Afghans in Pakistan

dawn.com/news/1702123/afghans-in-pakistan

July 29, 2022

PAKISTAN’S western border has been famously porous through

much of the country’s history. But flows of migrants intensified
from the 1970s onwards, as Pakistan formally played host to
Afghans fleeing turmoil, conflict and dictatorial regimes.

At the height of the Soviet occupation, in 1986-87, there were an

estimated three million Afghans resident in Pakistan as per
UNHCR (the UN refugee agency) and government data. There
were no serious efforts to repatriate Afghans till 2002, when the
government of Pakistan began to work with UNHCR to encourage
Afghans to return to what was then perceived as a stable
environment.
The repatriation effort gathered steam after Pakistan started
closing down refugee camps in 2005, and the distribution of
rations, etc, stopped. However, the reverse flows began to peter
out after the Taliban resurgence of 2007-08. In 2021, according to
Nadra, there were 2.8m Afghans in Pakistan; 1.6m of whom hold
Proof of Registration (POR) cards identifying them as having
been registered with the UNHCR. The rest hold ACCs or Afghan
Citizen Cards, a form of documentation launched in 2017 to cover
Afghan migrants who were essentially undocumented.

Notwithstanding the relatively recent (POR card issuance did not

begin till 2006) efforts to document the number of Afghans in
Pakistan, there is little doubt that the numbers do not tell the full
story. A census of Afghan refugees was not held till 2005, 26 years
after the larger flows began. From 1979 to 2005, numbers were
estimated based on discussions with tribal elders and household
heads, who were asked to state how many family members or
dependents they had with them. These numbers were supposed
to determine the volume of rations given out, and were almost
certainly exaggerated.
In spite of the integration of Afghans into Pakistan’s economy, the official policy
is to treat them as temporary residents.

In subsequent years, as families settled in and grew; and more

marriages and births took place, this initial (likely) exaggeration
was almost certainly offset, however. The census of 2005 did not
reach many Afghans who were scared of talking to the
authorities and preferred to lie low. Meanwhile, inflows and
outflows continued over the years (the border fencing project did
not begin till 2016), many Afghans acquired Pakistani citizenship
papers, many children were born who have never known any
country other than Pakistan.
With more than 40 years having passed since the Soviet invasion,
the concept of who is Afghan has become fuzzy to say the least.
This is a natural consequence of a policy where Pakistani
authorities were initially a) reluctant to count exact numbers
coming in from Afghanistan; and b) reluctant to confine them to
camps. In fact, the latter was impossible given the tribal, familial,
linguistic and religious links with the local population,
particularly in the border regions.

There are other factors also which preclude the classification of

the Afghan community in Pakistan as refugees in the strict sense
of the term. Refugees are formally defined (as per international
law) as people who cannot go back to their homeland for fear of
persecution or death. However, Afghans had been moving back
and forth across the border with few restrictions from the late
1970s till 2016-17. Many of those who came to Pakistan as
refugees, and have been resident here for years, have also made
frequent trips back to visit relatives, get married, check up on
land and property, etc. Until recently, it was not a problem to
cross the border using the POR card, or the Afghan tazkira, or
indeed nothing at all.

In spite of the obvious integration of Afghans into Pakistan’s

economy, notably their presence in transport and logistics;
construction, retail and wholesale trade, and the food business to
name just a few, Pakistan’s official policy is to treat them as
temporary residents. Afghans are not allowed to own property or
businesses. Until recently, they were not allowed to open bank
accounts (this only changed in 2020) or have cellphone SIMs
registered in their names. They were not allowed to hold driver’s
licences — a fact that leaves one incredulous given that they
were clearly running a significant portion of the cross-country
freight business. In fact, Afghans have done everything that they
have officially been barred from, by circumventing official
protocols and using informal economic networks to their
advantage. This was inevitable given the extended stays in this
country, and the societal/linguistic links.

Pakistan is not a signatory to the Refugee Convention of 1951, or

the accompanying Protocol of 1967. The government of Pakistan
says that it has actually given the Afghans many facilities above
and beyond what the convention stipulates. This can be debated.
But what is true is that Pakistan, in spite of hosting a large
migrant/refugee population for over 40 years, has not developed
a comprehensive policy on what to do with migrants.

