Re-enacting Iraq?

THERE is a frightening resemblance between “intelligence reports” prior to the American invasion of Iraq and the kind of claims US officials are now making about Iran’s role in Iraq. As a prelude to the invasion of Iraq, the information fed to the media turned out to be fake. Much of it was exposed by the western media itself and included such bizarre lies as the 45-minute warning time, the uranium trail to Niger, and “intelligence” based on a student’s PhD thesis, part of which was actually downloaded from the internet. The idea behind feeding false information to the public was to prepare the world for an attack on Iraq on the plea that Baghdad possessed weapons of mass destruction. However, the truth about Iraq’s WMDs became known when the team of UN inspectors led by Mr Hans Blix reported after “intensive and intrusive” inspections that they had found no “smoking gun”. But the invasion still took place. An unfortunate aspect of this was the cooperation which some sections of the media lent to their governments to prove that there was a link between Al Qaeda and the Saddam regime.

Now the same drama is being re-enacted with regard to Iran. President George Bush and his officials claim from time to time that Tehran is involved in violence in Iraq, especially against American troops. The Republican administration once came out with the precise number of people killed in a given period because of Iran. The allegation that Tehran is meddling in Iraq’s affairs is in addition to the perennial charge that it is helping terrorism. The two charges seem designed to make a case for war against Iran. If the aim behind the Iraq invasion was to destroy the country Israel perceived as its major enemy, the aim behind attacking Iran is not only to destroy its nuclear facilities but also to destabilise the country and effect a regime change which can be accomplished through resort to force and by inciting the regime’s opponents to revolt, thus causing domestic strife. The Mossadaq regime was overthrown not through an attack but by a CIA-engineered coup that brought the Shah back to power. Already, America is in close touch with the Mujahideen-i-Khalq. Some of the most sensitive pieces of intelligence on Iran’s nuclear programme have been provided to the CIA by Iranian dissidents.

Fortunately, unlike the Iraq case, powerful sections of the American media have expressed scepticism about the Bush administration’s intelligence reports about Iran’s involvement in Iraq. Even the New York Times — no friend of Iran’s — has questioned the authenticity of the intelligence reports being fed to the media and warned against “another disastrous war”. The warning is based on common sense. America is already overstretched from Afghanistan to Iraq, and there is no possibility that the situation in either is going to be normal in the near future. To attack and destabilise a large country like Iran, located in the heart of the Middle East, would be more than “disastrous”. This will be insane and spawn an anti-American wave that will sweep off all “moderate” Muslim regimes and hit American interests everywhere in the Middle East. That in such a scenario America will be able to install a compliant, Shah-like, regime in Tehran is not only to ignore harsh geopolitical realities but to take leave of one’s common sense.

Another fire in Karachi

MERCIFULLY no one was killed in the fire that broke out on Sunday morning on the eleventh floor of the Pakistan National Shipping Corporation building in Karachi. The flames rapidly engulfed the upper portion of the 15-storey building, making it difficult for firemen to douse the fire till late at night. Luckily, the day being a weekly holiday, few people were injured, although some of the firemen fainted because of the dense smoke. As an inquiry into the cause of the fire gets underway, it would be useful to reflect on the poor state of the fire department and the faulty construction of buildings in the city that can make fire-fighting operations a complicated and dangerous task. In the case of the PNSC, the insufficient length of the hoses and height of ladders and the inadequate pressure of water, in addition to narrow emergency exits inside the building contributed to the difficulties in fighting the flames. Rescue operations were also held up by the failure of the building guards to produce clearly marked keys to the doors of the burning offices.

Evidently, the city and the PNSC administrations have not learnt a lesson from the disastrous fire that broke out a month ago in a garment factory located in the SITE area. Several people were killed and rescue work was hampered by the collapse of the factory roof. It is necessary to revamp the fire department by increasing the number of fire tenders and rectifying the shortage and poor quality of fire-fighting equipment, besides providing firemen with adequate protective devices. Equally, in a city where poorly constructed, illegal structures are mushrooming, it is important for the KBCA to show greater vigilance in enforcing building rules so that high-rises are properly planned and have fire extinguishers and marked exits to make it easier to handle a crisis. There is also a greater need for coordination between the building administrations and fire departments. It is a pity that there are no fire drills in our schools and offices. These are essential to providing instructions on safe evacuation in the event of a fire.

