One-way to Mars: Pakistan's ex-military man wants to leave behind legacy

Ema Anis Published about 6 hours ago

Pakistani-Canadian Reginald Foulds believes death can come anywhere, be it in our beds, on the road or on another planet.

It was both astounding and fascinating to hear about the Mars One project – 24 people going on a one-way trip to the red planet never to return to Earth.

How does it feel? Is it equivalent to committing suicide? How do family and friends react? We asked these questions from the only Pakistani candidate to have made it to the shortlisted top 100 candidates for the project.

“My motivation is to do something extraordinary and die with a name and a legacy left behind for thousands of years to come,” says Pakistani-Canadian Reginald George Foulds who believes that Mars One is a great opportunity for him to fulfill his dreams and to do something “out of this world”.

“[I want to leave] a legacy behind like many other great people who took expeditions to the unknown territories. For me, it will be to another galaxy,” says Foulds, who has served in the Pakistani military for more than 20 years. “Being a pilot for many years, it was always my desire to be an astronaut.”

People may find this hard to believe but Foulds’ family has been very supportive of him regarding this project. “Everyone is as excited and thrilled as myself for my being amongst the top 100 candidates from an initial list of more than two hundred thousand,” says Foulds, who has two children – a son and a daughter.

Several people have termed this mission a suicide, but Foulds has a different point of view.

“I don’t have any fears whatsoever, death only comes once and is inevitable. Each one has to die one day, according to the will of God; be it in our beds, on the road or on another planet.”

Foulds has complete faith in this project. When asked about the research which said that the candidates will not be able to survive for more than 68 days on the planet, Foulds said: “Well, all researchers have their own research criteria and findings. Mars One is a wonderful project; they have a great vision and are working towards a flawless mission that will be safe in every way for humans to land and live on Mars.”

Being a dual citizen, Foulds plans to represent both Pakistan and Canada on this mission.

“I am a proud and patriotic Pakistani; Pakistan has given me all I needed to be a confident and good human being. I shall never let those values go at any cost. At the same time, Canada has given me and my family another home and the opportunities to further grow. I along with my family equally owe our allegiance to Canada.

“In this mission in fact I will be representing the whole world.”

http://www.dawn.com/news/1164840/one-way-to-mars-pakistans-ex-military-man-wants-to-leave-behind-legacy

Khyber Agency IDPs: Caught between militants and camp misery

Ibrahim Shinwari Updated about 7 hours ago

Internally displaced residents of Bara, a town of the Khyber Agency who have fled the military operation against Taliban militants, wait at a registration point. — AFP

Rehman Shah, 42, of Shalobar tribe of Bara has little faith in the government’s assurances about restoring peace in Bara, or the peaceful return of thousands of displaced families to their homes in the near future.

Living with his family of six in a patchy tent in Phase four of the Jalozai camp, Shah said security forces were still conducting search operations in most parts of Bara. Meanwhile, the proscribed organisation Lashkar-i-Islam once again issued a warning to avenge those who dared to come back.

“Everybody knew living in a tent in extreme weather conditions was not going to be easy. The displaced families are more than willing to go back to their homes, but cannot do so in the face of threats from militant groups and continuous military operations,” he said.

The Bara IDPs were expected to return home in mid February, as announced by Governor Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Sardar Mehtab Ahmad Khan in December last year. He claimed that most of the area, except a few pockets in the remote Tirah valley, were cleared of militants after a successful military operation.

But Abdul Meeran, a member of the consultative body (shura) of Bara IDPs at Jalozai camp, is sceptical of this claim.

“Militants still roam around in Bara scot free and are harassing local residents while their agents are issuing threats to Jalozai camp dwellers,” he said while explaining the IDPs’ fears and apprehensions about the current security situation in Bara.

“I remember a time when I used to feel secure in my home town. Going to my fields at any time of the day without any fear and intimidation from militant groups, taking a mid day nap under a shady tree after some hard labour and waking up with the call for azaan from a nearby mosque was a cherished memory," said the 60-year-old Abdul Meeran — a former Akkakhel farmer.

