Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Has unkil made noise about China buying Russi oil?
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Unkil wants to teach a small lesson to its munna that getting too close to China has a price to pay. Unkil is following a bit hands-off approach to all the countries which took money generously from China. This is to prove a point that "Don't get too close to China". We have seen this in Sri Lanka. Actually Bangladesh is having a severe problem too, but somehow it is managing well with India's help. Hasina is on a sticky wicket now.Brad Goodman wrote:Was thinking aloud about why all of sudden Unkil has lost interest in bailing out Pakis. All these years Pakis played the strategic location card and Unkill thought that Russia's underbelly was via the stans which could be exploited via pakistan. Now looks like the underbelly moved to Ukraine so all of sudden Pakis went out of favor. Add rise of dragon and idea of giving India breathing space to tackle its northern border. Pakis offcourse added to oil to fire with their Afghan strategy which also much have contributed. Lets see how it plays out
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Why are we helping Hasina out? Hasina has done diddly squat in protecting Bangladesh Hindus in her hinterlands.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Jumma Bazaar Sale! Roadside stalls cabinet @ 2 Daallars. Free tissue papers (colored) included!Manish_P wrote:Captions please
..
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
So far we have been happily watching Pakistan implode. We know this is not the time for war or any military pressure from us because that will give the Pakis reason to go begging to Unkil, UK, Cheen and everyone else to get military support (which obviously will be given).
Suddenly I realized that the crore commanders also know this fact. So what if they decide to get India involved? It's a possibility that they do some mischief and raise the temperature to ensure we respond. Once we do, it will distract from their country's collapse, unify their population and also give them begging rights. They have a history of getting into unwinnable wars to achieve domestic political goals, and this time there is an economic benefit as well. We need to be on guard.
Suddenly I realized that the crore commanders also know this fact. So what if they decide to get India involved? It's a possibility that they do some mischief and raise the temperature to ensure we respond. Once we do, it will distract from their country's collapse, unify their population and also give them begging rights. They have a history of getting into unwinnable wars to achieve domestic political goals, and this time there is an economic benefit as well. We need to be on guard.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
there is a possibility that has been undiscussed, color revolution and initiation of needling the iranians, there are reports of drone attacks on multiple locations today, perhaps jernail rent-seeking and geostrategy can yield them another lease for many years
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Noticed something. Earlier all such photos of goverment meetings conspicuously showed the uniformed Faujis in attendance.
Nowadays the Faujis make sure that they are not to be seen in a laughable attempt to put all the blame on the politicians
Nowadays the Faujis make sure that they are not to be seen in a laughable attempt to put all the blame on the politicians
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
https://www.msn.com/en-in/news/world/pa ... 767fbc93f1
Pakistan: Houses of Hindu, Christian Families Demolished in Rawalpindi's Cantt Area
excerpts
Pakistan: Houses of Hindu, Christian Families Demolished in Rawalpindi's Cantt Area
excerpts
Rawalpindi: Authorities in Pakistan`s Rawalpindi have demolished houses of a minority community, a Hindu and a Christian family, who were living in the area for the past 70 years. As per the sources, at least five houses were demolished in the Cantonment area of Rawalpindi on January 27 that belonged to a Hindu family, a Christian family and the Shias. Their belongings were thrown on the streets in the neighbourhood.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
The RAPE 'Elites' are now feeling the fear
Yawn - Basest instincts
Yawn - Basest instincts
Yawn - Why bash the elite?Some numbers are in order to understand what the normalisation of violence does to a society. If 15 mosquitoes are swatted every minute; you get 900 buzzing insects an hour. Keeping at it for 36 hours straight gets 32,400. Only, we are talking people. Yes, human beings. During World War II, the Nazis killed 33,771 Jewish people in a ravine near Kyiv in 1942. It is mindboggling what man can do, not least to his fellow beings. To comprehend what catastrophe stares us in the face, we need to reach for the calculator often. During the 1994 Rwanda genocide, the Hutus massacred 800,000 Tutsis in 100 days. It comes to 5.5 human beings killed per minute.
So where is this piece headed? Unfortunately, home. Yes, it is aimed at attracting attention to the severe polarisation, nay extreme hatred, being spawned in Pakistan in the name of campaigns ostensibly aimed at ousting one set of inept people by another gang of nincompoops. Who knows when the ‘tipping point’ — that most eagerly awaited watershed by the fourth-class diplomatic corps and the armchair analysts — materialises? No resort to machetes here. Anyone unfortunate enough to have seen clips upon clips of videos showing illegally produced arms would lose sleep.