Rising cell phone thefts

THAT 1,967 phones were snatched or stolen in the first fortnight of this month in Karachi makes for depressing reading, especially when compared to last year’s figures for the same period. Whereas 750 cell phones were snatched and 1,055 stolen in the first two weeks of February last year, this year the numbers are 829 snatched and 1,138 stolen. This is a sharp rebuttal of the claim made by the law enforcement agencies which routinely say that they are working hard to combat this crime. It also shows that the anti-mobile phone theft device, which was implemented on Sept 30 by the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority in an effort to arrest the number of phones being stolen, has failed to make an impact. This could be because users are still not aware of the anti-theft device and the procedure required or they may just not be registering their complaints with the police. In either case, the solution is simple: publicise the information as much as possible and encourage people to step forward and report the crime. This may not necessarily result in containing thefts but it will at least help the authorities figure out a better strategy to deal with the problem. For example, if authorities are able to figure out which areas record the highest number of snatchings and when, they may be able to deploy more police personnel in those areas. The authorities will have to come up with innovative ideas to deal with this menace because so far existing methods have proved a failure.

The PTA too will have to assess the performance of the anti-mobile phone theft device system and ask why it hasn’t received the results it had hoped for. It must, for example, ensure that all mobile phone companies are complying with PTA demand that would make sure that this system is effectively put in place. The agencies that do not stand to financially benefit from the anti-theft system should be penalised for not complying with PTA rules.

Higher education: the other side of the picture

THIS is with reference to Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy's article titled ‘HEC's unconvincing mega projects’ published in the February 10 edition of Dawn. Dr Hoodbhoy has painted a very bleak picture of the entire Pakistani higher education system.

Though himself a scientist, he has been emotional in his approach and largely unscientific in his analysis. Note the sweeping opening sentence of his article: “The on-going efforts at reforming higher education are turning into a disaster.”

To support his position, Dr Hoodbhoy refers to an article titled ‘In Pakistan, the problems that money can bring’ published in the New York-based Chronicle of Higher Education (January 2007). It may be noted that though the Chronicle is an influential magazine, it is not a professional peer-reviewed journal. The above-mentioned article is not based on empirical data nor does it contain any references. It is just a piece based on the private and subjective opinion of an individual. Can such a publication be presented as evidence of the failure of higher education in Pakistan?

Admittedly, Pakistan is a developing country and its institutions of higher learning need much improvement. Unfortunately, for the last 50 years, higher education has been grossly and deliberately neglected. As a result, our universities have turned into centres of power politics, violence and chaos. This is the painful reality. But chest-beating is not the solution. They must be reformed. For this, one needs to start somewhere and at some point. Reforms entail various risks and dangers of misuse of resources and corruption. But this is a part of the game; we have to pay the cost.

Dr Hoodbhoy has fiercely and unjustifiably attacked the HEC for opening new engineering universities. He has predicted doom for the planned universities because of the non-availability of qualified teachers and perceived poor planning. He fears that there is no way to attract competent engineering teachers to Pakistan and every effort in this direction is bound to fail.

He is also critical of sending thousands of Pakistani scientists to western countries for training. At the same time, he is sceptical of the quality of the local Ph.D programme. Further, for him expatriate Pakistani scientists also perform poorly under a foreign faculty hiring programme. However, after all this gloom and doom, he does not tell the reader where the solution lies.

While criticising the HEC, Dr Hoodbhoy terms the foreign faculty hiring programme a failure and notes that “Past experience of bringing faculty from abroad has not been good. There is scarcely a white European or American to be found in any Pakistani universitythe overwhelming majority of the foreign faculty comprises academic mercenaries from Russia, Ukraine, the Central Asian republics, as well as expatriate Pakistanis”.

I am not arguing that the foreign faculty programme is an absolute success but it does attract many scientists from other cultures. The programme infuses academic plurality and intellectual diversity in our otherwise monotonous campus life. All over the world, academic exchange programmes are encouraged for the cross-fertilisation of ideas and the programme under discussion has achieved this objective to a large extent.

For the last five years, Pakistan has witnessed a spectacular expansion and growth in the sector of higher education. Of course, this has raised many questions about the quality of education and the credibility of degrees. But one thing is for sure: both state and society have realised the importance of education and are willing to invest in it. In this context, a few points need to be kept in mind:

First, there is no need to predict doom and gloom about Pakistani universities. Despite all inadequacies, every year, thousands of Pakistani university graduates get jobs or admission in foreign countries and perform fairly well.

