SOME STRIKING PARALLELS

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/26/some-striking-parallels-2/

• Covid-19 is making us face some uncomfortable questions

Women have often dreamed of an opportunity to put men in their shoes, to see how far they can walk in them. That opportunity it seems is here.

Both men and women have been heard complaining about how uncomfortable it is to wear a mask. “Its hard to breathe,” “It makes me feel hot, suffocated,” and “I can’t wait to take this ruddy thing off my face,” are some of the things being heard.

Well, it is most understandable, so perhaps one could stop for a moment to perceive the parallel between ‘this ruddy thing’ and the face covering that many women are expected to embrace, the covering that Islam does not require but is said to expect women to don. One moreover that does not end with the discovery of a vaccine but carries on till the woman’s last breath.

Yes it is very hard to cover one’s face, particularly when the temperatures go up. It is impossible to believe that Allah, the One we call Rehman and Raheem, would put woman through this torture.

But there is more. Putting a covering over the face reduces peripheral vision which makes it hazardous for a woman in a tent to drive a car and cross the road. And then there is also the fabric wound around the head, no different to wearing a scarf in searing temperatures. A trailing abaya often accompanies all this other gear; it is both unsanitary and once again a torture, particularly in the heat. Both the trailing abaya and scarf are prone to getting snagged in the wheels of a motorbike, making it extremely dangerous and even life threatening for a woman precariously seated on the bike and for the child or children very often in her arms. In fact it should be illegal in this case. But when have the authorities ever been known to stand up to the religious mafia?

In fact, there are many facets to this coronavirus business. This episode will hopefully encourage people to take a closer look at some of the practices so deeply ingrained in our society in the name of religion.

There is of course the fact that the clergy seems to disregard all evidence to the contrary and is insisting on resuming congregational prayers in mosques, expecting worshippers to be somehow protected from infection.

This is nothing but an example of self-interest dictating policy, as for example is happening in the USA with the President suggesting medications in the making of which he holds a financial interest. Where would our poor uneducated mullah get the high that comes with authority without the congregations they head?

It is perhaps natural for a group of persons whose only claim to elevated position is their supposed knowledge of religion to be reluctant to relinquish it. Clerics have long fought against science, because they feel threatened by it, although Islam does not claim any conflict between the two. The Quran in fact repeatedly asks us to observe nature and learn from it.

In the Quran it says: “Have those who disbelieved not considered that the heavens and the Earth were a joined entity, and we separated them and made from water every living thing? Then will they not believe?”

And again: “It is He Who created the night and the day, and the sun and the moon. All (the celestial bodies) swim along, each in its rounded course” (21:33).

“It is not permitted for the sun to catch up to the moon, nor can the night outstrip the day. Each just swims along in its own orbit.”

There are numerous other such examples. So where does the conflict arise?

Why, for example can we not fix our lunar calendar instead of going through the moon-sighting ritual? Perhaps alone among the Muslim world, the people of Pakistan never know when they are expected to start fasting and when they must stop.

This is a democracy. It was a certain set of people that was elected to govern the country. It seems though that that set of people have little say in policy. If they say that congregational prayers will not be held until the threat to the health of the nation is over, congregational prayers should not be held. But that is not the case.

Why?

FAISAL EDHI: DONATING TO THE GOVERNMENT'S COVID FUND

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/18/faisal-edhi-donating-government-covid-fund/

There is a process involved in donating money. Most people give tips and the odd few hundred to someone who appears to need it without much thought, but larger sums of money always involve an assessment of whether or not the person genuinely requires it; while donating to an organisation is definitely based on which organisation you trust– and which you don’t.

It is not right therefore if the organisation you donated to because you trusted it passes the money on to another one, because there is a possibility that the donor did not donate to that other one because he did not trust it.

There is a good reason for example why many people did not donate to the damn fund, sorry, the dam fund, remember it? The one that was renamed ‘The Supreme Court of Pakistan and the Prime Minister of Pakistan Diamer-Bhasha and Mohmand Dam Fund,’ when Imran Khan the then newly elected Prime Minister of Pakistan jumped in in 2018 – as he does, into this, yet another example of judicial activism by the former Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar. Those who did not donate to that fund obviously did not consider the Diamer-Bhasha and Mohmand Dam worth supporting. Perhaps they took into account expert opinion, an opinion that was ignored by the authorities and which said that such large dams were actually counter-productive and were not the way to deal with the issue of water shortage. Others did not donate to the fund because they did not trust that the funds would be used as they were meant to be.

