Why Pakistan could not be reformed / fixed so far?

[araz]

I wanted to write this for a long time but was a bit afraid of reaction from the readers. But now after observing what's happening to Pakistan lately, I cannot wait any longer. So lets start:

1) Economy
No nation can survive without building sustainable economy. State of Pakistan failed to do just that. Since its inception it has not tried to build competitive industries to make goods for exports. Until Dhaka fall in 1971 majority of Pakistan's exports was jute and since then garment products. That's just not enough to cover import bill for a nation that has no check on its growing population. Since early 90s Pakistan's productivity and thus exports has been consistently falling against its regional peers.
View attachment 843261View attachment 843262
Putting the country on sustainable growth path is responsibility of the state not govt, as govts come and go but state is always there. So the state of Pakistan has clearly failed to fulfill its basic responsibility of putting together a sustainable economy and entire nation is paying its price through ever lasting inflation and other economic crisis that never go away.

2) Judiciary
No nation can survive without a functioning justice system. Recently it was revealed that Pakistan came at 130th place out of 139 in adherence to rule of law.

WJP Rule of Law Index

Explore rule of law rankings for 142 countries in the WJP Rule of Law Index

worldjusticeproject.org

It is responsibility of the state to provide equal justice for all. And considering above ranking and daily pathetic verdicts from Pakistani courts, it is clear as daylight that the state has failed to fulfill its basic responsibility in justice area as well.

3) Politics
No nation can survive without a stable political system. Unfortunately for Pakistan its entire history has been marred in political instability. Military coups, judicial coups, dynastic coups that's how you sum up entire political history of Pakistan. It's responsibility of the state to conduct free and fair elections, follow people's mandate as enshrined in constitution, and ensure the political system's continuity. Clearly the state of Pakistan has failed in all three.

Pakistan eighth least democratic place in the world: report

NEW YORK: Pakistan was placed at eighth place in the category of world’s least democratic places, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index 2021.According to...

www.thenews.com.pk

Conclusion:
As you can see the failure of Pakistan is not economic, judicial or political. It's a state failure. Pakistanis must reform their state structure to fix rest of the mess. Good luck!

You need to go back and start from basics.
A. What is our ideology and what system do we want?
B. How do we build a nation rather than remain a group of people? Differences are good as long as you use them to compete and improve yourselves.
C. What political system do we want?
D. How do we build institutions that run the country in a sustained manner?
E. How do we induct the right people for the right job? You cant hire a BA graduate to run the FBR. You will need specialists.
F. How do you separate and define the role of institutions so they follow policies but not whims and fancies of psychophantic politicians?
G. How do you invigorate judiciary and give it strength to stand up and make independent decisions?
H. How do you reform the police to prevent it being used as a state arm of terrorism?
Once you answer and settle these questions the country will start going in the right direction. The last thing is stop thinking progress will be made in days/weeks/months. You are looking at 10-15 years cycle of stability before you see any progress.
A

 

[ziaulislam]

Yep, even now some older folks think of it as a right, like water instead of a privilege

Balochs are rightfully angry- this was abuse

I told my relatives what the **** are they doing using these old gas gusslers geasers and placing them outside in cold..

They called me a over privelage youthia

Remeber when minister revomended we shiuld either warm water on a stove or use mini electric geaser..he was called a fool

Fools are pakistanis ..

You need to go back and start from basics.
A. What is our ideology and what system do we want?
B. How do we build a nation rather than remain a group of people? Differences are good as long as you use them to compete and improve yourselves.
C. What political system do we want?
D. How do we build institutions that run the country in a sustained manner?
E. How do we induct the right people for the right job? You cant hire a BA graduate to run the FBR. You will need specialists.
F. How do you separate and define the role of institutions so they follow policies but not whims and fancies of psychophantic politicians?
G. How do you invigorate judiciary and give it strength to stand up and make independent decisions?
H. How do you reform the police to prevent it being used as a state arm of terrorism?
Once you answer and settle these questions the country will start going in the right direction. The last thing is stop thinking progress will be made in days/weeks/months. You are looking at 10-15 years cycle of stability before you see any progress.
A

Simple once society accept corruption is wrong ..
For now pakistani society thinks corruption is okay

All your problems go back to same fundamental problem

"Wealth beyond means" a.k.a corruption that we dont think as society is corruption

If you make an independent FBR that punishes wealth beyond means like it does in USA and elsehwere..your 90% problems will be solved

 

[ST72]

A part of it is that too many people and parties benefit from things as they are. For real change and progress the fundamentals need to change.

 

[WotTen]

I think this is unfair though. India and Bangladesh also have similar issues, corrupt politicians but they develop too.

India developed because it has 29 states; Pakistan has 2 major provinces. It is hard for 29 crooks to agree on anything, but 2 crooks (Sharif and Zardari) can agree to take turns looting the country. Throw in some goodies for the army, and they will turn a blind eye while the country goes to rot.