Second, when a new institution is established, many people try to abuse it. Nonetheless, if it is allowed to function, the system corrects itself through its internal dynamics. But wrapping up the system or killing the initiatives driving it in the fear of failure has never been a constructive approach. If one looks at the history of prestigious universities like Harvard or Oxford, one finds that they started out as ordinary institutions, and institutions, like living beings, undergo an evolutionary process: they need time, resources, and resilience to attain growth and maturity.

Third, modern information technology has globalised the world of science and scholarship. It has opened up new opportunities and options for learning, information dissemination and human resource development. Developing countries need to be proactive, open and vigilant to harness technological innovations to cut the shackles of poverty. For this, India and China have done well and Pakistan should follow suit. Instead of being cynical and negative, we should try to look around and grab opportunities. The best thing would be to develop an infrastructure for human development.

Few would disagree that Pakistan urgently needs many universities to teach science and engineering to its rapidly growing young population. At the beginning, the institutions may have problems, but gradually, the snags will be detected and removed. No society is without corruption and no initiative is without risks. But if we develop a habit of projecting everything in a dark light, we would not be able to take any initiatives.

Let us welcome the multibillion project of establishing some engineering universities in Pakistan. For the last 60 years, we have spent billions of dollars on defence. Let us spend a couple of billions on universities as well. Let us assume that, in the beginning, these universities will not produce world-class engineers. Education is a public good and investing in this sector is a win-win situation.

Nobel laureate Dr Amartya Sen reminds us that spending on human development expands human capabilities which automatically reduce the space for poverty and misery. We need hope in order to progress.

The writer is professor of sociology at Punjab University.

Email: drmzakar@yahoo.com

Promises but little progress

When a leader insists that his country will stay in a dangerous place "until the job is done", the instinctive reaction is to wonder whether he means it. Tony Blair and Hamid Karzai, meeting in London last week, exchanged the usual vows. But both leaders know that the choices in Afghanistan are constrained by limitations of time, money, troops and political support.

A little more of each can no doubt be extracted but success in Afghanistan will come -- if it comes -- by a more skilful use of present resources and of the limited period before western electorates tire completely of the burden of intervention.

The problem is partly that the interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq have been so intimately linked. The ease with which Taliban forces were displaced in 2001 encouraged a misplaced optimism about the use of force in Iraq in 2003. Disasters in Iraq in turn affected the attention which the United States and its allies were ready to devote to Afghanistan.

It is true that greater success in Afghanistan would have had only a limited impact on Iraq, but the lack of it in Iraq has been directly damaging to Afghanistan. As a process of what has been called "Iraqification" gathered momentum in Afghanistan, with more suicide bombings, ambushes, and assassinations, the military response was slacker than it should have been, and reconstruction was neglected.

The danger now is that the exhaustion felt in the United States and Britain over Iraq will undermine what hope there is for efforts in Afghanistan. Interviewed on Sunday, Tony Blair made it clear he hopes to cut troop numbers in Iraq soon.

Mr Blair once said of the decision to go into the country in 2001 that he could not "recall a situation that has commanded so quickly such a powerful coalition of support". Over Afghanistan there was an international readiness to endorse, or at least tolerate, a military attack as the necessary prelude to rescuing a failed state and a damaged society. The follow-up was less than it should have been.

Even before they were distracted by Iraq, the Americans were only intermittently interested in the rebuilding of Afghan society, and their military effort went more into chasing Al Qaeda than ensuring security for ordinary Afghans. The division of military responsibilities between a fighting element and a peacekeeping element led on to today's difficulties in which a supposedly united Nato force cannot be flexibly employed because of caveats intended to keep many contingents out of harm's way. Pledges of aid flowed in, but the results on the ground were much less impressive.

Afghanistan became a place where governments could rhetorically demonstrate the solidarity with Washington that they had been obliged to withhold over Iraq, while discreetly limiting their real commitments. Nor are they entirely to be blamed. Iraq has made the public in western countries sceptical about all projects of intervention. Romano Prodi, the Italian prime minister, is a typical case, holding the line against domestic critics who want an Italian withdrawal from Afghanistan, but also resisting Nato calls for more troops.

—The Guardian, London