On Nov 8 the Asia Society held a Town Hall meeting where discussed the Martial Law in Pakistan, it had a number of panelist from Asma Jahangir, Ayaz Amir to Najam Sethi, for a real thought provoking and interesting discussion, anyone who missed the show can listen to the entire recording online on Asia Society’s Pakistan Emergency page.
Today at 8:30am – 10:00am EST (6:30pm-8:00pm Pakistan Time) the Asia Society has scheduled yet another talk on Pakistan but sadly it only features only a pro-Musharraf panel. The team nominated by Pakistan to project the pro Musharraf message is as follows
- Dr. Nasim Ashraf, Minister of State, Government of Pakistan; Chairman, National Commission for Human Development
- Barrister Mohammad Ali Saif, Minister of Tourism and Youth Affairs, Government of Pakistan
- Ms. Kashmala Tariq, Former Member, National Assembly of Pakistan
- Moderator: Ambassador Nicholas Platt, President Emeritus, Asia Society
It is without doubt unfortunate that Asia Society chooses to arrange a one sided argument and that too from the official government representatives, how can they call this anywhere near to being a discussion as there will be no opposing views to counter-balance the hot air coming from the official representatives. I expected more from an organization such as the Asia Society and I hope they will not pride themselves at having orchestrated such biased event.
To be honest I don’t have the heart to listen to another Pro-Musharraf rant, as we are already at the receiving end of such bombardment from the day the martial law was enforced in the country, since then the independent media was clamped down simply because the government could not stomach the free and independent voice. It is without doubt that the government touts will play perfectly to the American lobby specially to the ears of George Bush, the proclaimed upholder of democracy who recently described General Pervez Musharraf as a leader who has advanced democracy and “hasnt crossed the line. need I say more….. Who are we trying to fool.
On the other hand it wont hurt if we can all tune in and ask them the hard questions, literally take them to task, quite simply lets not give them an open field to spread their voice of reason. Asia Society, I expected more from you.
The talk will be streamed live and to join the webcast simply go to www.asiasociety.org just before 8:30am where you will see a prominent “live webcast” link, during the webcast questions can be asked from the panelist by sending in emails to moderator@asiasociety.org.
Comments
One response to “Asia Society Discussion : Musharraf Government Makes Its Case”
Mmm considering Asia Society’s contextualization of the event in a propaganda campaign , their “Please join us for an in-depth and challenging dialogue with the members of this delegation on the way forward in Pakistan” might be read as “please come and sock it to the man”.