An “impossible” compensation

Bara IDPs wait at a registration point in Peshawar. — AFP

With their property destroyed, schools, health units, roads and bridges demolished, and an absence of a comprehensive reconstruction and rehabilitation plan, the IDPs have little to look forward to.

To top it all, the procedure laid down for compensation of their damaged private property is both complex and tedious.

“The government and donor agencies compensate the damage to private property on basis of an approval from the political administration and upon the recommendation of tribal elders. This is also applicable only if the damages are reported by the media,” explained Haji Noor Muhammad who is also member of the camp shura.

He added that over 50 per cent of the damages caused to private properties have not been reported in the media because people were largely unaware of the procedure to avail monetary compensation.

The Fata Secretariat has made the situation worse by adding further complications.

It made obligatory upon the affected family to get approval of the political administration, security officials in charge of the military operation in a particular locality of Bara, along with signature from the Agency Surgeon and at least three tribal elders before a claim is made for compensation for monetary loses.

Noor Muhammad argued that it was nearly impossible for a displaced person to complete the entire process of verification.

Life inside the camps

A child from Bara at a registration point. — AFP

The disaster management authorities of Fata and KP have established distribution points near camps where IDPs can acquire basic ration. Getting hold of these was neither an easy nor a comfortable exercise for the female dwellers of Jalozai, especially the widowed.

Fauzia, a widow and mother of two children, complained about the uncooperative and at times harsh attitude of both the camp authorities and members of the shura.

She said that women were made to wait in line for long hours in order to get their ration. “We leave behind our children unattended at our tents and our household responsibilities are also affected. While we wait in line, men take their share out of turn and we are at times denied our portion altogether.”

The IDPs at Jalozai camp also claimed that they get sub-standard food items from ration points and the camp authorities have also recently curtailed its quantity. Large families are then compelled to purchase food from the open market which is an added financial burden.

Fauzia, along with her neighbour Sherin Bibi, also criticised the lack of proper schooling at the camp. They said they send their children to a tent school but there is a continuous absence of teachers.

“With no proper system in place for education, most school-going children are seen doing minor street jobs or chores like collecting firewood for their families from the nearby forest.”

Sajjid Khan, now a college student and living in phase two of Jalozai camp, was also dissatisfied with the facilities provided at the camp schools. Other than poverty and lack of teachers, he said most students were in need of psychiatric treatment as they were still traumatised by the volatile situation they had witnessed in Bara.

“At the camp we have no such treatment facility and frightened students avoid coming to schools.”

http://www.dawn.com/news/1164635/khyber-agency-idps-caught-between-militants-and-camp-misery

Analysis: China-Pakistan corridor or labyrinth?

Khurram Husain Updated about 9 hours ago

Federal Minister Ahsan Iqbal and Zhang Xiaoqiang, Vice Chairman, National Development and Reforms Commission, inaugurate 'Pak-China Economic Corridor Secretariat' in Planning Commission. - INP/File

IF you’re confused about the controversy around the route of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), don’t bother going online to clear things up. You won’t find a thing.

For instance, since much of the controversy is about the route of the road link between the deep-water port of Gwadar and the mountain border crossing of Khunjerab, simple common sense would want you to locate a map of this route.

The government is being assailed for having changed the route, which apparently under its original plan ran from Gwadar to Quetta, then up to Zhob before veering east towards D.I. Khan. The government is being criticised for having changed this route to go straight east from Gwadar towards Khuzdar, then slightly northeast to cross the River Indus near Ratodero and connect with the road network in Sindh. The government is strenuously denying that any route changes have been made, arguing that there are two routes being pursued, and on the request of the Chinese, the second route is being built first simply because it is cheaper.

Also read: Corridor furore

A visit to the website of the Planning Commission, which is overseeing much of the project at this stage, shows a link titled Pak-China Economic Corridor under their “About us” tab. You might expect to find some useful information that could clear the air on the route controversy on this link, but all you find is a series of press releases, and photographs.

