A slight improvement

THE IMF’s balance-of-payments support and the government’s macroeconomic stabilisation policies might have mitigated the ‘sense of crisis’ seizing the nation in recent months. But these haven’t lessened anxiety among ordinary people and investors as the economy remains fragile, and vulnerable to internal and external shocks. For this very reason, the State Bank of Pakistan in its first quarterly (July to September) report has warned the government against ‘complacency’, urging it to carry on with prudent policies to regain stability and meet economic challenges.

The first IMF loan tranche of $3bn means that the risk of default on sovereign foreign loan obligations has receded and the foreign-currency stocks have improved. The sharp cut in energy and food subsidies and development spending under the stabilisation plan and improved tax revenue collection so far have helped slash fiscal deficit to one per cent of GDP during the first quarter from 1.5 per cent a year earlier. The decline in global commodity prices, particularly of oil, is expected to moderate the country’s import bill growth. It will eventually narrow down the current account gap from last year’s 8.4 per cent and curb inflationary expectations in the economy. The freefall of the rupee has stopped and the currency has regained some of the ground lost on the back of falling foreign-currency reserves and speculations of a possible sovereign default. The relatively better performance of kharif crops and the expected bumper wheat output is likely to ease supply side pressures. Together, these factors paint a much better picture of the economy now than a month ago in spite of the downward revision of GDP growth projections.

However, although any further deterioration in macroeconomic indicators appears to have been arrested, the difficult international economic and financial environment still poses many challenges to the economy. Globally, the slowdown in demand can hurt the country’s manufactured exports and neutralise the positive impact of reduced commodity prices on the current account deficit. Also, the international financial crunch can further clip Pakistan’s ability to tap international capital markets and attract foreign investment, impacting upon its foreign exchange reserves and forcing the government to borrow from commercial banks to finance the fiscal deficit. Domestically, the failure of the government to ensure the pass-through of decline in global prices to consumers, the elimination of energy subsidies and depreciation in the rupee value means that inflation will breach its target by a wide margin. Large-scale manufacturing has already shown negative growth due to slowing demand and the months-long energy crunch. So despite the easing of risks, the economy continues to be threatened by internal and external factors. The imbalances are still quite large and require sustained efforts towards resolution. Without these, the growth outlook will remain gloomy.

Will BD change its ways?

ALTHOUGH elections in Bangladesh have produced a landslide victory for Hasina Wajed’s Awami League-led alliance, political stability in this country of 140 million is by no means assured. No doubt there have been many positive elements in how the elections were conducted. Polling was peaceful and the revised electoral rolls have not been challenged. Turnout was good — 70 per cent, as reported. The Awami League’s massive majority in parliament should lead to the formation of a strong government that is not easy to destabilise. But elections are only one of the pillars of democracy that facilitate participatory governance. They are not an end in themselves. Going by the conduct of their election campaign and the past record of the two major parties, no radical change seems to be in the offing. Although populist issues were taken up at the hustings — corruption, terrorism and inflation — the rhetoric had a familiar ring. Moreover, there were no indications that past animosities are to be bygones and the earlier pattern will not be revived of the losing party spending its entire term in the opposition trying to disrupt the ruling party. Even before the results were announced officially on Tuesday, supporters of Khaleda Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party had begun to warn that they would challenge the fairness of the polls. If Bangladesh were to revert to the negative pattern of politics of 1991-2006, the country would once again become ungovernable and no problems would be solved.

One hopes that this time the major parties will act with greater responsibility. The military that determined the course of events since early 2007 has mercifully stayed away from the limelight. It wielded power from behind the scenes allowing a government of technocrats to run the day-to-day administration. Of course the army was under pressure from the aid donors to return the country to democracy at the earliest. The emergency has been lifted and the corruption charges that were levelled against the two leaders and had kept them in prison for a year have not been used as a pretext to edge them out of politics altogether. But wisdom demands that the two begums of Bangladesh should not test the military’s patience at a time when the army in Third World countries is not shy of taking the reins of power. The two leaders have a political lesson before them: in 1990 they could dislodge an army strongman by joining hands and working together — the only time they did so.

Rethinking zoos

WILD animals, if they are bred in captivity or made captive through some cruel stroke of fate, ought to be given sanctuary. They need to live in an environment that at least resembles their natural habitat. They can be a source of awe and wonderment for the onlooker but must never be treated as a means of amusement. But visit any zoo in Pakistan and you will see exotic species living — if you can call it that — in cages or concrete enclosures, listless or driven to neurosis, biting off their own tails, pacing about repetitively and plucking plumage in an involuntary frenzy. That is because they are seriously unwell, for the conditions they must endure are enough to drive any living creature insane. Animals in our zoos are poked and prodded by visitors who exemplify all that is callous about this country. Mental well-being aside, zoo animals are also neglected physically by apathetic, incompetent or resource-strapped authorities. Little surprise then that the mortality rate in Pakistan’s zoos is unacceptably high. We should hang our heads in shame because we have failed miserably in catering to the needs of the non-human animals entrusted to our care. Anyone who cages an animal should pause for a second and think how it would feel if the same were done to him or her.

