The case for and against the creation of new provinces takes centre stage as the 20th Constitutional Amendment Bill is introduced in parliament.

By Huma Yusuf for The New York Times

On Monday morning, Pakistanis awoke to news that their country had just won its first Oscar. Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy and her co-director Daniel Junge received the award for best documentary in the short-subject category for “Saving Face.” The film chronicles the work of the British-Pakistani plastic surgeon Mohammad Jawad, who performs reconstructive surgery on women who were attacked with acid.

The media in Pakistan couldn’t get enough of the story. Television channels repeatedly broadcast footage of Obaid-Chinoy receiving her award. Fans posted on their Facebook pages pictures of the filmmaker on the red carpet. Her acceptance speech was tweeted and retweeted: “To all the women in Pakistan who are working for change, don’t give up on your dreams — this is for you.”

Politicians tried to share the limelight. Altaf Hussain, the head of the Karachi-based M.Q.M. party, congratulated Obaid-Chinoy publicly. Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani announced that she would be given a civilian award for making Pakistan proud and catalyzing social change.

The chain restaurant Nando’s, which specializes in grilled chicken, even designed an advertising campaign riffing on the documentary’s name: “From one hot chick to another: Thanks for Saving our Face.”

But Obaid-Chinoy’s triumph, a rare piece of good news out of Pakistan, also reveals the extent to which Pakistanis have become accustomed to feeling dejected.

For once, Pakistan is making headlines for a positive achievement, not another terrorist attack, political squabble or natural disaster. For Pakistanis who have been struggling to restore their country’s flailing image, it’s a relief to see a talented, young Pakistani woman receiving a coveted international award — and hobnobbing with George Clooney. As the cultural critic Nadeem F. Paracha put it in a tweet, “Viva la @sharmeenochiony! The pride of Pakistan is in their artistes & intellectuals. Not in bombs and bans!”

But what does it say about a country that it would rejoice at attracting global attention for rampant violations of women’s rights?

Pakistan is the world’s third-most dangerous country for women. Over 150 Pakistani women are the victims of acid attacks each year. Activists for women’s rights claim that only 30 percent of acid cases are reported and that this form of violence is extremely widespread because acid is easily available and inexpensive. Last year, the government passed the Acid Control and Acid Crime Prevention Bill, which imposes on attackers prison terms from 14 years to life and fines of up to one million rupees (about $11,000). But the new law has yet to be rigorously implemented, and attitudes toward women’s rights are far from reformed.

Obaid-Chinoy’s film highlights these problems — hardly a point of pride for Pakistanis.

Once the Oscar high subsides, Pakistanis will have to contend with the fact that their nation remains notorious for its challenges, violence against women included. Then the question will be, can the hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis who rooted for Obaid-Chinoy at the Academy Awards muster the same enthusiasm to tackle the problems that her work exposes?

Huma Yusuf is a columnist for the Pakistani newspaper Dawn and was the 2010-11 Pakistan Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.

Filed under: blasphemy laws, British Muslims, Freedoms, Pakistan, Pakistani Britons, Pakistanis Tagged: Academy Award, Acid Control and Acid Crime Prevention Bill, Altaf Hussain, Dr Mohammad Jawad, George Clooney, Huma Yusuf, Karachi, MQM, Oscar, Pakistan, PPP, Saving Face, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, Zakia & Rukhsana

Another shameful example of corruption of our so called elected government. http://www.express.com.pk/epaper/PoPupwindow.aspx?newsID=1101455314&Issue=NP_LHE&Date=20120221    

Pakistan political parties branded without the face of ‘religious’ – doing so would only hinder their fund raising opportunities with Western forces they supposedly despise – like the PTI, MQM, PML N, PPP and ANP have not aligned with the JUI and ASWJ to verbally protest NATO’s plans to restore their supply route. The route [...]

Non Religious Parties Support Restoration of NATO Supply Route is a post from: PakMediaBlog All Rights Reserved.

Let me start by saying I do not support this party, but one a close friend and confidant is a vocal supporter of the prime version i.e. SZAB era + policies. Let me further clarify that what is written below in italics comes close to the region of ‘bragging’ but I have no other way [...]

Reasons to Support the current PPP regime is a post from: PakMediaBlog All Rights Reserved.

By Saeed Shah for The Miami Herald

Pakistan’s political crisis, which pits its president against determined opponents in foes in Parliament, the Supreme Court and the military, is likely to reach fever pitch on Monday with a confidence vote scheduled in Parliament and hearings scheduled in two critical court cases.

