Election 2013 Rigging: Electronic Voting is the Future

It is about time that Pakistan came out of the dark ages and got rid of the paper ballot system!

Best way to avoid rigging and ensure free, fair, impartial and transparent elections is to have at the most 2-3 polling stations per city. Venues like stadiums or converting a huge piece of land into a temporary polling stations with tight security, media and observer presence. (This would avoid having numerous small polling stations that are easy targets for armed groups to target and take over for rigging purposes). These stadiums can be properly organised to contain enough entry/exits and multitude of electronic polling kiosks within to ensure quick turnaround and avoid long queues. Using biometric fingerprints where finger prints are linked to NIC through the NADRA database a person is identified on the kiosk, and upon positive identification he/she selects candidate and submits their vote.

A large screen overhead would show voting turnout in real time per constituency. At 5pm, hit button to publish result and everyone knows outcome.

It would require some investment but surely can be done!

If the boy who draws
lets you look over his shoulder.

If the poet
smiles
and shows you her work.

If the girl who sings for the shower only,
hums a song
in front of you.

Know that you're no longer a person
but the air
and dust
that fills their lungs.

When the world perishes,
and all things cease to exist,
you'll remain inside an ink stain,
a paint brush,
a song.

- Alaska Gold

Will The Silent Majority Find Its Voice?

Another one bites the dust.

And with it, yet again we see conspiracy theories abound, about external hands and sinister designs, about American interests and CIA.

There is no excuse. If the conspiracy theories circulating in the media are true and the CIA is in cahoots with the Taliban without the knowledge or approval of the ISI, then the government and state should be ashamed of their intelligence ignorance and take decisive action to stop this fundamental attack on Pakistan's sovereignty.

If these stories are bollocks and there is no CIA or outside connection, and the murders and ongoing situation are internally created, then too the government and the state should be ashamed that they have been unable to detect or reign in these extremist vermin operating right under their noses.

Either way, it is beyond high time the government and the intelligence/army got together to put a firm end to this nonsensical drama going on around us. Enough is enough. Extremists are a minority - if that was not the case we would have had a religious party majority in the parliament and in the PM's chair. The party forming the current government has a mandate from the majority of people in this country - people who voted for this party that stood as a moderate, liberal option. The cowing down of PPP in the face of a handful of mullahs, the backtracking on its position on the blasphemy law, not to mention the isolation of its key progressive members who are now dead, dying or facing death threats, is downright unethical and immoral, if not criminal.

It is the moral responsibility of all those sitting in parliament, including both the treasury and the opposition, all those claiming to represent the awaam, to leave their differences behind and come together to look at what they are, by their lack of action, collectively allowing the country to become. Silence on these murders is no longer acceptable. The parliament should either unanimously condemn extremism, pledge to purge it and take a unified stand, or they should resign for not having the guts to stand up and save the country.

Murderers should be caught and swiftly punished. Anyone calling for or condoning violence should be immediately arrested and booked under the law, banners inciting and glorifying murder and murderers should be swiftly removed from the streets, mosques and demonstrations should be strictly monitored for hate speeches and there should be an immediate clamp-down and arrest of the free-roaming members of known or banned extremist outfits.

The broadcast media that claims to be a champion of public opinion should wake up and look beyond their short-term ratings and profits at what they have helped create, an atmosphere of hate, intolerance and a world of doubt, scandal-mongering and conspiracy theories through their irresponsible, yellow journalism practices. There should be an end to sensationalising news stories, an end to ill-researched conspiracy theories, an end to shouting matches in talk-shows, an end to giving air-time to so-called "religious experts" with zero real qualifications - an end to media immaturity.

The public and society at large also needs to come out of slumber. Discussing this in drawing rooms and dinner parties is not acceptable any longer. We have to be vocal in our stance against extremism. We need to come out on the streets as well, hold candle-light vigils and demonstrations for peace, join human rights forums, boycott anchors and channels justifying extremist views, write about it, paint about it, twitter about it, facebook about it, do whatever is there in our power to individually and collectively condemn extremism in every way.

This is war indeed - a concerted campaign to violently and shamelessly silence any voice that dares to express dissent to extremist thinking.

Are we going to sit back and allow them to take over?

Practice What You Preach

The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pakistan criticises the rehiring of people in the bureaucracy who have reached superannuation:

"Why these retired officials are being appointed on contract in various departments instead of new recruitments...why not create opportunity for highly-educated people, instead of re-employing retired government officers."

And the next day's news:

'Veteran Supreme Court judge Justice Khalilur Rehman Ramday will get a rare second extension as ad hoc judge following a proposal adopted at a full court meeting...the proposal also sought the appointment of Justice Rahmat Hussain Jafferi as an ad hoc judge, who had reached superannuation on Nov 22 last year.'

