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Voice of People
Women education
Tayyaba Kamran
Educating women is the need of the time. If properly educated, women
can work far better inside and outside the house than those who are
not educated. Inside the house, they enhance the quality of life by
giving education to children and by participating in planning a proper
size of the family. Outside, they can provide financial support as
productive individual. Unfortunately Pakistan is one of those
countries where literacy rate is very low, especially among women. Out
of the total, 25 per cent institutions are for boys and only 21 per
cent for girls. Although in recent years the literacy rate has
improved, still this rate for women (42 per cent) as compared to men
(65 per cent) is very low and can be considered a major hindrance in
full utilisation of human capital. Highest participation is in Punjab
while the worst condition is for the NWFP and Blochistan. Human
resources of a nation play an important role in its economic and
social development rather its capital and material resources. So there
is a dire need to increase proportion of women in education for viable
future of the country.
—Sargodha
Stemming tide of militancy
E Anwar
This refers to a news item stating that the Prime Minister has
empowered the Chief of Army Staff to take all steps, which he would
deem necessary, for stemming the tide of militancy in the tribal areas
of Pakistan. The news item was frustrating, to say the least, as
keeping the wisdom of past aside, the politicians are once again
dragging the army in the matters which should have otherwise been
dealt with by the civilian authorities. These politicians as well as
members of civil society have been repeatedly stressing during all
these years that the army should remain confined to its barracks. And
now quite contrary to these demands, the political government is
itself asking the army to come out of the same barracks and take on
the job of the government. Matters in the tribal belt need to be
resolved through dialogue alone if we truly want to have a
satisfactory and long-lasting solution. But the last chief of army
staff, who was incidentally the self-proclaimed president of Pakistan
too, tried to resolve it through the barrel of a gun and today the
situation has worsened to such an extent where whole of the tribal
belt is up in arms. Instead of having corrected the past mistakes, the
present government has also adopted the same policy and has once again
entrusted the job of dealing with the defiant tribes to the incumbent
chief of army staff. The prime minister should be reminded that
dealing with our own people is a very sensitive matter and he should
himself take the responsibility to redress their grievances. I would
like here to quote former prime minister of France, George Clemenceau,
who led the country in the First World War, that war was “too serious
a matter to be left to the generals”. If war, which is a primary job
of the army and for which it is duly trained, cannot be left to the
generals alone then how can peace, which is the domain of civilian
authorities, can be left entirely to the generals? It seems that the
prime minister has given the blank cheque to the chief of army staff
at the behest of our American ‘friends’. He is, however, requested to
reconsider his decision in the interest of the country and strive to
seek resolution of the issue in a peaceful manner.
—Islamabad
Foreign tours
Masood Akram
The Foreign Ministry must clarify who is paying for Mr Zardari’s
foreign tour. Are his expenses met by the Foreign Office or the PPP is
bearing the cost of its Co-Chairman’s visit to Turkey? Why is it that
whenever there is a crisis in the country — and we have more than our
fair share — Mr Zardari heads for a foreign destination? When it was
time to fulfil his commitment he made with Nawaz Sharif at Bhurban, Mr
Zardari went to Dubai on a personal visit. When the PML-N leader was
declared ineligible to run for a National Assembly seat and later a
military operation was launched on the outskirts of Peshawar against
miscreants, Mr Zardari considered it best to leave the country and
discuss region’s ‘security situation’ with the Turkish authorities. He
should either give his lieutenants full authority to decide on crucial
matters or stay himself in the country to resolve such affairs
amicably.
—Sialkot
Life in Lyari
Sqn Ldr (Retd) S Ausaf Husain
This is with regard to a report “Women in Lyari wait for a farishta”.
Lyari is hostage to notorious gangs and a hub of all types of criminal
activities. These gangs are blood-thirsty of each other and do not
tolerate any interference by their rival gang or even by the police in
the area under their control. Hence, a never-ending war between these
gangs is going on in Lyari for the last six to seven years. Clashes
between these gangs are common in which innocent people, including
school-going children, are killed and injured in crossfire on the
streets of Lyari. Sadly the police and law enforcement agencies have
failed to control the activities of these gangs. In such an extremely
poor law and order situation in Lyari, women and children are the
worst affected part of the local population. Most women after the loss
of their male family members in the ongoing warfare are forced to
assume the role of the head of their household. The report rightly
said that feeling quite insecure, women of Lyari are praying day and
night for some ‘farishta’ (angel) to descend from the heavens to rid
the area of the scourge of these warlords. The state of affairs in
Lyari shows that the Karachi administration and the police have not
been able to find any solution to the warfare for bringing permanent
peace in the area. The elected representatives of the area and NGOs/
human rights organizations need to show greater interest in solving
Lyari’s problems and this has to be done sooner than later.
—Karachi
Job extension
Engr Amjad Hussain Malik
I would like to highlight the complete disinterest of the government
in state-run corporations which continue to be headed by highly paid
M-1 and M-2 grade officers who have been re-employed after their
service ended in the military and civil bureaucracy. Most of them are
average-performing civil servants and are interested only in sticking
around. The government should say goodbye to these officers since they
have already had a full career in government service.
—Rawalpindi
