The multiplying zeros
NOTHING seems to be going right for the Republic of Pakistan and the so-called `leaders` led by the supreme `leader` sitting atop the merry mass, are oblivious to their surroundings or to the perceptions held of them by their own people and those of other countries.
A man who was around in the days of Prime Minister Hussein Suhrawardy (1956-57) reminded me how, when forced by expediency to appoint an unsuitable man or a rascal as a minister he appointed at the same time an efficient `minder` to tag the man. Even in those days, there were far too many politicians with tarred reputations. Suhrawardy used to talk to my father, `Rustomjee` (as he called him), about the quality of the men he had to work with how many of them have ever read Shakespeare (some may even not have heard the name)? Then he would trot out Othello`s lament “Reputation, reputation, reputation. I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial! My reputation, Iago, my reputation.”
The remarks in last week`s column about the doling out of the brand new portfolio of post offices to Israrullah Zehri, the upholder of the murder of women, quaintly known in this country as `honour` killings, brought forth understandable reactions. Why do the women who sit in our parliament not protest? Why is there this strange silence? What, who, do they fear? By acquiescing to the appointment of Zehri and of Hazar Khan Bijarani they shed their self-respect and damage their reputations.
The man at the helm, the president, the be all and end all, Asif Zardari cannot weather the storm. The burdens he carries, one of which is his reputation, hinder him as much as they should be haunting him. In Saudi Arabia, whence he went with 240 `companions`, the king of kings closed doors that Zardari requested be opened and the succour asked for did not materialise.
As a sop, perhaps, he was invited to attend an interfaith conference held at a session of the UN General Assembly in New York, which he did (with how many `companions` we do not know), but he failed to attend a dinner hosted by the UN secretary general to which all the delegates had been invited.
And the presidential remarks about the US predator attacks inside Pakistan`s territory were somewhat unfortunate — “It`s undermining my sovereignty and it`s not helping win the war on the hearts and minds of the people ... anybody who comes to Pakistan needs to have a passport and a visa ... and if they don`t have a visa they are not allowed.” Why “my” sovereignty, one must ask?
Back home there is very little we the people can do in this environment physically, morally and in all manner polluted and corrupt. Ministers who have come from nowhere misuse and abuse their positions, caring not a whit for the plight of the people. For one, Minister Syed Khurshid Shah celebrated his son`s wedding in load-shedding stricken Karachi by lighting up the entire road in front of his house and the adjacent houses using `kunda` connections, with all other arrangements reportedly made at state expense (estimated cost for seven days Rs800,000). Well, why not? He is merely following suit. The grandiose Aiwan-i-Sadar was recently converted into a shaadi-bagh apparently for the wedding of the prime minister`s son, and the full presidential paraphernalia, flags and standards and uniformed staff not excluded, was brought into play — and all this again at our expense.
We have over 60 ministers, the majority of whom are undoubtedly following their leadership and not only making merry with the people`s money but playing havoc with the environment through their greed and selfishness. Islamabad, the now not so beautiful, is under attack and reportedly even the presidential palace is suffering, in part due to the paranoia about security and safety.
We have a new minister of the environment, Hameedullah Jan Afridi. How can he help? What can he do other than follow orders? We have a new minister of health, Mir Aijaz Hussain Jakhrani. What does he know about the subject of his portfolio? Is he aware of the state of the nation`s health and how the people are suffering from the neglect that accompanies poverty and the scarcity of medical care? He and the nazims of all our major cities would do well to heed the effect the environment has upon our health and learn how Mother Nature has her own cures.
A recent article published in Britain`s The Independent chose to reproduce findings from the medical journal The Lancet. They pertain to all those in this vast world who live in urban environments and have a particular message for highly polluted cities such as Karachi which has just been adjudged by a United Nations environment report as being amongst the 13 mega cities described as “atmospheric brown clouds”.
The `brown cloud` effect is frightening — apparently a three-kilometre thick `brown cloud`, a result of the burning of fossil fuels and biomass, stretches from the Arabian peninsula all the way to China and the western Pacific Ocean, and it threatens the health and food security of some three billion human beings and billions more animals upon which they depend.
The Lancet study, completed by university professors from Scotland, provides strong enough findings which should push planning authorities to consider making green spaces available in cities purely on the grounds of health and well-being. To quote “Populations that are exposed to the greenest environments have the lowest levels of health inequality related to income deprivation. Evidence suggests that contact with such environments has independent salutogenic effects....” Green spaces not only promote physical activity but “that contact (either by presence or visual) with green spaces can be psychologically and physiologically restorative, reducing blood pressure and stress levels and possibly promoting faster healing in patients after surgical intervention.... This study offers valuable evidence that green space does more than pretty up the neighbourhood; it appears to have real effects on health inequality of a kind that politicians and health authorities should take seriously.”