What price loyalty!

by Khurshid Anwer

Gen Kayani in a moment of weakness did the unthinkable, criticize Rahman Malik. The president in the hearing of all shouted, “How dare you, don’t you know he is my right hand man for all shady deals. Now come and see how I single him out for high praise (despite the risk of spontaneous laughter).

Similarly Mian Nawaz Sharif was injudicious enough to criticize Babar Awan, of the Punjab Bank fame. Here again the president came to the rescue, “How dare you, don’t you know he is Faustus to my Devil, he has sold his soul to me. He will not let even his religious piety stand in his way in service to me. He will lie hands down on Surrey Palace***. He will lie hand down on Swiss Cases. He will lie hands up under oath. He is a man after my heart. I wish I could invite you to show you how I will single him out for high praise.

*** Babar Awan crowed not many years ago that the government has not been able to produce proof of corrupt money being involved in the purchase of Surrey Palace. Meaning thereby that the purchase was kosher. Now that NAB has denied the existence of the Surrey Palace, is Babar Awan prepared to say under oath that Surrey Palace was not bought at all, black money or white money.

However there was one notable exception in the praise department. Ambassador Raisani of Syria has been faithfully following in the footsteps of Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto and Zardari Bhutto in employing relatives in lucrative government jobs and paying them top dollar. Surely he is due for some praise. Since he is also coming in for a lot of stick for rank nepotism. Perhaps he will be compensated with another school to employ his remaining relatives, and cronies if he runs out of relatives.

Let us see when this game of Kramer Vs Kramer started. This was when Bhutto was trying to woo over the awam:

tu mera chand mein teri chandni hooo hoho hoho ho

nahin dil ka lagana koi dil-lagi, koi dil-lagi

Of course politics is a serious business.

A engineering college friend was appointed MD of Lahore Foundaries by Dr Mubashar Hasan, the then finance minister who had also been our professor at the engineering college.

Very soon, against his protests, he was forced to employ dozens upon dozens of jialas against non-existent vacancies. The Balance Sheet soon went into red:

There was nothing right on the left, and nothing left on the right.

He was then asked to fudge the figures because it was not be shown that Bhutto Saabs nationalization was playing havoc with the industry all over the country. There was an epidemic of sick industries.

My friend resigned, became a heart patient, left PPP and joined Muslim League.

This is for those who still think Bhutto did not destroy Pakistan’s industry.

SOS Save Our Soil

by Khurshid Anwer

We are a nation of fools. We don’t know what dams are, why they are built, where they are built. We don’t know what barrages are, why they are built, where they are built. And the politicians exploit our ignorance to scare us into buying our votes.

Dams are built high up in the mountain valleys so that when the river is dammed, the valley fills up forming a natural reservoir. The dam is filled up only during the monsoons when surplus water is available, without interfering with the normal flow of the river. The dam has power and irrigation tunnels, through which the reservoir level and the river flow is regulated. Now how to use the surplus water which has been stored. It cannot be allowed to run down the river unutilized. This is where barrages ply an important role.

Barrages are built in the planes where water is needed for irrigation. They erect a low level barrier to raise the level of the river so that water can flow by gravity into the irrigation canals. Barrages too have regulating gates. But since there are no reservoirs at the barrages, the canals take water directly from the rivers. It is at the barrages where the rivers get depleted and not at the dams. The barrages subtract and the dams add.

Why the public does not know even these simple facts is because of our irresponsible media, both print and electronic. A letter comes to the newspaper editor saying that such and such dam is drying up my river and will make my city a desert. The editor prints it. Another letter comes saying, without dams industrial and agricultural growth will not be possible. The Editor prints that also.

No attempt at investigating reporting to find out the truth. In the west newspapers vie with each other to be the first to give the correct picture to the reading public on matters of national importance.

The same with the electronic media. The anchor person listens to one participant and then the other without interjecting in any intelligent manner. Obviously he doesn’t have a clue as to the subject in hand. Should the channel not have its own resident expert sitting in to interact with the participants and unravel the complexities for the confused public. No wonder it is called the idiot box, the good that it is doing now.

Is it too much to ask the media to do their homework on a subject on which depends the very existence of the country.

Fools we are and fools we will remain, with the active help of the politicians, and thanks to the media, both print and electronic.