The news item at the top is headlined “Early finalisation of projects under China-Pakistan economic corridor.” The news item tells you about a “high-level delegation” that visited Beijing on Feb 2 “to hold meetings with Chinese authorities”. The authorities are then listed and a photograph at the top of the release shows the delegation, which includes the minister of state for foreign affairs and the water and power secretary. The release contains statements given by both individuals at the event they attended, but no statements from their Chinese counterparts. Assurances are floated of “high-level interest” in the CPEC in Pakistan and that the government of Pakistan is “taking all the required measures” to see early implementation of the projects.

Other news items appear below but nowhere on the entire site do you find a listing of all the projects under the CPEC, no map of the routes, no tender documents for work currently under way or in the pipeline. In short, all you’ll find on the Planning Commission website is press releases about meetings and photographs of smiling officials shaking hands.

You could try the website of the National Highway Authority next, whose chairman has been appearing before committees in the legislature to explain the route. You would search this site in vain too trying to find out anything about the CPEC.

There’s a tab titled “Projects”, and two links under it, one titled “progress report” and the other titled “project details”. The first link opens up a page with two additional links, which if you click on them bring you back to the first page. The second link, titled “project details”, opens up a list of 100 projects of various types — roads, bridges, interchanges — many of them begun in the early 1990s and concluded more than a decade ago. Nothing on the CPEC.

Another link shows you the tenders floated by the NHA, which consists of images of press ads for tenders and requests for proposals, but nothing identified as being part of the CPEC. There is a tender for work on the N70 highway that runs from Qila Saifullah in Balochistan to Multan. One wonders if this is in connection with the “original route” of the CPEC road network, but there is nothing to indicate.

Next you might turn to the twitter feed of the minister for planning, who tweets under the handle @betterpakistan. You’ll find plenty of detail about all the people the minister has been meeting recently, and even a few tweets about the CPEC on Feb 6 and 10.

In one, he exhorts “vested interests should not come in the way” of the corridor project. In another, we are told that “Gwadar will be linked thru several routes incl Quetta and Ratto Dhero”. Nowhere do we find a map of the routes, any information to substantiate the government’s claim that there is no route change, and that work is being carried out on both routes.

Given the scale of the controversy, you would think the government would have made more of effort to release information that substantiates their claim that the whole controversy is about nothing, that no route changes have been effected, that the two stipulated routes are both being worked.

Given the plethora of platforms through which they could release this information, it is puzzling that it hasn’t been done so thus far. In fact, in a press conference held by the minister for planning specifically to clarify the controversy, no maps were shown nor distributed, and no supporting documentation to establish that work on what they’re calling “the original route” were produced.

So don’t bother to search online if you want to know more about the CPEC. Just sit back and wait to see what happens, because an assurance from the government is all you have to work with.

Published in Dawn February 18th , 2015

http://www.dawn.com/news/1164337/analysis-china-pakistan-corridor-or-labyrinth

Militarised society

Editorial Updated about 7 hours ago

.—AFP/File

IN the two months that have now elapsed since the attack on the Army Public School, much has changed in the country.

Dazed citizens have had to adjust to a series of unpalatable realities, the lifting of the moratorium on executions and the setting up of military courts being just one dimension.

Some of the measures the state and provincial administrations have considered necessary to adopt may or may not have far-reaching and negative consequences.

Also read: Teachers undergo weapons training

But there is one particular path that can already be identified and on which the country has already set foot that will without a shadow of doubt lead to an even more violent future: that of further militarising the population.

Since the APS attack, around the country children enter their schools as gunmen stand by. As reported in this paper on Sunday, the enhanced security measures at one school in Peshawar include a guard who used to be the office peon, and whose training in the use of guns lasted just one day.

KP’s decision to give school teachers training in the use of weapons and, in case of an attack, expect them to act as the first line of defence was shocking.

The problem that is developing, though, is much larger than just protecting educational institutions. On Thursday, the Peshawar High Court directed the provincial government to award licences of prohibited-bore weapons to lawyers, as is already the case for doctors and teachers.

The issue is not just about arms in untrained hands, even though accidental shootings have already occurred: it is the apparent attempt to counter guns by putting more weapons on the street, in the hands of people who do not represent state authority.

