In a democracy, you need a functioning independent judicial system. A functioning judiciary will take action to right wrongs as per the law, and that's where the problem lies in Pakistan. Whether elected or brought up through the army ranks, the leader of the country is always on the wrong side of the law, and thus a functioning judiciary is impossible.

The judiciary in Pakistan was hanged by Musharraf back in March 2007, and Zardari is exhuming the corpse and sending it before a firing squad to ensure it doesn't come back to haunt him. In a slight change from the Moguls of old, instead of only killing their entire family to ensure there is no challenger to the throne, these days all and sundry are targeted.

Zardari has made numerous promises over the last year to restore the judges, and recently he was asked on TV why he was not honoring his word to do so. His famous reply: "That was a political promise. It has nothing to do with reality".

Time will tell how naked the emperor really is, in this case just a measly 4 days till May 12th, when yet another deadline is due to restore the judges illegally deposed by the old dictator.

A Black Swan is a highly improbable event with three principal characteristics: It is unpredictable; it carries a massive impact; and after the fact, we concoct an explanation that makes it appear less random, and more predictable, than it was.

Taleb argues that events and life itself are far more random than we perceive them to be - the human brain just isn't able to cope up with the complexities of the modern world, most of which have sprung up in the last couple of hundred years, while our brains still haven't evolved much further than the hunter-gatherer stage. This is the most interesting part of the book, where Taleb discusses various studies on how the human brain processes and perceives information, probability and data. We fit explanations to events post-facto - but the world is not so easily squeezable into the theories we built to describe the past and than extrapolate to predict the future.

Our brains are wired in a such a way that we construct linear narratives, or theories about events, in an attempt to simplify and understand - but real life is not linear, and these stories about how events happen are too simplified to be of much use when the next Black Swan comes about.

A small number of black swans explain almost everything in our world, from the success of ideas and religions, to the dynamics of historical events, to elements of our own personal life. Ever since we left the Pleistocene, some ten millennia ago, the effect of these Black Swans has been increasing. It started accelerating during the industrial revolution, as the world started getting more complicated, while ordinary events, the ones we study and discuss and try to predict from reading the newspapers, have become increasingly inconsequential.

links

• Author's website
• Amazon
• Fooled by Randomness

Lahore, an ancient city of culture, now has more polo grounds than libraries. Lahore even has more offices for the chief minister (four in all) than libraries. Of course, the Chief Minister needs office space more than our children need libraries.

He hasn't visited Karachi, where far as I know there are no public libraries at all. There is this interesting library run by the Army where you need to be a millionaire in order to join - they require you to first buy a plot of land in a army run housing scheme before borrowing books!

Lack of cities aside, Karachi is a tough city to read books. The average new book price is a 1000Rs, and while used books are much cheaper the selection is really limited. Ordering from Amazon is a hit and miss process - if you order by DHL or UPS the books always arrive, but the shipping costs are so high that it's not worth while, and sometimes they charge duties on books. If you order by regular post, than the books get stolen sometimes, and it takes anywhere from 1 month to a year for the carton to arrive. The locally published books are also very expensive, and there just isn't enough variety.

It amazes me no end how many of my “learned” friends will actually provide expert commentary on books they have not read. They will give you elaborate critiques based simply on the title or something they overheard someone saying on TV. Indeed, many will start their critique by telling you that they have not read the book and then go on to pontificate on exactly what it is saying and why that is right or wrong...

I think he hits the nail on the head here, people here often don't read because not only do they know everything, they know it a lot better than these random joes who have time to waste writing books.

My MNA has a name, but I have no idea what she stands for, what she does, and how is it that she came to be standing for elections. Now, I can find out what his/her name is, but beyond that there is absolutely no information at all. Come election time, just a month or two before voting takes place candidates suddenly appear from nowhere running for election, and provide zero information about themselves in their entire campaign. What did the MNA accomplish in his/her last stint in office? What about their tax returns, their life, their positions on important issues (besides the rhetoric)?

