The fact of the matter is that there are no quick fixes, no shortcuts to ‘national prosperity’.
ISLAMABAD: This is with reference to Lt-Gen (retd) Ayaz Ahmed’s letter of June 24 titled “A revolutionary clean-up”. The problem with the military can be seen in what the writer of the letter is advocating, and also in the belief that many officers have, that theirs is the only correct view/reading of a particular situation.
The fact of the matter is that there are no quick fixes, no shortcuts to ‘national prosperity’. No general — not Ayub, not Zia not Pervez — can ‘get us there faster’. The faults in the system can only be corrected if we allow the system to take root. If we have enough elections, our citizens will learn the power their vote yields — the feudal (and, dare I say it, military and bureaucratic) hold on politics will eventually fade away. Yes, democracy is messy but, frankly, the lasting mess that successive military dictators have left our country in only makes me more willing to put up with the ‘mess’.
Shayan Afzal Khan
Published in The Express Tribune, June 29th, 2011.
