The New Nation - Internet Edition

Tackling flood damages

UNTIMELY floods have taken a serious turn. Damage of the flood protection embankment has caused river Jamuna to overflow and many villages have been inundated. The Jamuna at some points is reportedly flowing two to three feet above the danger level. The Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre has predicted flooding of the low-lying areas of the central region including Dhaka. The devastating floods shows the unpredictability of flood and the vulnerability of the country to such calamities.

Flood water has washed away dwelling houses and standing crops, and damaged physical infrastructures including flood protection embankments and has disrupted road transportation networks in the affected areas. Millions of people marooned or displaced by the floods are leading a sub-human life due to lack of shelter, food and safe drinking water. The local administrations have reportedly started relief operations for the victims. Bangladesh Army has been deployed for rescue operations. The authorities should equip the flood affected people with medicine to fight water-borne diseases. An overall assessment of the damages caused by the flood needs to be made as early as possible to take all preparations for post-flood rehabilitation.

River erosion has taken a serious turn at some places of Greater Rangpur district. The time of cultivation of the transplanted Aman crop in greater Rangpur and Dinajpur is almost over. Aman crops sown earlier in the affected areas are rotting under flood water. As seedbeds and seedlings of transplanted Aman have been damaged, farmers will have to be provided with seeds, seedlings and fertilisers. The poor and marginal farmers should be given micro credit supports with repayment of the outstanding loans written off or deferred. Without such measures farmers will not be able to resume cultivation and recuperate losses.

Demographic changes in the US

WHITES in the United States will reportedly no longer be majority of the population by 2042, nearly a decade earlier than previous projections of the US Census Bureau. While 65 per cent of the US population is projected to be white in 2010, those numbers will start to decline around the 2030s as white deaths outpace births as per bureau figures. In 2042, whites will be outnumbered by Americans who call themselves Hispanic, black, Asian, native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander. By the mid-century when the USA is projected to have a population of 439 million people, 54 per cent of the population will consists of non-whites.

The largest growth is projected to be among Hispanics coming mostly from Mexico, the expected number being 133 million by 2050 due to high birthrates and immigration. No other country has experienced 'such rapid racial and ethnic change,' demographer Mark Mather remarked as quoted by the New York Times. The Asians will increase from 4.5 per cent in 2010 to nearly eight per cent in 2050, but the non-Hispanic black population is expected to remain steady, from 12.2 per cent in 2010 to 11.8 percent by 2050.

The US population is also expected to be much grayer: currently 38.7 million people are aged 65 or older, a figure that will balloon to 88.5 million by 2050. Some sections of the United States already have reached the point where whites are minorities, such as the states of California and Texas. The findings also pointed to swelling of the US population as a whole, adding more than 130 million people to its current total of around 305 million, by 2050. And along with the overall growth, the number of mixed-race Americans is expected to triple, reaching 16 million, or close to four per cent of the population.

Quamrul Islam Siddique has gone beyond us

Dr. M. S. Haq

I took the news of recent death of Quamrul Islam Siddique with certain sadness and with a sense of loss. Engineer Siddique was apparently a fine gentleman, a solid expert in his field of engineering, a good communicator, and an effective result-seeker and maker in pertinent areas of his life long activities. He had, during his lifetime, held a number of responsible governmental and non-governmental positions - for example, a secretary to government of Bangladesh and a president of the Institution of Engineers, Bangladesh. In addition, he was associated with certain international organisations. His contributions to development of Bangladesh, particularly in areas of rural advancement, are commendable and lesson bearing. He was a recipient of national and international awards for his good work.

He loved, among other things, animals. It now appears to me: his love for animal could be one of the reasons as to why he created and maintained a kind of zoo at his Dhanmondi residence. Interesting though, Mr. Siddique used to take pride when it came to introducing for example his visitors to inhabitants of that zoo - deer and others.

I came to know about him when he was visiting Sri Lanka in early 2002. Ambassador Dowla, the then Bangladesh's envoy to Sri Lanka - one of the effective and efficient Bangladeshi ambassadors (in areas say, economic diplomacy) I have come across so far - introduced Engineer Siddique to me. Then, on one evening - I mean during his stay in Colombo - Engineer Siddique called me over telephone at our Colombo Hilton residence to find out whether I would be interested in presenting a paper in the 46th annual convention of institution of engineers, Bangladesh (IEB), scheduled to be held in Dhaka between 10 March and 13 March 2002, both days inclusive.

I thanked him for the inquiry but expressed my inability to present the paper in the convention. I told him my paper might not be able to withstand scholarly thrusts of papers meant for a convention of above nature. He rejected, in a polite manner, my apprehension and encouraged me to participate and present the paper in the convention. I finally accepted his invitation.

