| October 25, 2005 | Tuesday | Ramzan 20, 1426 |
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PIA working
Qazi’s statements
AJK telecom
Birmingham consulate
Keeping power supply intact
Transparency International
Overemphasis on the friendship
Neglected school buildings
WE reside in the Al Mustafa Apartments in Islamabad’s G-8 Markaz, which had also suffered damage on Oct. 8 and from subsequent aftershocks.
Material fell off and cracks appeared on staircases and walls, and, we hear, inside some apartments. We understand CDA engineers as well as the engineers of the private construction company which built the building checked and declared the apartments safe. We know how objective and accurate such assessments can be.
The most amazing thing that has happened since the earthquake is that while before one could drop a bomb on the building management and not an eyelid would flutter, now it is listening to the demands of residents with great promptness.
We are told by friends that the managements of many other highrise buildings in Islamabad, including many hotels, are doing exactly this in order to avoid losing residents and market value.
The fact of the matter is negligence on this score is criminal, just like the killing of 75 people who died in the collapse of the Margalla Tower block. And those responsible for the deaths are all those involved in the construction and design of buildings, and those who later turn a deaf to the complaints of the residents.
ARSHAD GILL, GULNAR ZUMKHAWALLA & QAMAR ALAM ANSARI,
Islamabad
MR Ayaz Amir (Oct 21) is very right in suggesting that in this gravest of emergencies we need not spend $3 billion on F-16s and should instead divert this money for the service of the children of Kashmir and Hazara. In addition to that, instead of asking MNAs to divert their meagre development funds to the affected areas, won’t it be wiser to divert Rs29 billion from the defence budget to rehabilitation and reconstruction?
Remember this year the government increased the military budget by 15 per cent, which amounts to Rs29 billion. We do not know what compelled the government to make such an increase in defence expenditure at that time, but now since we are facing our history’s worst-ever natural disaster, it is time to set priorities right. This means giving precedence over everything to the security of the affected people, and providing food, shelter, warm clothes and medical treatment.
Millions of Pakistanis are struggling to survive — if we let them die, we as a nation will not forget ourselves or those in power.
MUSHTAQUE RAJPAR
Karachi
THERE are some areas in the earthquake affected regions that have either received scant attention or have remained unnoticed so far. For instance, in the Hattian tehsil of Muzaffarabad district, there is a village called Juskool. The close relatives of a friend of mine live in the said village. On hearing the news about the devastation caused by the earthquake my friend went to the village to enquire about the safety of his relatives.
He said that it was an awful sight that met him there. Almost the entire village of Juskool has vanished and all houses have been razed to the ground.
There is hardly any sign of life. Worse still, the casualties are still buried under the debris and the people have no equipment to recover them.
Even after a fortnight, the inhabitants of the unfortunate village have not received any help in any form. Now the situation is that the people of the village want to bury their near and dear ones but they are helpless.
Moreover the stench in the air is making the environment unlivable. The survivors have almost nothing to eat and they are undergoing immense hardship.
One shudders to think how many villages like Juskool would be crying out for help.
The government of Pakistan, NGOs, Edhi, Red Crescent or whosoever it may be, are requested to please take immediate notice of Juskool and many others like it. It may already be too late for them.
RAFAT MAHMOOD ANSARI
Islamabad
IT was very annoying to see the coverage of Gen Musharraf’s visit to Balakot on a private TV channel. During his speech, an old man stood up and complained that some people from outside were looting gold and silver shops in the now destroyed town.
A man dressed in white shalwar-kameez — he must have been an agencies man — pressed the shoulders of the old man and forced him to sit down. Gen. Musharraf’s reply was quite revealing. He said: “Babaji, aap aise 10 logon ko pakar kar unko ulta latkaein (You catch 10 such people and hang them upside down)”. Had that poor old man been so powerful, why would he have complained to the president?
M. ASLAM MEMON
Karachi
THIS is to my fellow brothers and sisters who have suffered much in the recent earthquake and its ongoing aftershocks. My heart=felt sympathies go out to all those who are and have been devastated by the loss of so many innocent lives and the devastation caused to future generations.
My prayers and the prayers of my fellow Australians are with you at this time.
NIGEL G. INNIS
Bunbury, WA, Australia
IN poor countries like Pakistan, people depend upon their relatives and other family members to recoup their lives after severe natural disasters like the earthquake of Oct 8.
In this case, however, whole families have been wiped out and there is very little in the form of support the survivors can expect in this regard. There is one way this situation can be eased. Pakistanis in general should come forward and adopt whole families of survivors.
One family or a group of families of those not affected by the quake can together adopt one family from an affected area. The adopted family can be provided with the basic needs of life including housing and the means to earn a livelihood. Zakat money can be used for this. This will help the affected people a lot and also reduce the burden on the national treasury.
