All posts by Raza Jaffri

How many are too many?

Education

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

HOW many schools do we need to educate our children? According to the senior minister for education, Sindh, the province needs no more schools. In fact he has announced that 1,100 schools would be closed down as they are “non-viable and unfeasible”.

Given the state of the education sector, this has unsurprisingly invited scathing criticism. In fact, I have learnt from reliable sources that the minister has informed foreign donors (the World Bank, the European Union and USAID) that the school census for 2009-10 conducted by the Sindh Education Management Information System (Semis) found 5,500 schools closed which are now being reopened on an ad hoc basis after ascertaining their location to ensure that no other school exists in the vicinity.

The education department believes that of these only 550 would meet the criteria to be deemed feasible. That in effect means that most of these earmarked schools will be closed and not revived. Since many areas in Sindh have no schools at all, a halt to further expansion of the school system is not sound policy.

A grim picture emerges. According to the figures by Semis, of the 6.2 million children aged five to nine years in the province only 2.7 million are enrolled in government schools. An estimated 1.6 million attend private schools. Nearly 1.9 million are out of school. The dismal quality of education is another cause of worry.

According to Semis which has been conducting a count of public-sector schools in Sindh for several years, the province has 49,000 primary schools of which 10,000 are without shelter and 24,000 are one- or two-roomed structures. With few exceptions, they have only one teacher. If the teacher cannot attend and no replacement is found, the school stops functioning.

This is a colossal challenge which the Sindh government has to address. Explaining the strategy adopted, Azhar Adil Dahar, the deputy programme manager at the education department`s Reform Support Unit, says as a first step he is trying to rationalise the functioning and location of the primary schools. Three districts have been selected to try the clustering of schools by merging their administrations.

Under this experiment, schools will not be closed down but share teaching resources. Thus a teacher may be posted in any school in a cluster where required. This should, at least on paper, ensure that no school stops functioning because the teacher is not present.

The second strategy is to address the dropout issue by creating a rational ratio between the secondary and primary schools. Currently, Sindh has 1,800 secondary schools with an enrolment of 850,000 students. Figures for the private sector are not available.

The lack of capacity explains why the dropout rate is so high. There are not enough secondary schools for children to attend once they complete Grade 5. So they stay at home. Worse, they forget what they have learnt and often lapse into illiteracy. Hence the government plans to open new secondary schools to fill this gap. The number will be decided after the primary sector has been set in order.

Again, what we have is a perfect plan on paper. Will it actually work?

To start with, Semis has to get its data right. For the census it depends on local functionaries — district officers and assistant district officers (ADO) — who in turn ask the heads of every institution to provide the information required. It was only last year that the government discovered that the censuses were riddled with inaccuracies because the questionnaires were in English and many of the headmasters who filled them out did not understand the language.

Now the forms have been translated into Urdu and Sindhi and a workshop held to train the enumerators. For the last census, five per cent samples were used for internal verification by ADOs. Next year, a consultant is to be hired for third-party verification.

The main issue that we do not hear much about at the moment is whether the existing number and location of schools that the education department says it will manage are enough for the number of children in Sindh, who must be educated. The complete statistical picture is not available.

Semis does not have the mandate to enumerate the private educational institutions. Many of the private schools funded by the World Bank have attracted enrolment from already existing private schools charging a fee. This means enrolment is not growing; it is shifting from one school to another. goth

Assuming that the province will have 45,000 primary schools (that includes the 100-plus Sindh Education Foundation schools and excludes the 5,000 closed schools the education department feels will not be opened) one can ask if this number is sufficient to ensure that not a single in Sindh goes un-served.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that there are areas with children but no schools. If it is ensured that there are enough institutions in appropriate locations to give every child access to a school, a policy of closing unviable schools will check financial misappropriation and streamline the system.

Closely linked to the viability issue is the distribution of teachers. There are far too many teachers concentrated in coveted areas like Karachi, Larkana, Naushero Feroze, etc. There are other places where teachers do not want to be posted. How the education department plans to get around this problem is not very clear although it is aware of the tactics teachers employ to evade unsavoury postings.

