As another dreadful spree of mayhem and bloodshed unravels in Karachi, it seems that the Pakistani state has lost the capacity, will, cohesion and the confidence to put an end to this gruesome violence and ruthless slaughter. The police, Rangers and the state security forces are riddled with corruption and have become partners in crime. They have lost the morale in this war of attrition where crime and terror is linked with those in the echelons of power. Hordes of criminal gangs, land and property grabbers, mafias and vicious extortionist groups with political patronage are on a rampage. It is the ordinary innocent citizens who are being killed and maimed in the crossfire of these criminal gangs in their riotous lust and competition for loot and plunder. The only sections that the state gives protection to are the top industrialists and the city’s aristocracy who are behind this ethnic conflagration that is spilling innocent blood. It is no wonder that the security companies are doing the most roaring business in the city. After all, like electricity generators, the rich can buy those facilities that the state fails to provide. The small shopkeepers and street vendors are not only forced to pay the extortionists but now they are being forced at gunpoint to collect extortion money from their surrounding markets for these gangs related to different political parties. And once a certain ethnic mafia is paid, soon the gangsters of the rival ethnic gangs appear on the scene and demand their booty. The worst plight is that of the workers and the poor of different ethnic communities who are threatened by the bosses of their ‘own’ ethnic entity to pay up to fight the rival communities. During elections, these oppressed people are coerced in their shanty towns and ramshackle dwellings to give up their identity cards for blatant rigging. Fear and insecurity stalks the streets and neighbourhoods in this bastion of the Pakistani proletariat. With 72 nationalities, ethnic and racial groupings and religious sects, Karachi can only be unified on a class basis. But once that unity is achieved, with the unprecedented socio-economic crisis of capitalism that is proliferating in Pakistani society, the days of the rule of the present reactionary elite of capitalists, landlords and upstart mafia would be numbered. In reality the Pakistani ruling classes and their state apparatus have treacherously conspired for decades to break the class unity of the workers and the oppressed through ethnic, communal, racial, religious and nationalist prejudices manipulated through their agent provocateurs and state-fabricated political parties based on these prejudices. The PPP could have averted this bloody ethnic frenzy had its leadership not abandoned its founding programme of class struggle and revolutionary socialism. The policy of reconciliation imposed by the imperialists was a failure right from its inception. The alliance with the MQM was perfidious and opportunistic. The wounds of the conflict inflicted upon the party workers were too deep and could not be healed with unprincipled odious alliances with reactionary forces. Even during the stints of a coalition, the murderous conflict has continued to rage between the activists at grassroots level. This ‘on and off’ shameless saga of the PPP and MQM coalition has completely exposed the leadership’s mockery and deceit. The alliance with the ANP is not very different. However, with ideology taking a backseat, crime and corruption now rule the roost. With the worsening of the crisis the eruption of violence was inevitable. Under the present system this crisis is not going to abate and hence the mayhem will continue periodically in a downward spiral. Without the class unity of the oppressed of all nationalities and ethnic groups, these sinister forces will continue to pulverise Karachi. But what is happening in Karachi epitomises the situation throughout Pakistan. Balochistan is in the throes of a protracted civil war. In reality this is also in many ways a proxy war between the US and the Chinese in pursuit of the rich mineral resources and ports for the control of the waters of the Persian Gulf. So is the Shia-Sunni sectarian bloodshed being sponsored to a large extent by the Iranian and Saudi regimes to further their own regional hegemony. The total hypocrisy of the so-called Aghaz-e-Haqooq-e-Balochistan package passed by parliament is exposed by the state agencies’ ongoing killing of Baloch youth and political activists. The 18th Amendment is another facade. With all the ‘devolution’ of ministries and departments, nothing has improved for the masses. Health, education and other social needs of the people at large are in a state of continuous decay. With the aggressive privatisation of these sectors, more and more people are being deprived of these essentials, which any civilised state and society has a responsibility to provide. Now the ‘issue’ of the division of Punjab and the creation of new provinces is being staged by the media and the elite politicians. However, none of them have come out with a programme that can solve the burning social and economic problems of the Seraiki and other deprived sections of the population. Those who are not in power in Punjab are trying to gain their share of the loot by carving out new provinces, while the Sharifs do not want to part with chunks of the empire they are plundering. The induction of FATA into the mainstream political setup at this juncture is another diversion. With a ferocious war, the terrorism of the fundamentalists and the US drones brutalising the inhabitants living partly in medieval conditions, how could administrative changes make any difference in those hinterlands? Pakistani capitalism has utterly failed to bring large swathes of this region into the 19th century let alone integrating them into the modern world. The problem is that administrative and cosmetic measures cannot provide the social and material needs of society. One cannot become virile by dying one’s hair black. The malaise that has set in in society has its economic roots. The present system of imperialist plunder, the gargantuan military expenditure and capitalist exploitation leaves nothing for the vast majority of the people. Misery breeds corruption. The black economy, representing two-thirds of the total economy, dominates politics and the state. This reflects the failure of the Pakistani bourgeoisie to develop a modern healthy capitalist economy and its political structures. The present system has by now become a malignant cancer in this society. It cannot be treated by aspirin. It needs radical surgery to remove monetary covetousness and envious relations of property that are ripping apart the social fabric. Nothing less than a revolution, which abolishes the oligarchy of capital, can solve anything. Collectivised ownership of the economy and resources is the only way-out. The writer is the editor of Asian Marxist Review and International Secretary of Pakistan Trade Union Defence Campaign. He can be reached at ptudc@hotmail.com