All posts by Raza Jaffri

Who pays for health & education?

Economy, Education, Health

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

THE slide in the quality of social services in Pakistan has prompted some serious thinking in concerned circles on who should pay for the education and health care of the people. Now that the idealism of the left is no longer fashionable and market-mania (to borrow the Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen’s term) has swept aside all rational considerations, it requires some courage to suggest that the state must be responsible for educating its citizens and attending to their basic health needs.
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New information order

Media

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

THE media scene is changing dramatically all over the world. Globalization, accompanied with phenomenal strides in communication technology, has proved to be the catalyst. Had it not been for the fact that capital now flows quite freely across borders and cable and satellite television and powerful transmitters have made it possible for sounds and images to be carried across thousands and thousands of miles, the reach of the media could not have been internationalized with such ease and at relatively affordable cost.
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As our population grows

Population, Social Issues

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

THE UNFPA’s State of the World Population 2002 released last week should give much food for thought to policy makers in Pakistan. The first eye-opening information it gives us is that Pakistan’s population stands at 148.7 million.

The national census four years ago had put the head count at 130.5 million. If we accept the 1998 data as authentic — it was the product of a massive and costly exercise — the demographic growth has been phenomenal. That is not all. According to the UNFPA projections, Pakistan will have a population of 344.2 million in the year 2050 and we will be the fourth most populous state in the world after India, China and the US, in that order. What is most worrying in this mass of figures is the very high population growth rate (2.5 per cent) which is higher than many other heavily populated countries such as India, Bangladesh, Indonesia and China.
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Where are our libraries?

Education, Social Issues

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

THE time is not far off when many children in Pakistan may never have heard of or seen a library. This institution of learning is in real danger of becoming extinct. With politics generating the sound and fury that it does in this country, it is not surprising that non-political and seemingly mundane issues, such as the paucity of libraries, never receive the spotlight that they deserve.
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Will there be no opposition party?

Politics

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

THE most striking feature of the post-election scenario in Islamabad has been the singlemindedness of purpose the political leaders have displayed in their bid for power. Had it not been for the fact that the political future of the country looks so grim, one would have found these toings and froings in the capital quite amusing. So desperate do our leaders appear to be to get into office that the permutations and combinations that are being tried or being spoken of in speculative newspaper stories leave people aghast.
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