Change: but not for poor

Every other day in Pakistan we see political parties changing turns. We hear many promises, promises of change, promises of progress and  better future, promises of implementation of rule of law and justice, promises of ending the curreption ladden era and so on and so forth. The list of promises is refreshed with every regime because each one of them loots the country in his own unique style and leaves new problems to be addressed without solving the previous ones. People look towards others who take their turn, forget about any promises made, collect money and creat yet other crises which help the then opposition lot formulate new portfolios and yet some new promises for future. The process goes on and on.

Decades back, since autocracy took over the government affairs, people heard about the curreption done by the politicians and saw generals ousting them and declaring them barred from taking part in anything like government. Promise was to creat a curreption free state where we can implement the theorcratic ideologies of the likes of Abul Ala Modoodi and his lot (which is always supporting them). I wonder what excuses they present to themselves when they start looking for good out of the worst How do they face themselves in the mirror. Universal wisdom says that power currepts and absolute power currepts absolutely. But our establishment has a universal wisdom of its own. They made their promises and delievered them in the form of fall of Dhaka. Politicians took over and promised them to do what wasn't as yet done. They did what was never done before (although it was only about creating new problems and not about finding any solutions) and lost their turn of musical chair to yet another general. KER BURA HO BURA. Next general election in 90 days which will lead to elevation of honest, hardworking and pro-poor people to power, implementation of SHARIAT and bringing an end to all immoralities were the promises in his basket. He successfully did his job for 11 years but none of the problems was addressed, let alone any solution. Next came the politicians who promised to eradicate the remains of autocracy. I am not sure about what exactly they eradicated. The remains remained there and they looted the poor state like anything. They were thankful to the previous dictator for creating promise-opportunities and again proved fruitful to the incoming dictator. Yet after all these years of promises, all these changes, autocracies, democracies, and all other cracies, none of the problem that existed in 50s and 60s have been solved. It has just disappeared behind the toll of newer ones.

None of these changes has been for poor. Though it is always wrong to generalize, yet it is right to say that none of the government of this country had anything on their mind for poor. Regimes exchanged but poor remain the same. What changes is the CURRENT problem that they are facing. The only other thing has been their number, poor always increasing steadily. No education, health, communication, daily needs will be addressed except for earning excuses for prolongation of the turn in the hot seat.

Health and education are nowhere on the demand list of people. The list contains extremism (Zia's gift) electricity crisis (PPP, PML), sugar crisis (PML Q), flour, gas, petrol, diesel, justice and suicide bombing (Musharraf's gifts) are on the top of people's demand. Any idiot can predict what is going to happen in next decade. I dare first. The change will be there from America to Europe, China and Russia, Islamabad to Karachi and Lahore to Peshawar, but there will be nothing for poor. The ruling elite doesn't belong to them so they are not to blame. To blame is the middle class that casts the vote, vote in the name of everything except their basic rights and good governance. Till the day they find their leadeship among themselves and support them for their rights, they are bound to suffer. Change is a continued process, but there will be no change for the poor.