On the other hand several people and organisations did donate. Even so, the target of some Rs 1.5 trillion needed for building the dams was never reached and only Rs 9.8 billion were ever collected, which is a tiny fraction of the amount required. And then the Chief Justice sahib said, when questioned about ‘what next,’ that the fund was never meant to be for the dam really, it was only to ‘raise awareness’ of the issue. That response came as an unpleasant surprise for the donors.

Since then the fund has been in limbo, while the good judge has been too busy marrying off his son in a ceremony so lavish it boggles the mind, and makes you wonder, putting two and two together and coming up with much more than four.

It is never a good idea to cover everyone with the same blanket. There will always be exceptions to the rule. But the general rule in Pakistan appears to be that its governments are rarely to be relied upon to function honestly. There has never been a government that was an exception to that rule, not even the one currently in power, seeing that it is composed greatly of people who rolled over and into it from the previous one and the one before that. There have been wheat scandals, and sugar scandals, and questions as to whether the frontispiece is actually the person named or someone else pulling the strings.

Therefore, when Faisal Edhi donated Rs. 10 million to the Prime Minister for the government’s coronavirus relief fund, it was not appreciated by those who donate to Edhi.

Faisal Edhi’s father Abdul Sattar Edhi, helped by his wife Bilquis Edhi, was one of Pakistan’s─ and even the world’s─ greatest philanthropists. People donated to the Edhi Foundation, a non-profit charity organisation, knowing that the money they give was safe and would reach the people it was intended for. Edhi set up the world’s largest fleet of ambulances, homes for the destitute and other things that have benefited millions in this country over the years.

Abdul Sattar Edhi kept his charity organisation to itself with good reason. He helped whoever was in need of a helping hand regardless of the recipient’s religious belief, and was criticized by some so called religious figures for this. He retorted that he did not believe in discrimination. People put obstacles in his way and maligned him, but he never let them deter his good work, determinedly remaining independent because he wanted no strings attached to his work.

Perhaps Faisal Edhi has not understood the reasons behind his father’s refusal to ally with other groups, much less the government. Faisal has said that “if all stakeholders don’t work together and if they maintain gaps, the public will face problems.” He has urged “critics, opposition, the Centre and other parties to forget their difference and stop criticizing each other,” saying that “if we don’t form a consensus then it will benefit the coronavirus, not us.” He is also quoted as saying that “he is full and gratitude and very happy that the Edhi Foundation is working with the government.”

Well he’s very right about cooperation. But there is a difference between ‘working with’ and cooperation, at least in the context that Faisal has used it. Cooperation does not have to be monetary. Everyone, individual and organization, can and should forget their difference and work together towards a common good. The Edhi Foundation could loan out its ambulances where required, it could provide quarantine facilities and food for those infected with the virus and many such things. But money? How do you track where money goes? Take this seriously, because money very often can and does go walking where it shouldn’t. One hopes most ardently that Faisal will come to realise that his father had it right all along, before the Edhi Foundation falls victim to a lack of trust. What a huge pity that would be, given the lifetime of extreme hard work, self-denial and commitment put into the organisation by Abdul Sattar Edhi. May God bless him.

QUALITY ASSURANCE

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/11/quality-assurance/

With cases of the novel coronavirus increasing in the country as well as around the world the government of Pakistan is now encouraging the local production of ventilators, sanitisers and a larger quantity of chloroquine. It has also given the go-ahead for clinical trials for plasma therapy if required following infection with the covid-19 corona virus. This is good; it is in fact something that should have been done long ago. Sanitisers and chloroquine are already being made in Pakistan, but it is necessary to keep an eye on their quality if they are in much greater demand.

Making ventilators too is well within the capability of local manufacturers. The cost of a single ventilator is prohibitive, and it makes sense for the government to try and produce them right here in Pakistan, but stringent quality standards must be adhered to and no one, but no one, must be allowed to get away with carelessness.

Locally manufactured products tends not to be made with a care to safety. Ventilators require meticulous manufacturing as well as maintenance, or they can lead to a patient’s death from the treatment rather than the disease.

As for clinical trials, they pose a similar question mark.

