It’s the election fever again after 5 years and many of us
are concerned that what guarantee is there that the new government formed will perform
as promised. I have had no training is governance and all I probably know about
it comes from Ceasar or Age of Empires but have had this feeling for a while
now which seems to be getting stronger that we as a nation have no role models
to look upto, there are no reformers in our society, not in our homes, our
neighbourhoods, schools, workplaces, communities and thus on a national scale.
When was the last time you saw or admired someone in your acquaintances
for their unshivering courage, determination, going an extra mile to help a
complete stranger, someone with no double standards, someone who always abides
by the law, someone who would not abuse his powers & authority, not misusing
the smallest window of opportunity for personal gains? I bet you cannot find
such a person anymore. There is no uncle x left in your neighbourhood who would
have a green number plate car but only uses it for official work, theres no Police
officer left who does not utilise police mobile escort for personal parties and
picnics, you will find it extremely difficult to identify people in your
workplace who would have been hired (or promoted) on merit, people who declare
their real income for tax returns, civil servants whose standard of living
matches their pay grade, even your everyday mechanics, repair guys, shop
keepers are ready to mug you on the first opportunity.
Basic values that should be practiced in any good community
are no longer being witnessed; values of sincerity, honesty, tolerance, humility
and adherence to principles are nowhere to be seen. This mind you has nothing
really to do with religion, these values are universal across all religions and
communities but getting increasingly alien to us.
In the past few months I have seen people around me involved
in misappropriation and plain fraud through getting kickbacks in procurement
orders, I have seen people misusing company resources for partying, making
false excuses to get leaves from work, being dishonest about their commitment
towards the job and in the process depriving the organisation of priceless
opportunities. On the other hand I see employers misusing their authority too
who practice discrimination, favouritism, unlawful and complete disregard to
company policy & their supreme responsibility to safeguard the interests of
the organisation. So what I am trying to say is that our wrongs are collective,
which are accumulating and transforming themselves into a beast we cannot
control.
Recently a senior PTCL official came to our office and when
he found out that our PTCL Broadband Internet had been having some problems he
called literally the entire regional office staff to rectify the problem. I am
sure those 10 PTCL officers had other complaints/ work to handle but they were
all lined up for a parade to show off power. I am absolutely certain that the
guy had no issues with his conscience that how easily he misused his authority,
deprived other equally paying customers of timely service and then later how
proud he felt about it. There are several instances that you can identify
resembling it and unfortunately it is reflective of our general value system.
The acceptance of this massive social wrong is having
diabolical manifestations; we see masses re-accept people like Amir Liaquat who
in any other society would have had a very different future. Our generals are proudly
taking tax money bags to politicians, our governments confidently declare
secret funds, political parties are openly acknowledging equipping college kids
with assault rifles, USAID is funding media groups who admit they are therefore
no longer unbiased, our cities are dwelled by namaloom afrad, our citizens are
bombed by drones which fly from our own airbases, our generals who solemnly swear
to refrain from politics run political campaigns in uniform. Our lawful and
unlawful actions have gone through the cognitive dissonance filter so many
times that the only psychological argument is between less unlawful and more
unlawful. “So what if I used company money for partying, it’s not as if I
bankrupted it”