Pakistan adheres to international law in that it does not practise

forcible repatriation, at least officially. But there are still too
many unanswered questions. Why is there no path to citizenship,
and what purpose does it serve to not have one? Why were
people allowed to freely move around in the country and settle
here, yet not allowed to legally work or run businesses or own
property? How can one facilitate students to take examinations
when their parents do not have the requisite citizenship or
refugee status documentation?

It is important to start working on these issues. It does not serve

the larger interests of the state or society to host a large
population that is overlooked by social services or social
protection systems, is not documented and is perpetually
vulnerable to the whims of law enforcement and security
agencies. The recent protests by Afghan migrants in Islamabad
must be taken notice of, and a clear policy enacted.

The writer works on economic policy and governance issues.

safiya.aftab@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022

Deus ex machina? - Newspaper

dawn.com/news/1702124/deus-ex-machina

July 29, 2022

WHAT is happening to Pakistan? Anyone interested in the

question knows the answer. Who is to blame? Opinions differ.
However, there is broad agreement on the cast of culprits:
political leaders; political parties; political institutions; non-
political institutions; the security and intelligence establishment
and its institutions; the civil services; comprehensive corruption;
the dysfunctional state of the economy caught in a permanent
debt trap and outrageous inequality; complete external
dependency and a consequent lack of policy independence; a
general lack of education and a scientific outlook; the media
contributing to an uninformed, partially informed and
misinformed public opinion; the deliberate misuse of religious
fervour to obscure the true teachings of our faith; an obsolete
social structure preserved by a voracious and unaccountable
power structure; a judiciary that demands but does not
command universal respect; uncontrollable population growth;
irreversible climate change; a forever threat of nuclear
annihilation, a security environment that challenges rational
resource allocations; palliatives presented as solutions, etc.

We are taught that one should neither hate nor act in anger. This
is true as far as persons are concerned. But actions that
deliberately undermine the welfare of a whole people can and
must be hated. When they threaten the survival of a nation and
render its dreams and aspirations impossible they must be
confronted by the elemental force of rejection. If, instead,
political observers and commentators couch their opinions in
euphemistic and safely coded language they become complicit in
the perpetration of a national crime. They convey a pathetic
message of resignation, surrender and betrayal. There comes a
time when Faiz Ahmad Faiz has to give way to Habib Jalib. Either
Quaid-i-Azam was much mistaken or we are all complicit in
insulting his memory and murdering his legacy. We prefer,
however, to slander the father of our country instead of
becoming the citizens it required.

We are today, accordingly, reduced to being spectators of a daily

goon or puppet show in the guise of a morality play — without
any wit, humour or goodwill. There are no good guys in the
unfolding drama of our national tragedy. The Baloch are killed.
Their killers are martyred. When one political character
attributes unspeakable and unforgiveable crimes and
misdemeanors to his rival we know he speaks the truth. When
his rival returns the charges redoubled we know he too speaks
the truth. They are of course transparent partners in a single,
massive and lethal crime against the people and the country. So
what else is new? What should be new is the realisation that we
who are aware and do nothing are just as guilty. If one can live
with this realisation so be it. If not, we need to do what we can
and without delay. The chances are we won’t. The chances are we
have already lost our country. Unless…

Another wasted year of political posturing by rupee

multibillionaires representing their victims beckons. While the
US contemplates a climate emergency, Pakistan is beset by an
existential emergency that commands no contemplation. All the
challenges confronting Pakistan will be ignored. Technocratic
servants of the elite will continue to spin fairy tales about
stabilisation and progress invisible to the eye of the uninitiated.
They will be well compensated for dressing their employers in
the finery of their analyses and assessments. Other servants or
experts will do much the same in their own spheres. The people
must learn to eliminate the word ‘sarkar’ from their political
dictionary if they are to stand any chance against the forces
arrayed against them.
We are today reduced to being spectators of a daily puppet show in the guise of
a morality play.

