Bilgrami mentions.

Shahid Abdulla, another well-known architect is also a member of the group responsible for IVS. He is the person who discovered the warehouse in Kharadar and realised its potential. In his words, ‘if we cannot move in here, we’ll carry it to Clifton.’

And carry it to Clifton they did.

Stone by each 26,000 stone, every single stone and ‘hundreds of pieces of timber numbered and carefully removed, cautiously transferred and stored before being re-erected at the (allotted) site’ in Clifton. And there the IVS stands today, a proud symbol of a what seemed to be an impossible vision turned into reality by a group of visionaries, with the invaluable help of a team of workers who laboured to make Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture what it is today…an exquisite building, exactly the same as the one that once stood in Kharadar now in entirely different surroundings.

The IVS stands in front of the grand barricaded home of those who do not care surrounded by a neighbourhood that is not cared for, even though it is among the wealthier neighbourhoods of the city. What would be piles of trash ignored by municipal authorities are dispersed and blown in the wind behind the building. In front is the sea into which pours the waste of an entire city and God only knows what chemicals from factories.

The IVS is a ‘registered not-for-profit, private, degree awarding institute managed by an Executive Committee through the Executive Director, under the control of an independent Board of Governors that includes distinguished educationists, artists, architects, industrialists, bankers and media persons, in addition to three members nominated by the Government of Sindh.’

The institute’s similarities to Pakistan are striking. When the group of people who set up this school went to see the original building ‘cobwebs made our entry difficult. Rotting scraps of paper, letter-heads and old photographs covered with pigeon droppings were mementos that we found. It then seemed to us quite impossible that this building could actually be transported to a new location.’ But transported it was, painstakingly and not without immense difficulty, like the people who moved from India to make Pakistan their home, like Anjum who came with her sisters, like Bilal who moved from KP to Karachi and married the girl from a rival tribe. Anjum who never got to see her family again thanks to short-sighted policies on either side, and Bilal who does not get to see his because of the lawlessness that prevails in his home territory, worse in his case than the lawlessness that prevails in his adoptive city. IVS, exists in neglected surroundings amid self-serving non-governance, and thrives despite it all.

IVS provides girls and boys a great non-profit education in a displaced building of exemplary beauty. It is a result of the vision of a few men and women who did not seek to benefit themselves and therefore truly benefited society. It is what Pakistan could have been but is not. It is what Jinnah wanted but could not achieve. It represents a displaced people who moved to a new home in search of something better. The conditions in Pakistan are testimony to their never having found it, but they were resilient enough to carry on in spite of this.

The IVS stands as a testimony to what may be achieved. Even now, given some selflessness and hard work. A good reason to support the IVS and its endeavours in every way you can.