The
budget-free people
Anwar Ahmad
June
25, 2001
One thing the
presidential surprise has certainly achieved is to scotch the obligatory
post-budget debate even before it had started. But this isn't a great national
loss. After all, how many Pakistanis have any idea at all of what this annual
number-crunching ritual means for them? They only suffer its consequences. They
are blissfully unaware even of the maddening - but obviously mandatory - homily
that the budget would not affect the common man and national interest demands
yet another belt-tightening.
Over the years, the
one consistent bequest of the budgets is increasing poverty. The number of
Pakistanis living below the poverty-line, having doubled since the 1980s to 34%
of the population, is now estimated by the international architects and
enforcers of the policies which have brought it about at 50%. Most of those
above the dreaded line, are better off only by comparison.
Wealth was being
concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, as is the capitalist and feudal
imperative, even during Field Marshal Ayub Khan's decade of development. This
lit the fuse for the separation of East Pakistan and a people's backlash in the
western wing under Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's slogan of "Roti, Kapra aur Makan".
Bhutto did
accomplish the destructive first phase of his socialist agenda by instituting
land reforms (anathema thereafter) and nationalising major industries and
financial monopolies. But his own weaknesses, the capitalist-feudal reaction and
bureaucratic greed prevented the financial benefits from trickling down to the
people.
To undo the
"dangerous" social and political awareness that Bhutto had aroused in
the masses (and the trade union power) came General Ziaul Haq's
"Islamic" martial law. His non-party politics once again made the
people captives of their clans and local warlords, and killed the debate over
economic ideology. His external triumph, the collapse of the Soviet Union,
sounded the death knell of an alternate economic vision in the world.
Thereafter,
free-market global capitalism has ruled the world unchallenged (until the
inevitable backlash erupted in Seattle, USA, and, most recently, shook the
European Union summit in Gothenburg, Sweden). Thus, there has been little change
since Ziaul Haq in the essence of Islamabad's budgets - except, perhaps, in the
extent to which the poor could be milked without upsetting the applecart.
Increasingly, as the crushed appeared incapable of rallying around any alternate
idea, the governments grew bolder and their budgets more cruel.
Not coincidentally,
the Ziaul Haq years and after also saw Pakistan sinking deeper and deeper into
the debt-trap. The sum total of our national endeavour now is to draw the last
drop of blood from the poor to pay off the international Shylocks so that the
rich, who will not pay their taxes, may be saved from the dreaded default. So,
budget 2001-2002 duly allocates 72.54% of the national revenues for
debt-servicing (another 46.76% for civil and military governance).
We have muddled
through thus far mainly because the population was smaller, the cities
manageable and reasonably provisioned and, most importantly, the small farmers
were doing well and sustaining the bulk of the population. These crucial
elements are now being eroded by our own inaptitude and the economic model being
pursued.
No surprise,
therefore, for the Economic Survey 2000-2001 to find that the benefits of
economic growth had not trickled down to the poor during the last three decades.
No surprise either that the wealth-distribution had worsened drastically. That
is what unbridled capitalism does. The increasingly unavoidable issue of poverty
is most often debated in the coolness of five-star hotels, with mineral water
and sumptuous meals edifying the champions of the poor. Can they - and
Islamabad's budget-makers - even imagine the degradation of real poverty, or the
pangs of unbearable hunger?
The little girl was
sitting by a garbage heap, like the many rag-picking children we have learnt to
ignore as a part of our decaying cities and sprawling slums. But she wasn't
looking for rags. Even though there was nothing even remotely resembling the
remains of an eatable, one little forefinger was probing a gooey substance and
gingerly putting it on the little tongue to see if it could be swallowed. The
person who saw this haunting scene recalls it often, mostly while eating and the
morsel gets stuck in her throat.
Another scene from
the expanding world of hopelessness to which the "tax-free" budgets
are driving more and more Pakistanis unfolds in Lahore - the affluent heart of
the most food-rich province. Early each morning, this small restaurant across
the Al-Falah building throws out last evening's garbage. Waiting in anticipation
is a horde of humans and a swarm of crows. Both fall on the litter in a
shattering display of desperation and, in case of the humans, indignity to which
they have been condemned.
These glimpses of
human degradation can shake one's faith in everything. These people, our
countrymen and fellow human beings, have feelings and equally deprived and
degraded loved ones. What should they expect from budget 200-2001? Are they the
common people who will not, as usual, be affected by it? Or, since the rich will
not pay their dues and the ruling oligarchy will not give up the luxurious
lifestyle, will they have to tighten the belt around their sunken stomachs?
They are beyond
comprehending, much less making use of, the poverty alleviation schemes which
are the government's only assurance to the more "privileged" poor
until we can break out of the debt-trap in five years and the economy takes off.
Let us assume that
this will happen - although even capitalist practitioners, including the former
World Banker Shahid Javed Burki, have criticised the budget for its over
emphasis on stabilising the economy (to pay off the debt) rather than overcoming
the critical resource constraint by swapping debt-servicing for growth. But even
if the poorest somehow manage to survive, the debt is paid off and the economy
takes off in the promised five years, will the benefits trickle down to them?
Please recall that
the much-vaunted trickle-down effect of economic growth has been described as
what comes out of the other end of the horse. No country burdened with our
magnitude of population and poverty has been salvaged by free-market capitalism.
Please recall also
that increasing poverty is not peculiar to Pakistan. It afflicts the whole world
to a lesser or greater degree. After the Russian disaster, poverty is spiralling
even in China as it embraces free-market capitalism. The Indian free-market
"reformers" too are having to promise their 360 million below poverty
liners that good years are just around the corner.
If poverty is less
visible in the West, this is mainly because it has smaller populations and is
also ripping off the "developing world." This reality is brought home
by the images of emaciated babies, glazed eyes and fly-covered faces, lying
listlessly in the laps of their even more emaciated and lifeless mothers. Since
these epitaphs of humanity are almost always out of black Africa, few people are
moved by them anymore.
That has apparently
prompted the "Drop the Debt" group to conceive a remake which exposes
the rich-poor exploitative relationship in its stark cruelty. The group has
launched a poster in London showing a healthy western (white) baby trying to
breast-feed from a malnourished African woman. "Haven't we taken
enough?" is the damning question it asks.
The campaign is
intended to shock the public (ahead of next month's G-8 summit in Genoa, Italy)
into an awareness of the need to write off the debt of the poorest countries.
Quite expectedly, feathers have been ruffled and the group has received a
complaint from UK's Advertising Standards Authority. But it isn't repentant. Its
leading supporter rock star Bob Geldof said no apologies were needed as the
photo only depicts the truth about a single crippling issue that imbalances the
world morally as well as financially.
It is up to us to
learn the right lessons from the world scene, and world history. The immorality
of debt and its cruel human cost have made default all but inevitable. Nothing
is more important than giving the poor a fair chance. Therefore, what we need to
ponder is a humane alternative to unfettered free-market capitalism. "So
that the wealth shall not circulate only among the rich from among you," is
the guiding principle of the Holy Qur'aan.
The author is a
freelance columnist