AMIN AMDANI
Las Vegas, NV, US
THIS is in regard to a statement given by the president of the PML-Q, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, to a private TV channel on Oct 19. He said that the earthquake was a result of the evil deeds of the people in the affected areas. He said that it was punishment from God.
As if those poor people have not suffered enough, they have to hear such things from a politician. Who appointed Mr Hussain to be the interpreter of the event in any case? I thought politicians are there to calm people and give them hope and dignity.
I was happy to note that Makhdoom Amin Fahim and the president of Azad Kashmir (also on the same TV show) had the sense to call it a natural disaster and a test.
SANOBER HAIDER
West Windsor,NJ, US
EVERY day my job takes me to various parts of Karachi. The other day, while I was coming from SITE and going past NORE-I on Queen’s Road I saw tons of bags thrown on the side of the road and a collection tent not attended by anyone. The time was noon.
It seems that some of the donations for earthquake survivors made by people were just lying in the open on the road for anyone to come and take them away. As I drove past the Gizri signal I noticed the same thing there as well.
Then, in the evening after “iftar” I stopped with some friends to see a few young boys from a mosque trying on jackets and shoes that they had found from a relief collection camp situated on Tipu Sultan Road. Shouldn’t these have been sent to the affected areas? I wonder who the real beneficiaries of all this charity will be.
AMYN A. GHULAMALI
Karachi
THIS is with reference to Dr Sheikh Tanveer Ahmed’s letter (Oct 16).
In order to avoid chaotic working, a streamlined system had to be evolved where relief goods were despatched in the order of the priorities required in disaster struck areas. In this connection, PIA is working in very close cooperation and coordination with the designated government agencies in Sindh, namely, HQ 5 Corps and the Relief Commissioner, Sindh. Thus, the 5 Corps Headquarters first receives and then determines the priority in which PIA handles and dispatches cargo.
Since all available cargo space for Oct 13 and 14 was committed to urgent uplift of the already received cargo, no confirmation could be made to Dr Tanveer Ahmed.
However, the staff has been advised to be more sensitive to the requirements of those offering help like Dr Ahmed, provide them all assistance, and guide them accordingly.
CAPT HASSAN JAFFERY
General Manager Public Affairs & Communication
Karachi
I AM quite outraged to read Qazi Hussain Ahmed’s statements of late. First of all, his criticism of President Musharraf that “the president had not known the exact number of armymen who had perished in the disaster even after 24 hours”.
Maybe that was because the president was busy organizing the rescue operation for the people who were still alive and trapped under the rubble.
Secondly, Qazi Ahmed seems to be the only political or religious leader to bring up politics at a time when the whole nation is united and working as one. He kept on insisting that the president should resign and hand over all the powers to the civilian government. What has that to do with dealing with the crisis at hand is anybody’s guess.
And then the JI chief complained that TV artists and singers were going to raise funds through concerts, and that this was not the right way. To that I would like to say that I seriously doubt that the children who have not had food for more than a week and are sitting in freezing temperatures without a roof over their head care how the funds needed to end their misery are raised.
FAIZA ZAMAN
Karachi
I WILL like to draw attention to the poor state of telecommunications in Azad Kashmir. We have been deprived of a modern telephone system and its benefits such as cellphones and reliable internet services, which have become a part of life in other parts of Pakistan. The reason given was “security purposes”.
Result: When the earthquake hit the civilian telephone system of both Muzaffarabad and Bagh, managed and operated by the army’s special communication organization (SCO), collapsed and there was no alternative. Maybe if cellphones were available, many lives could have been saved as happened in the case of the Margalla Towers where calls and messages by those trapped in the rubble saved many precious lives.
Now the government of Pakistan has allowed all telecom operators into AJK but the SCO head has said that this is only a temporary move which will last for two months. Will another natural disaster be required to make these services permanently available to the poor people of AJK?
SAJJAD HUSSAIN
Mirpur
THIS refers to conditions at the Pakistani consulate in Birmingham. I went there recently to apply for my new child’s Pakistani passport.
Initially, as required, the first step was to get an NICOP card. The form needed to be attested by a Pakistani who had a computerized NIC. This took one day. The next day I went with the attested NICOP form and submitted it. No guidance was given by the staff to applicants. In any case, I submitted the application form for a passport and the fee. Surprisingly the staff was only taking cash (the standard practice in the UK is to use debit/credit cards, cheques, postal orders) and the consulate’s website had also said that cash would not be accepted. I had to leave the consulate briefly to go to an ATM machine and withdraw some cash.
When I went to collect my child’s passport, I discovered that his name had been written incorrectly. I was asked by a consulate official to wait while the name was corrected. But he served all the other people waiting before he crossed the name out with a pen and wrote the correct one, stamped it and gave it to me. At that point I also noticed that the passport’s date of expiry was the same as the date of issue.
When I pointed this out, the official told me that nothing could be done now. He said the person authorized to make the change was not at the consulate and had gone to the “police station”, so he asked me to come the next day.