Since the convention date was fast approaching, I managed to finish my paper and sent it to Engineer Siddique with a copy, as per his advice, to late Dr. Md. Golam Mohiuddin (then alive) who was a professor of department of industrial and production engineering, Bangladesh university of engineering and technology (BUET) and member-secretary, accreditation committee of IEB - within a week of my acceptance of the invitation. The paper was, among other things, inter-disciplinary in nature and scope. The core focus of it - was: futures of quantum engineering, quantum technology and environmental costs in the era of globalization.

On receipt of the paper, Mr. Siddique wrote back to me to let me know inter alia - - how much surprised he was when he found I had been able to produce - within a very short period of time - a substantive paper on matters, he termed difficult. Although I could not present my paper in person in the convention at Dhaka but I came to know (later on) from both late Prof. Mohiuddin and him: my paper was the hardest, most up-to-date and ingenuity-laden among all the papers - both in-country and ex-country - presented in that convention. I then shared with them inter alia reasons for making the paper hard.

I thanked them, in particular, Engineer Quamrul Islam Siddique, for affording me opportunities for sharing with the convention participants - via a virtual mode, though - my (the then) thoughts and ideas associated with unfolding matters of quantum and environment in the era of globalization. I also thanked my mother - Late Mrs. Syeda Sultana Haq - who was alive at that time and whom I consider, up to and including today (06 September 2008), as one of the most important mentors in my life - for her comments on the comments, mentioned above, on my paper.

My short but meaningful interactions with Engineer Siddique and vice versa were instrumental in inter alia making me investigative and analytical - subsequently - about his other qualities of life. I found him to be an effective motivator, a bold challenge taker and a good practitioner of diversity at relevant levels of knowledge, understanding and application, to mention a few.

In fine, I pray to Almighty God for the salvation of his soul and souls of those who are dead already and souls of those who will die between now and future up to and including the Day of Destruction - for example. May Almighty God give late Siddique's family members and concerned others strengths and courage to bear the irreparable loss.

New phase of political fight in Malaysia

Dr. Abdul Ruff

Ruling combine in Malaysia has got another setback when a prominent opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim got elected to parliament recently. Resurgent after the lifting of a ban on holding office expired in April, Anwar Ibrahim, Malaysia's opposition leader and former deputy Prime Minister won a resounding victory, despite facing fresh accusations of sodomy, in a by-election on 26 August in a seat vacated by his wife and his success to date has rattled the ruling coalition and undermined Badawi's leadership.

As he rejoined parliament on August 28 after a decade's absence, Anwar is seen busy scheming his immediate strategy to bring down the Abdullah Ahmad Badawi government and implement ambitious reforms. He has been trying to make his political comeback since a ban on seeking public office, related to a previous corruption conviction, expired in April. Anwar's re-entry now into Parliament is expected to complete his political rehabilitation. He was fired by Mahathir as deputy prime minister in 1998 and jailed for six years after he was convicted of corruption and sodomizing his family driver. The sodomy conviction, which Anwar charged was a politically motivated frame-up, was overturned by Malaysia's top court in 2004.

The governing Badawi coalition currently holds 140 seats in the 222-seat parliament. Anwar's coalition, Pakatan Rakyat, made up of three parties, holds 82 seats. Anwar has pledged to oust Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi said that his deadline to secure enough defectors from the government to overthrown Badawi by 16 September was still on. The governing coalition currently holds 140 seats in the 222-seat parliament. Anwar's coalition, Pakatan Rakyat, made up of three parties, holds 82 seats. He needs to persuade 30 government MPs to defect. He says the entire ruling party clique and their cronies who have amassed billions. He said that his deadline to secure enough defectors from the government to overthrown Badawi by 16 September was still on.

Former premier Mahathir Mohammed, who has slammed the policies of his successor Badawi for quite time now, said he believed many government supporters voted for Anwar "so that Abdullah will realize that his leadership is no longer wanted." Mahathir asked Abdullah to take responsibility and resign now. Mukhriz Mahathir, Mahathir's lawmaker son, said that that with Anwar Ibrahim in Parliament, the parliamentarians cannot afford to have a weak leadership because it could lead to our downfall.

Once the protégé of former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, Anwar was forced from office in 1998 on corruption and sodomy charges that he denounced as part of a conspiracy to ruin his political ambitions. Ten years on, he is being backed by the biggest number of opposition MPs in Malaysia's history in his quest to oust the Barisan Nasional coalition that has ruled the country for the past 50 years. But to fulfil his dream he must win the backing of 30 legislators from the ruling coalition to get a majority in the 222-member parliament. Besides, Anwar must also fight another charge of sodomy in a court case due to start on September 10. Previous charges of sodomy charges were overturned by a court in 2004 resulting in Anwar's release from jail after serving six years imprisonment.