ELITE-BASHING is Pakistan’s newest sport. As the country stares into the default abyss, the ubiquitous phrase — ‘elite state capture’ — putatively explains all that has gone awry. Fat-cats are blamed for stealing public resources, conspicuous consumption, and dollar flight. But this super-simplified, sophomoric reasoning misses the real point.
Doesn’t every country have its ultra-rich? Are they less greedy, avaricious, exploitative, and degenerate? Wealth and privilege in America, Europe, China, Russia, and India are still more concentrated than here.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Uproar amongst players of board game Monopoly as fake currency floods market!Manish_P wrote:Captions please
..
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Aaand we have the winner!!Lisa wrote:Uproar amongst players of board game Monopoly as fake currency floods market!Manish_P wrote:Captions please
..
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
6.3 magnitude strong Earthquake hits Islamabad & Pakistan.
https://indianexpress.com/article/pakis ... ajikistan.
no reports of damage or death
but the pakis will now do a quick draw on the katoras and go out begging again
https://indianexpress.com/article/pakis ... ajikistan.
no reports of damage or death
but the pakis will now do a quick draw on the katoras and go out begging again
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
What is the alternative option, Saar?hgupta wrote:Why are we helping Hasina out? Hasina has done diddly squat in protecting Bangladesh Hindus in her hinterlands.
Awami League's youth wing ('Yuva League') and the student wing ('Chhatro League') are going berserk, and are alienating common people
left and right. They are running a total goonda-raaj in local areas, and making educated liberal people very upset.
If not Awami League, then BNP-Jamaat combo will come to power, and that is another Terroristan. Is that any better?
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
responded in the Bangladesh thread
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
https://www.sundayguardianlive.com/opin ... out-paddle
Pak is up a long and deep political creek without a paddle
Lt Gen PR Shankar Retd, January 28, 2023
What is Pakistan’s status and what are India’s options?
From all accounts just when you thought that Pakistan has hit the rock bottom, it has found fresh strength to dig deeper. The hole has become so deep that it is becoming increasingly impossible for Pakistan to climb out of it. Where does it go from here?
Politically, Pakistan is at its weakest in its history. There is a weak government with a strident opposition. The Army, which is propping up the government, is itself on a weak political wicket. If the current trendline continues, Pakistan is likely to have a weak opposition with a toxic government headed by Kaptan sahib as and when the elections are held. He will make the situation even worse since he has been the root cause of Pakistan’s descent into this deep hole in recent times. When he started his tenure, he was on the same page with the Army. It is quite clear that in future he visualises his page contains the Army. He is not inclined to be on the Army’s page. Knowing the Pakistan Army, it will not cut a deal with any political party where it has to play second fiddle. If it has to continue to play the first fiddle, it will have to rig elections to keep the Kaptan decisively out. That will result in a weak government which will have to contend with a combatant Kaptan on a container. There will be no time to tend to Pakistan’s eternal woes. The third political alternative is that the Munirji takes over in classic Pakistan Army style. If that happens, the Kerry-Lugar Bill will ensure that no one helps Pakistan. Overall, Pakistan is up this long and deep political creek without a paddle.
The economic situation is as bleak as it can be. No gas. No food. No electricity. Interest rates hitting 17%. A US dollar costing 266 PKR. An impending slash in government salaries. Inflation at an all-time high, with the common man not being able to put food on his plate. As when the IMF resumes its program, price of essential items will spike across the board. The common man, who is already on the verge of starving, will be hit the hardest. Let us not forget that Pakistan is now a net food importer and irreversibly so. The recent power outage is symbolic of the darkness the nation faces eventually.
Social and human indicators in Pakistan have degenerated in recent times. Very simply put, the land has not been able to sustain the ever increasing mass of population. The basic rights and services which a common man expects from his nation and government are being denied increasingly in Pakistan. The nation cannot cater for the aspirations of its huge Youth Bulge. There is widespread simmering discontent beneath the surface. This is evident from the ethno-societal movements like Haq Do Tehreek in Gwadar, Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement in Pashtun areas, Mohajir problems in Karachi and woes of neglected minorities in POK. The concern of informed opinion is that neglect of people in their own space which has bred discontent will eventually lead to widespread disorder, resulting in anarchy.
