Official website of Zubeida Mustafa
By Rifaat Hamid Ghani
If ‘Go Nawaz Go’ is the mood of the chanting crowds, ‘Get Nawaz Get Him’ is the animus of the Opposition. Unfortunately, it is embarrassing to ask just how and where they themselves, singly or collectively, intend to go once they’ve got their quarry. Continue reading “Taking the Opposition seriously”
By Rifaat Hamid Ghani
May 12th 2017 is as good as come and gone. As I recall 2007—the year of CJP Iftikhar Chaudhry, for his persona was at once the catalyst and dynamic—that May 12th anniversary marker’s mood-content would be anachronistic today. Its villains and martyrs have squirmed and shifted, and are no longer held firmly within the mould of that year’s context.
Which also indicates its characters are operative: vital and politically relevant, not merely historical. Continue reading “May 12th 2007-17”
By Rifaat Hamid Ghani
Our country’s history predisposes us to dwell on the tensions of the civil and military relationship and the resultant impact on our politics. Implicit in the spasmodically yet doggedly publicized affaire of Dawn ‘Leaks’ is the underwriting of the thought that the armed forces and the civil government are/may/will be at cross-purposes; or that one or both of these bulwarks of the state may have conflicting currents within them: A more perilously confusing state—domestically and internationally—than the frank impropriety of civil government being subservient to military diktat; or the armed forces blatantly flouting or choosing to act independently of civilian policy’s direction and directives. Continue reading “Flipping pages”
By Rifaat Hamid Ghani
IT is of course entirely politically incorrect to miss the doctrine of necessity, and still more reprehensible to think wistfully of the Eighth Amendment. I would hate to appear on the side of our uniformly distinguished dictators who (fairly successful in some ways though toxic in others) variously went a-looking for the essence of democracy; an indigenous democracy not overawed by modes as of Parliament and Capitol Hill; or quite humbly a basic democracy; using those very legal implements. But quoi faire? Our democracy flounders like the bat in democratic daylight and finds its wings when fighting the dark of martial law. Continue reading “Learning the hard way”
By: Nasser Yousaf
Abbottabad. The name sounds romantic. But romantic it is no more. The small hill station, named after its first district administrator, is not even a shadow of its former glory. Sir James Abbott had been so greatly enamoured by the pristine beauty of his place of posting and temporary abode that he wrote an emotional poem in its praise. Continue reading “A hill station in decay”
By Rifaat Hamid Ghani
In a subcontinent where street power has been instrumental in ridding its peoples of British Raj and where ignoring it has also been implosive—as in the presently heavily occupied Kashmir and the no longer existent East Pakistan—it is an achievement of sorts that our politicians have been able to trivialize it: mass demos, dharnas, rallies, jalsas, have become stale as well as tiresome.
But it would be perilously delusional to assume that the consequences of the sustained abuse of street power can be counted on as also being trivial and dull.
Pakistan’s politicians conceive of street power as a tool of political one-upmanship: who had the larger turnout where. The public why and because are secondary rather than motivational, and the objective is to wrest power from the incumbents and gain it for the leaders’ party machine. (There is much verbiage but little evidence or precedent that power thus gained will be exercised in the public interest first and foremost.) The PTI’s use of its glitzy street power has been frankly disruptive but it has yet to gain the critical mass to get Nawaz to ‘go’ as bid. Other political parties align with the lionized Imran Khan and his PTI off and on in unedifying bargaining to gain traction for—first things first—Nawaz to go. The spirit is we’ll join hands but reserve the right to turn on each other later. Continue reading “Street power”
By Rifaat Hamid Ghani
WE much discuss what education should be giving/bringing society; but seldom dwell on what society is feeding into education.
Far too many dedicated and obviously competent, if not gifted—for teaching is indeed a vocation—feel a decline in the calibre of their students and an alteration in the expectations and orientation of parents. The nature of personal commitment to education has changed. It is perceived as a commodity— there is less love of learning than love of the fruits thereof. Continue reading “Education: demand & supply”
World Diabetes Day, 14 November, is a day to create awareness on diabetes, a metabolic disorder with a fast rising incidence. The International Diabetes Federation (IDF) and World Health Organization launched the WDD in 1991. This date was selected to pay homage to the co-discoverer of Insulin, Dr Frederick Banting whose birthday fell on that day. Every year a new theme is selected for the WDD. Most countries of the world observe the day by organizing programmes participated by the general public, health care providers and policy makers. It is a day to raise awareness among all, old and young to fight against the disorder.
By Dr Fatema Jawad
Mr X’s eyes have been giving him trouble of late. He goes to the doctor. After an examination and some laboratory tests he is informed that he has diabetes. The news comes as a shock to him.
But not to his doctor. It is now known that diabetes is a fast growing metabolic disorder. There are 415 million adults with diabetes worldwide. Simply put, 10.7 percent of the global adult population is living with it. IDF has estimated that by the year 2040 this figure will rise to 642 million or 11.2 percent.. This means one in ten adults has diabetes. About 80 percent of the people with diabetes live in the middle and low income countries and a majority are between 40 and 59 years of age, the most productive years of life. (International Diabetes Federation Diabetes Atlas, 2015) Continue reading “Eyes on diabetes”
By Rifaat Hamid Ghani
Pakistan’s democracy is an evolutionary process in which representative legislation derived from the popular electoral mandate moves in the direction of better governance. The electorate and the elected learn politically and self-correct. The mandates conferred in 2008 and 2013 may be viewed in that light: Government at the federal centre changed hands each time, and provincial mandates mutated. Tahirul Qadri’s PAT established an irrelevance within the electoral process; while Imran Khan’s PTI registered a significant though scattered national rise, and formed the government in KP. Given the PPP’s decline, Imran’s party emerged as a vibrant third force in the national parliamentary configuration. But the overall electoral outcome left Punjab in the grip of the PML(N) – where Imran tirelessly alleges massive rigging – and denied the PTI a high profile in urban Sindh.
Setting aside what the party may or may not have established about its ability to govern by the standards it demands in others; what example has its oppositional mode offered in terms of federal politics – which — as Pakistan is a federal republic – has acute relevance for each one of its citizens. Continue reading “Remember remember ? November”
TEN days ago I started feeling a peculiar pain in the scapular region of my back. It was localised at one point and was constant. It didn’t seem to be the routine muscular pain that I get after vigorous home chores. I took an analgesic but it didn’t go away. I was perplexed as to what it could be.
The mystery was solved after four days when some papular rashes appeared in a line at the same site. I made my diagnosis. It was Herpes Zoster which is termed Shingles in popular parlance. Yet I went to the skin ward of the Karachi Civil Hospital to confirm my diagnosis. And the doctors there endorsed it and put me on antiviral acyclovir tablets five times a day.
I am not going to college where I teach. Neither do I attend my clinics at the hospital where I work. Continue reading “Days with Herpes Zoster (shingles)”