Known for his corruption record, Anwar who many see as a possible future prime minister wants to put Malaysia back on a fast track to becoming a developed nation and says he will stamp out corruption and end an affirmative action program for ethnic Malays he says has failed to help them and made the country uncompetitive. The program gives ethnic Malays, who make up more than half the population, privileged access to education and civil service jobs as well as preferential loans and company ownership. Its opponents say it has produced graduates who are unfit for work and engendered a system of cronyism that has stymied economic growth.

Anwar, keen to overthrow the government of Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, has promised to reinvigorate Malaysia's economy, which has lost some of its attractiveness as an investment destination to faster-growing regional rivals. A research report said they expect the government to pull all stops with an expansionary, populist budget, designed to yield maximum political mileage during this critical period for the government. The twin overriding objective would be to placate public unhappiness over soaring inflation, as well as keep the BN (ruling coalition) component parties happy and minimise the possibility of further defections to the opposition coalition.

Abdullah, however, played down the significance of Anwar's triumph. Abdullah resisted calls to resign after the March elections. In the March elections, Prime

Minister Badawi's coalition won 140 of the 222 seats, while Anwar's three-party alliance won an unprecedented 82 - 30 short of a majority - and wrested control of five states. Abdullah's party has been the main party in a coalition that has governed Malaysia uninterrupted since independence from Britain in 1957, but which was seriously weakened for the first time in the March elections. Each major ethnic group Malays, Chinese and Indians, is represented by its own political party. Cracks started to appear in the ruling coalition especially from the United Malays National Organization, the biggest government party as there were calls for Prime Minister Badawi to quit. The government has been reeling since losing its usual two-thirds majority in an election in March, but it retained a parliamentary majority and is stable. The last time opposition parties made similar gains in Malaysia was 1969, an election where victory parties degenerated into deadly ethnic riots that scarred the national consciousness.

The ringgit currency and the stock market have fallen sharply since the opposition deprived Barisan of its two-thirds parliamentary majority in March. The prospect of prolonged political upheaval has hit Malaysian assets hard, even though some economists have lauded Anwar's plans and he is viewed by many investors as a safe pair of hands after holding the post of finance minister in the 1990s.

Abdullah is facing renewed calls to step down from some in the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), the main party in the coalition that has ruled Malaysia for five decades, after Anwar's better-than-expected election result.

Emerging political scenario has made the ruling coalition a bit nervous. The Malaysian government is expected to announce several populist measures in its 2009 budget to ward off the challenge from Anwar Ibrahim as it tries to tighten its weakening grip on power in the face of economic and political challenges.

Prime Minister Abdullah has already said that the budget may include some relief for the poor to shield them from high prices, and analysts said the steps could include cash handouts, incentives for small and medium entrepreneurs, and tax cuts. Annual inflation in Malaysia surged to 8.5 percent in July, the highest since December 1981 and well above expectations, and the central bank has said it is likely to stay high this year and early next year.

The government has already given a taste of populist economic policy by announcing a surprising cut in fuel prices last week. "The fiscal deficit was brought down from 5.3 percent of GDP in 2002 to 3.2 percent of GDP in 2007, but it is projected to widen to 3.5-4.0 percent in 2008-09, reflecting largely higher operating and development expenditure," CIMB said in its budget preview. Malaysia is going to tolerate for a couple more years deficit budget spending, which has been the case since 1998," According to Citigroup, the average annual development expenditure is likely to be 53-57 billion ringgit in 2009-10, significantly above the average of 38.9-41.6 billion ringgit in 2006-08. The extent of the government's generosity would only be capped by concerns over the size of the fiscal deficit, though windfall petroleum revenues would provide some important relief.

The government has also brought forward fuel price cuts after it slashed subsidies earlier this year in a move that was lauded by economists but shattered its popularity. "The budget would also aim to shore up support for the government following the huge fuel price hike in June and the electoral setback earlier this year," the United Overseas Bank said in a recent report. The government is also expected to announce a significant increase in development spending, which analysts say could slightly widen the fiscal deficit.

The forthcoming budget session in Kuala Lumpur would be fascinating experience for both the ruling and opposition coalitions. The future course of the politics and government also would be determined then. And, that will decide the welfare schemes for the people at large - both the majority and minorities. However, basic character of the economic policies of Malasiya would remain unchanged.

Europe set to eclipse America

Josef Joffe

It's decline time again in America, like every 20 years or so. Last time round, in 1988, the doomsyears got everything right - except the name of the country. For it was the Soviet Union which collapsed while the United States went on to savour its "unipolar moment."