Nothing signifies this more poignantly than the fate of those millions who were affected by the flooding when 1/3 of Pakistan was submerged six months back. As per the International Rescue Committee (IRC), food insecurity and malnutrition has intensified across the country. Further, an estimated 14.6 million people continue to be in need of food assistance, including 8.6 million people who are experiencing an extreme level of food insecurity and are facing impossible decisions on how to cope skipping meals and selling off assets. This dire situation for 1/5 of the nation will endure since it is now established that Pakistan is vulnerable to Climate Change as it lurches towards absolute water scarcity. The combined effect of neglect of agriculture, water security and turning a blind eye to the foreseeable adverse impact of climate change leaves Pakistan with a perforated begging bowl which no one is prepared to fill. Even if someone does, it will leak out into the coffers of the Army and elites who will siphon it out of the country into their personal accounts. This long-term trend line will not change.
......
Gautam
Pak is up a long and deep political creek without a paddle
Lt Gen PR Shankar Retd, January 28, 2023
What is Pakistan’s status and what are India’s options?
From all accounts just when you thought that Pakistan has hit the rock bottom, it has found fresh strength to dig deeper. The hole has become so deep that it is becoming increasingly impossible for Pakistan to climb out of it. Where does it go from here?
Politically, Pakistan is at its weakest in its history. There is a weak government with a strident opposition. The Army, which is propping up the government, is itself on a weak political wicket. If the current trendline continues, Pakistan is likely to have a weak opposition with a toxic government headed by Kaptan sahib as and when the elections are held. He will make the situation even worse since he has been the root cause of Pakistan’s descent into this deep hole in recent times. When he started his tenure, he was on the same page with the Army. It is quite clear that in future he visualises his page contains the Army. He is not inclined to be on the Army’s page. Knowing the Pakistan Army, it will not cut a deal with any political party where it has to play second fiddle. If it has to continue to play the first fiddle, it will have to rig elections to keep the Kaptan decisively out. That will result in a weak government which will have to contend with a combatant Kaptan on a container. There will be no time to tend to Pakistan’s eternal woes. The third political alternative is that the Munirji takes over in classic Pakistan Army style. If that happens, the Kerry-Lugar Bill will ensure that no one helps Pakistan. Overall, Pakistan is up this long and deep political creek without a paddle.
The economic situation is as bleak as it can be. No gas. No food. No electricity. Interest rates hitting 17%. A US dollar costing 266 PKR. An impending slash in government salaries. Inflation at an all-time high, with the common man not being able to put food on his plate. As when the IMF resumes its program, price of essential items will spike across the board. The common man, who is already on the verge of starving, will be hit the hardest. Let us not forget that Pakistan is now a net food importer and irreversibly so. The recent power outage is symbolic of the darkness the nation faces eventually.
Social and human indicators in Pakistan have degenerated in recent times. Very simply put, the land has not been able to sustain the ever increasing mass of population. The basic rights and services which a common man expects from his nation and government are being denied increasingly in Pakistan. The nation cannot cater for the aspirations of its huge Youth Bulge. There is widespread simmering discontent beneath the surface. This is evident from the ethno-societal movements like Haq Do Tehreek in Gwadar, Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement in Pashtun areas, Mohajir problems in Karachi and woes of neglected minorities in POK. The concern of informed opinion is that neglect of people in their own space which has bred discontent will eventually lead to widespread disorder, resulting in anarchy.
Nothing signifies this more poignantly than the fate of those millions who were affected by the flooding when 1/3 of Pakistan was submerged six months back. As per the International Rescue Committee (IRC), food insecurity and malnutrition has intensified across the country. Further, an estimated 14.6 million people continue to be in need of food assistance, including 8.6 million people who are experiencing an extreme level of food insecurity and are facing impossible decisions on how to cope skipping meals and selling off assets. This dire situation for 1/5 of the nation will endure since it is now established that Pakistan is vulnerable to Climate Change as it lurches towards absolute water scarcity. The combined effect of neglect of agriculture, water security and turning a blind eye to the foreseeable adverse impact of climate change leaves Pakistan with a perforated begging bowl which no one is prepared to fill. Even if someone does, it will leak out into the coffers of the Army and elites who will siphon it out of the country into their personal accounts. This long-term trend line will not change.
......
