Daily Times

News of a PIA A320 passenger plane crashing just before landing in Karachi has sent the whole country into shock, and the prime minister has already ordered an official inquiry. The tragedy is made all the worse because the plane crashed just minutes before landing at the Karachi airport, and that too in a residential area, the Model Colony not far from the runway. The plane, according to news reports, was carrying about 98 crew and passengers in all and quite miraculously one of them seems to have survived. Yet at the time of writing information was still coming in and it was not known just what number of casualties were suffered in the residential area.

This must have been a plane full of people trying to get to their loved ones in time for Eid after such a long period of forced quarantine because of the coronavirus. And how cruelly their dreams were cut short just one minute of flight time short of the port city. Now we can carry out all the inquiries we like, but the families of these people are forever reduced to tears and anguish. Still, it is of the utmost importance that relevant authorities get to the bottom of this tragedy, if for nothing else then to make sure that such a thing never happens again. That is the least that the government owes its people.

Once the dust settles the debate will no doubt come to centre on the ability of the national flag carrier to do its job properly. For far too long it has represented all that is wrong with a bloated government entity that would not know the first thing about surviving in the modern competitive environment. Each government that takes office makes tall claims about just how it is going to restructure the airline and not just return it to profitability but also make it the epitome of market efficiency. And this government has been no different. In fact, it made the boldest claims yet just a few days ago about how PIA was just set to surprise the whole world. Well, it has shocked people, but we’re hoping that this is not quite what the government meant when it made those claims a few days ago. Clearly too much rot has already set into public sector enterprises (PSEs) to take the matter as a joke anymore. From hemorrhaging billions of taxpayer money every year, they are now graduating to killing people. If this trend is not checked and stopped, the government will be responsible for all that goes wrong. *