Daily Times

Sir: Sometimes it is quite frustrating to see persistent and mindless contradictions among the Pakistani elite on whether they are political or religious leaders, or whether they represent the superior judiciary. On February 13, 2013, several news items caught my attention, further proving my point. Pakistan’s religious parties have once again insisted the government open a dialogue with the Taliban while in the same breath, they blame India, Israel, the US and other western countries for ongoing terrorism and mayhem all across the country. On the same day, the Jamaat-e-Islami and Tehreek-e-Insaf refused to attend the ANP’s All Parties Conference (APC). The ANP called this conference on February 14, 2013 to discuss a single-point agenda: how to deal with the ever-increasing terrorism in the country. No one can dare to ask these parties that if the West is responsible for terrorism in Pakistan, why do they wish to strike a deal with Taliban? Even if the Taliban do matter in this equation, then why walk away from discussions to deal with the situation?

It was reported on February 13 that a first ever Pakistan-origin lawyer and parliamentarian, Yasir Naqvi, has been sworn in as minister of labour in Canada’s most populous state, Ontario. Yasir was elected to the legislative assembly in 2007 and within five years he is now a minister. On the same day, Pakistan’s Supreme Court (SC) dressed down Dr Tahirul Qadri and threw out his petition against the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP). Interestingly, Qadri’s petition was not discussed on its merits. In fact, there were no discussions at all on the petition’s merits. Instead the court kept questioning Qadri’s loyalty to Pakistan as he holds both Pakistani and Canadian nationality. His petition was dismissed as being inadmissible. It seems the SC will be forcing millions of overseas Pakistanis to worry about their rights in their mother country.

MASOOD KHAN

Jubail,

Saudi Arabia