Bangladesh is a different story. They had the passion and zeal of a freshly independent country before the corruption cemented itself in. Their society is also much more progressive than Pakistan. Perhaps it is Bengali culture. Even in pre-1971 Pakistan, Bengalis were always more inclined towards education and intellectualism.

 

[UKBengali]

India developed because it has 29 states; Pakistan has 2 major provinces. It is hard for 29 crooks to agree on anything, but 2 crooks (Sharif and Zardari) can agree to take turns looting the country. Throw in some goodies for the army, and they will turn a blind eye while the country goes to rot.

Bangladesh is a different story. They had the passion and zeal of a freshly independent country before the corruption cemented itself in. Their society is also much more progressive than Pakistan. Perhaps it is Bengali culture. Even in pre-1971 Pakistan, Bengalis were always more inclined towards education and intellectualism.

Good post but we are missing the importance of ethnic unity in developing a country.

While India has done better than Pakistan, BD has overtaken India in per capita nominal GDP and will slowly stretch it's lead as the years go by.

Frankly it is difficult to develop when you have multiple ethnic groups that you need to keep happy - with BD there is no such issue as it has a single dominant Bengali ethnicity.

Also you will see that BD is much more tolerant than either India or Pakistan. Religion is not major factor in the politics of the country in BD and India especially has gone down in its economy since the Hinduvta nut-job Modi came into power in 2014.

 

[TNT]

Certain institution doesn't want Pakistan to develop, they want to keep it occupied in this mess so they can keep power and keep looting and doing whatever they wish. Just think, Bangladesh was poorer and when they got free from control of these snakes, they developed. We have to accept reality, the military establishment will never ever want a strong state with strong economy because that would mean no control of army over the country. See its them who bring in corrupt thieves like nawaz, zardari, altaf, fazlu and then its them who dont let these political govts to settle either. We should not let this chance go and should not settle for anything less, we should totally eliminate role of these snakes.

 

[Pandora]

I think by now every one knows the root cause of our problems. Our establishment cant seem to keep their fingers out of other peoples pots which is the only issue here. I mean just look at how they made our constitution irrelevant in just matter of few week. Can some one here honestly tell me that our country runs on a constitution and not the mood swings of Pakistani generals? Our country is in this $hithole bcz us Pakistanis allowed our military to get away with their every political judicial and social engineering of this country. Our country is being treated like a chess board. All these zardaris shariefs diesels khawariji molvis and others were raised by our military. Heck even Imran khan was assisted by them to power bcz it is not as if they havnt built this system to filter out people they dont like. Our country is on last legs just get over it.

 

[Ssan]

No, read my previous post.

He formed his own party and then was no longer part of the military.

Hard to say this when he had complete control of the army and was by all means a dictator, read abt the Yushin constitution and their 4th republic.

 

[WotTen]

Good post but we are missing the importance of ethnic unity in developing a country.

I would replace 'ethnic unity' by 'ethnic indifference'. India has held together people of different ethnicities and religions because they have successfully formed a vision of common destiny. Of course, nothing succeeds like success, and the success of India as a country strengthens this common vision. Whether Hindutva sabotages this unity remains to be seen.

Pakistani provincial makeup, on the other hand, magnifies ethnic divisions because past leaders have exploited ethnic jingoism rather than cultivate Pakistaniat. I believe we need to reorganize Pakistan into 50+ small provinces to change people's thinking from ethnicity-based politics to governance-based politics.

We need a brand new constitution which, among other reforms, mandates a maximum population of 5 million for any province. Any province that exceeds the limit should be broken into two provinces.

Religion is not major factor in the politics of the country in BD and India especially has gone down in its economy since the Hinduvta nut-job Modi came into power in 2014.

Jinnah was prophetic and visionary in so many ways. He knew how deeply the anti-Muslim hatred runs in Hindutva ideology. I believe his thought was that, in Pakistan, Muslims would be free from persecution and could therefore focus on other aspects of development.

Think of it this way: if every day you are discriminated against because of some feature, you will constantly think about that feature and it will consume you. However, if that feature is not important, then you will think of other things.

I believe Jinnah's vision was that Muslims could take Islamic freedoms for granted in Pakistan and focus on worldly development. Unfortunately, some people have completely turned his vision around and become obsessed with showcasing Islam to each other. I am always amused (and disgusted) when politicians, including some PTI politicians, recite several aayats from Quran before answering any question on TV. I find this cheap display of piety exploitative and disgusting.

 

[ziaulislam]

Allow me to say, the Sharif clan has copulated their sons/daughters into every influential family in Punjab.

Punjab province in my opinion is just too big and politically whoever controls Punjab rules over Pakistan. This is quite pathetic.

