Some Sharif memories
OF all political journeys Pakistan has witnessed, Mian Mohammad Nawaz Sharif`s must ranlc among the most remarkable. Sharif was 29 when his family-owned industrial empire, nationalised by ousted leader Z.A.…
How Nawaz Sharif can win the day after elections
The 2013 election was billed as the most important and most historic in Pakistan’s short and oft-interrupted experience of being a democracy. It is safe to say that the performance…
Unravelling…
IT was an odd few days, but it did return one clear verdict: when the dust settled, a majority of the Punjab Assembly could be seen raising their hands high in support…
The business of hate
PAKISTAN’S economy has been under pressure for decades; the country has yet to get down to the business of undertaking the structural reforms necessary to put it on a firmer…
Fading optimism
SECTIONS of the clergy and society have issued an outright condemnation of the dance performance that took place at the Independence Day ceremony as shameful and going against the ideology of Pakistan.…
Year of polycrisis
2022 was a tumultuous year in Pakistan even by the standards of its turbulent political history. It confronted a polycrisis — several crises that converged to reinforce each other and…
A saffron silence
HAD William Shakespeare been alive today in Pakistan, he would have given a different twist to his drama Julius Caesar. He would have reframed history in the light of our…
Imagine, just imagine…
THIS beloved country of ours never ceases to surprise us with the possibilities it offers. The imagination at work is often good enough to beat the unlikeliest fable. The clinching…
Unity for immunity
AS Pakistan returns to glorious hereditary rule, it helps to listen to Leonard Cohen’s classic Democracy: “I’m sentimental, if you know what I mean/ I love the country but I…
Status quo ante
THIS week’s return to dynastic rule hardly qualifies as a celebratory moment in Pakistan’s chequered political trajectory. We can leave to future historians to decide whether it’s a step forward…