Pakistani Moral Values 101: Top 10

Arguably the most-repeated phrase in the last few days has been 'Pakistani Moral Values'. "Why, oh why can't people follow simple Pakistani moral values?!" is on the lips of many, but when asked no one is able to really describe what these are.

So what exactly are 'Pakistani Moral Values' of today?
Based on actual examples, the following could be useful:

Pakistani Moral Values 101: Top 10

1. If a Pakistani man romances more than one woman, he is a casanova. If a Pakistani woman romances more than one man, she is a slut

2. If a Pakistani cricket star dances with Indian starlets on stage in India he is being amusing. If a Pakistani actress dances in an Indian show she is a cheapskate

3. If a Pakistani man marries an Indian/any other nationality, he is a hero. If a Pakistani woman marries non-Pakistani she has no shame

4. If a senior male at the workplace is divorced/single he is an eligible bachelor, if a woman at the workplace is divorced/single she must be a corporate bitch

5. If a male makes a dance video with scantily-clad women he is being stylish. If a woman makes a dance video she is promoting vulgarity

6. If a male minister hugs a foreign official he is keeping etiquette, if a female minister hugs a foreign official she deserves a fatwa and the boot

7. If a male (especially if he is a cricketer) gets embroiled in a false marriage scandal he is an innocent victim. If a woman gets embroiled in a similar scandal she deserves to be hounded and made fun of

8. If a man chooses his bride it's his right, if a woman chooses her mate she is a characterless kari

9. If a Pakistani man wears shorts on TV for a game his religion should not be mixed, if a woman wears shorts on TV it's scandalous sacrilege

10. If a male director makes sleazy movies casting all his heroines as hip-thrusting prostitutes it's called fantasy (please sit back and enjoy the cheap thrills). If a female actress as much as sits next to man under a blanket in freezing cold on a TV show it is abuse of culture and a maa behen mulk izzat iman ghairat issue

The next time you are unsure if Pakistani Moral Values and culture have been challenged by someone or not, please refer to the above generally-agreed guidelines.

If anyone else has more interesting ones, please feel free to add.

Confessions of a Fundoo Strategist

This article is also posted at Express Tribune.

I am what some of you call a Fundoo. A Fundoo strategist to be precise. I was recruited in secret by a group of people calling themselves the Tehreek-e-Nifaaz-e-Duniya-e-Jahaane-Musalmaniya Pakistan, a top secret group made of representatives from different religious parties, banned outfits, sympathisers and financiers.

Our group operates like a small company, with an established mission (evident from our name) and a chain of command: a nigraane nizameen (board of directors), a markaze tazobarkar (core strategy group) and a majmuahe teelibaaz (um...general workers). I am the naib chaalbaaz (deputy strategist), recently promoted and reporting to the emir chaalbaaz (chief of strategy) who reports directly to the board of directors.

We've been operating since long and our results are beginning to show. Our latest achievement is something we have been fighting very hard for: Total Fear. No war is won by physical force alone, one has to have a psychological advantage - achieve the mental victory, the rest will be easier. After years of hard work, we have achieved this important milestone. All the Libboos (yes, we also have a word for you so-called liberals and moderates) are now really really afraid, bringing us closer to our mission.

We achieved this through a simple, two-pronged strategy: a Libboo hit-list, coupled with a coordinated Fundoo mobilisation.
You look confused. Let me explain.

The first part of our strategy is a Libboo hit-list comprising of people from various walks of life. This was a long list (there are too many libboos in this country if you ask me) but we shortened it considerably by focusing on those who are prominent, outspoken and courageous: politicians, writers, journalists, lawyers. Our research tells us prominent single murders have more impact, far more than multiple killings through suicide bombs - yes really, trust me we keep checking this theory regularly during our monthly Suicide For Dummies course (this is a very popular course by the way, enrolment is free so we have to have many sessions running at one time, but let's discuss that later). When I say more impact, I mean that when we tick off someone on the hit-list, we are able to more strongly reinforce the belief that those who speak out against us will be silenced, resulting in lesser voices. This is the key pillar of our strategy.

To achieve the second part of our strategy, more coordinated and forceful fundoo voice, we capitalised on the media boom. Over the last few years not only have we set up a few channels, we have also arranged for time-slots on regular channels for our broadcasts and also given numerous regular jobs to many of our teelibaaz. This was actually much easier than we initially thought - you see, we were expecting successive governments to have some media policies or rules, or channels to have some qualification criteria for political and religious commenting and anchoring, but thankfully all they care about is money and ratings, which makes our task a whole lot easier.