It is perhaps a sign of the grim times we are living in that the trend has not received the serious and critical societal debate it merits. But the alarm bells must be sounded, for this is exactly the sort of slippery slope that leads down to the abyss.

Published in Dawn, February 17th, 2015

http://www.dawn.com/news/1164060/militarised-society

Footprints: Yellow fields and colourless skies

Fareeha Rafique Published about 5 hours ago

.—Reuters/File

THE words Basant and bahaar were inseparable till 2007. Basant bahaar then became bahaar, bereft of the million coloured kites dotting springtime skies. Our skies are now azure, albeit of still a troubled shade, not a calm one. As colour faded from the lives of people in this country, it seems strangely reflective that the only non-religious festival uniting Lahoris of all faiths also ground to a halt. The reason, of course, was that the Punjab government decided to resort to banning Basant entirely in order to curb the unfortunate deaths occurring resultantly each year. Kite-string of a lethal kind being the culprit.

Now, it’s been a good eight years that Basant has been relegated to memory. Fading fast. We will, indeed forget. We will forget that the Basant of our generation was the evolution of a festival thousands of years old, that the beginnings of the festival had nothing to do with kite-flying at all, really. So should we have another Basant, then? Another kind of Basant, in which we go back a little, to having kite-flying only with basic, harmless dorr, the kind that does not lead to fatalities. But then, that being not possible I suppose, for government authorities to monitor, it is easier to simply cut the cord. Will we get our Basant back in the near future, or even not-so-near future, wonder many, come this time of the year? This time of the year that used to have February Basants.

Also read: Basant banished & banned

I remember them. In the late 1980s, Basant was mostly a cutesy, walled-city-folk kind of affair. I, being fortunate enough to have grandparents living in the walled city back then, remember those Basants — they were really about kite-flying. There was the in-house mandatory cousin who spent pre-Basant up on the rooftop honing his skill. My more daring younger sibling would brave the bamboo ladder up to the highest level, while I mostly stood below, too afraid of heights. But the few times I ventured up, the world was a beautiful sight from there — Lahore was a vista, unfolding to the farthest stretches of the horizon. There crept in night Basant then, and it was clear that this was the fun part of the show. We stopped visiting in the daytime for Basant then, the evening prior being more colourful and festive. A loudspeaker or two would be stationed at every kite-flier’s rooftop, the music intermittently broken by the essential “bo-kaata” war cry. There were fierce, enthusiastic kite-flying competitions; these could take on an intense hue if neighbourhood tiffs were involved.

By the late 1990s, Basant was a modernised, hip ballgame. Havelis (including those that didn’t quite qualify as) in the walled city were rented out for the weekend; the corporates had stepped in. Everyone wanted a whiff of walled city culture for a day. Basant became one of the save-the-dates on the society calendar. It was all about partying the night and day away. Food, couture and revelry mingled to the drift of barbeque smoke. Music blared from sophisticated systems, and the dhol-wallahs had a field day too. Twenty-something Sara Rafey recalls “hopping from rooftop-party to haveli-do,” each year on the eve of Basant.

This was not the way we were, though, if you step a little farther back in time. Those living in the walled city in the 1960s and 1970s will tell you about the time that “Basant was a simple affair”. Misbah Shafi, who is in her 60s, fondly recalls the Basants of her childhood, when she was “the only girl allowed up on the rooftop to fly kites”. Females weren’t really allowed to scale those heights, the rooftops being a male domain. “But I was indulged by my father,” she reminisces. The dhol-wallahs that she also mentions remained a constant through the decades — perhaps even more so than the art of kite-flying itself, which waned with the Basant-partygoers of the 1990s and beyond.

The harmless fun that was Basant started taking on an alarming hue, as competitiveness spiked, and with it resultant casualties ascribed to dangerous versions of dorr being more and more commonly used. It had all spun out of control for government intervention. The debate is still dragged out around this time every year in the media, about how things can be managed in a way as to reinstate Pakistan’s much-loved annual festival of kites. New solutions are proffered, old ones discussed. And then put away till next year. No loss of life is acceptable, yet arguments in favour of holding the festival without safety impositions are also made by enthusiasts of the sport.

