Daily Times

The leaders of the Social Democratic Party addressed a corner meeting in Ibrahim Hyderi village in Karachi on 12 September. They also took a round of the village along with the local community leaders. What we witnessed was shocking. An historic village of fishermen existing since centuries was in a sorrowful state of neglect with narrow and broken roads and streets and overflowing sewerage. As in the rural regions of the country, the population of over 0.5 million people of this village is deprived of drinking water, steady electricity and gas supply, functioning public schools, healthcare centres including maternity homes. The poverty is endemic. The livelihood of the people mostly depends on fishery. For couple of years, we have been hearing the tales of the corruption of billions in the Fisheries Department of Sindh with its senior officials facing National Accountability Bureau. The Department never thought of developing the fishery-related industry to enhance the income of fishermen.

This under-development is not restricted only to Ibrahim Hyderi village. All the historic villages falling now within various districts of Karachi suffer from the same callous neglect of the provincial governments since decades. For that matter, all the cities and towns of Sindh have the same problems. The callous rulers of this country have employed all repressive, coercive and exploitative measures to subdue the people to bear with bad governance. Rather, they have reduced them to a despairing state of resignation where they prefer to suffer and sulk in their miseries than confronting the corrupt rulers. When the general masses fall into social and political apathy of this depth, it becomes difficult for the society to maintain its existence. The Governor of Massachusetts in 1780 famously said; “when the government fails the people, the latter have a right to alter the government and to take measures for their prosperity and happiness”. One wonders when the people of Sindh will be ready to do so.

The elite have been increasing their power and wealth and keeping the poor electorate on crumbs condescendingly thrown to them. They face insensitive administrations; the inhuman law enforcing agencies and callous judiciary

Most of the period of independence, the country was governed by military dictators. In the shame democracy that follows every dictatorial regime, the so called elite who have been shamelessly partnering with every autocratic regime, capture power and state resources pursuing more blatantly anti people policies and practices. What consequences this bad governance has resulted in. The elite has been increasing their power and wealth and keeping the poor electorate on crumbs condescendingly thrown to them. They face insensitive administrations; the inhuman law enforcing agencies and callous judiciary. Poverty, disease and ignorance have been intertwined with their destiny from generation to generation. Sindh and Balochistan have been more poignantly suffering from this social and economic asphyxia. The Bhuttos and Sharifs, claiming to be democratic though, have had the chance of forming many a provincial and federal government in the country from 1972 – 2018. They have miserably failed to improve the social and economic conditions of the people of Pakistan.

Sindh mostly ruled by Pakistan People’s Party has been pushed into an abysmal depth of misgovernance characterized by callous neglect of the constitutional rights of the people to education, healthcare and safety of life and honour. The Thana culture has worsened into frequent police encounters – half fry and full fry (phrases describing crippling or killing of a person in police custody); the primary and secondary education has been reduced to a farce; the university campuses have mushroomed filled to the brim with party sympathizers to the peril of merit picking up Vice Chancellors and other senior ranks more for their connections with the ruling elite than their academic qualifications;; appointments on contract are galore to the ridicule of the Supreme Court verdicts; the corruption in the senior ranks is endemic with some of the senior officials being on bail before arrest; the professors are more interested in administrative assignments than teaching.

A few Universities of good repute have fallen victim to the ethnic division in Sindh. The Sindhi speaking students have been rarely making it to the Karachi University and Dow Medical University (DMU). During the heyday of MQM in the Musharraf era, Governor Ishrat ul Ibad exercised untrammeled powers to appoint Vice Chancellors and control admissions in both the Universities. The students from the rural districts of Sindh were denied admissions and hostel accommodation. Some years ago, the Legislative Assembly of Sindh reversed powers of Chancellors of Universities from the Governor to the Chief Minister. With this reversal, it was hoped the students from rural Sindh would have the much awaited relief in their ordeal for admission and boarding. Their hopes were shattered when the female students of DMU from rural Sindh were forcibly dragged out of the hostel of DMU on the pretext of Coronavirus epidemic.

Now that the federal government has announced to start the academic activities from 15 September, the Sindh rural students are running from pillar to post for hostel accommodation. They have approached politicians, political parties and civil society leaders for help. The social media is awash with statements and appeals to the provincial administration for the redressal of the predicament of the hapless students. But all this is apparently falling flat on deaf ears.One wonders how long the poor people of Sindh will bear with the political trickery and financial impropriety of these leaders. They have long paid the debt they owed to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto. What remains of the PPP today is a crowd of arrogant, callous, corrupt and shameless thugs masquerading as saviors. Nothing has escaped their loot and plunder. Poor Bilawal has been set on the task of haranguing the federal government with no time to see around what is really happening in his home province.

Confucius had rightly said, “In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of”. Our political leaders are an absolutely shameless lot. The people have to throw them into the marsh lands of the Arabian Sea.

The author was a member of the Foreign Service of Pakistan and he has authored two books