How businessmen can save Karachi
Recently, the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) and the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) held deliberations to evolve a strategy against the worsening and never-ending law and order issue, eventually announcing strikes. The Sindh chief minister tried to convince them to withdraw their calls by giving hollow pledges and the Sindh governor held a marathon four-hour joint session with the FPCCI and KCCI leadership. Finally, the governor was able to get them to postpone the strike.
The strike would only create temporary waves but would not solve the grassroots problem. Its postponement reflects the backfoot stance that is common when people in the corridors of power prevail upon business leaders. It is now time for the business leadership to play on the front foot like cricket players in Super Sixes matches. It should adopt a radical strategy to prove their point. The time has come for Karachi’s business leaders to play like Brian Lara. The writing is on the wall; Karachi is becoming a war zone.
The economy is not encouraging, while transferring assets abroad is not the only viable solution. Business leaders know that diabolical internal and external forces are making it an insurmountable task for them to bring about sanity in their businesses. Therefore, the following actions should be initiated.
When there is a landlord-tenant dispute, the rent is deposited in the court until the matter is decided. Similarly, the leadership should announce that businessmen should deposit their taxes with the Supreme Court, requesting it to decide on the release of the revenue to the FBR after ascertaining improvement in law and order. Secondly, a private security force of retired commandos should be organised to devise and implement a security strategy for trade and industry. The chief of army staff should be requested to delegate a serving major general to assist the security force. The governor should also be advised to order the inspector general of police, director general of Rangers, home secretary and representatives of sensitive organisations to hold a weekly meeting with leaders on a designated day, time and place and update them with the handling of the law and order situation.
The promises of arms licences to businessmen should be translated into practical implementation. Political parties must be given a strongly-worded warning that they should help bring peace to the city instead of playing politics. The COAS should be demanded to come heavy against the banned terrorist groups that have found a haven in Karachi. Finally, the business leadership must shed personal conflicts and unite to achieve the objectives of peace and security in Karachi because Karachi is the economic mega city and any criminal event there is detrimental to prosperity of Pakistan. A lackadaisical attitude towards ushering in peace is against all norms of good governance and reflects submission to terrorists and criminals.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 6th, 2012.
COMMENTS (14)
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Only one solution, Brian Lara Strategy, PTI Imran Khan, global and local altogether as glocal in the May 2013 election.
The Army should appoint a rugged top ranking General as administrator for the city and suburbs of Karachi and clamp a Martial Law, eradicate all the unwanted elements and de-weaponize it. Withen a month or two Karachi will see it's glorious days of the past.
At present it's the political parties under whose cover a turf war is on and the enemy of the State is having field days.
Karachi,one of the ugliest,dirties cities...one of the worst...according to stupid Paki propaganda Karachi is the city of lights !!!a statement so pathetic it makes your blood boil (what with all the power failures)...city of darkness more like it... Paris is the city of lights because it started lighting its streets with gas lamps in 1828 ! the first to do so... and the law and order situation in Karachi...well,this blighted city is cursed with a terrorist party with a facade of talented lawyers,the MQM,whose unquenchable appetite for hecatombs has bestowed Pakiland with oceans of blood and mounds of cadavers...
What?? Are you for real Mr. Majyd Aziz?
You want the Supreme Court to act as a tax collectors' office? How do you propose Supreme Court will do its own functions of providing judgement if it started collecting taxes all day?
You want a serving major general directly answerable to the Army Chief to effectively take over the running of Pakistan's biggest city? Hellooo dictatorship!
You want everybody and their grandma to give you a weekly briefing? When will they do the crime fighting then?
And you want to carry guns too. I thought the real problem in Karachi was that there were too many guns, and there is talk of deweaponisation now. So what entitles a businessman to a gun as opposed to an accountant? Should all of us be allowed to carry guns then?
Terrible suggestions all of them! Thanks for wasting 10 mins of my time!
More arms through arms licences, everybody should be armed !! that's a symbol of civilized societies like KPK and Afghanistan!!
Another aspect in this unholy mess is the lack of representation. This needs serious consideration. The people in Government from Karachi do not represent the majority, hence no one really gives a damn what happens to Karachi as long as they can retain power through any means necessary. As the saying goes, "no taxation without representation", I fully agree with the author's suggestions.
Sir, very good article. As for the comments above, I don't know why the ignorant keep commenting on articles beyond their mental capacities and keep muddying the flow of thoughts. Anyway, the author rightly pointed out that time for words is long gone. Take action now or expect the worst.
O' People, whether you are the intellectuals, thinkers, writers, businessmen, office workers, or whatever, whatever you have to do, it is you who will have to organise and do. Why? Have you not been leaving these matters in the the hands of those whom you thought will do it for you. Have they solved your problems then? Have they? No. No one is coming to slove your problems. So what are you gonna do? Leave it as it is or better still, do it yourselves. Organise. Organise yourself. Organise and bring people together. Sane people, good people, peace loving peaceful people. Everyone who wants to live and let live everyone in peace has to come together to join hands. If there are business area i.e concentration of retail business areas the business owners will need to organise their own security guards. But bringing in all people to volunteer and create vigilantes has to be tken into consideration. Not doing anything about such seriuos problem is not an option.
let us hope people will do something good
Karachi is being reduced to a mere Karachette. We can think of 3 solutions the army, the judiciary, or the PTI, i.e. political change? Who'll bring things back on track? All bets are on.
Interesting solution. As far as your tax deposit solution in SC is concerned, it is prone to manipulation. As soon as indicators improve, transfer will occur and the situation will go back to same old. Instead, it might be a better idea to tie to monthly / quarterly / yearly crime indicators. However, I think all of these are short-term solutions (including the Army one), the only viable solution is to displace the level of political influence in the city by voting in new faces.
"The COAS should be demanded to come heavy against the banned terrorist groups that have found a haven in Karachi." Banned terrorist groups in North and Souht Waziristan and other agencies are freedom fighters, who at best should be left to run amok in Afghanistan, at worst, be negotiated with. However, banned terrorist groups in Karachi should be crushed? We really do have a split personality as a country.