The fields of sarson turn lush every year even now on cue, but the basanti colour that has inspired poets, artists and writers for generations remains restricted to the earth. Our Lahori skies remain colourless, year after year.

Published in Dawn, February 17th, 2015

http://www.dawn.com/news/1164042/footprints-yellow-fields-and-colourless-skies

Pakistanis bought property worth 16bn dirhams in Dubai

Aamir Shafaat Khan Updated about 3 hours ago

— Reuters/file

KARACHI: Pakistanis purchased properties in Dubai worth over 16 billion UAE dirhams during 2013 and 2014 as compared to over 36bn dirham purchases made by the Indians.

Pakistanis bought property worth 7.5bn dirhams, and became the second largest community in the list of expatriate property buyers in Dubai during 2014.

However, Indians remained top investors with 18.23bn dirham investment in 2014 as compared to 18bn dirhams in 2013.

Read: Pakistanis share 8pc in Dubai property market

Based on 2013 investment of 8.6bn dirhams, total buying by Pakistanis in 2013 and 2014 stood at 16.1bn dirhams, according to data of Dubai Land Department (DLD).

The amount of investment in Pakistani rupees crosses over Rs430bn after taking the value of one dirham at Rs27.

Market sources said that political leaders, government officials and business tycoons were the major buyers.

An estate agent said most of businessmen had managed to pull out their investment after 2008.

A builder ruled out the possibility that any developer/builder had lifted any property for launching new projects in Dubai or for investment. He said that the builders are highly busy in Karachi where property demand is high.

Investment from UK in Dubai fell to 9.318bn dirhams in 2014 from 10.4bn dirhams in 2013.

The total value of non-Arab investment in Dubai real estate market stood at 64bn dirhams through 29,098 transactions compared to over 69bn dirhams in 2013.

Iranians and Canadians invested 4.5bn and 3.157bn dirhams, respectively, in 2014.

Citizens of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states bought property worth 32bn dirhams through 7,186 investors in 2014.

Emiratis invested 22.771bn dirhams, registering 4,452 transactions, while Saudis stood second with 1,745 transactions worth 5.207bn dirhams.

They were followed by Kuwaitis who made 426 transactions of 1.271bn dirhams; Qataris with 221 transaction of 1.969bn dirhams, and Bahrainis with 187 transactions of 483bn dirhams. Investors from Oman put in 613 million dirhams in 119 transactions.

Arab investors registered a total of 5,431 transactions worth over 12bn dirhams. Jordanians ranked no. 1 with 1,028 transactions of 2.513bn dirhams.

They were followed by Egyptians with 874 transaction of 1.768bn dirhams, followed by Lebanese with 785 transaction of 2.068bn dirhams. Iraqis came in the fourth place with 650 transactions of 1.631bn dirhams.

People from 140 countries are investing in the property market of Dubai, with total real estate transactions amounting to 218bn dirhams in 2014.

The total value of non-Arab investment in the Dubai real estate market for 2014 amounted to more than 64bn dirhams through 29,098 transactions.

Indian nationals were ranked the highest value foreign investors, making 7,353 transactions with a total of 18.123bn dirhams worth of property transactions.

Investors from Pakistan came in second with 5,079 transactions with a total of 7.588bn dirhams worth of property transactions.

British investment came third at 9.318bn dirhams. They were followed by Iran and Canada with a total of 4.5bn and 3.157bn dirhams.

Published in Dawn February 17th , 2015

http://www.dawn.com/news/1164035/pakistanis-bought-property-worth-16bn-dirhams-in-dubai

Celebrating iron ore discovery

Editorial Updated about 10 hours ago

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.—Reuters/File

THE discovery of a large iron ore deposit in Chiniot is indeed good news but it is useful to keep in mind that the hard part begins now. By itself, the discovery is actually not new.

The deposits were identified as early as 1989 by the Geological Survey of Pakistan, and verified in 1999 by the Department of Mines and Minerals of the Punjab government in a study using samples from 14 bore holes around the Chiniot area.

Each bore hole yielded high-quality iron ore deposits at depths ranging from 120 to 160 metres below the surface, which make these the deepest deposits in Pakistan where all other iron ore extraction is done on the surface.