When a country’s ‘leadership’ fails to address fundamental

existential issues at home it can have no external policy to speak
of. The rest of the world sees this and refuses to take its foreign
policy seriously, however well articulated and reasoned it may
be. Pakistan has itself become a major stumbling block to the
success of its principal foreign policy issue: a principled, peaceful
and lasting settlement of the Kashmir dispute with India that is
primarily and ascertainably acceptable to the Kashmiri people.
The Kashmiri people cannot defeat India although they have so
far heroically denied it the victory it strives for. Pakistan cannot
defeat India although its nuclear deterrence capability limits
India’s military options. A diplomatic stalemate maximises the
suffering of the Kashmiri people. The world is aware of India’s
perfidy in Kashmir but is simply not inclined to back a failed or
failing Pakistan against the gigantic market and strategic value of
what will soon be the world’s most populous country. China, for
obvious reasons will continue to back Pakistan against India,
while increasingly worried about Pakistan’s inability to learn
anything from the amazing experience of its most reliable friend.
The US sees Pakistan as a resentful puppet ruled by dependent
elites who will do its bidding even it undermines the confidence
of China in Pakistan’s resilience and strategic value.

In Afghanistan, Pakistan backs the Taliban which backs the TTP

which perpetrated the massacre of schoolchildren and teachers
in the Army Public School on Dec 16, 2014. The army today
engages with the TTP, which is essentially a Pakistani branch
party of the Afghan Taliban, while refusing to engage with the
Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement of Manzoor Pashteen which is a
Pakistani movement because of its protests against the bombing
of Waziristan. Pakistan has practically no support among the
Afghan political intelligentsia, particularly the educated youth
who are the future of the country. India has the field to itself.

These absurdities are the direct result of the state of the state in
Pakistan. Unless this state of affairs is addressed, foreign policy,
indeed all other aspects of national policy, will not be able to
develop coherence and credibility. This is all too clear to political
observers in Pakistan. But they are by and large easily resigned
to the prospect that this state of affairs will not be addressed —
and that they will themselves be complicit in this dereliction of
duty, citizenship and patriotism. Unless we await a deus ex
machina.

The writer is a former ambassador to the US, India and China and
head of UN missions in Iraq and Sudan.

ashrafjqazi@gmail.com

www.ashrafjqazi.com

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022

History lessons - Newspaper - DAWN.COM

dawn.com/news/1702122/history-lessons

July 29, 2022

“DO not follow in the footprints of your elders. Create your own
footprints,” is what Dr Mubarak Ali would exhort his students
when he began his academic career as a lecturer of history at the
Sindh University (Hyderabad) in 1963.

Those words had a magical impact on the young men and

women in his class, whose minds had been locked in the
straitjacket of state-dictated historical narrative. Unlike many of
his colleagues, he challenged the youth to think and explore the
world of knowledge.

Unsurprisingly, Dr Mubarak Ali, basically a non-conformist,

became persona non grata with those who control the academia.
He had a chequered career, going from one institution to another
in spite of his high qualifications, including a PhD from Ruhr
University (Germany). After retirement from the Goethe Institute,
Lahore, he continued to record ‘people’s history’ through his
writings in the print media. Now he has launched his own
YouTube channel on which his talks are uploaded periodically.

According to Dr Sahib, our history has been the history of the

rulers and the ashrafia (elites) while the common man has been
ignored. Students learn about the rulers and the ‘wars’ they
always ‘won’. They are glorified exaggeratedly while the people’s
perspective is never explained. This is why our society is so
stratified and social justice noticeably missing.
Students learn about the rulers and the ‘wars’ they always ‘won’.

For Dr Mubarak Ali, it is the people who matter if a sense of

ownership of their country has to be instilled in them and they
are to be gelled into a nation. He describes himself as a people’s
historian who writes history from below. He is spot on, for our
history textbooks do not take into account the people’s point of
view at all.

The fact is that much of what Dr Mubarak Ali has recorded in the
last 50 years in his classroom lectures and his books as historical
truths is not known to our youth. That is why history which is
taught in practically every university with social sciences
programmes in Pakistan has failed to make any impact on the
mindset of the youth.

How have we arrived at this point? “We made a wrong start,” he

observes, “Our initial policies laid a lot of stress on our faith and
ideology. The Pathan tribesmen raided Kashmir when the
maharaja had signed a standstill agreement with Pakistan. This
raid was described as a jihad to give it a religious hue. This
alienated India and the maharaja.”

