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| India-Pakistan |
| Governance overhaul |
| 2015-02-20 |
| [DAWN] WHEN a building collapses in Pakistain -- and sadly this happens often -- and people lie there injured and dying, the inevitable debate begins about whether the building was constructed as per approved standards. A factory catches fire, literally reducing to ashes over 250 lives because no fire exits were available for those working there and the fire crash tenders called in to extinguish the blaze are unable to do so. A school bus carrying children breaks down on the road resulting once again in injury and death because, of course, the bus was not certified as roadworthy. Quite literally, to add insult to injury, in all three examples when the dead and injured are finally taken to the emergency department of the nearest government hospital to be treated, the staff is found to be barely qualified and ill-equipped to deal with such a large number of patients. So what are we to make of this never-ending cycle of neglect and incompetence? Well, staring us in the face is the fact that the state and all its requisite parts are becoming increasingly incapable of meeting the challenges of governance. We talk a lot these days of Pakistain's existential war against militancy, extremism and terrorism; however, our children are unable to attend school because their parents cannot afford to send them there; these children end up at madressahs where they are willingly provided with shelter and food, as well as a paranoid worldview which is more dangerous than anything else. |
| Posted by:Fred |