Now walk the talk

Spring is in the air; new life is sprouting green and birds are singing melodious songs. Add to this the euphoric expectation of a new political dispensation taking shape naturally and one can easily become heady. Cynics say that when all is said and done, nothing will change; romantic optimists think this political spring will be different — something good will happen, something that puts Pakistan back on track. The truth will be in-between.

Parties are putting out manifestos full of promises, with timelines to fulfil them. Some are readily doable, many hard to believe, and some are, well, political jargon for lies. In all this election rhetoric, one issue that is getting more mention this time across all parties is education. Astute as they are, they are even putting a price tag on the investments they will make, knowing well that this will add wind to their political sails. Be that as it may, these are God’s small mercies that I wish and pray convert to public policy.

Of course, we are accustomed to the vacuous promises politicians make. But things change. Who would have thought the innocuous Article 62 would sting those who let it stay in the Constitution with such malice? Or, that a little fib about academic qualifications five years back would knock them out of the elections? While some of it appears sadly comical, suffice it to say that a new paradigm is at play. We may yet find a path for Pakistan. But we are inured with empty words. Politicians have talked the talk on education long enough; let’s nudge them to now walk that talk.

What is obvious is that education is the only panacea for us, and the path to national salvation cannot be found without educating Pakistan. We know this, our parents knew this, and their parents and on and on because we strive to educate our children well, just as our parents did. And we — the power brokers and policymakers — have created perfect little niches where our scions get a good, credible education. It’s only when we formulate policies for the poor and downtrodden, i.e., the vast majority, that our eyes become hazy and we get entangled in cliches and empty rhetoric. Let us keep it simple. Let us try to do unto others as we do unto our own. Let us try to give children in the public sector school system some fighting chance against the children of the elite. God creates all men equal; we are unjustly creating an educational apartheid.

When you cut to the bone through the technical, administrative and a myriad other reasons afflicting public sector schools, a stark reality staring us in the face is the woefully inadequate investment we make in education. At this point, many will argue that even the current investment is not properly utilised, and even with all the restraints, some schools perform better than others. This only obfuscates the fundamental argument. Some schools may be performing better, but none is even close to where we want them because of inadequate funding.

If one researches public sector investment in education, one will find Pakistan near the bottom. Cuba invests around 17 per cent of its GDP on education; the US over five per cent. India, Bangladesh and Nepal are also ahead of us as we are painfully feeling the blowback from a flawed policy in pitiful educational statistics. This is now starkly manifested in the breakdown of institutions and society, where an out-of-school kid has no qualms blowing people up for a pittance because of hopeless despair. My eminent colleagues, vice chancellors of public sector universities, have deliberated over the malaise in the education sector and are of the unanimous view that the singular important reason is inadequate funding. Unless education is better funded, we will continue to plummet in a dizzying spiral.

Once the policymakers decide that empty words are not enough and serious money needs to go into education, modalities of how it can be efficiently achieved can be readily worked out. Let us chastise the political elite into making education their top priority — no ifs, no buts, no hows.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 27^th, 2013.