[Reader-list] PAKISTAN PEOPLE VOICE

[Bipin Trivedi]

Dear Yasir,

I appreciate that you oppose your politician and army policies/agenda, but how many people are of the view of such opposite stand? With the few people opposition the purpose will not serve and the things remain the same. In India also the majority times ruled congress party has no internal election since about 25 years. 

Anyway, if you have given authority to initiate dialogue between India-Pak than what will be your agenda? Can you share views?

Thanks
Bipin




-----Original Message-----
From: reader-list-bounces at sarai.net [mailto:reader-list-bounces at sarai.net] On Behalf Of yasir ~?? ??
Sent: Wednesday, May 05, 2010 12:59 PM
To: Sarai Reader-list
Subject: Re: [Reader-list] 140,000 troops in FATA

sorry the policies of the govt may not reflect the will of the people, if
democracy is weak. its gotten better with a freer media influencing the
government over the last 10 years.

if you dont have regular elections, the only other way for a govt,
especially military govt to stay in touch with people in through
intelligence gathering by intelligence agencies operating within the
country. and in pakistan they have ALWAYS manipulated the election to get
the desired results out of parliamentarians careers. imagine majors and
colonels negotiating with to be elected parliamentarians about what they
want or else. the last election was a bit better, but we need several cycles
before the corrupt get cleared or adapt. believe it or not this is how
disconnected we are. there is an insurgency inbaluchistan, there are
separatist movements, and a war in khyber-pakhtunkhwa, and then, a huge
population that is totally disconnected from any political process, who are
the majority of the people of pakistan and have absolutely no expectation of
the govt. In the recent 18th Amendment to the Constitution, they have
dropped the requirement for political parties to have internal elections.
Just imagine what kind of people are sitting in govt. I cannot call them
representative. i am sure it is just a little bit different in india.