Positions are sublet to unqualified people or the teacher shows up in school only when a supervisor`s visit has been scheduled. It is difficult to say how the training programme is faring. This speaks of the flaws in the monitoring and supervision mechanism.

Senior officials in the education department do not make frequent and unannounced field trips. They obtain information from their subordinates who are not always reliable. With corruption so rife at all levels one is sceptical of the effective implementation of policies.

Blasphemy law amendment

Human Rights, Women

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

THE uproar following Aasiya Bibi`s death sentence for alleged blasphemy has a familiar ring to it. If the past is anything to go by, we can be assured that Aasiya Bibi will not go to the gallows.

For every time a case of an alleged blasphemer sentenced to death has come into the limelight, there has been a hue and cry from the enlightened section of Pakistani society as well as human rights activists abroad, and the ruler of the day has had to give a reprieve to the condemned.

What next? Here is the example of Mohammad Younus Sheikh, a doctor/teacher in Rawalpindi, who was hauled up in 2000 under the infamous Section 295-C, found guilty and sentenced to death. Dr Sheikh won the support of some media persons and diplomats. His appeal led to a retrial that resulted in his acquittal. Dawn

Ardeshir Cowasjee and I wrote in support of Dr Sheikh in . After he had left Pakistan this erstwhile death row prisoner wrote me a letter of thanks.

I quote verbatim from his communication to convey the emotions of a person who had faced the hangman`s noose for “false and fabricated charges”: “The retrial was held in November [2003]. This time in view of the threats my lawyers had received, I decided to conduct my own defence. I was acquitted on Nov 20 and released in great secrecy on the 21st. Following my release I spent several weeks visiting family and friends, but during this time I received indirectly a number of threats to my life, and in the second week of January I heard that my accusers had appealed against my acquittal. I realised that for my safety I had to leave my country.”

He continued, “Happy though I am to be free, I cannot forget that as long as the blasphemy laws are on the statute books, they will continue to be misused. At this very moment [January 2004] there are at least 100 innocent people, victims of these black laws, languishing in various jails and lock-ups in Pakistan awaiting an uncertain future.

“It is a sad reflection on the state of society in Pakistan that even when individuals are exonerated, their lives may still be threatened by the fundamentalists and many will be forced to flee Pakistan. The state seems unable to provide us protection. I was not at all eager to leave my country and would willingly have stayed with my family and friends.”

That should give us an idea of the fate that awaits Aasiya Bibi. This is how it has been since the 1980s when Gen Ziaul Haq changed the laws in vogue since colonial times to introduce a draconian provision (Section 295-C) that prescribes the death penalty for making derogatory remarks against the Holy Prophet (PBUH). Isn`t it strange that a law that is supposedly designed to deter blasphemy has actually led to a rise in the number of cases reported?

Between 1927 and 1986 (the year the amendment to the Pakistan Penal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code became effective) 10 cases of blasphemy were reported. In 1988-2005, 647 people were charged for offences under this law and half of them were non-Muslims. More than 20 were murdered while they were under trial. A judge who acquitted an alleged blasphemer was also killed.

It requires no profound wisdom to see that the law is being abused to settle personal scores, tyrannise over the minorities and for economic gains. The laws have become a weapon for the fundamentalists to inflict fear on a society that has been becoming increasing intolerant. If people like Dr Sheikh have been saved it is because activists raised a hue and cry. But this speaks of a fire-fighting approach — the blasphemy law remains intact.

All kudos to Sherry Rehman, the PPP MNA, for taking the bold step of introducing a bill in the National Assembly recently that seeks to amend the blasphemy law. Ideally this law should have been done away with altogether. Sherry Rehman also admits that. But she says “there is no appetite for repeal”. Hence she has moved an amendment to take the bite out of the law. That is the approach she adopted for the Hudood laws — and succeeded.

