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 Subject :Sugar, Flour and other Food Crisis Issues.. 2009-09-19 19:15:00 
Asim Khan
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Dedicate this thread to discussion about food crisis in Pakistan.
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 Subject :Pakistan seethes over food, energy crises .. 2009-09-19 19:15:37 
Asim Khan
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President Asif Ali Zardari will be seeking support from donors in New York next week for a country beset by problems ranging from militant violence to food shortages and rising prices.

While the 18-month-old government has won praise from Western allies for its efforts to quell a Taliban insurgency, ordinary Pakistanis have a strikingly different perception. “All these politicians are self-centred and corrupt,” said Muhammad Nawaz, a low-level government worker in Islamabad, as he queued outside a shop to buy subsidised sugar. “They only focus on non-issues and have no sympathy for the common people and the core issues that they are facing.” Such dissatisfaction may not be something to worry too much about for a government with a comfortable majority so early in its five-year term. But the ruling coalition is fragile, institutions are weak and people’s faith is shaken with every government misstep.

The current government inherited an economy on the brink of meltdown when it came to power after nine years of military rule. They were forced to seek a bailout from the International Monetary Fund, but there has been one crisis after another. Last week, Finance Minister Shaukat Tareen, according to aides, nearly resigned in opposition to a cabinet decision to hire rental power units from abroad to reduce an electricity shortage. Aides say Tarin believes the money would be better spent on upgrading existing facilities, and the cost of renting will be too burdensome. Critics of the government say another fear is the opportunity for corruption in rental power deals.

Fears: Donors, who are meeting at the Friends of Democratic Pakistan gathering in New York next week, worry that money earmarked for specific projects could disappear in budget support schemes if given directly to the government. Some analysts fear the army, which has ruled for more than half of Pakistan’s 62 years of independence, could eventually step in if the civilians fail to govern properly. Accusations of government misconduct and mismanagement brought down civilian governments in the 1990s, paving the way for then General Pervez Musharraf’s coup.Security analyst Nasim Zehra believes the generals are committed to staying out of politics, but fears other factors such as graft and the fiascos over sugar and flour will undermine democracy.

“Pushed to the wall, people will now increasingly opt for anarchic ways to protest against democratically elected leaders who may, at this stage, be faulted both for not solving people’s basic problems and for filling their own coffers,” she wrote in an English daily on Thursday. Zardari has failed to win people over since taking over from Musharraf. Dogged by old accusations of corruption, and under constant criticism from hostile sections of the media, Zardari’s approval ratings are little better than his unlamented predecessor. Frequent power cuts and an acute shortage of flour, the country’s most important staple, have outraged the public. Having peaked at 34 percent a year ago, food inflation levelled out at 10.6 percent in July, but analysts see the upward pressure building up.

The latest crisis is over sugar. The government has blamed millers for hoarding, and sugar smuggling into Afghanistan. But many Pakistanis believe the millers are protected by powerful vested interests among the politicians. The Lahore High Court took up the public interest, and ordered traders to ensure a retail price of Rs 40 per kg, compared with a market price of Rs 46 and a peak of Rs 55 last month. The Supreme Court is currently hearing an appeal by millers and traders.

Flour shortages and price rises are another lightning rod for anger, especially after this year’s bumper wheat crop. “On the one hand, we say we have a bumper wheat crop and we will need to export,” said Ashfaque Hasan Khan, dean of the NUST Business School and a former government economic adviser. “Yet the people can’t find flour locally and are forced to pay so much to get it. This signals that there may be an element of misconduct involved.” reuters

source: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009%5C09%5C18%5Cstory_18-9-2009_pg7_48
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 Subject :NAB revises report, clears politicians in ‘06 sugar crisis .. 2009-10-19 10:52:20 
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ISLAMABAD: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has submitted a fresh report to the Supreme Court claiming that President Asif Ali Zardari, Pakistan Muslim League-N chief Nawaz Sharif and several other prominent people were not involved in the sugar crisis that hit the country in 2006.

Preliminary findings placed by the bureau before the apex court in 2006 had held them responsible for the crisis.

The court apparently wanted to examine the previous sugar scam to understand how sugar barons had once again manipulated the situation during the current year. ‘I have submitted a fresh report and informed Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry that NAB had neither conducted any such inquiry nor submitted any inquiry report before the apex court in the past,’ the bureau’s Additional Prosecutor General Abdul Basir Qureshi told Dawn on Friday.

However, sources in NAB confirmed that the bureau had started an investigation to ascertain the cause of the crisis, but it was suspended on the directives of former president Pervez Musharraf as he wanted to save some leaders of the Pakistan Muslim League-Q.

‘NAB had already informed the Supreme Court through a letter in 2006 that it had not conducted a proper investigation into the sugar crisis,’ the additional prosecutor said.

In 2006, NAB spokesman Brig Nasir had said at a press briefing that the bureau had launched an inquiry, but it was stopped because of fears that such an action could aggravate the situation and lead to more hoarding and increase in sugar price.

According to the fresh report, NAB’s awareness and prevention wing was assigned the task of holding a fact-finding preliminary probe into the cause of a rise in sugar price in the country and to suggest remedial and preventive measures.

‘The wing compiled the information from newspapers and other secondary sources about the state of stocks and annual demand and supply of sugar,’ the additional prosecutor general said.

He said the fact-finding inquiry was halted after an impression was created by some quarters that it was contributing to escalation of sugar price.

‘Such an impression, though totally misplaced, could have caused further hardships for consumers. As NAB had no intention to create instability in the market, for the wider good and to restore confidence in the market it decided to close the inquiry,’ Mr Qureshi said.

‘In my latest report, I have informed the court that during investigation of an illegal assets case against Mr Zardari, NAB had not found any sugar mills belonging to him.

Nawaz Sharif was also not the owner of the mills reportedly involved in the crisis or hoarding. Similarly, a mill that was once owned by Gen Akhtar Abdul Rehman, father of then minister Humayun Akhtar, had been sold before the crisis.’

Meanwhile, President Zardari’s spokesperson Farahnaz Isphahani said he did not own any sugar mill in the country.

‘Years of investigation by accountability machines of Mian Nawaz Sharif and Gen Musharraf could not find any links of Mr Zardari to any mills.

‘It is very interesting that a preliminary report prepared with no proper inquiry or investigation in the year 2006 by NAB has been given so much credence now,’ she said.

She also pointed out that in 2006, President Zardari was being persecuted by the Musharraf regime and all his assets were frozen. Ms Isphahani said some lobbies were trying to malign the elected leadership.

‘These are the very people who have always benefited from military dictatorships and are present in different sections of society and they keep twisting facts to suit their agenda,’ she added.

source: http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/11-nab-revises-report--clears-politicians-in--06-sugar-crisis--il--12
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 Subject :wedding.. 2010-05-31 04:57:07 
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