I would like to know exactly who and what it is I'm voting for - the best way of getting usable data on our politicians is through the government itself - what is it that they do while in the employ of the govt? Since everything is noted down (in theory, and often times in practice) by the govt. itself, there is no dispute about this information.

Most of the landlords in the Senate and the National Assembly - if you remove all the speculation and opinion pieces, practically the only verifiable information about them is that they're landlords and they lord over lands, and now and than then do a stint as MNA or Senator. That's it - there really is nothing else there. The media just spews forth opinion after opinion - talk is cheap, and investigative journalism unheard of, so it's not really useful as a source of information.

Step 1 is to get the minutes, proposed laws, voting records and whatever else takes place in the Senate and National Assembly easily accessible to the general public. There have been many projects over the years aiming to do just that, with funding provided by the US, the UN, different European Counties, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and more. Despite all that funding and numerous different projects, none of them have succeeded so far, and most (if not all) have already finished (or finished their funds).

The National Assembly website and Senate website are incomplete and contains no useful information besides the names of the current members.

Pakistani law binds the Govt. to provide access to it's workings, two such laws being the Freedom of Information Ordinance 2002 and the four Local Government Ordinances of 2001 clearly state that all public records are to be computerized and made accessible to the public, and furthermore that the Govt. is bound to assist anyone who requests access to public knowledge.

The cheapest and easiest way to provide access to government workings is over the internet, which the Government acknowledges - the question than becomes that of how to actually turn this commitment into action.

As an example, click on the name of any MP on theyworkforyou.com - it's amazing the amount of information available - every thing they do and say as MP is available, along with their expenses, voting records, proposed bills, questions, speeches - everything!

Step 2 is to take that data and make it accessible and usable. There are a number of open source initiatives which are doing just this, they're linked below. The source code for all of them is freely available, and can be adapted to Pakistani needs.

This is trivial, given a few technical people donating some of their spare time - all that needs to be done is to pull the data from government servers, convert/parse it as need be, than store it in a database - which is accessible by anyone anywhere.

Step 1 is far more important, as once that's done anyone can implement ways of viewing, sorting and visualizing the data as needed.

Links

• http://www.theyworkforyou.com/ :: Opensource website tracking British Senators.
• Pakistan Senate - Pakistan National Assembly
• Pakistan Legislative STRENGTHENING PROJECT :: One of the stated aims of this was to provide information to the public through 'parliamentary websites and dissemination of legislative records'
• Thomas - Legislative Information from the Library of Congress
• GovTrack.us :: GovTrack.us is a nexus of information about the United States Congress. Bringing together information on the status of federal legislation, voting records, and other congressional data from official sources, and turning it into an understandable and trackable free information resource for everyday citizens, GovTrack aims to narrow the divide between the public and our government. This site serves as both a research tool as well as a customizable Congress-tracker, by providing email updates and RSS/Atom feeds for all aspects of Congress.
• Hansard :: Hansard (the Official Report) is the edited verbatim report of proceedings in both Houses. (UK)
• Google Visualization API :: Easy way to visualize and compare data.

All the above sites in turn link to more, there is a wealth of information in most democratic countries about the functioning of their government.

Nawaz Sharrif's family owned a smallish middling sized industrial concern, not doing too well - but after the military blessed the family their fortunes started rising on rockets. Today, his star is high up in the sky, hanging with the likes of Zardari and Saudi Kings. From not much money and land at all, Nawaz turned himself into a veritable landlord by acquiring land and contracts everywhere.

Army Generals, lord bless their souls, generally come from a humble background, and when thrust into the maelstrom that is Pakistani politics, often loose their minds and souls, while gaining a large number of plots in the process. They, poor chaps, get no votes at all, so they end up manufacturing referendums, buying political parties, and rigging elections. Musharraf went all the way from being a nobody bullied at school to hobnobbing with the world elite at Davos, proving once again how egalitarian Pakistan is.