Solution:
- Break up provinces (into 15-20 provinces)
- Tax non utilized land
- Tax agriculture related income
- Place a limit on land ownership

This wont happen as noone allow it

But provinces need to be further broken up

Not only to preserve theirculture and langauage but to avoid large concentration of powers

Hazara, chitral/kohistan, punjab into three and sindh into two and balochistan into two parts
Each can have their own language/culture capital

But problem is capacity

 

[ghazi52]

Pakistan can not progress because of these politicians....

https://twitter.com/x/status/1524456368975278080

 

[UKBengali]

Jinnah was prophetic and visionary in so many ways. He knew how deeply the anti-Muslim hatred runs in Hindutva ideology. I believe his thought was that, in Pakistan, Muslims would be free from persecution and could therefore focus on other aspects of development.

Think of it this way: if every day you are discriminated against because of some feature, you will constantly think about that feature and it will consume you. However, if that feature is not important, then you will think of other things.

I believe Jinnah's vision was that Muslims could take Islamic freedoms for granted in Pakistan and focus on worldly development. Unfortunately, some people have completely turned his vision around and become obsessed with showcasing Islam to each other. I am always amused (and disgusted) when politicians, including some PTI politicians, recite several aayats from Quran before answering any question on TV. I find this cheap display of piety exploitative and disgusting.

Both BD and Pakistan have Jinnah to thank as otherwise Muslims would have been at the mercy of Hindus after "independence" from the British in 1947.

In the UK, Pakistanis are more and more tolerant as the years pass by but this is probably due to the system here.

I cannot say what the solution is for Pakistan but let me restate the average annual GDP per capita growth rates of Pakistan, India and BD over the last 20 years.


BD: 5% - this is accelerating to 6-7% now and was 6% a year average over the 2010s
India: 6% - constant at 5-6% average with higher growth in 2000s compared to 2010s
Pakistan: 2% - looks likely to be at this level now.

Although neither BD or India are economic success stories, Pakistan seems to be stuck on a low-growth trajectory and little hope of lessening the gap with the developed world over the coming decades.

Unfortunately too many Pakistanis were taken in by the fallacy that CPEC by itself would turn the Pakistani economy around. There are just far too many Pakistanis(200 million+) for CPEC to have a major effect on Pakistan's long-term growth rate.

Both BD and India are where they are now due to decades of governments of both major parties in each country having a pro-growth and pro-social development goal. Unfortunately this seems to be lacking in Pakistan from what I have observed. It takes decades of sustained work in order to get to the kind of 6-7% sustained growth rates that BD and India have managed.

Sorry to say this but as an outsider I cannot see anything in Pakistan that is likely to turn this country round in the next 10 years at least.

Wish the best for Pakistan and hope there is a leader soon that is pro-growth and pro-social development that has the backing of the army and can stay in power for at least 10 years to carry out the needed reforms and get a momentum going.

 

[Norwegian]

root cause is Bhuttos socialism paradigm that was adapted at popular level.

Exactly. Pakistan's political economy started after Bhutto's mindless socialism. Before that we had Ayub's free capitalism and thus organic gdp growth

 

[ziaulislam]

Good post but we are missing the importance of ethnic unity in developing a country.

While India has done better than Pakistan, BD has overtaken India in per capita nominal GDP and will slowly stretch it's lead as the years go by.

Frankly it is difficult to develop when you have multiple ethnic groups that you need to keep happy - with BD there is no such issue as it has a single dominant Bengali ethnicity.

Also you will see that BD is much more tolerant than either India or Pakistan. Religion is not major factor in the politics of the country in BD and India especially has gone down in its economy since the Hinduvta nut-job Modi came into power in 2014.

Pakistan there is no issues of ehtnicity causing growth problem
Its corruption and elite of just one region
Now i am going to get banned lol

 

[WotTen]

Sorry to say this but as an outsider I cannot see anything in Pakistan that is likely to turn this country round in the next 10 years at least.

I agree that 20 years from now, both India and BD will be on a whole different level from Pakistan. Even Afghanistan, if they can get a stable government, will surpass Pakistan because they have enormous mineral wealth.

Despite enormous poverty, India is matching the Western world in many aspects. Modern metros exist in most cities. Fast rail is being built between cities. Literally millions of I.T. professionals are approaching Western standards of living, and India makes more from I.T. per year than Saudi Arabia makes from oil sales.

Sadly, I think the corrupt power structure in Pakistan is too strong and they will kill Imran Khan sooner or later. Once he is gone, it is smooth sailing for the two corrupt dynasties to loot Pakistan for the next 50 years.

As the economy falters and the country flirts with defaults, the military budget will suffer. One might have thought the military leadership was smart enough to see the trend but they are either too stupid to see the obvious or, more likely, the other option which is best left unsaid.