Gautam
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Duplicated and deleted. Sorry.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Paki army can't risk the humiliation that may come after that. The card doesn't work anymore after 2019. It may fire back with Indian jhapad tearing apart what is left of their H&D.yensoy wrote:S It's a possibility that they do some mischief and raise the temperature to ensure we respond. Once we do, it will distract from their country's collapse, unify their population and also give them begging rights.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Banana Republic has declared half day off in Islamabad on Jan 30 on the occasion of visit of UAE officials
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Strategic asset of illegitimate ass seized by Jernails ?
Yawn - Sheikh Rashid claims Lal Haveli residence in Rawalpindi sealed by FIA, police
Yawn - Sheikh Rashid claims Lal Haveli residence in Rawalpindi sealed by FIA, police
Former interior minister and Awami Muslim League (AML) chief Sheikh Rashid has claimed that his Lal Haveli residence in Rawalpindi was completely “sealed” by authorities in the early hours of Monday. “After the Rangers and Frontier Corps refused, they sealed the Lal Haveli with the help of the Federal Investigation Agency and the police,” he tweeted.
“Sealing Lal Haveli is an act of fascism and terrorism. If it is not our personal property, we would be national criminals,” Rashid said, claiming that the government took this step after it failed to find anything against him.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
TTP's new narrative that democracy has failed in TSP and only a greener Islamic Emirate can bring prosperity might find popular backing among mangoes if the current economic turmoil continues.
Unpacking TTP’s curious new narrative
Unpacking TTP’s curious new narrative
ISLAMABAD': After remaining dormant for nearly five years, the largest militant network of Pakistan, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), commonly known as Pakistani Taliban, has made a strong comeback in terms of its attacks inside Pakistan, thanks to the return to power of Afghan Taliban in Afghanistan, where the TTP is based. In order to become a force to reckon with and to sustain the group, its leadership has come up with a seemingly elaborate narrative.
The new narrative can mainly be attributed to TTP’s current head, Maulvi Noor Wali Mehsud, a far more articulate head of the TTP than its founder Baitullah Mehsud (2007-2009), followed by Hakimullah Mehsud (2009-2013) and Maulvi Fazlullah (2013-2018). The foremost reason for this being that Noor Wali has received formal religious education while Baitullah and Hakimullah did not study at an established Muslim seminary. Although Fazlullah received education at a madrassah, it was not at par with that of Mehsud.
The only consistent line of argument on its part regarding its terrorist attacks in Pakistan and on its security forces had been that the country joined the US, and the West orchestrated the global war on terror. In groups such as the TTP, this war view dislodged an ‘Islamic Emirate’ in Afghanistan in 2001, referring to US-NATO occupation of Afghanistan by forcibly ousting the Afghan Taliban regime there, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the US.
The previous narrative could not justify much of its violence in Pakistan, specifically the attacks on civilians and non-combatants and above all schoolchildren (2014 Peshawar school massacre). Consequently, the group became disliked in Pakistan and elsewhere for such loathsome activities.
The foremost argument in the new discourse of the TTP has been to associate itself with society in Pakistan as the vanguard of Islam and society’s Islamic personality. More importantly, TTP’s bid to link itself with the Muslim-dominated society of Pakistan is aimed at exploiting the profound Islamic sentiments of common Pakistanis. “The mujahideen of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan are children of their Islamist nation, no matter how many operations the government conducts, the impression of Mujahideen in this Islamist society cannot be eradicated,” said the TTP head, during an interview to a Turkish media outlet in November 2022.
According to Dr Naila Qazi, a specialist in political sociology at the University of Peshawar, “The TTP would not be able to make a place in the Pakistani society, which may be Islamic in orientation and associate emotionally with everything Islamic, because it does not support mass violence in the name of religion, for instance, on adherents of other religions. Having said this, over the last two decades, the Pakistani society has become profoundly radicalised, supporting violence in individual instances on the pretext of religion. The TTP efforts to associate with Pakistani society by exploiting its Islamic sentiments could be successful to a certain extent, particularly given that the country’s political and economic situation has remained adverse for decades.”
It is important to understand that the TTP leadership has been cognizant of the profound political and economic issues of Pakistan and hence, it has started arguing more vociferously, that as long as the western democratic constitution with its parliamentary political system are in vogue, people will suffer. This argument of the TTP has considerable substance and logic, because Pakistan’s parliamentary political system, which is personality and individual driven, and designed to provide benefits to specific groups, families, institutions and individuals has brought misery to the people.
