Khurram Hussain at Dawn: MUCH has been said about “reimagining Pakistan” but it is important to understand that task comes the day after. For now, the focus needs to be on “reassembling Pakistan”.
This task should not be underestimated. Those who think they can pull this off on their own are deeply mistaken. And the country is just emerging from the mistaken misadventures of those who think the country is a toy made of Lego and can be disassembled and reassembled in whatever shape they fancy, to pursue whatever goals their minds are seized with at that moment in time. It would be bad for the country to exit one such mistaken misadventure only to enter another.
A proper rendering of accounts is necessary to understand how and why the country has been brought to the present impasse. The story does not have a single starting point, but a number of turning points are important to note.
The first turning point is the arrival into power of the PML-N government in 2013. The period of Nawaz’s rule was marked by the kickstarting of growth on the one hand. But it also saw the emergence of massive deficits that the government financed by expensive borrowing. Debt skyrocketed in those years and has remained elevated ever since.
More here.