So our two-pronged strategy works in a cycle. Our media teelibaaz are mobilised to support our cause - contrary to what most people think, we do believe in empowerment, teelibaaz are free to use their imagination, be it encouraging Ahmadi murders, issuing fatwas in talk-shows, justifying suicide bombers, hailing hit-list killers as Ghazis, covering up our suicide practise lessons as government failures, calling any contrary opinions un-Islamic, or proving rising potato prices to be American/Jewish conspiracies - anything that will keep the government occupied elsewhere while reinforcing Fundoo viewpoint in the country and gaining us Fundoo recruits from the frustrated citizenry. Gotta admit, works like a charm.

We are very close to realising our mission: we will establish Islamic law in the country soon...don't ask me to elaborate on that right now, that is still work in progress - so far our board of directors have not reached consensus on what Islamic law means or even who is the true Muslim from among us - there as many points of view as our directors...but we will sort that out later.

For now, first things first. We need to gain total control and silence the common enemy: the Libboos.

Purdah from the Dead

One of my early memories entails an unforgettable trip to Makli. I must have been twelve or thirteen, and a friend from school had just visited Makli, a place with historic significance, and raved about how beautiful the tombs were and how much fun she had had on the trip. Hanging out with my cousins at an uncle's place the following weekend, I had been telling them about it, so we all went over to my uncle - who used to have a big van in those days -  and begged him to take us. We were a bit fearful of reprimand as my uncle was generally quite conservative and also very strict - the whole family feared him - but after some cajoling he agreed to take us.

So we all pile into the van, about five boys and six girls, with my uncle driving. The drive was over an hour long and the eleven of us joked and played during the ride, all in a picnic mood - that is, till we got to Makli.

I can never forget the shock of the moment, when, upon reaching the entry gates, my uncle turned around to face us and said, "Only boys will get out here, girls will sit in the van till we get back." Surprised, I asked why, he glared at me for daring to question him and said stonily, "Don't you know that the dead are able to see the living without clothes on? Girls will stay in the van. No arguments."

I wish I could say here that I rebelled, that I managed to get out and see Makli, that I argued by asking about the dead women who could see all the living men naked, but the truth is that I was too dumbfounded and speechless as I had never ever been before (or after) in my whole life.  I only remember the anger slowly rising up as we waited in the van for the boys to come back, the rage seething in me when they did and talked incessantly about it all the way back to Karachi, and my endless bawling as soon as I entered my own house and saw my parents. No words would console me.

Years down, I have still not had the chance to see Makli.

Bringing Peace to Karachi: Please, Just Shut Up

I swear, my ears will start bleeding if I hear any of this one more time:

No one will be 'allowed' to disrupt peace in Karachi.
'Writ' of government to be enforced.
'Special inquiry team' formed to investigate Karachi violence.
'Special strategy' formulated to deal with Karachi violence.
CM takes notice of Karachi violence.
PM takes notice of Karachi violence.
President takes notice of Karachi violence.
MQM blames ANP for Karachi violence.
ANP blames MQM for Karachi violence.
'Land Mafia' involved in Karachi violence.
'Taliban' involved in Karachi violence.
'Sinister hand' involved in Karachi violence.
'Foreign hand' involved in Karachi violence.

Just google 'Karachi violence' and you will find all of the above in news items spanning over the last 5 years (and more)! And all that our politicians are interested in is giving completely useless statements.
Meanwhile, Karachi continues to bleed.

Here is just one year of statements, Jan 2011 all the way back to Jan 2010.

Jan 17, 2011: PML(N) Chief Nawaz Sharif: "No one will be allowed to disrupt peace in Karachi."

Jan 15, 2011: Interior Minister Rehman Malik: "The government will not allow anyone to destroy the city’s peace and motives behind these killings were being evaluated."

Dec 14, 2010: Sindh Home Minister Dr. Zulfiqar Mirza: "Target killers belong to the biggest party of Karachi."

Oct 22, 2010: Rehman Malik: "The government will recruit 3,000 extra police...action will be taken against anyone who dares challenge the writ of the state."

Sep 28, 2010: The Awami National Party (ANP) and Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) exchanged allegations over unrest in Karachi in the Senate on Friday and held each other responsible for the ongoing target killings.

Aug 10, 2010: PM Gilani: "A "multi-pronged strategy" has been evolved with the help of the three political parties of the coaling ruling Sindh to restore peace and order to Karachi"

June 14, 2010: Rehman Malik: "The government is 'very close' to finding out who is working against the law and order situation in Karachi. Peace will be established in Karachi at all costs and no group or faction will be allowed to create any kind of violence and those who do work against the law will face strict action."

May 20, 2010: Rehman Malik: "No one would be allowed to break the law in Karachi and violators would be dealt with iron hand."

Jan 14, 2010: President Asif Ali Zardari: "Karachi will be turned once again into a land of peace..I urge all political forces to join hands to restore the city’s peace."

Politicians, give us a break. Either you have zero intelligence or zero guts.