Occasional pieces of writing, statements and interviews of the TTP leadership indicate that it is trying to present itself as a political force. Through multiple communications, TTP tries to depict that it has already been chosen by the people to perpetrate violence to get rid of the corrupt political system. The TTP leaders also publicly claim that the group seeks to establish an Islamic caliphate in Pakistan and for this, the parliamentary political-constitutional-democratic system needs to be overthrown. “Overthrowing an established but malfunctioning political system by an armed group is sheer terrorism,” says Dr Qazi. “But terrorism is known as politically-motivated violence. One aspect of this axiom regarding terrorism which is not highlighted is that it may be politically motivated violence, but one where the aims are political, while the means are non-political and rather violent. In this context, establishing of a caliphate by the TTP is purely a political objective.”
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Pakistan’s dark age: The joke’s on us, and it’s no longer funny
With everything collapsing in the country, dark humour is the Pakistani’s only respite. But even that’s wearing thin.
Zarrar Khuhro
Pakistani journalist, columnist and talk show host
Published On 25 Jan 2023
25 Jan 2023
If I had a dollar for every time that I have heard the Pakistani people called “resilient”, I could probably single-handedly bridge our current account deficit while having enough left over to try to buy Kashmir from India.
We have been derailed by coups, split apart by civil war, faced multiple waves of attacks by armed groups and economic meltdowns, and are subjected to constant political shenanigans and yet we somehow keep going, much like a particularly demented energiser bunny who does not realise his battery ran out long ago.
We survive by using sarcasm so sharp it could slice steel. We have weaponised euphemisms and analogies (a skill honed by decades of on-and-off censorship and state repression) to the point that sometimes even we do not know what we are talking about. We cope by employing a humour darker than the Pakistani sky itself during our last nationwide power breakdown, the third of the kind in the past three years.
The lights went out at 7am on January 23, and despite repeated prayers and promises from the energy minister, remained off in most of the country till almost midnight.
Businesses shut down, hospitals could not function and just about every aspect of life came to a standstill as the power reserves of mobile phone companies and internet providers slowly ran out.
Faced with the crisis, those Pakistanis who still had some battery life in their phones immediately turned to the giant town square of social media, flocking to Facebook and Twitter not to post updates or exchange information, but to try and figure out what had happened. “You see, we couldn’t pay the IMF bill so they cut off our electricity,” wrote one person. Another thought that the standard tech support solution was in play, posting: “Well the country wasn’t working so we had to turn it off and on again.”
And so, we whiled away the hours, feeling as powerless as a Pakistani prime minister and trying to chuckle away the latest crisis.
But as is so often the case, the joke was on us. Because when the energy minister finally spoke about what had happened, he admitted that they deliberately “temporarily shut down our power generation systems” overnight as a cost-saving measure and then were unable to switch it back on again.
Let that sink in: They actually literally tried to turn the country off and on again and failed, much like the motorist who switches the engine off at a traffic signal to save on fuel and then is unable to restart the car. Meanwhile, 220 million people are stuck behind him and honking furiously.
The political backlash from the Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) – always looking for an opportunity to savage the government – was immediate, as they pointed out that during their tenure, they managed to restore power within 12 hours after a similar breakdown.
“Oh great,” said Pakistanis: “We’re now competing over which government had the best national breakdown.” As for the current government, while the breakdown during the PTI’s tenure was labelled as the result of gross incompetence and negligence, this even more prolonged outage was ascribed to good intentions gone horribly wrong. There were mutterings about sabotage for good measure, just in case there are any buyers for the highly overused spectre of malign foreign interference. There were not.
Granted, trying to save a few of the country’s rapidly depleting dollars is a good thing, but this particular scheme ended up backfiring spectacularly. The Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry has estimated $300m in losses to the economy because of the power loss. And that is without calculating the amount of generator fuel burned by people trying to keep their homes, hospitals and businesses running.
But then, this is a typically Pakistani approach to firefighting: First we ignore the blaze, hoping it will die out on its own, then we fan the flames a bit, and finally, when it is a bona fide inferno, we try to douse it by pouring a few gallons of imported petrol on it. Shockingly, it never works, and yet we opt for this tried-and-failed formula every time thinking that it will finally, somehow work. It never does.
Meanwhile, we have a finance minister who thinks that keeping the dollar rate low is a sign of masculinity and is trying to stare the IMF down into submission, literally daring them to lend us money.
As a result, there are now two separate exchange rates in play and obtaining dollars is considerably harder than scoring drugs. Countless containers are stuck at Karachi port because there is not enough foreign exchange available to clear them.