As a tenacious fighter for human rights causes Sherry Rehman has sound credentials, and she must be supported. After all who would understand the mindset of her fellow parliamentarians better? Explaining the amended law, Sherry Rehman says that the blasphemy amendment bill requires the accuser to establish the “malicious intent” of the accused.

Since the death penalty has been removed and sentences reduced in the law, the incentive to use the law for other advantages has also been removed.

To deter false accusers with mala fide intent a clause has been added that penalises strongly all false accusations and there is a provision that all blasphemy cases will be moved to the high courts where higher public scrutiny is possible and miscarriages of justice less likely.

Dr Sheikh, who now lives abroad and campaigns for the repeal of the laws, wrote to me on “behalf of the victims of blasphemy laws” to say they “welcome” the proposed amendments. He suggests some additions which the mover of the bill could consider to further strengthen it.

First, compensation should be paid for the expenses incurred, the time spent in prisons which could have been used for socio-economic activity, for the life of a person killed or injured while in prison or on bail, or after being acquitted by the courts. Secondly, a criminal case against false accusers and false witnesses should be instituted automatically. Thirdly, the proposed amendments should apply to all the cases registered with the police since the introduction of the blasphemy laws. n

Dr Sheikh has a valid point. It is time for the Assembly to begin a serious debate on the blasphemy laws now that Sherry Rehman has taken the plunge.

The whole truth?

Book Reviews, Islamisation, Women

Reviewed By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

Paradise Beneath Her Feet captures succinctly the contradictions in some Muslim societies where religion is a powerful force that exercises an overarching influence on the socio-cultural, economic and political life of people.

As women exposed to modernism struggle for their rights to education, economic empowerment and political representation in the power structures of a country, they very often find their progress obstructed by elements propagating an obscurantist version of Islam. In many parts of the Muslim world they have had to devise strategies to overcome these barriers. Isobel Coleman, the author of the book under review, terms this approach ‘Islamic

feminism’.

According to her, after ceding the space of religious authority to conservative forces for centuries, women in the Islamic world are now trying to gain control of their own lives by demonstrating that equality and change is possible within the ambit of the faith.

Female scholars are now studying the Quranic texts to advance a liberal and progressive interpretation of the religious doctrines which is not in conflict with women’s rights as perceived in the modern context.

By adopting this approach ‘Islamic feminists’ do not have to enter into a confrontation with the ulema. They also find it easier to enlist supporters from the masses for their cause by using a liberal religious discourse. Female activists are now using the power of religion to empower women.

Research in Islamic laws on the status of women forms the underpinning of this strategy. Be it Afghanistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia or Iraq, women are engaged in finding the Islamic solution to the challenges posed by gender inequality in their societies. And they are succeeding, if the author is to be believed.

Isobel Coleman, who is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, Washington, has reached this conclusion after studying the status of women in a few Middle Eastern countries for a decade and travelling to them to interview activists and scholars engaged in projects for women’s development.

They are trying to establish that Islam and women’s rights as we understand them today are not in conflict. Coleman is firmly convinced that the only road to emancipation for women in the Muslim world lies in this strategy.

That is why she attaches so much importance to the birth of Musawah (equality) in 2008 in Kuala Lumpur which she describes as a ‘global movement’. It is intriguing, though, why a movement that is supposed to be global has not even gained a toehold in most parts of the Muslim world, including Pakistan.

Pakistan’s is a case quite different from the others. It appears that Coleman, who had already reached some conclusions about Islamic feminism, attempts to stretch her ideas to fit the women’s rights situation into her hypothesis.

Coleman concludes the chapter on Pakistan in these words that seem a bit too far-fetched: ‘Women’s rights in Pakistan will continue to be a hotly contested cultural, political and social arena where tribal, feudal, religious and liberal secular interests clash. Islamic feminism is helping women and men to work across these lines to encourage women’s empowerment.’

