From David Warren and the Ottawa Post
http://www.davidwarrenonline.com/index.php?id=827
….
The creed of the PPP — “Islam is our faith, democracy is our politics, socialism is our economy, all power to the people” — consists of three calculated lies followed by a howler. A more honest creed might be, “Government of the Bhutto, by the Bhutto, and for the Bhutto.”
…
I have been reading much rubbish in celebration of Ms Bhutto’s life. A number of my fellow pundits have further provided personal memoirs: it seems dozens of them were her next door neighbour when she was studying at Harvard or Oxford or both.
She was my exact contemporary, and I met her as a child in Pakistan, so let me jump on this bandwagon. I remember her at age eight, arriving in a Mercedes-Benz with daddy’s driver, and whisking me off for a ride in the private aeroplane of then-President Ayub Khan (Bhutto père was the rising star in his cabinet). This girl was the most spoiled brat I ever met.
I met her again in London, when she was studying at Oxford. She was the same, only now the 22-year-old version, and too gorgeous for anybody’s good. One of my memories is a glimpse inside a two-door fridge: one door entirely filled with packages of chocolate rum balls from Harrod’s. Benazir was crashing, in West Kensington, with another girl I knew in passing — the daughter of a former prime minister of Iraq. They were having a party. It would be hard to imagine two girls, of any cultural background, so glibly hedonistic.
…
Faced with the actual problems of Pakistan, she twice made a disastrous prime minister. Her death obviates a third term. But the legacy creates as large a mess. She tutored her supporters to blame President Musharraf for any harm that might come to her, so that when Al Qaeda pulled off the murder, they scored twice. In addition to killing a hated symbol of Westernization, they set the mobs not against themselves, but against Musharraf. As I have argued before in these columns, for all his visible faults, Musharraf has been dealing to the limit of his abilities and opportunities with the actual problems of Pakistan.
Good news, for once…
Edhi is free to go
http://dawn.com/2008/01/31/top6.htm
Edhi gets back his passport
By Masood Haider
NEW YORK, Jan 30: US immigration authorities have returned the passport of prominent social worker Abdul Sattar Edhi and issued a new green card.
Mr Edhi said on Wednesday that he would head home some time next week. He thanked Pakistan’s print and electronic media for highlighting his plight.
According to a Pakistan Embassy official, Mr Edhi has been advised by the US authorities to stay ‘longer’ the next time he visits the country so that his green card and American citizenship issues can be resolved.
Mr Edhi’s new green card is valid for only one year, even though normally there is a 10-year limit.
Giving an interview to Dawn after collecting his travel documents from the authorities at the JFK airport, he thanked Pakistan’s New York consulate, embassy in Washington and the Foreign Office in Islamabad for helping him out.
The US immigration authorities had confiscated Mr Edhi’s passport and green card on his arrival in New York on Jan 10, saying that the green card was obsolete and an investigation would be launched into his trust. The homeland security office had also issued a date for hearing on Feb 20.
But following the outcry over the situation in the media, the US authorities relented and handed over Mr Edhi his papers.
Mr Edhi said: “I have to settle some issues before returning to Pakistan next week”.
He died so others could live….
A PAF cadet chooses to stay with the plane and save innocent lives, rather than eject and save himself.
http://www.dawn.com/2008/01/25/letted.htm#2
http://philscanvas.wordpress.com/2008/01/25/in-essence-stop-the-bitching-and-whining-and-do-something/
Edhi faces travel Problems
Maulana Edhi, a virtual saint among men, is apparently having entry problems stemming from an inspection at JFK. What a pity that this should happen to such a man.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7215145.stm
http://www.nation.com.pk/daily/jan-2008/30/index9.php
http://www.dawn.com/2008/01/30/top7.htm
An American in Pakistan
I’ve always mantained that Pakistan is a lot safer than the media would have you believe. That’s been the opinion of every single American we’ve hosted – about 20 over the past 2 decades.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=20081\28\story_28-1-2008_pg7_41
American hunter surprised by Pakistani hospitality
Urges Americans to visit Pakistan without any fear
PESHAWAR: Sam Jaksick, an American hunter, was surprised by the hospitality and cooperation extended to him by the people of Pakistan during his hunting tour here.
Talking to reporters at the office of NWFP Wildlife Department Chief Conservator Dr Mumtaz Malik after hunting a Markhor in Chitral district under the Trophy Hunting Programme, Sam said, “I was concerned due to the media reports about Pakistan, but after visiting the country, I realised that such reports depict a wrong impression about the people of this country.”
He said when he informed his family and friends that he was going to Pakistan to hunt wild sheep, they were surprised and tried to persuade him to change his plan. “However, my passion of hunting forced me to face all sorts of challenges and when I got here, I was relieved to see the hospitality and passionate behavior of the people of the area,” he said.