Given our track record, Pakistan does not deserve zoos of any sort, public or private. If the photograph of the leopard languishing in Karachi’s Korangi-Landhi zoo that appeared in this paper a few weeks ago did not break the hearts of all right-thinking people then we have stopped being human. Cognitive skills may differ but animals feel trauma just like we do. What we have in this country are freak shows, not zoos where endangered animals are protected or bred for the propagation of the species. When animals die in our zoos we import replacements, as if they were spare parts, and the cycle of cruelty continues. The choice is clear: we should either run zoos the way they should be or not at all. There can be no middle ground.

OTHER VOICES - European Press

Church vandalism

Irish Examiner

Human tolerance is clearly finite... The Reverend David Crooks, the rector of the Church of Ireland in Newtowncunning-ham, Co Donegal, realised the ineptness of his Christmas message when he denounced as vermin the vandals who trashed his church on the night before Christmas.

Earlier in the year, other vandals broke into the church through a rear door and stole a safe. This time they wrenched the doors off and threw them over a hedge. The culprits should “get a birch where it hurts”, the Reverend Crooks said. One senses that he would give a whole new meaning to the term ‘turning the other cheek’. The exasperation of people at such vandalism and antisocial behaviour is thoroughly understandable and it is time that society took a serious look at the whole issue. All too often people no longer even complain to An Garda Síochána about vandalism, because they consider it pointless.

The gardaí, on the other hand, are exasperated because nothing seems to happen when they apprehend the culprits. If they are brought before the courts, they are let go with a mere figurative tap on the wrists, whereas a few lashes of the birch might leave a lasting impression on their warped minds at any rate. The lives of many people are being blighted by antisocial behaviour. Recently, when some young people were vandalising the home of Aidan O’Kane in Dublin, he gave chase and ended up being shot dead.

The media has been focusing on the banks and the health service, but vandalism and other forms of antisocial behaviour are just as important, because these can have such a devastating impact on the lives of people.

Many people believe that a decline in disciplinary standards can be traced back to the ending of corporal punishment in schools. That is probably a bit simplistic because the abuse of corporal punishment led to a great many problems itself, but the figurative pendulum has now swung too far in the other direction.

In places like Singapore, where the birch is still in vogue, they don’t have these vandalism problems. All too often vandalism is simply the mindless behaviour of louts deriving vicarious pleasure from destruction. If they were rewarded with the birch and the humiliation that goes with it, they might not think their actions were quite so ‘cool’.

Of course, this should be done in a properly regulated and appropriate manner. The problem is acute and it is time such issues were considered and debated seriously. — (Dec 30)

Plight of women in Swat

THE current situation in Swat is such that any sign of peace in the valley has been washed away. The people are living through the most miserable phase of its history. No doubt, the valley has witnessed invasions, turbulence and chaos from the time of Alexander’s invasion in 327 BC to the formation of Swat state in 1917.

However, at least in living memory the present chaos engendered by militancy has no parallel. It has adversely affected the physical and cultural environment, the economy, tourism, trade, governance and social life in the valley.

Unfortunately, in all this, women have been the worst sufferers. The militants’ obscurant version of Islam begins and ends with womenfolk. According to their belief, women are the source of all sins. A cleric while delivering the Friday sermon in Marghazar village was heard telling his flock, “My fellow Muslims, listen! The prices of daily commodities are rising because women abandon their homes and loiter about in the markets.”

In fact, the Fazlullah-led militants have announced a complete ban on female education from Jan 15, 2008 on FM radio. Some days ago, they announced that no government or private educational institution would be allowed to enrol girls and that all schools and colleges should stop educating them by Jan 15. Schools found violating this ban would be blown up. Taliban spokesman Muslim Khan somewhat modified the announcement saying that schools would remain closed until an Islamic curriculum was devised for imparting education to girls.

Parents and students have lost hope of schools reopening in this volatile atmosphere. The militants have usually been seen to follow up on their words and, despite the army’s presence, there have been no signs of the restoration of peace and harmony.

The militants have bombed or torched more than 100 girls’ schools and colleges to forcibly stop 80,000 girls from going to school in the district. There were 10 high schools, four higher secondary schools and four degree-awarding colleges and a network of primary schools across the district for girls and women, besides a postgraduate institution for young men and women to study at the master’s level.

Against the culture of keeping womenfolk away from development, the rulers of Swat state (1917-1969) encouraged female literacy, the first step on the way to progress, by establishing girls’ schools and colleges. The valley had the highest female literacy rate as compared to neighbouring districts.

