Deeda-e-Beena

Pakistan is facing a huge and growing energy crisis, a daily reminder of which are the multiple instances of load-shedding each day all over Pakistan. The crisis, of course, needs long-term energy generation solutions. But it also needs immediate energy conservation. And one important way of doing this is through Energy Saver Bulbs.

Pakistan is among a few countries taking off aggressively to use these energy saver bulbs. While people have been converting to them in millions during the last couple of years in this age of Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) gadgetry and individual generators, the government has recently decided to import millions – 30 millions by a newspaper report – of these energy saver bulbs for reportedly “FREE” distribution.

Nadeem ul Haque

At a recent meeting with the Hafeez Shaikh, the new Finance Minister of Pakistan, some of our best economists came up with the refrain that “Research and inquiry is not necessary, we know it all. We need to act and not think.” Alternatively, “we know it all! The only problem is that no one will implement what we are suggesting.”

I found this a little disturbing. So I asked some “what is it that we know?”

The usual answer the World Bank or some donor report knows it all. This raises a number of issues that need to be understood and discussed.

• All the donor recommendations are excellent and can be fully implemented off the shelf.
• All donor consultants who completed those reports are of the best quality.
• All donor consultants know all local conditions.
• All solutions can be borrowed there is no local innovation possible.
• There is no need for a domestic review, critique or discussion of this excellent work.

Adil Najam

Late Wednesday night the Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Reforms (PCCR) led by PPP’s Mian Raza Rabbani signed the draft text of the “18th Amendment” to the Constitution of Pakistan.

The News reports that some are describing this as “the best constitutional thing to happen since the 1973 consensus Constitution. It is, indeed, a major – even a ‘historic’ – development.

However, given that this is Pakistan politics, it will be wise to wait until this actually passes through Parliament, actually becomes reality and its provisions are actually made clear. After all, we are quite used to things changing – dramatically at that – at the last minute, and sometimes even after the last minute!