The crisis is so intense that President Asif Zardari’s administration may be willing to call elections for as soon as October, according to members of his ruling coalition and its advisers. But that may not be enough to mollify the opposition, which wants earlier elections, or the country’s powerful military establishment, which is believed to be trying to force a so-called “soft coup,” under which Zardari, a critic of the military’s traditional dominance of Pakistan, would be forced out by Parliament or the courts.

The threat of an outright coup also hangs over the crisis, if the politicians cannot find a way out or the court proceedings reach absolute stalemate.

Whether the government can reach agreement with opposition leader Nawaz Sharif is unclear. Zardari’s Pakistan Peoples Party doesn’t want to announce elections until after voting in March for a new Senate, which the PPP is widely expected to win. But Sharif would like the new elections to be in the summer, perhaps June, which would require an earlier announcement.

“There is no other option for the government to come out of the current crisis without elections,” said an adviser to the PPP leadership, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, as did the other coalition members. “It is in the interests of the PPP to reach an agreement with Nawaz.”

The PPP rules with three major coalition partners, but the alliance is looking shaky. Two of the parties, the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Q, have distanced themselves somewhat from the government.

A senior member of the coalition said the parties so far have agreed internally only to a general election to be held in October. That would be just a few months before the February 2013 date when Parliament would complete its five-year term and elections would have to be held anyway.

An early election should also placate the courts and the military. A supposedly neutral caretaker government would have to be installed to oversee a three-month electioneering period.

Another coalition member said: “It is 100 percent certain that there will be elections in 2012. The only solution is elections. It doesn’t matter whether they are held in June or October.”

Zardari’s coalition itself brought Monday’s confidence vote resolution to Parliament, cleverly wording it so that it asks for support not for the prime minister or even the government, but for democracy. That makes it difficult to oppose.

But the PPP’s troubles in Parliament are only one of the fronts in its battle for survival. The courts and the military are both maneuvering against the party’s leaders, with two explosive cases coming up for hearings Monday.

The first stems from a 2007 decree by President Pervez Musharraf that granted immunity from prosecution to Zardari and other exiled PPP politicians in an effort to persuade them to return to Pakistan to participate in elections that Musharraf was being pressured by the United States to hold.

The Supreme Court later ruled, however, that the decree was illegal and demanded that the government reopen corruption charges against Zardari stemming from the time when his wife, the assassinated PPP leader Benazir Bhutto, was prime minister.

The government declined, however, and now the court has summoned the government to explain its actions. The court could declare Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani in contempt of court, which would in effect remove him from office.

The other case involves the the scandal in which a judicial commission is investigating allegations that Husain Haqqani, a close Zardari adviser and former ambassador to the U.S., wrote a memo that was passed to U.S. officials in May. That memo offered to replace the Pakistan military’s top officials in return for U.S. support should the military attempt to push Zardari aside.

Haqqani, who was forced to resign, says he had nothing to do with the memo, which the military has said amounted to treason.

The judicial commission may take testimony this week from an American businessman, and occasional news commentator, Mansoor Ijaz, who claimed that he had delivered the memo to U.S. officials, in a column that appeared in the British newspaper the Financial Times in October. Ijaz has said he will show up as a witness, though he apparently has yet to receive a visa to enter Pakistan.

Filed under: Afghanistan, American Muslims, Democracy, Freedoms, Pakistan, Pakistan Army, Pakistanis, President Obama, Taliban, United States, US Army Tagged: Asif Ali Zardari, General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, Imran Khan, Mansoor Ijaz, Memogate, MQM, Muttahida Quami Movement, Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan, Pakistan Muslim League-Q, Pakistan Parliment, Pervez Musharraf, PPP, Yousuf Raza Gilani

Yet another blogger for yet another major news publishing house has written yet another blog in the ‘open letter’ format, a format that implies that the writer has the balls to take all the heat (come what may) as a direct result of his/her publicly declared opinion. Well gosh darn, I have to know who [...]

Dawn News Blogger Thinks Mansoor Ijaz Cares is a post from: PakMediaBlog All Rights Reserved.

By Owais Jafri Published: January 8, 2012 MULTAN: Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) senior leader and Deputy Convener Raabta Committee Farooq Sattar said on Sunday that the approval of the 20th amendment from the parliament will be a gift of change to the middle class society, poor people and struggling classes of Pakistan. “The 20th amendment is the [...]