Altaf Husain went all the way from a student taxi driver to leader of the MQM. There aren't many countries which can point to a taxi driver as future leader of the nation, so this is something Altaf is rightly proud of. On the other hand, taxi drivers in other countries aren't supplied guns and ammo by the Army to kill of all the opposition… Besides making it all the way from Taxi driver to a major political leader, he is also insane, which really shows how egalitarian Pakistan is, where even insane former taxi drivers have a shot at the big job. Now, many countries, like the US, routinely elect insane people, but even they aren't egalitarian enough to elect insane (former) taxi drivers!

Assorted Land Owners (Politicians): In just a generation, they metamorphisized into urban dwellers, swapping horses for Mitsubishi Pajeros, reaching a pinnacle at the Toyota Land Cruiser, than onto Mercedes cars as they left the dust of their lands behind for good, and now eying Porches and other exotic cars. Despite figuring out how to drive a stick shift (badly), going to college and even learning how to operate a TV remote, they remain the most illiterate, backwards people in Pakistan, so once again it goes to show how egalitarian the country is by consistently voting them into power.

Chamchas and hanger-on's to the above - this is the largest category of them all, as Pakistan has only so much money to steal and land to parcel out.

Technocrats: Every now and than the above import some fresh blood into Pakistani politics to revive the perpetually rotting body politic. This is a subgroup of the chamcha's and hanger-on's, and even the technocrat sub group has a very short half life, quickly dissolving fully into the chamcha and hanger on category.

Another interesting aspect of Pakistani politics is how everyone, regardless of their background, education or personality, joins the mainstream political categories defined above, once again showing how deeply egalitarian Pakistan is.

The above categories cover 48 percent of Pakistani politicians. The remaining 2% include:

Imran Khan, who went all the way from being the most famous person in Pakistan to talk show host. In the US, any actor or famous person can cash in on his/her fame to get elected, while here in Pakistan our deeply egalitarian population looks beyond the fame, and refuses to elect him.

Sheikh Rashid, he who stands in a cuban cigar smoking category of his own. The most entertaining politician on TV, he openly sold himself to the biggest stick/bank accounts. Once again, he too was kicked out on his behind, unlike politicians in the west who openly sell themselves yet keep getting re-elected.

The math above doesn't quite add up to a 100%, but than, neither does Pakistani politics.

...the new PPP government would feel more comfortable with the present Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar instead of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry.

Translation: Dogar is a priceable commodity, bought and sold as needed by the powers that be. Earlier, he worked for Benazir, than switched to Musharraf, and now that Zardari is the new king of Pakistan, Dogar is busy licking his boots. From his track record, Dogar is not so much a judge, but a trader, better suited to a pan shop than the Supreme Court.

The actual Chief Justice, who was just freed from an illegal arrest, is a bonafide judge. Despite every single intelligence agency in Pakistan desperately trying to dig up dirt on him, they have failed to find anything wrong with his tenure as Chief Justice. That in itself is an amazing thing, in a country where all hands are dirty.

The Prime Minister said his government will take steps for the restoration of deposed judges. As a first step, these judges have already been freed from detention.

The issue is still developing... It's interesting how no mention is made of the current Chief Justice, since he'll have to take a hike if the old one is restored.

Once there is a free judiciary, there's the interesting issue of Musharraf and his sidekick Shaukat Aziz arresting numerous judges and lawyers illegally - an open and shut case if there was ever one.

A great followup to The Undercover Economist. Thomas Schelling, a Nobel prize winning economist on the book: "This is a terrific read. It's one those books that forever changes the way you look at things. It proves economics is not a subject for dull textbooks; but is really a way of thinking that can shed light on all aspects of life."