Plasma therapy requires a plasma donor and a recipient. The plasma donor must be recently recovered from covid-19, which means he should at the time of donation be confirmed as negative following a positive diagnosis for infection with covid-19. And so that the plasma does not pass on any diseases, the donor must be tested negative for diseases such as HIV, AIDS, Hep-C, syphilis or others. If he or she is free from all of the above, he can then donate blood from which the plasma– the liquid part of the blood- is separated and transfused into a recipient who is currently critically sick with covid-19. The idea is that the antibodies in the plasma of the donor will generate similar antibodies in the recipient.

Clinical trials are a meticulous exercise conducted in several stages, all of which will not apply in this case because plasma therapy is not a new treatment, Still, the effect on recipients of the plasma donation must be painstakingly recorded and studied, also because covid-19 is a new disease, and so therefore is whatever is being used to treat it.

The donor’s blood must be properly screened to prevent diseases being passed on to the recipient. A single mistake can lead to terrible results.

Phase II of a clinical trial involves testing of the drug, transfusion or procedure on patients to assess and record the effectiveness. The process is monitored by the researcher. Any side effects must be noted and recorded.

During transfusion attention must be paid to sanitization, which is not one of our strong points.

Phase III involves much the same with a larger number of patients, and this time also a clinician to oversee the process.

Phase III is a follow-up phase after treatment. Personal physicians are involved in this phase where long-term effects of the treatment, positive and negative are noted and recorded.

Pakistan is not best known for meticulous work. Gross carelessness and even fudging of records and results by medical assistants and even doctors has been experienced even in some of the best hospitals of Lahore. It must be the same in other cities. Even students have been known to be censured when their figures did not meet the data conclusions anticipated by their University. You wonder how much of this is likely to occur during the course of these trials, which stand in danger of not being taken seriously by the international community just because of where they took place.

In Pakistan the Drug Regulatory Authority is in charge of clinical trials. No trial can be carried out without a certificate from this authority which is issued after the scrutiny of an application and the payment of a fee. The proposal must also pass through an ethics committee, and the researchers must possess the specified qualifications and experience.

Unfortunately in Pakistan money changes hands all too frequently to get the desired results. It takes place in every sector, every aspect of national life. In the case of clinical trials and the manufacture of life saving equipment more than any in other, such deplorable practices must not be allowed to happen, or the death or disability of hapless individuals will be on the heads of the authorities, if they care.

WHAT THE MOON SAW

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/05/what-the-moon-saw/

• A look beyond the pandemic

“Tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.” Malcolm X

“Unless we see the new moon through these, our lowly eyes, neither the joys of Eid nor the mourning of Muharram can proceed.” Mullah in What the Moon Saw.

In 1967 Ghulam Abbas wrote a short story called Dhanak, one of the most remarkably prescient stories ever written. It is translated and included in a selection of Modern Urdu short stories by Amina Azfar. In the English version this story is called What the Moon Saw. In this tale Abbas talks about mullahs becoming increasingly bold in Pakistan, until they view any action by the government as interference in religion. The legitimate government finally becomes unable to move, even to do what was right, and eventually the mullahs take the reins of government into their own hands. Section 144 is imposed, and there is a crisis in the country. Many professions come to an end, and thousands lose their livelihood.

What was shown as likely to happen is eerily similar to what is now happening, a government too afraid to do what it thinks is right, if it has thought at all.

You wonder what, at the end of this worldwide tragedy called COVID-19, the moon will see when it looks down upon this shattered earth. Will it see some people with blood on their hands, among them those who insisted on gatherings and congregations even when quarantine was the need of the hour?

Will the moon see people picking themselves up as if after a battle, dazed, surrounded by shells of homes and stubs of trees? Will it see raiding gangs and ravenous mobs devouring whatever comes their way, something like the Chinese people whom we see fit to blame for this event? Perhaps the Chinese too learnt to eat anything and everything after exactly such a calamity, it is said that that is very possibly the reason.

As for the people, they are now and will be even more so later too caught up in a frenetic cycle of making ends meet and trying to survive, much too caught up to look for ways and means out of the situation.

Will the moon see a massive and inevitable rise in violence and robberies, the only recourse for a desperate people for whom help was announced with much fanfare but when it came to the point it was too complicated to work?