He mentions how “the Basic Principles Committee in the

constituent assembly adopted the Objectives Resolution making
ideology a significant factor in our politics”. According to him, “at
no stage in the freedom movement was Pakistan intended to be a
theocratic state. This reversal of policy proved to be our undoing.
India and Bangladesh have remained secular and have fared
better than us. I cannot say where India will end up under the
Modi government considering its pronounced tilt towards
Hindutva.”

Dr Mubarak Ali also speaks of the establishment’s role in

Pakistan’s politics. “Today it is the most powerful force in
Pakistan’s political arena. But it rules from behind the scenes,
allowing political parties to seemingly wield power. But in
reality, the politicians have no power and they have not grown or
learnt from their political experience. Hence their performance
has been so discouraging being directed mainly at their own
survival.”

Hs draws an interesting parallel between Pakistan today and the

last days of the Holy Roman Empire when the military controlled
politics. The figurehead emperor would be selected by the army
and whoever bid the highest amount won the throne but no
power. For centuries, money has been an integral part of politics.

Historians speak of four theories to explain the historical

process. Dr Mubarak terms them as the ‘cycle’, ‘arrow’,
‘pendulum’ and ‘seesaw’, when events repeat themselves, follow
a linear pattern, swing from one end to the other, and zigzag up
and down. Pakistan’s history has followed all these patterns at
different times creating uncertainty. In that case what does he
think the future holds in store for Pakistan?

“I see it to be bleak. We need a new wise, dynamic and

responsible leadership. From where will it come? None of the
political parties have shown the acumen to produce good leaders
given the reasons mentioned… . The educational institutions and
the universities do not have the capability to give us national
leaders. The good private universities only focus on management
and business sciences. How will leaders be produced when the
youth is not being taught philosophy and the social sciences?
Finally, the spread of religiosity has ensured that we will
continue to turn to the past and Pakistan will continue to fall. The
country may continue but the nation will be splintered and may
continue as islands of chaotic hopelessness.

www.zubeidamustafa.com

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022

Courting disaster
dawn.com/news/1702121/courting-disaster

July 29, 2022

THOUGH part of the triumvirate, at least under democratic

norms, the courts usually escape the scrutiny that their
counterparts, ie the executive and the legislature, are subjected
to. Courts come under the limelight when they sit on judgement
in high-stakes public interest litigation and matters about
celebrities, or when they are possessed with an insuppressible
urge for activism.

No Latin term has of late become as much a part of the daily

language as ‘suo motu’. When it is not the honourable chief
justices themselves, it is some politician or an activist who calls
upon them to exercise their power and take up a case without
anybody having to file it. This raises a plethora of issues,
including the elected representatives’ dereliction of duty by not
thrashing out issues of public import in parliament, as well as the
entire judicial process involving the lower rungs of the court
system being circumvented.

It has been observed that while deciding on such matters, the

learned benches hardly call upon specialists to help them with
subjects they know little about. The amicus curiae is almost
always a lawyer, equally uninitiated in the matter. Yet they
endeavour to decide the price of CNG and sugar for 200 million-
plus people. Whether it is the privatisation of the Pakistan Steel
Mills or exploration of Balochistan’s mineral resources by a
foreign company under a legal contract, such matters are often
decided by the honourable members of the judiciary who have
little knowledge of these highly specialised fields.

As mentioned earlier, the courts cannot be held solely

responsible for this situation. If the other organs of the
government played their part and made sure that competent and
independent regulators are held accountable, and the polity is
not polarised to the extent that no bipartisan effort can be
mounted to reach minimum consensus on national priorities in
parliament, such matters would hardly ever end up in the courts.
Specialists are hardly called upon to help the bench.

If we broaden our scope of discussion to include two countries

we are most obsessed with — the US and India — it is amazing
how much of what goes on in their courts fails to attract any
attention over here. While we are besotted with other genres of
entertainment there — Hollywood, Bollywood — the recent
pronouncements of their respective supreme courts have hardly
been mentioned in our public discourse. Why should we care
about what the superior judiciary in another country does, some
may ask. We should, because there may be a method to all this
madness and if we can spot it maybe we can do something about
the forces that game the system to their benefit, which
persistently remains opposite to the public interest.