The author’s research on Pakistan appears to be sketchy. The fact is that activists who tried to work within the Islamic framework found it impossible to reconcile the conflicting doctrines advanced by different sects and jurisprudence that claim to represent the ‘true’ faith. Justice Munir who had looked into the violence against the Ahmadi community in Lahore in 1953 had testified to the absence of consensus on various issues among various schools of Islamic thought.

Small wonder Women’s Action Forum (WAF) clearly announced in its charter in 1990 that its approach will be secular (Coleman fails to take note of this). Besides the fundamentalist religious lobby in Pakistan has been so strong that those on the other side of the divide have found it impossible to make a dent.

It is therefore not surprising that Dr Riffat Hassan, the moderate Islamic scholar interviewed by Coleman, failed to counter the retrogressive Farhat Hashmi of Al Huda fame whose reach has been growing phenomenally.

The Iqbal International Institute for Research, Education and Dialogue that Hassan set up in 2005 under General Musharraf’s patronage with funds from the ISI (as reported in the book) failed to create an impact.

Coleman would do well to research the subject in greater depth in Pakistan. She is again way off the mark when she projects GEO TV as championing the cause of liberal Islam. Those who have watched the obscurantism being spewed from the channel would be taken aback at the claim made in the book that GEO has stimulated ‘critical thinking’ and controversy on many sensitive issues.

The strength of the book lies in the first chapter titled ‘Why Women Matter: The payoffs from women’s rights’. It sums up succinctly how women make an impact on society when those working at the grassroots level are given some support financially and policy wise.

Some notable examples that Coleman cites are the kitchen women in Somalia who keep schools going during civil war and famine, the Bangladeshi women who borrow from Grameen Bank for small businesses and in the process benefit their families and Chaggibai Bhil, the Dalit woman who became the head of a panchayat in Rasalpura (India) and changed the lives of people in her region. These examples prove that whenever women achieved some success it was as a result of secular empowerment.

If religion has exerted such a powerful influence in the Islamic world it is because women in Muslim societies were kept in a state of illiteracy and ignorance for centuries. Education and enlightenment are necessary to lift them out of their backwardness. Research into Islamic doctrines will not empower women unless changes on the ground make an impact on their lives and thinking.

Changes are taking place in Muslim societies but the process is not holistic. As a result small pockets of liberalism in an ocean of backwardness have been created. How far this will empower women in these societies is the key question.

As Coleman points out, in Saudi Arabia nearly 60 per cent of graduates are women, but only five per cent of the workforce comprises female workers.

She does not adequately explain the sharp disparities between the highly empowered women and the under-privileged. Apparently a conservative cultural tradition rooted in religion continues to hold back progress.

Paradise Beneath her Feet: How women are transforming the Middle East
(women studies)
By Isobel Coleman
Random House, New York
ISBN 978-1-4000-6695-7
352pp. Rs2,050

The question of nationalisation

Economy, Education, Politics

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

PRIME Minister Gilani stirred a hornet’s nest when he termed Z.A. Bhutto’s 1972 policy of nationalisation of schools and colleges as a mistake.

Most people, especially those who have watched the slide in education over the years with dismay, have joined forces with the prime minister on this issue. Others have defended the PPP’s founder on grounds of principles. In the debate that has ensued, the polarisation between the two sides is sharp.

It has also clearly emerged that there is very little understanding of the conditions in which the nationalisation policy was pursued in the education sector and the reasons for the poor results we see today.

In today’s age when the marketplace reigns supreme no compunction is felt when the poor are left to their own devices by limiting the role of the state in the social sectors. It is a pity that none of those who have argued for or against the statement made by Mr Gilani has deemed it necessary to place the issue in its historical and ideological context to understand why such an extreme move was contemplated and why it failed. When it is dubbed a ‘mistake’, the yardstick presumably used is the appalling state of public-sector education in the country today.

But this gives the impression that it was all hunky dory in the education system in Pakistan in the pre-nationalisation era. The fact is that the system was flawed even then; the only difference was that the flaws were of another kind. A solution was needed but to be effective it had to be more focused than the nationalisation policy.