Visit Pakistan: Sam also urged his countrymen to visit Pakistan without any fear. “I have not seen anything here like what we have heard about the people of this country, specially NWFP,” he said. Speaking about his excursion to the rugged and hilly terrains of Chitral, Sam said he really enjoyed it but had faced some difficulties due to the extreme cold in the area.
Sam Jaksick, who lives in Reno, Nevada in the USA, said he was an experienced hunter and liked hunting Markhor in Chitral district.
Did not realize how underpaid the British police could be….
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/01/19/npolice119.xml
Why bobbies are marching to a different beat
The problems actually started way back in 1919 – the last time the police went on strike over pay and conditions. Then, they had no pensions and the top rate of pay for a Metropolitan constable was 48 shillings (a skilled shipyard fitter earned 68s 4d a week). The Army was deployed on the streets to keep order and the police won the increase they wanted; but it was a Pyrrhic victory. To stop anything similar happening again, legislation was introduced to prohibit the police from joining a trade union, taking industrial action or belonging to a political party.
With no industrial muscle, the police’s pay again began to fall behind that of other workers. By the 1970s, the miners and the dockers – and almost everyone else – went out on strike, but the police could not. By 1978, when a committee chaired by Lord Edmund-Davies was convened to consider the issue once more, their pay was so low that some officers were on supplementary benefit because they earned less than £2,000 a year.
From Time Immemorial
From The Times.
Boris Johnson
Why do you cycle and talk on your mobile at the same time?
“Just as I will never vote to ban hunting, so I will never vote to abolish the free-born Englishman’s time-hallowed and immemorial custom, dating back as far as 1990 or so, of cycling while talking on a mobile.”
Glad to see the Supreme Court of Pakistan reign in its suo muo jurisdiction
Not to denigrate the very real problem of inflation the average Pakistani is facing. But then not even my Lords can repeal the laws of supply and demand…..
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=20081\25\story_25-1-2008_pg7_23
SC dismisses suo motu case of price hike
ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a suo motu case initiated by sacked chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry on price hike in Islamabad and Rawalpindi, saying that it was not the job of the SC to fix the prices of commodities. The SC bench consisting of Acting Chief Justice Muhammad Nawaz Abbasi, Justice Muhammad Qaim Jan Khan and Justice Mian Hamid Farooq observed that the suo motu did not fall under the jurisdiction of Article 184 (3) of the Constitution. The suo motu notice into price hike was taken on June 25, 2007 on a news report stating that prices of the daily-use items had increased alarmingly and there was no administrative check on them. Abdul Hafeez Pirzada, counsel for the Sugar Mills’ Owners Association, told the court on Thursday that the NAB in its report had admitted that an inquiry was initiated against those responsible for the increase in sugar prices, but it had stopped the inquiry without nominating anybody. The acting CJ said the court could not ask for initiation of inquiry against anyone, as control over prices was the duty of the market forces and not of the court. Attorney General Malik Qayyum the court could not influence the issues related to market and the case did not fall in the suo motu jurisdiction. staff
For once I agree with Dr. Irfan Zafar….
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=20081\25\story_25-1-2008_pg3_7
The election manifestos of nearly all the political parties have somehow forgotten to raise the most haunting historical issue: the settlement of East Pakistan’s Biharis (not even considered Pakistanis) in Pakistan. …. These immigrants supported the Pakistani army, sided with the West Pakistani establishment and contended that they had migrated to a homeland for Indian Muslims, not to a country based on Bengali nationalism, and went against the roughest of tides. In return, the Bangladeshi nationalist militias hunted them down during and after the bloodbath of 1971.
Those who could not leave after the fall of Dhaka have now lived in excruciating conditions in the refugee camps of Dhaka for decades. Many have died a natural death, and a whole new generation has grown up, married, and produced children; all under the illusion that a day will come when they will set foot on their cherished homeland Pakistan.
Pakistan houses millions of refugees and illegal migrant workers, but unfortunately these two hundred thousand men, women and children cannot be accommodated. These people continue to pay the price for their forefathers who were on the wrong side of the political divide many years ago. Who will fight for these forgotten souls remains a question for a country that is still struggling to arrest further disintegration.
DR IRFAN ZAFAR
Islamabad
Chaudrys villified for what others have always done
More Nonsense Bemoaning the Ethnic polarization in Pakistan, and as always, blaming the poor Punjabi.
http://thenews.jang.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=92774
However, I believe that the blame for this lies at the feet of the politicians of the “smaller” provinces, which have never ceased to vilify the Punjab and demonise the Punjabi. In the rioting following the death of Nawab Bugti for instance, the parliamentarians of the smaller provinces were not prepared to offer a single word of sympathy to the innocent Punjabis being killed in Balochistan.
History shows that such vitriol invariably generates a backlash. And if the late Mohtarma can be exalted as a symbol of the federation despite blatant appeals to Sindhi chauvinism, why fault the Chaudrys for trying to pick up a few votes now that the shoe is on the other foot?