Many see it as beginning at the provincial courts’ level. Who

becomes an ad hoc judge, who gets confirmed after two years,
who is removed as advocate general, who gets labelled as
‘independent-minded’ or is ‘exiled’ to the superior judiciary —
these are matters that are often perceived to deviate from a set
course. At the end, all that changes is the regime and despite the
same evidence, the same investigators, the same lawyers, and the
same adjudicators, a different outcome is witnessed.

Yousuf Raza Gilani was sent home as a prime minister for not
writing a letter to the Swiss authorities to reopen a case against
his political boss. Nawaz Sharif was shown the door for not
declaring his work permit in a foreign land. The PTI has so far
managed to drag the illegal funding case.

The provincial and Islamabad high courts serve as the nurseries

for the apex judiciary; who gets elevated and when is not just
happenstance. Too much is at stake even when supreme courts
restrict themselves to their originally envisaged role in most
constitutions, ie ‘interpret the law’. In most places, the higher
judiciary is flexing its muscles and jumping into the political fray,
literally rewriting the law. American women’s rights over their
reproductive systems in the Roe vs Wade verdict and the ruling
against gun control legislation by the US supreme court are some
recent examples of conservative vs liberal political activism by
the courts.
We in Pakistan have an edge over the Americans as our judges
retire after reaching the age of superannuation. American
supreme court justices do not retire. Short of dying with their
robes on, only mental incapacity to perform their duties can
curtail their lordships’ tenure.

Unless, of course, they are impeached for inappropriate

behaviour. However, we have one more issue to settle. While the
International Cricket Council has decreed that ‘batter’ instead of
‘batsman’ be used as a more inclusive term, we still go about
talking of ‘brother judges’ to refer to the bench. Now that we
finally have a ‘sister’ on the bench, let’s put an end to this
‘brotherhood’.

The writer is a poet. His latest publication is a collection of satire

essays titled Rindana.

shahzadsharjeel1@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022

Hepatitis awareness
dawn.com/news/1702118/hepatitis-awareness

July 29, 2022

UNWAVERING commitment to healthcare on the part of the

highest government offices in the land is necessary to curb the
spread of disease. Regrettably, for decades, the lack of such
dedication has allowed even preventable diseases to fester.
Among the illnesses devoid of government ownership are a
variety of hepatitis cases. Take, for example, the fact that
Pakistan has the second highest global burden of hepatitis C. Yet,
only about 21pc are reportedly diagnosed, while between 13pc
and 15pc receive treatment. The rest, according to health experts,
are silent carriers of the hepatitis C virus — something that is
also reflected in the high incidence of liver cancer patients in the
country. Given the situation, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that
hepatitis B and C, transmitted through blood-to-blood contact,
together kill between 30,000 and 35,000 people every year in the
country, with experts signalling a steady increase in the number
of hepatitis C infections.

Though people are reluctant to get themselves screened, given

the lack of government interest and deficiencies in the
healthcare system, the larger share of the blame for the high
prevalence of hepatitis cases rests squarely on the authorities’
shoulders. Clearly, treatment options and plans need to be
developed and made more accessible to the bulk of the
population, with the active involvement of the basic or primary
healthcare set-up. Around the world, hepatitis continues to be a
big threat to public health, with more than a million deaths per
year being caused by the hepatitis B and C infections alone. This
is the reason why global health bodies, in connection with World
Hepatitis Day that was observed yesterday, have also
recommended bringing hepatitis care closer to the people, to
encourage and increase the screening and treatment of silent
infections that continue to be just as lethal, if not more, than the
Covid-19 pandemic. It is time the authorities woke up from their
slumber and worked towards plugging the many gaps in the
country’s healthcare sector.

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022

Opinion

Surging deficit - Newspaper - DAWN.COM

dawn.com/news/1702119/surging-deficit

July 29, 2022

PAKISTAN’S current account deficit has surged to $17.4bn or

4.6pc the size of the economy during the last fiscal year on the
rising trade deficit, in spite of multiple actions taken by the
government and the central bank since the last quarter of 2021 to
restrict imports. The growth in exports and remittances sent
home by Pakistanis living abroad did somewhat help close the
gap, but elevated international commodity and oil prices meant
that the country would spend more on its energy and other
imports. The higher prices and 33pc spike in imports from the
petroleum group more than doubled the country’s oil import bill
to $2.9bn in June from $1.4bn in May, the central bank said, and
pushed up the month-on-month trade deficit by 27pc, despite a
drop in non-oil imports. A surging current account deficit amid
depleting dollar inflows from multilateral and bilateral lenders,
as well as shrinking foreign investment have brought the foreign
exchange reserves and rupee under enormous pressure over the
last several months, stoked rapid inflation, forced the State Bank
to boost borrowing costs to a multiyear high and eroded investor
confidence in the economy.

