We need to look only as far as Sri Lanka to learn what is in store for countries that live beyond their means and are eventually unable to meet debt payment deadlines as and when they appear. Finally, after months of very violent clashes, Sri Lankan protestors broke all barriers and security cordons around the presidential palace and Columbo and stormed it. This means that the Rajapaksa dispensation, which is barely hanging on by the skin of its teeth, is definitely counting its last days, if not hours, in the office. Yet it’s not as if there will be another head of state and all will be well immediately in the island country. The road to better times runs through painful reforms, which it must prepare for. The big difference is that even by the most liberal calculations Sri Lanka’s population is not more than 40 million people. When the economy breaks and the poor spill out on the streets and threaten the very seats of power, a lot also depends on how many people with nothing to lose have decided to put everything else aside and grab whatever can be found. Pakistan’s economy is no doubt on the same path as Sri Lanka’s was not too long ago. We are also no longer able to meet repayment obligations till somebody lends us the money for it. And with $38-40 billion in debt payments due over the new fiscal, it’s anybody’s guess how the country will manage to stay afloat for too long. But when, in the worst-case scenario, people start venting their anger on the streets here as well, we will have a much, much bigger problem than Sri Lanka. We have the fifth-largest population in the world, and a lot of them are very poor, and at the moment they are like a powder keg that can be set alight with the slightest spark. It’s very unfortunate, therefore, that the government and opposition are not working together to save the economy and, by doing so, keeping a lot of people out of harm’s way. Over here, the opposition is doing everything possible to undermine the government, in a reversal of roles from just a few months ago, with the result that the people suffer the most, as usual. If we can learn one thing from Sri Lanka’s severe tragedy, it’s that the so-called charter of the economy is urgently needed and government and opposition parties alike must step forward and do whatever needs to be done to turn the economy around. *