A lot of newspaper editorials, opinion pieces and even the reporting consists of the proverbial blind man groping a herd of elephants, trying to figure out why things happen the way they do in Pakistan - Tim Harford lucidly explains that often even the most seemingly irrational acts have a logical explanation.

the book elsewhere

• Timharford.com, Book Reviews
• Amazon
• Google Books

Pakistan has always had only two pillars of state - the army and the politicians. In a functioning democracy, you have three pillars - the executive, legislative and the judiciary. While we will not be heading towards the regular mode of democracy any time soon, it looks like the restoration of the judges fired by the outgoing dictator will empower them all the way to the third pillar of state.

The current crop of politicians are the same as the old, corrupt, feudal, illogical and often stupid beyond belief, but that really doesn't matter.

A functioning judiciary along with a independent media enables regular people to enter into the political space, and that is a great thing. A lot of people don't, or can't understand the importance of a independent judiciary, and to be fair, they can't be blamed as that is something no one here has ever experienced.

From personal experience, most voting in Pakistan is based on fear and ignorance, coupled with a cynical disbelief in the future of the state. In the feudal areas, the local big man gets the vote - for if he didn't, the area will suffer, and there is no one for the residents of the people to turn to.

Even in big cities like Karachi, parties like the MQM end up getting the vote - for in their areas no body else dares to run, on fear of death, or worse. What ends up happening is that the only contestants are those with big guns backing them - wealthy feudal landlords with private armies, organizations like the MQM, the Pakistan Army, the intelligence agencies, the Taliban, and other unsavory organizations. Politics in Pakistan is not far from how the mafia operates, where each candidate has to be blessed by a godfather, and independents are assimilated or bumped off.

The fight for the judiciary continues, and despite all the noises coming out from the newly elected parties, they will fight tooth and nail to restrict the 'new' judiciary - given that most of our politicians belong in jail, they will fight to the death before allowing a independent judiciary with equal powers alongside the executive/legislate (they are both one and the same in Pakistan).

Sadly, the worlds most important democracy, America, remains on Musharraf's side against the judiciary, afraid what democracy might bring to it's vassal state. Considering that it's Pakistan's defacto fourth pillar of state, American's lack of support is earning it plenty of ill will amongst the population at large.

The struggle continues here in Pakistan, today, March 9th being the anniversary of the day Chief Justice Ifthikar Choudhry refused to walk away quietly in the night, breaking a long chain of judicial subservience. There are a number of rallies planned, and large numbers of people are expected to turn up. Given the number of bomb blasts (and intelligence agencies) in Pakistan, even a small number of people is a big thing - as each one is risking his life.

The struggle continues, and Jinnah, a lawyer himself, would mightily approve.

The outgoing government tried every dirty trick in the proverbial book to hang onto power - but the wonderfully heartening news is that the rigging wasn't enough - the government still got kicked out.

The story which is emerging is the age old one, that of the naked Emperor who fools himself into thinking he's clothed, while the whole world laughs. The dictator was naked, and like the emperor of old, surrounded by tailors and yes man who wouldn't tell the truth.

In other news, the government is busy trying to censor videos of rigging uploaded to Youtube, which show the the government parties busy rigging away. I wrote up my own personal brush with censorship here, and now it seems the govt. has moved on from targeting individual websites to the Moby Dick of the internet, Youtube.

I do think that the next time there are elections there will be a lot less rigging, with camera toting webloggers streaming live video of any irregularities straight to the whole country. The technology should be very much in place than, what with Wimax and 3G networks springing up all over the country, and five years from now video cellphones should be just a bit more expensive that a Macdonald's meal.

It's not really the rigging which is the issue, it's the current crop of politicians who equate campaigning with rigging. As it gets harder for the current lot, it leaves space for 'regular' people to enter politics.

To be fair, there was a massive and transparent attempt at rigging by the outgoing government, and it would have been enough if the results had been closer - but the difference is so vast in the actual polling results that the rigging was just not enough! Now, if this was Florida where the state was evenly divided, a little bit of rigging would have done the job, as we saw in the US - but Musharraf's party underestimated the extent to which they are disliked.