And so, we end up doing the rounds of “friendly and brotherly” countries hoping for enough bucks to last the month. It is sort of like that relative who turns up at your house in a fleet of luxury vehicles, along with a full entourage in designer suits, eats your food and then asks for fuel money so he can get home.
You pay, knowing that he will be back next month. You pay him anyway because if you do not, the dramatic soul that he is, he threatens to shoot himself right in your living room and you do not want your nice upholstery stained with blood and bits of brain matter. That is right, we can find humour in humiliation as well.
But our smiles are increasingly strained, and the jokes are told through clenched jaws; our resilience is depleting faster than the government’s political capital. That is because, time and again, the system shows us that it does not care for us, that the game is rigged in favour of a rapacious elite that continues importing luxury cars when essential medical supplies rot at the port, awaiting clearance.
We see the machinations of a powerful establishment playing games while parents struggle to feed their children. We see politicians sniping at and sabotaging each other while businesses shut down. We see a government speaking loudly of sacrifice and austerity while constantly increasing the size of an already bloated cabinet.
And to bring that stark reality home once more, on the day of the blackout came the news that Rao Anwar, a policeman accused of numerous extrajudicial killings (reportedly at the behest of powerful state institutions), had been acquitted of the murder of Naqeebullah Mehsud, an aspiring model whose killing sparked protests across Pakistan five years ago.
Unanswerable even to the police hierarchy, Anwar was treated with kid gloves throughout the trial in marked contrast with the violence and humiliation meted out to less connected suspects, many of whom languish in jail for years without their case ever coming to trial.
These are just selections from the veritable buffet of injustices and distortions that we are force-fed on a daily basis; daily reminders that the vast majority of us are third-class citizens in our own country.
Now, if we could somehow monetise our sense of humour, we would be in the position of lending the IMF money. Sadly, such schemes remain the province of fantasy while in reality, the laughter is about to end. And when it does, what follows would not be funny at all.
Link purposely not provided as site is not halal.
With everything collapsing in the country, dark humour is the Pakistani’s only respite. But even that’s wearing thin.
Zarrar Khuhro
Pakistani journalist, columnist and talk show host
Published On 25 Jan 2023
25 Jan 2023
If I had a dollar for every time that I have heard the Pakistani people called “resilient”, I could probably single-handedly bridge our current account deficit while having enough left over to try to buy Kashmir from India.
We have been derailed by coups, split apart by civil war, faced multiple waves of attacks by armed groups and economic meltdowns, and are subjected to constant political shenanigans and yet we somehow keep going, much like a particularly demented energiser bunny who does not realise his battery ran out long ago.
We survive by using sarcasm so sharp it could slice steel. We have weaponised euphemisms and analogies (a skill honed by decades of on-and-off censorship and state repression) to the point that sometimes even we do not know what we are talking about. We cope by employing a humour darker than the Pakistani sky itself during our last nationwide power breakdown, the third of the kind in the past three years.
The lights went out at 7am on January 23, and despite repeated prayers and promises from the energy minister, remained off in most of the country till almost midnight.
Businesses shut down, hospitals could not function and just about every aspect of life came to a standstill as the power reserves of mobile phone companies and internet providers slowly ran out.
Faced with the crisis, those Pakistanis who still had some battery life in their phones immediately turned to the giant town square of social media, flocking to Facebook and Twitter not to post updates or exchange information, but to try and figure out what had happened. “You see, we couldn’t pay the IMF bill so they cut off our electricity,” wrote one person. Another thought that the standard tech support solution was in play, posting: “Well the country wasn’t working so we had to turn it off and on again.”
And so, we whiled away the hours, feeling as powerless as a Pakistani prime minister and trying to chuckle away the latest crisis.
But as is so often the case, the joke was on us. Because when the energy minister finally spoke about what had happened, he admitted that they deliberately “temporarily shut down our power generation systems” overnight as a cost-saving measure and then were unable to switch it back on again.
Let that sink in: They actually literally tried to turn the country off and on again and failed, much like the motorist who switches the engine off at a traffic signal to save on fuel and then is unable to restart the car. Meanwhile, 220 million people are stuck behind him and honking furiously.
The political backlash from the Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) – always looking for an opportunity to savage the government – was immediate, as they pointed out that during their tenure, they managed to restore power within 12 hours after a similar breakdown.
