The Blame Game

As my country goes through one of the toughest phases of its lifetime, we find ourselves tossing blame around at one another. We've got a variety to choose from - Zardari, the War on Terror, excessive red tapism, religious bigotry - your pick. But does anyone ever question how we actually got here?

Zardari didn't just walk up to the President House and declare himself King, we elected the Pakistan People's Party. We supported the wrong leaderships for the wrong reasons, or we acquiesced silently. We let Ayub Khan defeat Fatima Jinnah. We stood and watched as Bhutto gave away half of the country. We allowed Zia to come up with the Hudood Ordinance. We knew when Benazir and Nawaz stole billions of rupees worth of our tax money from under our noses and yet hailed them as heroes when they returned. We gave Arab oil money the opportunity to hoard Wahabi madrassahs because our own education system failed and the poor had no where else to go to.

We let down Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Big time.

Still, I'm not pessimistic - this is not the end. We've done it before, we can do it now too. We kicked the British out in 1947. We told India who's boss in 1965. We sent shock waves all over the world from Chagai in 1998. We came out on the streets with everything we had to help the earthquake victims in 2005. We are Iqbal's vision. We were the center of the oldest civilization in the world. We've made world records in squash and brought cricket and hockey world cups home. We have Nobel Laureates, world-class scientists, musicians, poets, painters, and writers. The competence of our armed forces is widely acclaimed and highly honored. We are the nation of Abdus Salam, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Guljee, Hakeem Saeed, Abdul Qadeer Khan, Aziz Bhatti, Noor Jahan, Sadequain, Rashid Minhas, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Javed Miandad, Parveen Shakir, Manto, Nazia Hasan, Abdul Sattar Edhi, Jahangir Khan, and a million others who make the country proud everyday in one way or another. We just need to look at ourselves, realize our mistakes, and take responsibility for what we've done. 

It is all part of growing up. This is my country's coming of age. Our coming of age.