Even if people were to search for a way out, how would they know what there is out there? Would they be able to think of anything other than a roof to sleep under, bread, water and – these days mobile phones? Lacking education and even literacy, they do not possess the advantage provided by books, those extendable poles which look beyond immediate surroundings. The vision books provide might give them something to work towards. Is this why little effort has been made to bring the two together?

If people come together with books they might read in the same anthology Manto’s Jhooti Kahani, all about an ‘association of rogues and criminals,’ fighting for their rights, a satire on the workings of public office.

And these are only a handful of stories. Others can be found on the faces of those who have lost their livelihoods, and now have nothing to eat.

Future generations need us in the present to pave the way for them to understand the challenges they face. We do not need another generation of ‘institutional decay, social anarchy, intellectual degeneration and urban decline.’

When all this is over people need food, yes, and jobs, yes, and the means to survive. But most of all they need to be able to think for themselves. They must no longer be led by the nose to drink at troughs in which the water has been laced with brain-numbing drugs.

The situation is not good, and the government is facing an uphill task. Its fears are legitimate. But just as doctors and nurses all over the world have rolled up their sleeves and carried on working even without proper safeguards, the authorities need to stand up to the hurdles it faces and do what is right, which is what they were elected to do.

HIGH MORALE

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/03/28/high-morale/

• Emergancy measures show what should be done routinely

High morale among the people of a country leads to hope and confidence and provides citizens with an incentive to work towards the future. Governments therefore have a responsibility to maintain morale among the people they govern, but this morale-boosting must be based on truth, something real to be hopeful about. Word-mongering, empty words without substance, is nothing but the worst kind of electioneering.

What can be done to make a real difference in an emergency such as in these current virus-ridden times?

It’s a tough situation. Whatever course of action is decided upon is condemned by someone or the other. The government must be strong enough to withstand that opposition if it genuinely believes in the measures settles upon. It must also institute such measures that are possible in normal times. Such as measures to maintain hygiene.

Rumour is strong that streets are to be sanitized starting the next day or so. At the time of writing this column this is hearsay. If it is true, that is one good thing that is being done. Although why something short of ‘sanitising’ cannot be done routinely is difficult to understand. It is all about the will to improve things, making a careful plan and sticking to it. As it is, if it is done just the once, it takes little time for the dirt to accumulate once again.

A big factor in the spread of infection in a country like Pakistan are houseflies. Apparently these can carry infection on their legs, and flies are a given in the presence of piles of garbage. (According to the WHO mosquitoes cannot transmit COVID-19).  Effective measures for waste management and cleaning are a must in every way, at any time.

The other measure that is possible to take in advance is to stockpile equipment that comes in useful in the event of an emergency such as these pandemics. After all in our own lifetime the COVID-19 pandemic is just one of several such pandemics. There ought at least to be a sufficient quantity of masks and gloves in stock, and expensive as they are, as many ventilators as possible.

Every hospital needs a protocol, similar to that (which should be) in place in case of fire. Events such as the current pandemic require strict isolation. Detailed plans for this isolation are urgently required, plans involving points where the patients will enter from, where they will be directed to and treated, how they will leave, as well as effective plans for disposal of infected substances. It is NOT possible to determine these at the last minute.

The hardest hit at times like these are the poor, as they are almost on every occasion. Funds must be set aside for such contingencies along with a detailed plan for distribution.

One of the major factors that has surfaced in this, as in many other event, is the role played by the clergy.

It is the government that is the elected representative of the country. The clergy– and other organisations– are not. As such it is the government’s responsibility to ensure that the electorate is as safe from harm as possible. Otherwise, as Muhammad Malik so pertinently enquired, who is responsible in the case of disaster, and the PM accepted that he, as the Prime Minister was. That dialogue incidentally resulted in much furor which ended up in Malik apologizing for some reason. Perhaps he was made to. Anyway.

When events such as the current pandemic take place, isolation is crucially important as has been pointed out. Infection spreads in crowds. As such, all places where crowds accumulate must be temporary shut-down. Therefore schools, cinemas, bazaars, malls, restaurants, and as many offices as possible, these have been shut down. Mosques must be included in this list of places to be shut down. This is up to the government to decide, not the clerics. As it happened this time, the President asked for a fatwa from Al-Azhar, but when it came back saying that yes, mosques should be shut down, the Pakistani clerics did not accept it. It puts one in mind of US President Donald Trump who was intent on not shutting down contact with the UK because that is where his businesses are located.

