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Shakir Lakhani

Shakir Lakhani

<em>The writer is an engineer, a former visiting lecturer at NED Engineering College, an industrialist, and has been associated with the petroleum, chemical industries for many years. He tweets @shakirlakhani</em>  

I no speak English!

Published on: January 15, 2020 11:32 PM

We should really be grateful to the selectors for choosing such highly intelligent people to rule over us. You know, like that genius who claimed that rampant inflation is actually good for the country. And the one who spoke openly about killing some five thousand Pakistanis to solve the country’s acute problems. Not to mention the lady who said that the untimely but welcome winter rains were due entirely due to the Great Khan being perhaps the only honest and upright man in the country. I wonder who she thinks is responsible for the dreadfully cold winter this year. Trump?

Our leaders’ recent pearls of wisdom are enough to make one conclude that the country is in safe hands. The advisor on commerce, for instance, has just claimed that businessmen are responsible for inflation. He said, “The business community is causing rise of inflation in the country” and asked them to make efforts to reduce it, according to a news item. What can I say?He should know, being the scion of one of those twenty two richest families in the country until forty years ago. So we were wrong all the time, it seems. Inflation isn’t caused by devaluation or the steep rise in energy prices. The high cost of diesel (which is used in trucks transporting goods), doesn’t cause prices of foodstuffs to increase. It’s really businessmen like meat, fruit and vegetable sellers who are responsible. So what can they do to reduce inflation?Give away their goods free of charge?

Our leaders’ recent pearls of wisdom are enough to make one conclude that the country is in safe hands. The advisor on commerce, for instance, has just claimed that businessmen are responsible for inflation. He said, “The business community is causing rise of inflation in the country” and asked them to make efforts to reduce it, according to a news item

Then there is the Dear Leader himself. After more than twenty two years of struggle, he’s suddenly realized that peace can only be found in the grave and that only in fairy tales do people live happily ever after. You could have fooled me. So all that yelling and screaming on top of that container was for nothing?

But that’s not all. He said those politicians who make speeches in English in our assemblies suffer from an inferiority complex, as most of their listeners don’t understand the language (apparently he doesn’t know that the Quaid couldn’t speak Urdu, so he always used English at rallies). As has happened so many times with the Great Khan, one of his own party men immediately did something which proved he didn’t agree with him. He appointed a simple matriculate as education minister in the Khan’s home province of KP. When asked why, he said the man was highly qualified as he spoke excellent English. That’s all? I’ve come across taxi drivers who speak very good English, much better than the National Assembly speaker who should stick to speaking in his mother tongue (whatever that is). I’m referring to his egregious accent, when he said, “Aaaaal those in favor, say aaaaaye!”. One wonders why he couldn’t have asked that question in Urdu. As for inferiority complexes, the next time Imran Khan makes a speech at the U.N., he too should speak in Urdu (or Punjabi, which really qualifies to be the national language, being spoken by seven out of ten Pakistanis). The leaders of France and Germany don’t make speeches in English at international forums, despite being fluent in it. Nor do the Chinese. It’s high time our Dear Leader shed his own inferiority complex, he should also make speeches in Punjabi in the country’s largest province, it will win him many more votes (assuming that the next elections are not rigged).

And finally, the Great Khan should watch the viral video of the senior-most police officer in KP lecturing students on the benefits of positive thinking. If that doesn’t make him immediately ban the use of English in the country, nothing will. In the meantime, I no speak English!

The writer is an engineer, a former visiting lecturer at NED Engineering College

Filed Under: Commentary / Insight

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