“Oh great,” said Pakistanis: “We’re now competing over which government had the best national breakdown.” As for the current government, while the breakdown during the PTI’s tenure was labelled as the result of gross incompetence and negligence, this even more prolonged outage was ascribed to good intentions gone horribly wrong. There were mutterings about sabotage for good measure, just in case there are any buyers for the highly overused spectre of malign foreign interference. There were not.
Granted, trying to save a few of the country’s rapidly depleting dollars is a good thing, but this particular scheme ended up backfiring spectacularly. The Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry has estimated $300m in losses to the economy because of the power loss. And that is without calculating the amount of generator fuel burned by people trying to keep their homes, hospitals and businesses running.
But then, this is a typically Pakistani approach to firefighting: First we ignore the blaze, hoping it will die out on its own, then we fan the flames a bit, and finally, when it is a bona fide inferno, we try to douse it by pouring a few gallons of imported petrol on it. Shockingly, it never works, and yet we opt for this tried-and-failed formula every time thinking that it will finally, somehow work. It never does.
Meanwhile, we have a finance minister who thinks that keeping the dollar rate low is a sign of masculinity and is trying to stare the IMF down into submission, literally daring them to lend us money.
As a result, there are now two separate exchange rates in play and obtaining dollars is considerably harder than scoring drugs. Countless containers are stuck at Karachi port because there is not enough foreign exchange available to clear them.
And so, we end up doing the rounds of “friendly and brotherly” countries hoping for enough bucks to last the month. It is sort of like that relative who turns up at your house in a fleet of luxury vehicles, along with a full entourage in designer suits, eats your food and then asks for fuel money so he can get home.
You pay, knowing that he will be back next month. You pay him anyway because if you do not, the dramatic soul that he is, he threatens to shoot himself right in your living room and you do not want your nice upholstery stained with blood and bits of brain matter. That is right, we can find humour in humiliation as well.
But our smiles are increasingly strained, and the jokes are told through clenched jaws; our resilience is depleting faster than the government’s political capital. That is because, time and again, the system shows us that it does not care for us, that the game is rigged in favour of a rapacious elite that continues importing luxury cars when essential medical supplies rot at the port, awaiting clearance.
We see the machinations of a powerful establishment playing games while parents struggle to feed their children. We see politicians sniping at and sabotaging each other while businesses shut down. We see a government speaking loudly of sacrifice and austerity while constantly increasing the size of an already bloated cabinet.
And to bring that stark reality home once more, on the day of the blackout came the news that Rao Anwar, a policeman accused of numerous extrajudicial killings (reportedly at the behest of powerful state institutions), had been acquitted of the murder of Naqeebullah Mehsud, an aspiring model whose killing sparked protests across Pakistan five years ago.
Unanswerable even to the police hierarchy, Anwar was treated with kid gloves throughout the trial in marked contrast with the violence and humiliation meted out to less connected suspects, many of whom languish in jail for years without their case ever coming to trial.
These are just selections from the veritable buffet of injustices and distortions that we are force-fed on a daily basis; daily reminders that the vast majority of us are third-class citizens in our own country.
Now, if we could somehow monetise our sense of humour, we would be in the position of lending the IMF money. Sadly, such schemes remain the province of fantasy while in reality, the laughter is about to end. And when it does, what follows would not be funny at all.
Link purposely not provided as site is not halal.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Freedom fighters / Darker shades of Green carry out soosai dhamaka in a mosque in Peshawar.
Reports of casualties among the less pious
Reports of casualties among the less pious
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Typical slimy RAPEist. All that put on veneer of sophistication cannot hide his sneering contempt of Hindu baniyas.Lisa wrote:...
Zarrar Khuhro
Pakistani journalist, columnist and talk show host
If I had a dollar for every time that I have heard the Pakistani people called “resilient”, I could probably single-handedly bridge our current account deficit while having enough left over to try to buy Kashmir from India.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Chetakji & Cyranoji, I say let him come. Hechetak wrote:and there is a whole bunch of lootyens press that is waiting to go ga ga over the fruit cakeCyrano wrote:Bilawal recently called Modi butcher etc. He will be treated accordingly.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
This mosque is inside police headquarters compound as per reports.
17 killed, 83 injured in blast at Peshawar Police Lines mosque
17 killed, 83 injured in blast at Peshawar Police Lines mosque
At least 17 people were killed and 83 injured in a blast at a mosque in Peshawar’s Police Lines area on Monday afternoon, officials said.
Mohammad Asim, a spokesperson for the Lady Reading Hospital (LRC), confirmed the casualties, adding that some of the injured persons were in critical condition.