In Dubai, congregational prayers have been suspended for the period of one month, and the later lines of the azzan there have been amended to say ‘“Al Salat Fi Buyootikum,” which means ‘pray at home’ instead of “Hayya Alasalah” which means ‘come to prayer.’

These decisions are for the people’s representatives to make. Clerics are neither qualified nor elected to represent the people. A government that cannot stand up to them, not once but every time, is not strong enough, and whatever such a government says, is not likely to raise morale in any segment of society. A genuinely strong government on the other hand is capable of raising morale. There is the added advantage of such a government being good for the country.

THE LATEST PANDEMIC

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/03/22/the-latest-pandemic/

The world is not new to pandemics. 165 to 180 AD it witnessed the Antonine Plague, probably smallpox. It killed about 5 million people. The Bubonic Plague in the 14th century killed about 200 million. Over centuries other plagues followed. There was SARS in 2003, and HIV-AIDS which has killed almost 35million persons.

In 1917, the year before the end of the First World War, hospitals and camps in several countries were crowded with injured soldiers and civilian casualties of war. It was said that in France a 100,000 soldiers came in and out of just one of its many hospitals.

That was when a new disease started spreading around the world, as a result of which many people died. It was identified as a strain of the ‘flu said to have started in infected poultry and transmitted to the pigs. Another opinion is that it went from birds to humans, and from there to the pigs.

As a result of the First World War, people moved around more than they would normally have done at the time and they carried infection from one place to another. There were also many injured persons who were more vulnerable to infection. The crowded hospitals and camps provided ideal conditions for the spread of this disease.

The USA was lucky that epidemic was never dubbed the ‘American ‘flu’, even though the 1918 ‘flu is said to have started in the USA, a position supported by several historians. But since it occurred so soon after the end of the First World War, censorship following the war played down its effects in the UK and USA to maintain morale and played up its effects in Spain – which had been hit hard but had not participated in the war.

China in that instance saw the fewest cases of this flu in contrast to the Covid-19 this year.

That ‘flu spread around the world, assuming pandemic proportions in 1918.

It is estimated that as a result of this pandemic anything between 17 to 100 million persons died around the world. At least 12 million people died in British-ruled India, about 5 percent of its population at the time. A large section of the world population today has at least one ancestor who died of the ‘flu at the time.

The situation then was eerily similar to the present when the COVID-19 has immobilized much of the world.

So, the world has been there before, and this situation in which we find ourselves is nothing new. Have we learnt anything from those pandemics?

Almost all those pandemics had a ‘pre-human host’, birds, rats, fleas, pigs, camels, and others, creatures that spread the infection to humans. So you would expect that we would already have better control of food source. Diseases require quarantine facilities, attention to hygiene, and afterwards care both financial and medical. Thousands of years later, none of these things are at a satisfactory level.

Scientists and medical personnel have played their role. Cures have been discovered, and doctors and nurses regularly put themselves in harm’s way. But have governments done their job?

The pandemonium and scramble to deal with COVID-19 testifies to the fact that we are ill equipped to deal with such a crisis which can and does arise at any time, with no warning.

In Pakistan medical facilities are woefully inadequate to deal with routine matters. At this time when we need them most we find ourselves to be short in every sense of the word. What has the government, and more specifically the Ministry of Health, been doing instead of preparing for eventualities which are by no means unusual?

The situation in hospitals in the Punjab would be comical if it weren’t so critically dangerous. There is no protocol in place in case of such an emergency, such as the protocol in place for events such as fires. People have no idea where to get themselves tested from and are shunted from window to department in search of the correct destination. Kits are in short supply, although that is understandable, given that this is a new form of virus.

There are only a handful of ventilators, even though these are urgently required in any form of respiratory illness. There is no concept of quarantine, neither among the staff nor the public, and the state of hygiene is as abysmal as always. The administration and bureaucrats are busy passing the blame to anyone but their own selves.

The situation has been compounded as always by the religious fraternity which has refused to allow mosques to be shut down for the period of this emergency. So although people have been asked to isolate themselves as much as possible (not possible in case of the less affluent segment of society) they congregate every Friday and pass the virus around.

