Leader
ELITE MEMBER
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2010
- Messages
- 29,159
- Reaction score
- 9
- Country
- Location
Not much of a vision
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharifs second televised speech to the nation was, like all sequels, less necessary than the original. Where in his maiden address Sharif had concentrated on the major issues of terrorism and the power crisis that will define his governments term, this time the focus was on the youth of the country. The need to tackle the problem of the countrys youth bulge 35 percent of our population is aged 15 or under should certainly be high on the list of the governments priorities but the proposals offered by the prime minister were disappointingly limited. Sharif pledged to spend a total of Rs20 billion on the youth, with programmes ranging from the provision of interest-free and low-interest loans to educated youth, skills development for those who pass eighth grade and free tuition for those who hail from the less-developed areas of the country. In a rerun of Shahbaz Sharifs laptop scheme in Punjab, the PM also promised to provide free laptops to 100,000 students this year. None of these ideas are completely unobjectionable, although the utility of handing over free laptops can certainly be debated. (Laptops for users who cannot access YouTube or many other websites?) But as a whole they reveal a lot to be desired. There seems to be no vision to tackle the problems of access to education, to improve the syllabi and correct distorted history taught to our children, ensure that girls stay in school and public schools receive the funding they need.
Perhaps the most interesting part of the speech was the prime ministers complaint about how much money government corporations are bleeding. Coming on the heels of the governments decision to sell a minority stake and hand over management control of PIA, this could be seen as building the case for wholesale privatisation. Nawaz Sharif knows that he may face resistance from the unions and the opposition parties and he may even have to face challenges in the Supreme Court on his privatisation agenda, so this may be the start of the governments bid to win public support. It is also interesting to note that Sharif did not use the televised address as an opportunity to tout the achievements of his government in its first hundred days in power. That may be because there are precious few achievements to celebrate. The problems facing the country are so massive that even an entire five-year term may not be sufficient to make significant improvement. If this speech is any indication though, the prime minister has nothing more than band aid therapy to offer to a mutilated body. At a time when vision and courage is needed, the prime minister had such limited ideas on offer that one wonders why he bothered delivering the speech in the first place.
Not much of a vision - thenews.com.pk
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharifs second televised speech to the nation was, like all sequels, less necessary than the original. Where in his maiden address Sharif had concentrated on the major issues of terrorism and the power crisis that will define his governments term, this time the focus was on the youth of the country. The need to tackle the problem of the countrys youth bulge 35 percent of our population is aged 15 or under should certainly be high on the list of the governments priorities but the proposals offered by the prime minister were disappointingly limited. Sharif pledged to spend a total of Rs20 billion on the youth, with programmes ranging from the provision of interest-free and low-interest loans to educated youth, skills development for those who pass eighth grade and free tuition for those who hail from the less-developed areas of the country. In a rerun of Shahbaz Sharifs laptop scheme in Punjab, the PM also promised to provide free laptops to 100,000 students this year. None of these ideas are completely unobjectionable, although the utility of handing over free laptops can certainly be debated. (Laptops for users who cannot access YouTube or many other websites?) But as a whole they reveal a lot to be desired. There seems to be no vision to tackle the problems of access to education, to improve the syllabi and correct distorted history taught to our children, ensure that girls stay in school and public schools receive the funding they need.
Perhaps the most interesting part of the speech was the prime ministers complaint about how much money government corporations are bleeding. Coming on the heels of the governments decision to sell a minority stake and hand over management control of PIA, this could be seen as building the case for wholesale privatisation. Nawaz Sharif knows that he may face resistance from the unions and the opposition parties and he may even have to face challenges in the Supreme Court on his privatisation agenda, so this may be the start of the governments bid to win public support. It is also interesting to note that Sharif did not use the televised address as an opportunity to tout the achievements of his government in its first hundred days in power. That may be because there are precious few achievements to celebrate. The problems facing the country are so massive that even an entire five-year term may not be sufficient to make significant improvement. If this speech is any indication though, the prime minister has nothing more than band aid therapy to offer to a mutilated body. At a time when vision and courage is needed, the prime minister had such limited ideas on offer that one wonders why he bothered delivering the speech in the first place.
Not much of a vision - thenews.com.pk