Know more: Pakistan discovers 'huge' reserves of iron ore

The study found verified reserves of iron ore of around 13m tons. In 2010, the Punjab Board of Investment and Trade began the process to develop a bankable estimate of the total deposits using scientifically proven methodologies that would be acceptable to the global mining community.

That work got under way in 2013 and has just concluded, and the results authenticate the findings of the earlier study done in 1999. Total proven and estimated reserves of iron ore are larger than 100m tons, with another 500m tons of anticipated deposits, making this a large find indeed.

The quality of the iron ore is also comparable to some of the better deposits being mined around the world as well as in Pakistan.

The hard part comes now as Punjab moves to chart a mining methodology, and determines the cost of extraction for these deposits.

Given the depth at which the seam sits, and the fact that multiple water tables lie between the surface and the seam, mining these deposits is going to pose significant technical challenges and will likely require a large initial capital outlay. This will have to include the cost of erecting a steel mill near the mines since surface transport of iron ore is very costly.

Complicating matters is a steep drop in the international price of iron ore in global markets since 2012, when the request for proposals for the study just concluded was sent out. With iron ore prices plunging, and cost of extraction likely to be very high, the commercial viability of mining these deposits could prove to be difficult, trace findings of copper in the samples extracted thus far notwithstanding.

Clearly, it is far too soon to be rejoicing over this find. The road ahead is still fraught with too much uncertainty. Pakistan has a poor track record in developing its mineral resources, as evidenced from the failure to tap Thar coals or develop Saindak or Reko Dik mines.

Far from celebrating the find in such overwrought terms, the government’s energies would be better used by accelerating the search for a commercially viable route to utilise the deposits.

Published in Dawn, February 13th, 2015

http://www.dawn.com/news/1163217/celebrating-iron-ore-discovery

Footprints : Dangerous child's play Saher Baloch Published about 11 hours ago

Footprints : Dangerous child's play

Saher Baloch Published about 11 hours ago

NESTLED among the shops selling pashminas in Mingora town’s China Market are a number of pushcarts. It’s 10am but the area is already congested with honking passenger vans and daily wage earners waiting to be summoned. Amid the pile of colourful markers on one pushcart are grey daggers, pistols, swords, a hand grenade and small rocket launchers. It is only when the vendor takes the lid off most of these items that a pencil nib emerges. The price of these weapon-shaped pencils ranges from Rs20 to Rs30.

Sensing questions, the pushcart seller informs others in Pashto about a “possible raid” and says the stationery can’t be photographed, then explains that selling it is the only way to make ends meet.

Amidst the cacophony, another shopkeeper, Mohammad Sulaiman takes me inside his shop and says the weapon-shaped stationery is available only “in a select few corners of Mingora”, because of a two-month ban imposed by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government last year on selling toy guns or anything resembling a weapon to children. “These pushcart sellers are particular about selling this stationery to children only because an adult buying it would ask questions. But chances of that happening are small. Most people here don’t understand the repercussions of its sale the way some of us do.”

However, one can’t make assumptions about a place that has already seen its fair share of violence as Swat did before the military operation of 2009 against the Taliban.

In such an environment, three people from Swat — a student, a painter and a documentary film-maker — are fighting against the acceptance of weapons in any shape and violence in any form.

Among them, 24-year-old student Neelam Chattan brought the sale of weapon-shaped stationery to the authorities’ attention in 2012 by writing articles in local newspapers. At her home in Shagayi in Saidu Sharif, Neelam says: “We saw the worst of the violence. You may not see sacks with body parts of unidentified men near street corners anymore, or their bodies hanging in the middle of Green Chowk — better known as Khooni Chowk — but it all happened. And because they couldn’t fight it, the people accepted it. But the internalised violence may look for an outlet.”

She speaks of the beautiful town of Kabal, three kilometres from Swat. “People are still seething with rage over their missing family members and those they found in pieces. Children who grew up witnessing such violence may want revenge. Handing them weapons — carefully disguised as stationery — will exacerbate the alienation they feel.”