Elections are messy in Pakistan - all the parties try to rig the elections in their favour, it's just that they employ cruder methods than in more developed countries. It seems like everyone was rigging, but it seems to have canceled itself out.

One really big change, which no had predicted, let along even thought of, is the level of interest people took in the elections this time. Sure, turnout was low, but many 'regular' people volunteered for election watch duty, and besides that, I've heard from many polling stations that people just randomly turned up to keep an eye on things, armed with cellphone cameras and the numbers of the local media. Yes, there were a few hundred foreign observers, but there are just too many polling stations - it was the observing of the many thousands of Pakistani's who just turned up to observe which was key.

I didn't volunteer for elections watch, but the three hours I spent trying to vote I kept snapping pictures of the process - and no one said anything. This in itself is a sea change in Pakistan - just the last elections if you tried to do that you would be beaten up, the camera smashed, and worse.

Both are unsavory characters - even Zardari's supporters, and there are precious few, his friends, polo buddies, fellow car enthusiasts, and just about everyone else, openly admit that he is a multibillionaire in US dollars. Nawaz, in his two turns as PM, ran Pakistan like Al Capone would have run Chicago as Mayor.

They key thing here though is not that they're crooks, it's that this time around, they were voted in - they'll have to cleanup their acts somewhat and get some things done.

They are both pretty competent - even stealing a billion dollars takes some level of skill, which is preferably to a well intentioned person like Musharraf who just couldn't ever see beyond his own big boots.

Both of the winning parties have promised to restore the judiciary - that alone makes them infinitively better than Musharraf. Whether they actually do so is another matter, but there will be a heck lot of pressure on them to follow through with their repeated promises.

Secondly, without a functioning judiciary, you can't have elections - it makes it too easy for the govt. to rig them. It's a simple matter of self-interest - the govt. is running the elections, and wants to get elected - so it's blatantly using the entire apparatus of the state to ensure it wins.

The voting lists turned out to be as bad as I thought it would - in fact they turned out to be even worse, despite my low expectations. The elections website is completely unusable, and missing a lot of names which were there on the old list. For example, it's missing the names of my family and many of my relatives - most of which are registered voters.

Despite our name not being on the list, I still set out to vote - I spent 3 hours going to all the voting stations near my area, and I wasn't registered in any of them. I met quite a few people I know, and over 50% of them weren't on the lists - so we came back vote less.

Anyways, more on that later, but heres a few election stories.

• Mine: Out of 10 people, only two were on the list, so 8 couldn't vote.
• A friends: Went to vote, his vote had already been cast. After making a big fuss, they offered to let him vote in someone else's name, at which point he left.
• My aunt: She voted thrice. I don't know why. She went to vote, than she went back twice, and was able to vote again.
• Another relative: A party offered to vote for him, if he would only give his ID number to them - as he too wasn't registered on the electoral list. (he is a registered voter, having voted 4-5 times before, but not on the list for this elections.) This happened at numerous places.
• There was no way to cast a 'secret' vote at the 5 voting stations I went to - votes were completely public, with no way to cast it in secret.

These are all anecdotes, and pretty meaningless. More anecdotes are being posted at the Pakistaniat.

I am positive though, that these elections are rigged - it's not just that the names of so many people I know are missing from the electoral lists, it's the way in which the lists were prepared, how the entire judiciary still remains house arrest (or threat of if they do something, anything!) - and key figures like Aitzaz Ahsan remain in arrest.

Jemima Khan interviewed Musharraf 3 days before the elections, and this paragraph sums up the situation in Pakistan completely:

Musharraf mentions democracy a great deal. He seems sincere. He is genuinely likeable. But it seems he just can't help himself. You can take the general out of the army but not the army out of the general. It reminds me of the Aesop fable about the scorpion and the frog. The frog gives the scorpion, who cannot swim, a lift across the river. Halfway across, the scorpion stings him. "Why did you do that?" asks the frog. "Now we'll both die." "I'm a scorpion; it's my nature."