Before 1972, the public sector in education — at least at the school level — was larger than the private sector. There was no private university at the time. The performance of government schools was considered to be satisfactory enough if not ideal. Their examination results were relatively better. The key problem of the education sector was that of accessibility. Expansion of the government school network was not taking place fast enough to reach all sections of society and not keeping pace with the rapidly growing population. The private sector could not step in to meet the shortfall.

Another problem was that private institutions, with a few exceptions, were mismanaged. The teachers were treated with contempt and corruption was rife. A report by a committee set up in 1969 by the commissioner, Karachi division, to probe “into the affairs of the private colleges in Karachi with particular reference to irregularities and malpractices prevailing in those institutions” was quite an eye-opener.

Some findings are worth quoting: “Salaries are not disbursed regularly … [the teachers] were not paid their salaries for several months…. The teachers were forced to sign on higher amounts of salaries than actual payment.” Maltreatment and abuse of teachers was commonly reported and this included “the slapping of teachers by the proprietor”. In one case a part-time teacher served as the principal of a college and the hiring of under-qualified teachers was quite common.

Some of these irregularities were confirmed by the Hamoodur Rehman Commission set up by the Ayub regime to investigate the causes of unrest in universities. Anita Ghulam Ali, who was then the president of the West Pakistan College Teachers Association, recalls that her association had sent a charter of demands to the PPP leader in April 1970. Among other things it suggested that the government pay the salaries of the teachers of private colleges while setting up a body to regulate the working of these institutions.

Nationalisation did not rectify the weaknesses in the system existing at the time though not because the government could not cope with the financial responsibility it entailed, as is generally suggested. It was more a case of bad management that characterised the working of many private institutions as well.

All senior, experienced and meritorious teachers above the retirement age were sent home and the positions vacated were stuffed with loyalists of the ruling party. Time and again it has been proved that loyalty is no substitute for merit.

Intrinsically, the nationalisation of schools cannot be faulted. It was its flawed implementation that doomed it from the start. It was not that the government could not bear the enhanced expenses incurred on education. Previously the government had been subsidising the private sector considerably to make education affordable for all. It was another matter that much of this subsidy went into the owners’ pockets. After nationalisation the subsidies were discontinued and have never been revived.

The need of the hour was, and still is, the regulation of the private sector and the expansion of the public sector concurrently under an efficient management system. That is why the denationalisation policy introduced in the Zia era and the boost to the private sector thereafter failed to improve education in Pakistan. Even today when the private sector is having a field day and private institutions account for nearly a third of school enrolments, matters have not improved. If anything education is in a mess.

The simple reason is that the private sector cannot provide education at affordable rates. It has to earn a profit on its investment. Neither can it make education universal at the school level. It will not open a school in a remote low-income area — be it rural or urban. Only the government has the resources and political compulsion to do that.

The problem with the nationalisation policy was that it was implemented in a ham-handed manner and not professionally. The sooner Mr Gilani understands that the better will it be for education in Pakistan. The upscale private institutions that are providing excellent education to the elite are no solution. The bulk of the children who need education are not from the elite class.

Yet the government wants to shed its responsibility of educating the youth of Pakistan by entering into partnerships with private entrepreneurs. The world over education is preponderantly in the public sector and does pretty well in providing this service to the people. By criticising Bhutto’s nationalisation policy Mr Gilani appears to be looking for a pretext to renounce his government’s role in the education sector.

Atoning for our sins

Development and Poverty, Natural Disasters, Social Issues

By Zubeida Mustafa
Source: Dawn

IS change in the offing? I should hasten to add that I am not talking about political change in Islamabad which is perennially the subject of much speculation. It is socio-economic change I want to write about this week.

Recently at a two-day conference of stakeholders titled `Floods and Beyond` hosted by the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research some speakers spoke of the changes that will mark people`s lives in the post-floods period.Dr Kaiser Bengali, adviser to the Sindh chief minister, pointed out that the floods have brought a general awareness of the measure of poverty in the rural areas and what this means for the people. According to him, this has stirred even the residents of Defence Housing Authority to talk about it today. This should augur well for the future.

