As we welcome 2025 and start the New Year with a bang – there is hope that this year Pakistan will outshine the previous year, this year missing will be the ones who passed away and not the ones who are still alive, this year the naysayers will be proven wrong and the soothsayers will be proven right, this year worry beads will be few and worries even fewer, this year fat cats will be less fat and poor mice will be less poor! One might expect Pakistan to be a land transformed by new technologies, modern policies, and a growing sense of national unity. But despair not dear reader, as we are about to discover, the trajectory of the country seems destined to stay remarkably similar to a hen trying to launch itself into flight! The hen and the country both will keep crawling on ground – at least, according to the nauseating wisdom of those who have been predicting change for decades. Buckle up, because in 2025, it’s business as usual in Pakistan. Islamabad will remain the palace of intrigues and deadpan expressions “What, is the country burning?” As cold hearted as the chills of the Margallas and as devoid of logic as in rebranding Twitter to X. Lahore will rise to the occasion to become the beacon of light in these trying conditions, if its light could shine through the smog and the myriad levels of political banners adorned by its main highways. Karachi will continue to swelter under a relentless sun, the air thick with the scent of exhaust fumes, biryani and despair. The city’s infamous traffic jams will achieve a new level of superiority, capable of instinctively creating their own gravitational fields to put a black hole to shame and trap unsuspecting motorists in a vortex of gridlock. In 2025 – Pakistan will remain a land full of contradictions where the new will keep on clashing with the old, the digital will collide with the ancient and Wi-Fi will clash with Why-Me? Development will remain perpetually around the corner, much like the elusive arrival of residential gas when it is time to prepare a meal. Progress will remain absent just as the obscure availability of electricity during load-shedding hours. In the New Year – the political landscape will continue to be a bewildering episode of “Squid Game” with politicians of all sizes and ages vying to grab power by climbing over as many dead bodies as needed. In this pursuit, they will use a bewildering array of tactics, from obtuse social media posts to outright bribery and backstabbing. It will continue to be a spectacle of dramatic re-runs and u-turns. Re-runs: love them or hate them, the political dynasties will reign supreme, ensuring that mere lip-service is provided to the notion of “fresh blood”. U-turns: same trusted family names will remain at the helm of party affairs and hold press conferences to announce their undying commitment to change but of course back tracking it with such guile later that it would put a champion twirling gymnast to shame. The rulers, having perfected the art of “gaslighting the nation” will convince the public that everything is actually going great, while the country teeters on the cusp of financial ruin. The country’s many opposition parties will hone the art of turning every single government initiative into a national scandal. Instead of aligning to the adage “we’re not in power, but we’re always in the media” they will transform their slogan to “we’re not in power, but we’ll make sure no one forgets it.” The silent “guardians of the galaxy” will continue to run the policy of a need-to-know basis – the less you need to know, the better for you! The circus that is the economy will keep providing international economists a perennial sense of amusement. Inflation may rise to such proportions where a cup of chai can only be bought with a small loan and a life insurance policy. The rupee may devalue to such an extent where it may be considered a realistic alternative to toilet paper – if ever toilet paper was in vogue in Pakistan! The stock market will continue to play out the game of “snakes and ladders” with no one knowing how it works and everyone and his uncle claiming that they have the inside track (andar ki baat). Skyrocketing prices would mean that the most expensive commodity will be honesty, followed closely by hard work and then an apology from the finance department for getting all of us in this mess! This year, the state of Pakistan’s infrastructure will be as stateless as it gets! It will be as half-baked as an uncooked apple crumble at a bake-off contest. Roads will be started but never finished, flyovers will be initiated but will “fly-over” nowhere, dams will again be damned! Along with Shalimar Gardens and other Mughal relics, the legendary potholes of Lahore will be a tourist attraction in their own right. Pakistan’s health system in 2025 will be a medical miracle, except when you actually need it! It will be a blend of luck and chaos – both available in equal measure. The healing will be done more on a wing and a prayer and less on cutting-edge technologies and skilful expertise. The education sector, not to be left behind, will be the saga of the blind leading the blind or in this case, the unread leading the unread. In schools, textbooks will be updated only when the printers run out of stock and have to print new ones, making history lessons about the Mughals feel like a very live conversation. Pakistan’s universities will be hotbeds of debate – but mostly about politics and whose uncle is in charge of the university. When students finally graduate, they’ll face a job market so saturated with degree-holders that it’ll make the search for a needle in a haystack seem like a pleasant diversion. In 2025, Pakistan will again be a place where change is promised, but will never be fully realized. The cities may never develop, political dynasties may never fall, the roads may never finish, and the economy may continue its rollercoaster ride – but in Pakistan, at least the ride is never boring. So here’s to the New Year – a year very much like 2024, a year like every other! Containing the same raft of challenges, the same hood-winking politicians, and the same convoluted traffic patterns. But don’t worry, one can always look to the next year! Pakistan will remain a land full of contradictions where the new will keep on clashing with the old, the digital will collide with the ancient and Wi-Fi will clash with Why-Me? The writer is Director Programmes for an international ICT organization based in the UK and writes on corporate strategy, socio-economic and geopolitical issues.