This time it is a consumptive greenback, shrinking credit, soaring gas and two wars with no V-Day in sight in Iraq or Afghanistan. Now let's look across the Atlantic where Europe used to strike Americans as one huge Disneyland with real castles and wondrous shopping arcades, like H&M (for the kids) and Hermes (for the Kerrys).

Today, the Manolo is on the other foot, or, more apropos, in the other shopping bag. Over the last eight years, the euro has almost doubled in value against the dollar. It used to be the Japanese who bought Fifth Avenue dry; now it is those Euro hordes and even Russians! They even come to buy their own stuff - Prada, Zara, whateva - which usually costs a lot more in Milan than in Manhattan. So what do the Europeans have the Americans don't? Above all, more time. At home, Barack Obama could never pull in 200,000 as he did in Berlin in July.

Does that mean Berliners are a soft touch for soaring platitudes? Hardly. Like all big-city folks, they are snotty seen-it-all types. But they have lots of free time on their hands. Unemployment in the German capital runs to 14 per cent, about twice the national rate. Like most West Europeans, Germans enjoy much more R-and-R than Americans, who work 400 hours (10 weeks!) more per year.

These Calvinist work habits (which have infected American Catholics and Jews as well) mark the basic difference between America and Europe. When Americans come to Europe - heck, when Europeans come to Europe, as I did on my Italian vacation that took me from coldish, Lutheran Hamburg to Todi and Perugia - we all fall for the same wondrous thing: tasteful leisure.

Leisure has disappeared in America. Americans don't just hang out any more; we "network." When they go to the ball game, it is for "quality time" with the kids, not for the bliss of a lazy afternoon. Work and non-work have become a single seamless thing in 21st century America.

This is why we, Europeans as well as Americans, love sitting in a cafe on Perugia's Via Mazzini. The pizza is richer at Domino's and the lettuce is crisper at Denny's, but we happily drop two hundred bucks for a so-so meal for six. Why? Because we can stay and stay; no waiter will accost us with that atrocious question: "Are you still working on your carbonara?" Food as work - this is just one step short of the end of Western civilisation.

Bella Italia, bella Europa - chock full of Peruginos and Massacchios, Drers and Matisses, where the Barolo practically comes out of the faucet, where the women dress to kill even for a date with the copy machine. Dallmayr and E.A.T. will drive you into Chapter 11, but the starch-apron ladies in the Munich fancy-food store just pull off the heist more suavely than their co-conspirators on Madison Avenue.

There is that endless diversity stretching from Lisbon to Lodz - the food, the architecture, the history. And the high-speed trains that cover the 180 miles between Hamburg and Berlin in 90 minutes. And the Metros, autobahns and buses - all immaculate. So why isn't everybody hyping Europe, like they are rhapsodising about China and India as new masters of the universe?

It's the economy, stupid. Europe's has practically ground to a halt, with Germany's actually contracting. No, it's not 7 or 10 per cent eternal growth for Euroland, as it is for "Chindia." And this is no accident, comrades, as the Soviets used to say. Europe's life-style is to America's like slow food is to McDonald's. It's a two-hour lunch versus pay, gulp and back to work. Europe has chosen gem¸tlichkeit; America wants to re-invent itself once a month. "Which is better?" is like asking, "Is it warmer in the summer or in the city?" Though Europe and the U.S. share so much of modernity - from burgers to baseball caps, from soaring divorce rates to spreading ghettos - they have written very different "social contracts" for themselves.

The European contract favours stability and disfavours change; it prefers egalitarian outcomes to untrammeled opportunity. Hence the stark difference in public spending. In the EU, the government grabs about one-half of GDP, in the U.S. it is only 37 per cent (which also pays for two wars these days).

So, the state taketh, and the state giveth, which creates a vicious but cozy circle. High levies and dense regulations brake growth and kill jobs, but high welfare, financed by rising payroll taxes, make life on the dole quite tolerable.

Universities boast open admission and no tuition, but not a single German university has made the World's Top Fifty compiled by Shanghai's Jiao Tong University. Thirty-five of them are American, as are eight of the Top Ten.

Protecting its industrial past, Europe perfects old technologies; hence the Mercs, the first-rate medical and tool-making machinery, not to speak of the perfume, the haute couture and the haute chocolate. But it is in America where the kid from Russia goes to invent Google. It is also in the U.S. where my best students at Stanford have names like Kim and Zhou. The "new new thing" will surely be Made in U.S.A. America is invention, Europe is perfection. America is a house built from drywall and two-by-fours; Europe is massive stone piled up for eternity, like our friend's borgo in Todi, whose origins date back to Etruscan times.

You can knock down the flimsy drywall and build a new house to suit your new needs. Or just leave for a new life, as Americans have done since they ran from Ireland or the Pale. But your castle is forever.