I have lived in the UK for a long time and in that time I have never come across any situation where the English have behaved in such an unprofessional manner. I think that is the key to their success.
DR NAEEM
Worcester Royal Hospital Worcester, UK
A MONTH back there were photographs and reports in several newspapers regarding damage to a high-tension tower at the entrance to Karachi’s Port Qasim area. It remained in the news for several days and then it fizzled out.
KESC engineers and technicians first held up the sagging “live” wires with a crane, ensuring no disruption in the traffic on the main National Highway.
Steel wire bridges were constructed on both sides of the road in parallel. As soon as the wire bridge across the road was ready, the wires were gradually lowered on to it and the crane was removed. The construction of a new high-tension tower in place of the damaged one started slowly but picked up speed during Ramazan.
The wires were shifted from the bent pole on to the new pole without disrupting the power supply to Karachi. All the above jobs were done without using expatriates or sophisticated technology. They used their own jigs and their skilled manpower instead.
While we are quick to blame the KESC for any power outages, we must also recognize their good efforts in ensuring that power is not disrupted by such incidents. People who risk their lives climbing 150 feet up on the towers and hanging by a rope to hook up power for Karachi are our unsung heroes.
S. NAYYAR IQBAL RAZA
Karachi
TRANSPARENCY International has rated Pakistan at number 144 out of a list of 158 countries compiled by it in the corruption perception index (CPI) 2005. The CPI focuses on corruption in the public sector and defines it as the abuse of public office for private gain with the focus on bribe-taking by public officials in public procurement. The sources do not distinguish between petty or grand corruption.
Since Transparency International does not distinguish between petty bribe and grand corruption, it would obviously not take into account the difference in the bribe element of a petty official who charges $100 to give an electricity connection in a developing country and a big shaikh who takes 10 per cent commission as a sponsor of a multi-million-dollar project, say, an oil refinery being built at a cost of $1,000 million and in the process pockets a cool $100 million as sponsor fee. What rating would Transparency International give to a country like Holland where a member of the royal family was involved in a multi-million-dollar bribe scandal?
For that matter, what ranking would it give to Japan where ex-prime minister Tanaka was convicted by a Japanese court of law for taking bribes from a ompany? Nigeria has been given a rating of 1.9 in the corruption perception index whereas Pakistan has been given a rating of 2.1.
Having worked in both countries, I can say with conviction that Pakistan’s ranking should have been significantly better as the level of corruption in Nigeria far exceeds that in Pakistan. I also wonder as to what extent CPI takes into account the Washington lobbyist who entertains and bribes congressman on behalf of numerous countries. The corruption perception index is largely a matter of perception by the compiling agency, based perhaps 25 per cent on facts and 75 per cent on hearsay.
This is the reason the index is called a perception index. By compiling this list every year the agency ends up doing a lot of disservice to developing countries like Pakistan. It encourages a would-be investor shy away from countries like ours. Agencies like these along with the international print and electronic media will always gang up to target Third World countries by projecting and highlighting the shortcomings of these countries out of proportion to the actual ground realities.
With the opening up of the world economy, I am sure the level of corruption in the developing world will go down and the importance of CPI be will proportionately reduced.
SHIRAZ SACHEDINA
Karachi
“OUR militaries are working together. We will be with you, not today, but forever.” So said Condoleezza Rice, US Secretary of State (Oct 13).
The Pakistan-US relationship is nowadays being overemphasized as if to convince us that past setbacks will not be repeated.
The US secretary of state must not be unaware of the fact that politics is not static and every nation looks first to its own interests in the situation prevailing at a given time.
Saddam Hussein had been a great friend of America, and was incited to wage a long war with a Muslim neighbour. Pakistan’s entry into the US camp dates back to 1951 when our first prime minister paid a state visit to the US. And we witnessed our plight during the 1965 and 1971 wars.
After the break-up of the USSR, there is hardly any country which is not craving for America’s favours. If you are in Washington’s good books, you can have an autocratic system back home and enjoy unprecedented power. Therefore there is no option a country has but to seek American “friendship”.
GHEEWALA AGM
Karachi
THE death of hundreds of students in schools and colleges due to the earthquake on Oct 8 should be an eye-opener for the authorities concerned. It is true that man has never been able to predict earthquakes but making and enforcing masonry laws is not beyond his capability. If even now
the government does not review and implement masonry laws for construction and maintenance of buildings, specially schools, colleges and hospitals, it may lead to a catastrophe without a natural disaster.
I recently visited the Government Boys Primary School, Ranipur district, Khairpur Mirs, where I have studied. To my utter surprise, all walls and roofs had cracks, looking like a school in quake-affected areas.
Classes were being held in the open and in the verandahs. It is to be noted that the school was constructed in the 1970s and since then no maintenance has been undertaken, putting at risk the lives of 1,000 students and 80 staff members.
I hope the authotities will look into the matter.
AMIR HUSSAIN SOOMRO
Ranipur
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