Ramazan Kareem!

This is the Arab greeting during Ramazan. Ramazan is generous, an opportunity to bring out the best in people and communities. This is needed in a time of Corona, climate catastrophe, nuclear anxiety, ideological narratives threatening war and genocide, fake news making it impossible to tell falsehood from truth, fake democracy and class warfare as governance. The Doomsday Clock of the renowned Bulletin of Atomic Scientists notionally measures proximity to the annihilation of ordered human existence i.e. human civilization. It is now seconds rather than minutes to midnight: the moment of annihilation.

The reply to the greeting is “Allahu Akram!” Allah is most generous! Ramazan is, accordingly, an opportunity to reflect, resolve, take action and pray: to reflect on the challenges confronting us as well as on ourselves as individuals, members of a group, society, nation and international community; to resolve to improve ourselves at every level; to take action to address and progressively overcome all challenges; and to pray for Allah’s blessing and forgiveness knowing sincerity of prayer is established only through the quality of intent and actions.

But the government of a soft or corporate capitalist state does not 'walk the talk'. It provides neither priority nor resources for public goods and basic services to enable the poorer and more vulnerable segments to survive and prosper. Instead, Potemkin democratic structures are set up to deceive and destroy any longer-term prospect of real democracy and security through development and transformative change. Major crises reveal hidden fault lines.

According to research scientists in Pakistan, the strategies to combat Covid-19 – until a vaccine is developed – include massive testing, isolating and treating those who test positive, tracing those who have been in contact with them, etc. The number of those tested is only in the thousands and apparently 30 percent of the tests are 'false negative' because of defects in testing equipment or mismatches between PCR instruments and testing kits. Meanwhile, the number of asymptomatic 'spreaders' is unknown because of insufficient data to develop strategies to test an essential minimum of them. Only then can there be a scientific estimate of the extent and distribution of the corona virus and therapeutic ways to contain it.

Given the similarity of conditions in India and Pakistan, it is interesting that renowned Indian TV journalist, Karan Thapar, who has recently conducted a series of extremely informative interviews with economic and epidemiological experts in India, has speculated on possible reasons for the low death rate from Covid-19 in India. (Pakistan’s official death rate is apparently even lower.) He suggests, while acknowledging the lack of supporting scientific evidence, that the younger age structure, warmer temperatures, and the general practice of having children inoculated with tuberculosis BCG vaccinations may account for it. Others have suggested an acquired 'herd immunity' for all sorts of reasons. Scientists do not rule out these possibilities, but in the absence of clinical trials cannot base their mitigation and suppression strategies on speculative assumptions.

Accordingly, we must assume that in the absence of interim non-pharmaceutical interventions or NPI a 'tsunami' of cases could be lying in wait. This would overwhelm Pakistan’s fragile and underfunded public healthcare system. A quantum jump in mortality could destabilize the country’s economic, political and law and order situation beyond control. The confusion over lockdowns versus re-opening the economy, and misunderstanding the symbiotic relationship between public health and the national economy, could lead to a tidal wave of deaths from the disease or from starvation or both

Despite the limited resources made available for public health emergencies, active scientific research is being conducted in Pakistan to develop vaccines against the constantly evolving Covid-19. The virus in Pakistan already differs from the Wuhan virus at several points. Therapeutic drugs to ameliorate positive cases until a vaccine is available are also being developed. Domestic designs for the manufacture of ventilators and PPE are being tested by concerned institutions.

Major relief packages for the poor and the vulnerable are in various stages of implementation although critics allege these packages are being used for party political purposes which, if true, would be unfortunate if not unprecedented. Social behaviour including physical distancing, wearing masks, washing hands etc is being counseled on a regular and nation-wide basis. However, the poorer classes are simply unable to observe many of these 'protocols' for obvious reasons. The religious lobby is also playing politics with the situation. The CJP indicated his disapproval of the way the crisis was being handled.

Once, Inshallah, Pakistan comes through this phase of a complex and multi-dimensional existential crisis, will any meaningful lessons be learned to face the even greater challenges of climate, war and governance? Hope springs eternal, but the record of Pakistani governments with regard to learning lessons from national tragedies is not encouraging.

What have Pakistani governments learned from the loss of East Pakistan, the failure of their Afghan and Kashmir policies, constitutionally illegitimate and asphyxiating rule by security institutions, dysfunctional “parliamentary democracy,” inter-provincial disharmony, the nurture of proxies, the humiliation of Abbottabad, the deliberate underfunding of human resource development and human rights protections, the manipulation and suppression of the media, etc? Pakistanis in general have become cynical. They feel helpless. They feel betrayed. Their leaders or heroes have flattered only to deceive. As a result, they regard efforts to change things as impractical and irrelevant. They are reduced to being satisfied with getting by from day to day – and even this is now threatened.

The situation is not much better in the dystopian US and the increasingly divided EU – with or without the UK. In Asia, there is the contrast between the disciplined and effective performance of China and the chaotic and reprehensibly communal response of India. India-Pakistan relations, moreover, pose a potential threat to billions of people in and beyond South Asia unless the leadership in both countries can rise above zero-sum policies towards each other.

The UN secretary-general has called for a world-wide ceasefire and international cooperation to build a post Covid-19 peace and to confront other existential challenges to organized human society. The peerless Noam Chomsky’s latest book is fittingly titled 'Internationalism or Extinction'. World War I was “the war to end all wars.” Its unprecedented horror led to the League of Nations to consolidate the unjust and unstable peace of Versailles which led to Hitler and World War II, and even greater horrors. The UN was created to ban the scourge of war forever. The cold war ensued. Colonialism was replaced by neo-colonialism. Keynesian capitalism was replaced by corporate financial capitalism, the rule of the 0.01 percent, and perpetual wars against developing countries.

Today the US is losing its soft power and its economic hegemony, but not yet its military supremacy. It is obsessed with the rise of China and the military resurgence of Russia. The reprobate Trump, whom Chomsky calls “the most dangerous leader in history,” is a serious threat to humanity. Yet he seems set to be re-elected, which defines the state of the US.

Nevertheless, Pakistan’s PM can still contribute to international cooperation. For this he must unflinchingly address serious domestic challenges, rise above miserable party politics which assails us every day, and somehow achieve the seemingly impossible by inducing Modi to cooperate in transforming Pakistan-India relations through a mutually satisfactory resolution of all outstanding issues, including Jammu and Kashmir. A combination of a palpable instead of a mere rhetorical vision, an implacably principled and driving resolve, domestic and external consensus building, and realistic diplomacy can succeed.

The writer is a former ambassador to the US, India and China and head of UN missions in Iraq and Sudan.

Email: ashrafjqazi@gmail.com