Perhaps the most disgusting of all has been the oath-taking ceremony of the Chief Justice of the High Court on the March 19, which hundreds of invitees attended seated cheek by jowl in the city where Section 144 has been imposed. Clearly the law does not apply equally to all.

But infectious diseases are much less discerning.

A MUCH LARGER SCHENGEN

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/03/15/much-larger-schengen/

• The world-state is still far away

It may be a joke that the US President Donald Trump imagines Schengen to be a place ‘somewhere out there in China’, but he may well do so, given the rest of his misconceptions, even worse than the idea that we have been ruled by Turks for 600 years. Yet, the idea of Schengen, although it may be restricted at present to an area comprised of just 26 European states with no border or visa controls like one big state, and even though the ‘one big state’ is only for the purpose of international travel: you get a Schengen visa and you can visit any of those26 states– that idea makes you stop and think. Would something like that, even more than that, on a much larger scale, be possible? Like a much larger, much more powerful Schengen;

Civilisation after all seems to have been moving from a scattering of individuals towards a conglomeration of individuals into a single unit, the unit getting larger and larger until who knows, unlikely as it seems at present, one day Dante’s dream of world government may come true. Even ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian Kings dreamt of ruling ‘all that the sun encircles.’ Somewhat flawed as to the science if encircle means to travel around, but the idea was out there.

Those scattered groups of humans went on to form tribes, which still exist today, although today they are part of one State or another. Before that it was after hundreds of years of living as independent tribes that Sumer came into being around 4500 BC, and what might have been the first ever city, Uruk. Uruk had some 50,000 to 80,000 citizens living in approximately a 2.5 sq mile area surrounded by walls. The region in was what is now Iraq, east of the Euphrates River. There were no countries at that point.

Not many people know much about San Marino or even of its existence today, but that was the first country as we know it, and it came into existence a few thousand years after Sumer in 301 BC. Its constitution, which was written in 1600 AD, is one of the oldest in the world. Today it is one of the world’s smallest countries, a tiny mountainous area entirely surrounded by Italy. But from a single country the world went on to many, and then groups of several nations banded together for various reasons, for example the African Union (AU), the Commonwealth of Nations, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and others, with the European Union as the most recognized, with its open borders, single currency, and unified economic policy.

When the League of Nations came into being after the First World War it was unable to prevent the Second World War. Around then came Communism at its peak, and the United Nations which came into being after the Second World War with its most important feature, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The UN’s members consist of almost all the recognized countries of the world, that is 196 out of 199. But it seems unlikely that even the United Nations as it exists today will be able to prevent a third world war if it comes to the point. The United Nations must widen its remit.

Several persons including Gandhi, Bertrand Russell and Einstein were keen to allow the UN to grow towards becoming a world federal government, but for now it is still restricted to aiming for international justice, peace and security, fostering economic cooperation, education, and providing a meeting point for the nations of the world.

The idea of a single entity is now more than appealing. It appears almost inevitable with the means of transport we now possess, and the communications technology at our fingertips which is almost impossible to control. In fact communications and viruses have been thumbing their noses at authorities today, crossing borders with impunity despite controls, respecting neither regulations nor differences. The list is likely to grow.

After Dante, many people have advocated world government. Kant, Ulysses Grant, and even Lord Tennyson, who said: “…in the Parliament of man, the Federation of the world. There the common sense of most shall hold, a fretful realm in awe. And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapped in universal law.”

There was also William Gladstone, Friedrich Nietzsche, and then later Bahaullah, the founder of the Baha’i faith. Bahaullah apparently ‘envisioned a set of new social structures based on participation and consultation among the world’s people, including a world legislature, an international court, and an international executive empowered to carry out the decisions of these bodies.

Bahai’s great grandson described Bahai’s vision of a world state as per the Bahai faith as ‘the world’s future super-state’ with the Bahai faith as the ‘state religion of an independent and sovereign power.’

And this is where the problem comes in.

Of the factors that would prevent a world state, two of the most major are likely to be racial and religious constraints.

Unless the major religions can be brought to sit at the same table without each trying to eliminate the other, unless governments that build walls against other nations can be taught to build bridges instead there can be no such thing as a single unified independent and sovereign force that includes all the people of the world. And till that happens, war is likely to be the method of choice in resolving disputes.

People can be taught racial non-discrimination, but can they be persuaded to leave religion out of matters of State?