We are facing a credible threat

Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

No state, individual or government can claim to have an eternal right to rule because their right to existence is directly linked to the duty of and commitment to fairness and justice for all without discrimination. They are under a moral, legal and social obligation to perform. Abandonment of this principle deprives them of their right to rule, govern or exist. They also become a credible threat to the welfare and safety of the people.

Here too the government has lost, if it ever had, its right to exercise power in the name of the people due its illegality and obsoleteness. Having lost its right to exist, it has become compulsively repressive and oppressive. Organized and systemic repression has become an absolute necessity for it and it is exclusively preoccupied with preserving its perks and privileges. Its intransigence and obduracy has increased in proportion to the worsening of the situation and conditions.

Serious repercussions

Mir Mohammad Ali

In these wonderfully free times of the reign of enlightened moderation the procedure to get an exclusive interview with the General-President has been radically streamlined. All a TV channel has to do is to either request the Islamabad police to send its commandos to wreck the studios while the information minister is there or ask the goon run coalition partner of the Sindh government and of course Musharraf’s favorite to send their democracy and liberalism loving goons to bring it under small arm fire for a few hours. And Hey Presto the exclusive interview is granted.

There is no guarantee that pearls of wisdom will be showered or solutions of world problems forwarded but one thing is certain the mindset of the interviewee is duly exposed.

The velvet glove

Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

In my life I have often come across warped, self-serving political statements but the one coming from the third time around aspiring PM truly takes the cake on all counts. It stinks not only of self-interest but of the utter disregard of something known as the people’s will and interest. It is not only absurd in its logic, it is an outright affront to something known as “democracy”, something which this aspirant doesn’t ever tire of paying lip-service to. It is an outrageous insult to the people who have long suffered under the shabby rule of the army and corrupt politicians.

Benazir Bhutto, former prime minister and chairperson of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), said on Saturday that the international community and the armed forces of Pakistan have confidence in President General Pervez Musharraf and therefore “we need to work out a solution with him”.

‘One who pays the piper calls the tunes’: On China in Balochistan

The higher the stakes the more intense the resentment and resistance is bound to be and consequently the repression too will assume horrific proportions.

by Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur

Have you ever thought when and why an investor needs to have armed back-up for it to continue to develop, yes that is what they say to develop, a mine a port or power-station etc. They need to do have armed security when they are doing it without the consent of the people and need that armed security to keep their resentment in check and suppressed and this results in human rights violation which are explained away as deterring misguided people from putting up obstacles in way of development and progress.

‘VBMP has record of 14,000 missing Baloch people’

SAHIWAL: Up to 18,500 people of Balochistan have been missing since 2000, and of them data on 14,000 has been documented by the Voice for Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP).

Mama Abdul Qadeer Baloch, VBMP chairman, said this while talking to reporters in Sahiwal on Thursday. Mr Baloch, the VBMP chairman, is leading a long march from Karachi to Islamabad to highlight the issue of missing Baloch people.

Gold diggers in Balochistan

by Murtaza Haider

The caretakers were expected to take care and the governors were supposed to govern. However, in Reko Diq’s case, governance failed and the care was never provided.

In a recent judgement, the Supreme Court of Pakistan has declared illegal the July 1993 agreement between the Balochistan Development Authority (BDA) and Australia’s BHP. Since the original agreement stands null and void, all subsequent sales and transfers of the exploration rights by BHP to Tethyan Copper Co. (TCC), which is jointly owned by Canada’s Barrick Gold Corporation and Chile’s Antofagasta, have been deemed illegal and void.