After the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan, their repressive activities started getting support in the Pakhtun areas of Pakistan along the Durand Line. Swat is among the more recent victims of Talibanisation. The secular nature of Swati society is slowly and gradually leaning towards extremism.

The clergy first started speaking against girls’ and women’s education through unauthorised FM radios and at public gatherings. But as they got more emboldened, they attempted to stall female education — and eliminate the presence of girls and women in the market — through fiercer means including bomb blasts. Many schools have been destroyed in this way.

Then they turned their wrath on women doctors and the female nursing staff in hospitals warning them to observe strict purdah, confine themselves only to wards for women and not to attend calls on their cellphones. The medical superintendent of a group of hospitals complied with the order and circulated a notice to the entire female staff telling them to do as they had been told. Women patients and visitors were also advised to conform to Taliban instructions.

Militants also ordered the segregation of students at the Saidu Medical College, telling the principal to keep away women students from research labs after a certain time. Meanwhile, another college refused to take in women because of the continuous threats of the militants from 2007 onwards. Militants regularly monitor hospitals and colleges. In fact, working women and those attending school or college, or going to the doctor or in the marketplace are given a bad character by the militants.

Indiscriminate mortar shelling has hit houses and killed and injured civilians. In these, the toll for women casualties has been higher since they are more often at home, while unannounced road obstructions or curfews have made sudden medical emergencies, especially among pregnant women, difficult to be attended to. As a consequence women have lost their newborns as they have not been able to make it to the hospital in time. Besides, with their men also casualties of militancy, many of them are losing breadwinners in the family.

The threatened closure of educational institutions has proved to be the last nail in the coffin. The mindset of the militants — who routinely resort to the violation of fundamental rights in order to accomplish their goal — is clear and their misused and illegal authority has led them to establish a state within a state. Swat is not a no-man’s-land and is very much an integral part of the country. By tradition its inhabitants are not religious bigots. In fact, society in Swat is more civilised and accommodating of opinions than the rest of the Pakhtun belt. Islamabad should understand that and break its silence to take assertive action against the militants if it does not want Talibanisation to engulf the area and paralyse the entire structure of society.

Where are all the international and national human rights organisations and women rights groups? They must raise a collective voice against this victimisation of Swati women and girls. It is also time for the media to take drastic steps to highlight the current lot of Swati women whose repressive treatment should also serve as a wake-up call for women parliamentarians to take an active part in rescuing them from the spread of a venomous culture.

udyana64@yahoo.com

Small is beautiful

FOR the past decade, Britain’s biggest museums have relied on blockbuster exhibitions featuring numerous well-loved masterpieces to draw in visitors and shore up attendance figures.

But now, the director of a leading art gallery is urging galleries to rethink the way in which major shows are staged by offering up a single work of art rather than the usual rooms crammed full of gilt-framed Monets, Turners and Caravaggios.

Sir Nicholas Penny, the director of the National Gallery in London, who has previously criticised the growth of blockbuster exhibitions that offer up major artists, is now advocating recession austerity for 2009 with major exhibitions consisting of a single work of art.

In some cases, he says, numerous images shown together, such as in some exhibitions focusing on religious works, it could be off-putting. “There’s something comical about having a line-up of the Virgin and Child. It’s not a beauty competition. These religious works of art would gain from being shown in isolation, because it re-emphasises their sacred purpose,” he said.

This policy could also be one of the ways to bypass the gloom of recession which will bring with it a reduced ability for gallery directors to buy new works or pay for expensive loans from abroad with which to stage exhibitions.

He favours new ways of staging exhibitions, especially in the present economic climate, with rising transport and insurance costs in loaning works of art. There is increasing competition for the number of exhibitions and the opportunity to have them. He would like to stage one or two picture exhibitions in the future.

Visitors, he thinks, might better appreciate a work of art if it was hung in this singular way. One example was a special exhibition currently at the gallery, consisting of two works by Titian which have been brought down from the National Galleries of Scotland as part of a fundraising campaign.

The show had not only attracted extraordinary crowds but public attendance had lasted longer, with visitors standing in front of the paintings for considerable lengths of time, sketching the works or debating their merits.

It was a ‘two picture exhibition’, just two works in one room, and it was a major event which drew incredible numbers of people. It is about learning to look at one picture and that is what people did, they stood for a long time and looked, puzzled over it, drew it, argued about it.

Next year, a single, large-scale installation by Kieholtz, Hoerengracht, will go on show alongside an exhibition of religious sculptures from Spain, called The Sacred Made Real which Sir Nicholas says would be “sparsely displayed”, as well as works by Picasso in February.

Sir Nicholas believes one of the most successful episodes in the history of the gallery had been its “single picture” shows during and after the Second World War.

“The smaller pictures were coming back from storage to the National and people had been starved of paintings. Only one masterpiece would come back at a time and be shown. This was the most famous episode for the gallery,” he said.

— The Independent