Dawn.com’s correspondent at the blast site said the explosion took place at around 1:40pm as Zuhr prayers were being offered. He said personnel of the police, army and bomb disposal squads were present inside the mosque.
The reporter said a portion of the building had collapsed and several people — especially those standing in the front row during the prayers — were believed to be under it.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed has postponed the visit.CalvinH wrote:Banana Republic has declared half day off in Islamabad on Jan 30 on the occasion of visit of UAE officials
Now what. Will the abduls be called back to work?!
https://www.arabianbusiness.com/gcc/uae ... istan-trip
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
https://indianexpress.com/article/pakis ... s-8412871/
Blast at mosque in Pakistan's Peshawar targets police, at least 28 killed.
150 injured.
Score likely to reach 72.
Blast at mosque in Pakistan's Peshawar targets police, at least 28 killed.
150 injured.
Score likely to reach 72.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
TTP will hit century.Parasu wrote:https://indianexpress.com/article/pakis ... s-8412871/
Blast at mosque in Pakistan's Peshawar targets police, at least 28 killed.
150 injured.
Score likely to reach 72.
Pak police families target of attack.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Pakistan Mosque blast Live Updates: 46 killed, 150 hurt at mosque in Pakistan's Peshawar
Pakistan blast: Foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari also condemned the attack, saying "terrorist incidents before the local and general elections were meaningful".
Pakistan mosque blast: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif strongly condemned the attack, saying the attackers behind the incident "have nothing to do with Islam".
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
UAE president’s visit to Islamabad postponed due to ‘weather conditions’
UAE President HH Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s one-day visit to Islamabad — scheduled for today — has been postponed due to bad weather conditions, the Prime Minister’s Office said on Monday.
“Due to weather conditions, President HH Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s visit to the friendly Islamic Republic of Pakistan scheduled for today has been postponed to a later date,” a PMO statement said.
The Emirati president had arrived in Pakistan on January 25 on a private visit. On Monday, Al-Nahyan was scheduled to pay a visit to Islamabad to discuss friendship and cooperation between the Gulf state and Pakistan and ways to enhance them in various fields.
However, the PMO statement said today that the visit to the capital will now be rescheduled, adding that the new dates will be announced soon.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Pak Taliban commander claims responsibility for suicide bombing at mosque which killed nearly 50
Sarbakaf Mohmand, a commander for the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack at mosque which killed nearly 50, reports AP
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Khuhro is Sindhi RAPEManish_P wrote:Typical slimy RAPEist. All that put on veneer of sophistication cannot hide his sneering contempt of Hindu baniyas.Lisa wrote:...
Zarrar Khuhro
Pakistani journalist, columnist and talk show host
If I had a dollar for every time that I have heard the Pakistani people called “resilient”, I could probably single-handedly bridge our current account deficit while having enough left over to try to buy Kashmir from India.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Complete amateurs. They should have done it on a Friday. Even so, toll should cross 72 inshallah.Parasu wrote:https://indianexpress.com/article/pakis ... s-8412871/
Blast at mosque in Pakistan's Peshawar targets police, at least 28 killed.
150 injured.
Score likely to reach 72.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
They can't be called back to work - no power or petrol. Better to give them half a day off to stand in a queue to buy atta.Parasu wrote:Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed has postponed the visit.CalvinH wrote:Banana Republic has declared half day off in Islamabad on Jan 30 on the occasion of visit of UAE officials
Now what. Will the abduls be called back to work?!
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Ah just a normal day in Pakistan
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
Boyiz have started batting after a while.Dilbu wrote:Pak Taliban commander claims responsibility for suicide bombing at mosque which killed nearly 50Sarbakaf Mohmand, a commander for the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack at mosque which killed nearly 50, reports AP
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
First it was gundum (wheat), then atta, then gas, now it seems like water will be a scarcity (due to renegotiation of IWT). Can't even knead the dough if you can 'manage' to lay your hands on a bag of atta. How is ayesha going to make rotis, hainji.
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
RCase wrote:Boyiz have started batting after a while.
And the bois played well
snakes in the backyard onlee
Re: Terroristan - March 31, 2022
A 6.3 magnitude earthquake jolted parts of Islamabad on Sunday afternoon.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1734233/63-ma ... -islamabad
Nature is amateur, must be at least 7.2
https://www.dawn.com/news/1734233/63-ma ... -islamabad
Nature is amateur, must be at least 7.2