Each new year, fates promise us a new beginning. And as is the wont of the most beautiful amongst the ladies, and a part of their allure, this assurance can ultimately lead to either of the two, a heartbreak or a delicious surprise . But in the meantime the mere thought of the possibilities keeps one enthralled.

And the new year is also a traditional time for us foolish mortals for making our own resolutions, remarkable only for the generally singular absence of any real intent and serving the rather useful purpose of making us feel good. The frivolous ones go unheeded, as expected, after a few days into the new year. But then there are others , normally based on personal convictions driven by and filtered from bitter experience, which are meant to be kept.

As with individuals, so do nations appear to make new year resolutions. And judging by the general mood, Pakistan has firmly resolved to change.

This new year has a special universal significance anyway. December of this year is when the fourth count on the ancient Maya calendar ceases. Unlike that portrayed in films and imbedded in popular culture this date is not a portent of some great cataclysm which will strike the human race, but to the Mayans it signified an end to one cycle of human civilization and the beginning of the next one.

And this year is also associated with the most powerful positive force in Chinese cosmology, the Dragon. The Dragon symbolizes potent and auspicious powers. It is also a symbol of power, strength, and good luck. What superheroes can do, Dragons can do better, and then some more.

By some quirk of fate, both of the above seem to have intertwined and gifted us ordinary Pakistani’s something which most of us had despaired of ever coming across again , a year to look forward to. Looking back it’s amazing how much difference a mere three months can make in changing the psyche of a whole nation. And to emphasize the point, please do recall that the term nation itself had sounded embarrassingly alien in context of Pakistan not so very long ago.

Now we seem poised on the cusp of a new beginning, with PTI being the catalyst.

While for the elite among us , as a popular saying goes, every day has always been Eid and each night a celebration, for millions of other citizens life had become too much of a struggle. The dire socio-economic situation being a major cause but the chief instigator being an absence of hope. A void which had created a palpable pall of depression all round and put a question mark on the very viability of Pakistan as a normal country. Snide remarks of a failed state were being incessantly echoed in international and national media.

And then the previous three months came along. It’s still debatable that whether PTI jumped or it was pushed but it sure made a hell of a splash. Irrespective of who scored the most points, or runs, in this phase one thing is quite apparent, that the ordinary voters have suddenly been energized and become uncompromisingly demanding. They are no longer willing to be treated as mere numbers, to be duped by the more astutely wily of our traditional politicians.

As that most erudite of observers of life , Oscar Wilde observed “what seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise”, the apathy of voters in the last election subsequently dealt them a very harsh lesson indeed as to the perils of imprudent choices. Having suffered under the resulting political oligopoly of PPP, Muslim League, MQM and ANP for the last three years, the voters had become increasingly desperate. The desire to teach these arrogant oligopolists a lesson had been thwarted by the fact that there had been no real alternative available. Now Imran Khan and PTI have made sweet retribution all too possible. And promise of real change hangs thick in the air, further exciting the imagination.

No wonder then that two different observers reporting about the mood in Pakistan now and say in the past June would come across to the uninformed reader as addressing different countries altogether. Make no mistake that’s the magnitude of the change which has taken place in the national psyche. At this point in time, after many a year, there is a visible undercurrent of optimism and exhilaration in the national polity.

What we are now witnessing is that for the second time in our history , post independence, the engagement of the voters in the political process is promising to dramatically influence the direction our country is likely to take. The people feel that they have an alternative leadership to support. And most importantly well meaning political leaders have another platform to join in case they feel out of sync with their present party’s policies.

Like a particularly well thought out teaser campaign the new year has thus already provided exciting glimpses of a list of alluring possibilities to the Pakistani nation. For once the ordinary people seem to have a fighting chance to set the national agenda. For too long this has remained a prerogative, directly or indirectly, of our armed forces. Well meaning or not their intervention has ended in disaster for all of us, sooner and later. The last undisputed elections were held in 1970. We all remember what happened next when the will of the people was subverted on the plea of greater national interest. This must not be allowed to happen this time round.

For those pointing out the numerous chinks in the armor of our knight to the rescue, a word of advice. Please save your energy , nobody expects a perfect hero in Imran Khan. Real life hero’s, other than saints, are individuals who despite their all too human flaws have the courage to strive for real , meaningful change. I too disagree with his current tactics, and am pretty vocal about it, but I also truly believe that he is the best choice we have.

The Oracle is in a good mood, the auguries are auspicious, the mood is buoyant. Now it is up to all of us to ensure that 2012 year turns out to be a year to remember.