On Dec 1 last year, a two-month ban was imposed on the sale of toy guns by the Mardan deputy commissioner after two children shot each other from a gun they thought was a toy. Soon after, an Awami National Party leader raised the issue in the KP Assembly after which legislators have been working towards a proper province-wide law to restrict the sale of toy guns.

But just as the ban expired in February, weapon-shaped stationery made its way into the market. Neelam claims it is exported from China through the Afghan trade route to KP.

So far, her campaign ‘Peace for the young generation’ is focusing only on mothers, and making them aware of the consequences of carrying weapon-shaped stationery. “I don’t want to set up an office. Because then we’d need funds to run it, which in turn would make us dependent on our donor’s whims. Working voluntarily works for all three of us. The only funds I need at the moment are for refreshments for the neighbourhood women who come to my place for the meetings,” says Neelam.

During the meetings, mothers narrate the kind of games their children play. One game includes asking a younger, usually female, sibling, to “stay at home, or face the consequences”. Another is called ‘hangings’, in which one child holding a weapon-shaped pencil is supposed to ensure the one hanging is properly dead.

Neelam recounts her personal experience. “The other day, my younger sibling narrated in detail how a commando at their school was holding an SMG. Then he told me the number of bullets it has and calculated the number of people it could kill.”

To deal positively with such cases, mothers are asked to bring their children to painting classes offered at her home by her colleague Mohammad Sattar.

In Swat, activism comes with a price. Recently, while returning from a meeting, she was approached by a man who warned Neelam to stay at home otherwise he would shoot either her or her younger brother. Since then, she has started hiding her face which she never felt the need to do before. “When I narrated the incident to my mother and elder brother, they asked me to continue working. They argued if we won’t speak up then who will. My father worked as an activist till the day he died in 2011. This work comes naturally to me. I’ll have a clear conscience that I at least did something for my country.”

Interestingly, the year Neelam started her campaign, another campaigner for girls’ education, Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai, was shot in the face by the Taliban. Was that the motivating factor? She denies it. “That incident pushed parents to be more open about educating girls. I derive motivation from my surroundings. I was a polio worker deputed 13 kilometres away in Murghazar in early 2012. It was during one of our immunisation rounds that I saw a child playing with a weapon-shaped pencil. That started it.”

Perhaps for the girls of Swat, taking a stand against injustice comes far easier than suffering in silence.

Published in Dawn February 13th , 2015

http://www.dawn.com/news/1163249/footprints-dangerous-childs-play

How Canada's new immigration system is going to impact South Asian men

Murtaza Haider Updated about 3 hours ago

Despite the changes, Canada will still welcome over 172,000 individuals under the economic class of migrants in 2015. —AP

It used to be a sure shot thing: arrive as a foreign student in Canada, graduate with a degree or a diploma, and apply for permanent residency.

But the changes in the Canadian immigration regulations, which came into effect on January 1, have turned a sure thing into a game of chance, where the Canadian government will draw names from a pool of candidates, who will then be invited to apply for permanent residency.

If you were planning to take on huge debts to finance your studies in Canada in hope for a permanent residency later, be careful. After accumulating huge student loans, you will still have to compete with other skilled workers to get a shot at permanent residency — for only those jobs for which no Canadian worker is available.

While the new regulations have added new challenges for foreign students in Canada, they have also improved the odds for highly-skilled professionals and trades. Instead of a 'first come, first serve' basis, the new immigration regulations will fast-track those prospects whose skills are more in demand in Canada.

As a prospect, one needs a job offer from Canada for advance standing, even before one applies for permanent residency.

Also see: Visa denied to Pakistani Hazara unlawful: Australian High Court

The Canadian immigration system was a huge mess. In 2012, 280,000 applicants were waiting to hear back on their applications. The system lacked coordination with the labour markets. Physicians were getting permanent residency, whereas their odds to practice medicine in Canada were very low. This changed in 2012, when the government returned all under process applications and started afresh.

While the changes may look drastic, they benefit those whose odds of finding an employment and adjusting in Canada are stronger.

Despite the changes, Canada will still welcome over 172,000 individuals under the economic class of migrants in 2015.

