Today when media, politicians and everyone is talking about corruption then we must think what kind of corruption Pakistan is facing. Is it financial corruption? Political corruption? Administrative corruption? Social corruption? Or this is just a slogan which only protects the corrupt system.

It is a reality that people of this country are not happy. They don’t have enough money to meet their daily needs. They don’t have the opportunity of proper education. They don’t have job security. The laws of the country are not only discriminative but also not practicable.

So in this scenario when the common people see shining vehicles on the roads and other expensive articles then definitely it is natural they will think of corruption. But is it the corruption that is destroying our future or the slogan of corruption is a tool of the opposition parties to target the sitting government?

In English language the meaning of corruption is very vast. Corruption is not limited to only accumulation of wealth by unfair means. In Pakistan, corruption is the outcome of the system. Even this system is corrupt. And the ugliest aspect of this system is that we are not ready to comprehend the complexity of the problem.

So far we have not informed our people that what is the capacity of our economy? What are the realities of our neighboring economies? What are our total resources and where these resources are consumed? What are the hard realities of our politics and economy? What is the relationship between social and political system? What is the relationship between political system and economic system?

We have not told our people that the problem is not the corruption in the system but rather there is no system at all. We think that Slogans are policies. But the fact is that slogans can only create utopia. It is not the solution. Have we ever informed our people what are our defense, foreign relations, trade, and agricultural, educational and industrial policies? Sorry to say but every year we announce only Haj policy.

We always hear that corruption must be eradicated and there must be transparency. But for this we need a liable government. Do we believe in a liable government? If yes then why we always welcome martial laws?

Transparency and accountability are continuous processes. It is not a button of light that you switch on and the light starts glowing. For transparency and accountability we need continuity of the political process. And continuity of political process is only possible in democracy. It is not possible that we dream of transparency on western standards but at the same time we love to establish a conservative government that has been discarded centuries ago.

Accountability and transparency depend upon ethics. But the dilemma is that we are trying to relate accountability and transparency with morality. That is the reason that so far we are not able to achieve the goals of accountability, transparency and eradication of corruption.

If we want to eradicate corruption then the need is to think about the system which is standing upside down. The dilemma is that we only favour the slogans against corruption. It only benefits the political parties to overthrow the sitting government. The need is to think seriously about the system and its atrocities. Instead of celebrating anti-corruption day, the need is to celebrate anti-system day. The slogan of anti-corruption is no more than a deception that only gives protection to the system. Only the eradication of the contemporary system can solve our problems. And the real corruption is that we are not telling the people that the entire system is corrupt.

The latest example of corruption is the recent row of anger against the Taliban. People who once supported Taliban are chanting slogans against this cruelty of Taliban in Army School Peshawar. But here again the common people are kept ignorant that Taliban are the outcome of this hypocrite system where fundamentalism, extremism, fanaticism and sectarianism are always supported. Today if Taliban loses the support from the public then this system has the capability to collect support for the newly established Islamic State (IS). 

We must keep in mind that in Islamic History “Khawarij” were having the same mentality from which today we are combating but it is also a fact that even after the elimination of Khawarij , fundamentalism, extremism, fanaticism and sectarianism could not be eradicated from Muslim society. That is the reality and now it is our duty to eliminate this type of corruption from our society.