Horse doctor

It is often said that certain jobs should be left to those who know how to perform them. People who have been trained and educated specifically to do specific jobs tend to do them efficiently and productively. An economist studies all his life to ensure he understands the intricacies of how an economy is run and how it should be run. Doctors study most of their lives to ensure they can correctly diagnose and treat patients. Attorneys invest enormous finances to learn how to make more money.

In either case, specialised people are required for specialised jobs. That is how countries prosper and that is how economies bloom. If this simple formula is ignored, you end destroying state institutions, SUPARCO being a stark example of that ignorance.

In lieu of the country’s present (or perpetual) economic downfall, it requires its trained and educated lot to be researching, formulating policies and leading the nation from the front. This is the time for the government to invite specialists, academics, researchers, professors, critical thinkers and scientists to take hold of the steering wheel and guide this ship out of rough waters. That is what we should be doing.

What we are doing is having people, with completely irrelevant qualifications, going out to the stakeholders and assuring them of a positive economic turnover in the near future. These assurances lack concrete backing. The business community in Pakistan deserves to hear it from an economist, with a plan in place, who knows what the next step would be, based on market research and trends.

Taking no jabs and with most respect, it would be wise to leave certain jobs to those who have spent their lives studying them and learning about them. One of the significant contributing factors in our downfall has been the unwarranted disturbance in the affairs of the state. The state, in its entirety, is indebted to its citizens who pay hefty taxes to ensure that the state gives something in return. That something includes inter alia a sound infrastructure, public transport, efficient health systems and a just judiciary. In 75 years, none of that has been achieved. It is flabbergasting how the state is letting such mockery happen.

Countries all around the world invest in their citizens in the form of public education, public libraries and reasonable health care. In return, the residents pay taxes and ensure the upcoming generation is informed, opinionated, educated and ready to be a part of the skilled workforce. If anyone wants to argue against capitalism, kindly have a peak at communist China and cry me a river then. Capitalism has its pros, read a book.

A skilled workforce acts as a spine of the entire system. You cannot expect one part of the body to fulfil functions of another part. All parts work in harmony fulfilling their own functions and that is how the entire body performs smoothly.

That is exactly how state institutions work. You cannot hand a chef a screwdriver and call him an electrician, the same way you cannot hand a fighter a pen and call him a stoic. About time we understand the nuances.

And as always, while the elite continue to sulk in their double padded office chairs and enjoy their gourmet dinners on mahogany dinning tables, the Baloch people continue to suffer under the reins of the oppressors. Dare anyone talk, they are labelled as terrorists and forcefully disappeared. This fiasco is being orchestrated for years and will continue to add to the Balochi plight.

And what do they ask for? Basic rights. The right to decide who enjoys the economic benefits of the province’s natural reserves. The right to have their own fellow brethren protect their borders instead of outsiders. Something as basic as the right to live. All their cries have fallen on deaf ears.

You can hide behind walls and you can hide behind desks, but realise that the men of this country will always see through your masks.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 13^th, 2023.

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