Application by invitation only

A key difference in the new system is that only those prospects who meet a certain threshold will be invited to submit a formal application for permanent residency.

The two-tier system invites prospects to create an online profile with the government. A new scoring algorithm will automatically score the prospect; for which the maximum achievable score is 1200. Based on the current needs of the labour markets, the federal government will draw names from the pool of prospects several times during the year to admit over 172,000 skilled workers.

These changes guarantee that the system is not overburdened by applicants who are less likely to adjust in Canada.

Who wants to be an immigrant?

The new regulations make a direct connection between the needs of the labour markets and the skill sets of aspiring immigrants. The government has made the task rather simple for applicants to determine the labour market needs in Canada. The aspirants must visit the Canada job bank to learn about the vacancies.

Most readers of this blog will be up for a surprise. Canada is not particularly looking for engineers, doctors, research scientists, or journalists. In fact, the largest number of vacancies are for retail sales clerks (5,572 openings), followed by cooks.

For South Asian men with higher qualifications this may not sound very appetising: Canada needs caregivers (nannies), cashiers, and cooks – not computer scientists.

Canada’s higher education system produces enough highly educated and trained professionals to fill the entry level positions in engineering and applied sciences. The Canadian labour markets demand skilled trades (plumbers, electricians, and truck drivers), retail sector workers, and obviously caregivers to look after the very young and the very old.

The engineers and doctors who immigrated in the past 20 years learned this bitter lesson after they landed in Canada. The new immigration system now links the aspirants to jobs, thus minimising the risk of a mismatch between immigrants’ skills and labour market needs.

—Graphic drawn by Murtaza Haider using data (http://www.jobbank.gc.ca) on February 11, 2015.

Over the past 20 years, I have met with numerous Canadian immigrants from Africa, Eastern Europe, and South Asia who claim to have been duped into immigrating to Canada. They were surprised at how hard it was to find a job, let alone pursue careers as immigrants. In fact, recent immigrants are the new face of urban poverty in Canada, which I reported on earlier in 2012.

Explore: How Pakistani candidates embarrass us in Canadian polls

The immigrants have, to a large extent, themselves to blame.

They applied to immigrate to Canada without researching their odds for employment. Doctors, for instance, arrived without exploring the licensing requirements to practice medicine in Canada. They are the most vocal group among the disgruntled immigrants.

The Canadian government also shares the blame for the archaic point system it used to qualify applicants for immigration. Even when Canada faced serious shortages for truck drivers (the most common profession among Canadian males), the government was busy admitting doctors and engineers.

Instead of prioritising younger applicants, the system brought in middle-aged workers, who were schooled before computers became ubiquitous. The older workers were educated, but not necessarily skilled for Canadian needs. In addition, they were set in their ways and found it hard to change habits and work ethics. The result was obvious:

Canada has the most educated cab drivers and security guards in the world.

The new regulations are not without risks and inherent shortcomings.

For instance, the aspirants with a job offer from Canada will be given priority to apply for permanent residency. The invitees will have up to two months to send in their formal application, which the Canadian government promises to process within six months. The process may take up to eight months before the worker with a job offer is allowed entry into Canada.

Read on: For many UK immigrants degrees are a ‘taxi’ to nowhere

What employer will be willing to hold a vacancy for eight months for a worker living thousands of miles away?

Still, the new system does a better job of setting expectations for aspiring immigrants and Canadian employers. Though the critics of the system are wary of the discretionary powers assumed by the government, they must realise that when immigrant workers fail to adjust in Canada, the governments have to bear the burden of supporting the families of unemployed workers.

By prioritising those applicants whose skills are more in demand, the system improves the odds for new immigrants to succeed in Canada and not be a burden on the taxpayers.

http://www.dawn.com/news/1163129/how-canadas-new-immigration-system-is-going-to-impact-south-asian-men

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Related reads:

• Pakistani-Canadians: Falling below the poverty line
• The grass appears greener to would-be Canadian immigrants

 

Murtaza Haider is a Toronto-based academic and the director of Regionomics.com.

He tweets @regionomics