Two days later, at the Hamza Alavi distinguished lecture, social analyst Arif Hasan delivered a thought-provoking talk on feudalism and the process of change. Arif Hasan pointed out the numerous changes — many of them very subtle, nevertheless profound — that he has observed over decades of travelling to big and small cities and the rural areas of Pakistan. He considered these changes inevitable because the nexus between the administration and the landlords that held the social structure in place has broken down.

Given the dismal state of existence of the overwhelming majority of Pakistan`s population today, these prophecies of change should give rise to hope. But why is there scepticism? There are a number of reasons. The general awareness that has been created, which Dr Bengali so correctly identified, can only be translated into reality if those in a position to act actually do something. The awareness that had sent many into a state of shock is fast dissipating. qurbani

The back-to-normal atmosphere on Eidul Azha would have been reassuring to those who want the status quo to continue. Cows and goats were sacrificed in massive numbers at a time when the headcount of livestock losses in the flood was said to be 234,982. Plea for conserving cattle and making cash donations to the flood victims as a symbolic fell mostly on deaf ears.

Can we then hope for change? The feudal who is no longer believed to be as strongly entrenched as before can still not be written off for he continues to control the lives of the people living on his lands. They have nowhere else to go and they seek his help for their livelihood or for other `favours` which in democratic societies are citizens` fundamental rights. To acquire the latter, `connections with high quarters` are not needed.

This explains why change is such a difficult process in our society. Arif Hasan attributed the difficulties being encountered to the failure of the intelligentsia and the media to provide a value system I think more to blame is the failure of the state to provide protection and the basic human rights a person seeks to make life tolerable. wadera

Apart from employment he also needs healthcare, shelter and education for his children. If the system cannot guarantee these, he has to turn to someone — be it the family, community or the .

And don`t think it is only the poor who suffer from insecurities of this kind. Remember the axiom `uneasy lies the head that wears the crown`. In the absence of state protection and a social security net even the elites fear change. After all, how can they assume that a change would be in their favour?

Change, especially if it comes fast, can be emotionally destabilising. It is human nature to create a comfort zone where a person feels settled and relatively stable as he adjusts to the changes in his wider environment. But if he has to make adjustments in quick succession that can be a challenge for even the most well adjusted. Linked to this is the need one feels to be in control of one`s own life.

Pakistan`s poorest have never enjoyed that luxury. Upward social, economic and political mobility has enhanced the control factor progressively. But today, as recent events have shown, upward mobility is virtually absent and whatever informal support systems people had created for themselves have become fragile. It might be a natural disaster, an act of violence, a criminal activity or even a policy decision by a foreign government that can play havoc with a person`s sense of security today.

It is interesting to see how people have responded to this growing insecurity that has quietly crept into their lives over the last few decades. Religiosity characterises our national ethos. More are turning to religious rituals that enable them to hand over responsibility for their own actions and decisions to a supreme creator.

If it had simply been a case of the whole nation adopting religious values, should not there have been a fall in corruption, a rise in ethical norms, a decline in crimes and an increase in human compassion? After all, we are told that this is what Islam teaches us. On the contrary, this is not happening. Many who are suspected of being involved in wrongdoing of the most heinous kind resort to rituals in a big way because they believe that these are atonement for the evils they have committed.

Take the case of Eidul Azha. On account of soaring prices of sacrificial animals the number of sacrifices offered may have declined somewhat. But that was because of economic compulsions and not in support of conservation. Those who were financially well endowed, celebrated Eid as they have always done — with ostentatious display of their sacrificial booty.

Scant attention was paid to this telling verse from the Holy Quran published by the newsletter of a philanthropic eye hospital in Malir headed by a leading ophthalmologist of Pakistan, Prof M. Saleh Memon: “It is not their (sacrificial animal) meat nor their blood that reaches Allah; it is your piety that reaches Him.” (22:37)”