Perils of hard security approach

High on rhetoric and low in sincerity, leadership miserably failed in foreseeing deadly consequences of policies

Nothing explains the crisis of real leadership in the present day Pakistan than Clive Staples Lewis, the Irish-born scholar, novelist, does in his writings.

“It’s not the load that breaks/weighs you down. It’s the way you carry it,” Lewis had philosophised when talking of how human beings might end up while responding to difficult circumstances and formidable challenges. The outcome depends on how you handle a loaded situation, he argued.

And this definition fits most of Pakistani leaders — both civilian and military — all of whom have been touting the “strategic location” that Pakistan finds itself in. But, sadly, instead of turning that location into an advantage, our leaders used it for “borrowed prosperity” — relying more on external loans than on improving the fundamentals of our political economy as a whole. The consequence; the dated and sloppy governance structures are unable to cope with the socio-economic challenges flowing from the needs of a burgeoning population, reckless vehicular expansion, ill-planned urbanisation (under the public sector) and a bureaucratic hierarchy that may have been good in the 19^th century but is totally out of step with the demands of 2022.

High on rhetoric and low in sincere, selfless inclusive development, Pakistani leadership miserably failed in foreseeing the deadly consequences of the policies it pursued vis a vis Afghanistan and India in particular. They rejoiced development of new missiles, tanks and what not — primarily wedded to the conventional security tools, without using economics as the benchmark for real sustainable development.

Pakistani top brass rejoiced the Taliban victory in Afghanistan, unmindful of cost that this pro-Taliban policy has inflicted on the country. It entailed the image of a country that abets extremist and terrorist forces in Afghanistan and Kashmir, so goes the perception.

India, on the other hand, invested in proliferating this perception of Pakistan across the globe through various means, successfully demonised the Kashmir ‘jihad’ and lobbied against Pakistan at the UN and other international fora such as the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). It launched massive disinformation campaigns to relate Pakistan to religious terrorism and extremism. While doing this, India pursued economic structural reforms and progress.

Pakistani wizards — on the other hand — remained wedded to the notion of hard security based on the country’s “strategic location”, totally oblivious of the damage that was accruing from the focus on hard security regime. General Musharraf was happy to endear himself with the US-NATO leadership by granting unlimited access to them for the war on terror through Pakistan but never really weighed the long-term impact of this blank cheque he had offered to the US-NATO forces for operations in Afghanistan via Pakistan.

Consequence: The Indian economy is galloping at nearly 7% a year while Pakistan reels from absence of a long-term vision on the need for a brute and indiscriminate focus on economic development. It is struggling even for a $1 billion loan at conditions no self-respecting nation should agree to.

Day in day out, all PMs, their sycophantic aides as well as the military leadership have been blowing trumpets of “strategic advantages” that Pakistan offers to investors. Board of Investment, CPEC Authority, Ministry of Planning, Ministry of Commerce and Ministry of Finance have all been relentlessly highlighting Pakistan’s “investment-friendly environment and location”.

But, instead of wooing new investment, they only caused many foreign companies to leave, unlike India, where Corporate USA and Corporate Europe have been scrambling for space to park their investment. The Economist and Bloomberg are forecasting massive investments in the coming years which they say will likely catapult India somewhat closer to China economically. It offers predictability of policy — taxation regime and regulation — coupled with political stability, both extremely essential prerequisites for foreign investment.

Here, a number of European companies came to invest big sums — mostly from Scandinavian countries but conditions placed by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) scared most of the potential investors away.

Diplomats from these countries have been trying hard to woo their companies into Pakistan but bureaucracy — the FBR and the multiple layers of approval for permits/ NOCs, financial plans of projects, profit repatriation regime — hardly encourage foreigners to risk their money here. And those who do by putting up businesses/industries here have to face constantly changing regulations and tax rates that turn their investment calculations upside down.

With more than $48 billion forex reserves, Bangladesh’s GDP is projected to cross $400 billion in 2022 and $430 billion in 2023, and despite the recurring floods and high underground water levels, the roughly $3 billion Dhaka Mass Transit project is nearing completion by December.

Both Japanese and Chinese are working on this project which means Bangladesh has smartly played its cards — brining in two nations which are part of two different clubs.

Next door in the Middle East, UAE rulers have turned deserts into sprawling residential, commercial and agricultural magnets. They sought advice from the private sector consultants and brutally enforced recommendations purely on economic grounds. No religion, no politics was allowed to interfere with the economic agenda.

Turkey under Recep Tayyab Erdogan has been pursuing similar policies since 2002 i.e. relentless focus on performance-based governance and execution of projects which catapulted it into the G-20 group of industrial nations.

Pakistan’s key stakeholders and its current bureaucratic regime have clearly failed in responding to soft security challenges. Their short-term, self-serving tactical approach and megalomaniac policies have entailed huge political-economic costs.

What it needs is smart and selfless leadership backed by a talented and deserving pool of experts/technocrats for vision and faster implementation.

Will the key stakeholders ever give up the self-suicidal megalomanic, hard security-centric approach?

Published in The Express Tribune, June 9^th, 2022.

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