Finance Minister Miftah Ismail recently said a policy plan would

soon be in place. “Imports will go down gradually and exports
will be up organically within three months,” he said without
elaborating. The State Bank too is hopeful of the current account
moderating from this month. The “… surge in oil imports saw the
current account gap rise to $2.3bn in June despite higher exports
and remittances. So far in July oil imports are much lower [due
to the accumulation of record-high stocks] and the deficit is
expected to resume its moderating trajectory,” the bank tweeted.
With the IMF expected to release its funds soon, thus unlocking
additional financing from other multilateral and bilateral
creditors, Pakistan’s external sector may likely perk up in the
short term. Yet, the deepening political turmoil is spawning
doubts about the government’s ability to make tough decisions
going forward and tackle the long-standing structural issues of
the economy responsible for the recurring balance-of-payments
crisis. Lately, global credit rating agencies like Fitch and Moody’s
have also cited political risks to Pakistan’s ability to maintain a
credible policy path. It will be unfortunate if the country
digresses from the stabilisation path and fails to address
structural impediments to exports and FDI because of the
opportunistic politics being witnessed at the moment.

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022

Opinion

False equivalence
dawn.com/news/1702120/false-equivalence

July 29, 2022

CELEBRATING his party’s triumph in dislodging the PML-N

government in Punjab, former prime minister and PTI chairman
Imran Khan on Wednesday made what sounded unmistakably
like a speech delivered on the hustings, by a man confident of the
ultimate prize. He reiterated his demand for an early election as
the only solution to the prevailing crises and vowed to continue
public welfare schemes started by his government earlier. More
significantly, he dilated upon the direction his policies would take
in critical areas once he returned to power. For instance, Mr
Khan said he wanted good relations with all countries including
the US, which he accuses of having engineered his government’s
ouster through a conspiracy, but exhorted the nation to choose
“death over slavery”. In the same vein, the PTI supremo claimed
he would make the country stand on its own feet and for
financial assistance would appeal to overseas Pakistanis. True to
form, Mr Khan’s statements were gossamer-thin on substance
and heavy on populist narratives. To point out but one fact, it
was the PTI government that in 2019 had signed a bailout
package with the IMF agreement and had no qualms about
seeking financial support from other countries.

That said, it is accepted that populism has a tenuous relationship

with facts. What cannot, however, be easily overlooked, or filed
away as a ‘rhetorical flourish’, is Mr Khan’s assertion in
Wednesday’s address that he can talk to the TTP or the Baloch
separatists but not with “thieves”, as he often describes the
leadership of the major political parties other than PTI. “Will you
speak to someone who robs your home?” he asked. To place
bloodthirsty militants who have murdered tens of thousands of
innocent Pakistanis on par with political leaders, howsoever
corrupt, is an abhorrent and cavalier overstatement. Such false
equivalence ignores the gravity of the crime of terrorism which
in many countries, including Pakistan, attracts the death penalty;
even nations that have done away with capital punishment
reserve the most severe sanctions for those convicted of
terrorism. That brings up another point, that of prosecutable
evidence: political leaders found guilty of corruption should of
course be punished. But despite having a compromised — and
hence pliant — NAB chairman leading its ‘anti-corruption
campaign’, why was the PTI during its nearly four years at the
centre unable to successfully prosecute most of the political
personalities it denounces as thieves?

Finally, Mr Khan’s stance makes it depressingly clear that

personal animus, reinforced by obduracy, remains the driving
force behind his politics. Even when the country is in the grip of
a dire financial crisis and polarisation has risen to dangerous
levels, the former PM — perhaps a future one too — insists on
demonising his opponents when the only rational way forward is
to cool down the political temperature and talk to those across
the aisle.

Published in Dawn, July 29th, 2022

Opinion