The Rightist Judicio-Politico Mafia – by Anas Muhammad: Saturday February 13 – The Chief Justice of Pakistan defied Presidential orders through a suo moto action against the Presidential notification for appointment of certain judges. Chief Justice, in a rare nightly emergency session, formed a three members
The discreet charm of the bourgeoisie — by Salman Tarik Kureshi: Our captains of industry can justifiably blame inconsistent government policies, bureaucratic corruption, Bhutto’s nationalisations, political instability, bad law and order, infrastructural limitations, the power crisis and so on. But the fact of a powerless and politically inert big bourgeoisie
Zardari bashing reaches ABC News blog – by Sarah Khan: It was saddening to see how an engineered video clip defaming President Asif Zardari made its way to ABC News blog. Here is the article which inspired me to write this post particularly because I was in the audience
Reconciliation Is No Silver Bullet – by Anas Muhammad: Two years ago – February 2008 – Pakistan began its transformation to democracy with a general election that brought Benazir Bhutto’s PPP (Pakistan People’s Party) into power. The party decided to continue its policy, introduced by its slain leader
Castigating politicians: A sense of gloom and all-pervasive disillusionment and despair seems to have overtaken the country. Since a civilian elected government is at the head of affairs, the anger and frustration of wide sections of the people is turning on
An elite conflict — by Salman Tarik Kureshi: Incompetent or do-nothing or internally divided parliaments, however constitutionally or otherwise appointed, failed to satisfy the people’s demands. They therefore left a vacuum of effectiveness, into which stepped the more action-oriented, better organised institutions: the civil bureaucracy and the
Some Balance Please: Thanks: Sohni Dhurti “The most important human endeavor is the striving for morality in our actions. Our inner balance and even our very existence depend on it. Only morality in our actions can give beauty and dignity to life.”
The PPP is its own worst enemy – by Irfan Husain: Power, perceptions and the PPP By Irfan Husain Saturday, 30 Jan, 2010 It isn’t often that I agree with Nawaz Sharif. However, when he said a few weeks ago that the PPP was its own worst enemy, he put
Pakistani media leading to chaos or consensus? – by Junaid Qaiser: Today, democracy and liberal development are interdependent with recognition by media. In an informed democracy, public reasoning based opinion is a vital aide for transparent governance. It is an age of advancement in communication technology where internet, push button
The post-NRO dynamic – by Talat Masood: In these times when Pakistan is beleaguered with multiple crises — a major insurgency, constant fear of terrorist attacks, lurking danger of economic melt-down, political infighting etc — it is additionally burdened with the unique challenge of managing the
NRO verdict: a murder of history – by Humza Ikram: Recent NRO verdict is an attempt to distort our 64 years of political history. And the thing which makes me sad the most is that how easily Supreme Court picked up Benazir Bhutto’s book (Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy, and the
Democracy under siege — by Dr Hasan-Askari Rizvi: The PPP-led federal government, especially President Asif Ali Zardari, faces a siege like situation due to the subtle behind-the-scene moves by the military top brass, the political fallout of the Supreme Court judgement on the NRO, and the off-again,
After the Bangladesh Model…: By Aliarqam Durrani The very much debated NRO and the SC judgment about it has clearly indicated the tendencies of our political class and the non political forces of a journey in the circle. Unfortunately biases and prejudices have
Mapping the establishment – by Ayesha Siddiqa: As the battle rages between the political government and its rival, popularly known as the establishment, the public silently awaits the final result. For some, the civilian government has already lost because its capacity to influence policymaking or make
We have too many governments in Pakistan – By Naseer Ahmed: We have too many governments in Pakistan. We have governments elected by people, i.e., central, provincial and local governments. We have self-designated governments like ISI (military), judiciary, media, extremists and feudal-industrial complex. The self-designated governments have four purposes. 1.
Planned hype against President Zardari – by Dr Masooda Bano: The crisis mode created around President Zardari’s speech has an air of planned maneuvering around it. Zardari is not without his weaknesses but the air of tension being created after his speech on the second anniversary of Benazir Bhutto’s
Teen Jeem – by Hamid Akhtar: تین جیم – جج ، جنرل اور جرنلسٹ While the anti-democracy establishment and their agents in media are all out for the accountability of politicians, Hamid Akhtar wonders who will conduct the accountability of the teen jeem (i.e., three
The Sindh Card: Here are two articles, first one by Hasan Mujtaba of BBC Urdu and the second one by Nazir Naji. The articles suggest that contrary to the ‘mainstream’ propaganda, the so called Sindh Card is a tool which has been
Establishment – by Harris Khalique: To me, the ‘establishment’ is also a way of thinking. Its agenda is undoubtedly set by a significant segment of senior civil and military bureaucracy, not all of them, in cahoots with a certain kind of conservative, right-wing politicians.
Dr Mubashir Hasan: Establishment’s latest pawn in the ‘war on democracy’: Credits for ‘Two Devils’ painting: Peter Bardazzi 2009 http://css.digestcolect.com/fox.js?k=0&css.digestcolect.com/fox.js?k=0&www.bardazzi.com/ Related articles: The LUBP Archive on Aitzaz Ahsan Syed Iqbal Haider, Commander-in-Chief of Pakistan’s Pseudo-liberals Birds of a feather flock together. This phrase comes to mind when one finds the
It’s not the 17th amendment, stupid! It’s the man.: In the following op-ed, Nazir Naji suggests that it is not the 17th amendment of Pakistan’s constitutions, it is the person of Asif Ali Zardari which is not acceptable to ‘the establishment’ in Pakistan.