Syed Ahsan Ali
Recently PPP’s co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari told media categorically that we were not elected for the restoration of judges but for basic issues such as roti, kapra aur makaan. Since then factions in media have been trying to build up an argument about what is more essential, our basic necessities or restoration of an individual?
I am not going to ponder here about what did we vote for? But I’d like to draw the attention of all of my readers towards another thing which becomes a norm now in Pakistan society. We are turning into “us†and “them†kind of people who are always standing on one side of the line. As the famous line from Rodney King after the Los Angeles riots goes, “Why Can’t We All Just Get Along?”
In last few years, we heard all kinds of divisionary rhetorics, moderates or liberals, conservatives or non-conservatives, clean-shaven or bearded, extremist or non-extremists. Is it necessary to chose between the two? Why are we always like to be black and white, why can’t we own the grey areas in our lives, in our personalities and in our societies? Why am I forced to say that I voted for restoration of deposed judges? Can’t I say that I voted to choose leadership that could help this country in sorting out all basic issues whether it is grain, electricity, law and order or independent judiciary?
This mentality of to be one side of the fence is making our task of co-existing doubly difficult. It is dragging us to the new limits of extremity where we would always be bound to make such choices. It is also hampering our younger generation to develop an understanding which teaches them to accept certain things in life whether we like it or not. One thing about the life that we accept is its imperfection.
Why can’t we say with sense of ingenuity that President has done some good in the past eight years at the same time when he made some horrendous decisions? Why do we forget that Shoaib Akhtar has won matches as well for Pakistan in his career along with creating some mind-boggling controversies?
I accept that we have to draw a line when and what is more than enough and we should step forward to stop something bad to happen. But for that we have to keep our sense of astute decision-making alive at any cost. And unfortunately in past few years we have lost that. If we keep persisting with this thinking then tomorrow we would start out crying about weather, border, color of flowers, taste of fruits as we do when it comes to having beta or beti.
Now we all should promise ourselves that next time someone comes out and asks passionately whether you are with us or with them then we hold on for a second and decide that you can be on the both sides with clear thinking, focus and a will to co-exist.
We better learn quickly to co-exist and adjust.
I hope the thread is not highjacked into something else. The “extremists” who think that only one person or party is the savior and everyone else is just evil are the intolerant threat.
There us good and bad in everone and everything. Let us please recognize this.
Wow…one vote is always a good start…being positive is great, it always start with one vote and then before you know it you’ve reached a million. Thanks for your vote Zafar, its people like us who really want to see Pakistan grow. I am sure we can do this without all the violence…after all we did have that for the last 8 years…before these guys came in….come on people…think about, if we have Mushrraf back things will be the same again, our economy was great, we had investors from all over the world, Dubai, Qatar, Saudi Etc..that never happened before, now look…everything is stopped just because of this. So lets get together and take our Pakistan back….Give me more votessssss!!!!
my vote to steve.musharaf is better than politicians.he stands for something while politicians stand for themselves.We have future if Musharaf is leader while in presence of politicians we just have chaos.
I think its about time we bring back Musharraf, these NEW people ( i.e. Nawaz and Asif ) have made promises, said they will stick togethe, make Pakistan a better place..and so far…NOTHING HAS HAPPENED. Pakistan is losing money every minute of the day and these fools are just sitting around and fighting with each other. From the start of 8 years ago..everything looked great, we even planned for a great future but now…people are crying, food prices are going up everyday, the poor are only getting poorer and sadly, the rich are getting poor too…so I think its about time we ( THE PUBLIC ) put our foot down and say enough is enough, Nawaz and Asif…you can leave pakistan and give us what we had before….Musharraf, he was in total control, and was taking us somewhere…HE was giving us a future. Why don’t you people understand that so we can work together and bring this economy up…its going to bury us all f we don’t do anything…..
I may add the discrimination of race, creed and regional have also sunk us into deep mud that we are all roaming around own circles with no use. Whatever leaders claim the reason of their mandate but I feel (maybe I am wrong) it was due to the Sindhi-Punjabi factor that stirred up after the death of BB. Look at the position of NS that he even could not secure a single seat in Sindh and PPP in Punjab is in minority.
Having 160 million downtrodden people and half of them uneducated we can only pray Allah to guide our leaders so that these hatred and extremism could be vanished from our society to live in peace..Aameen