A friend recently forwarded via Whatsapp an article by Anatol Lieven, curiously titled "Battered, But Still Afloat". On a separate note I can only wonder what we all would do if Whatsapp was suddenly un-invented; frightening thought isn't it. To recap, Leiven is the same gentleman who wrote the book, "Pakistan: A Hard Country", published in 2011, which by the way was an interesting read. In this article he asserts that, it is because of the resilience of Pakistani society that it is still afloat, albeit battered, after crises which would have sunk other states, "It is striking that several Arab states that once looked much richer and stronger than Pakistan have collapsed completely, whereas Pakistan, in its own messy and infuriating way, continues to trundle along". I must confess that I got a fuzzy feeling while reading the article, and why not! Levien believes we can take all the punches that the world keeps throwing at us, and then some, and that we will go on surviving for a long time.

The view that Pakistan is resilient comes on the back of another article which insisted that, "Pakistan thrives on disorder and adversity, pursuing Nassim Taleb's notion of anti-fragility". The author of that particular piece in July 2017, Ali Khan, points out that despite the entanglements with the USA, Indian aggression, energy shortages, political upheaval, domestic terrorism over the past many years, Pakistan continues to baffle the world with its long list of accomplishments that include acquiring nuclear capabilities, challenging the Russians successfully in Afghanistan, fighting the war against terrorism, shifting to a democracy, winning the cricket world cup 2017 and what not.

When you think about the last 70 years in this perspective, it actually is rather baffling. As my elders endlessly point out to me that the country has never ever managed to balance the budget, but life goes on. The consequent popular notion is that something will happen which shall keep the economy afloat, CPEC being showcased as the latest knight in shining armour in this regard. And should you make the mistake of trying to compare CPEC with what is happening with Sri Lanka, the nonchalant response is that this too will pass.

Unfortunately, as time passes even I am buying into this narrative about stop worrying about the future, Pakistan is indestructible; after all, the evidence is insurmountable. Geographically, for the past two decades, we have been surrounded by nations openly hostile to Pakistan. On top of that, Pakistan is perhaps the most preferred location for the world to carry out its proxy wars; and if that was not enough, we seem to be right in the middle of the battle for the title of the "Superpower of the World" and seem to be, utterly remarkably, cajoling all three aspirants to the title simultaneously. Frankly, completely contrary to Machiavelli's advice, I fear, that we ourselves haven't decided which side we are on.

And while the world is beset with conflict in the Middle East, Korea, South China Sea, and where else not, and struggling with political turmoil in Europe and America, what exactly, as a nation, have we been busy with for the last year or so? Perplexingly, the Panama case and now the verdict! With everything happening around us and within our borders, politically, economically and militarily, we had time to send home the sitting government, and the current biggest concern of our ruling elite is how to amend the constitution once again to ensure that nothing like that happens in the future.

Oh yes, I almost forgot. In between all that we carried out a census, according to which there are 207 million Pakistanis as opposed to 180 million, and counting. And while all the political parties have a problem with the result, what was the first observation floating on the irreplaceably notorious Whatsapp: congratulations the debt per Pakistani just went down significantly, so have more children! The debate on adverse impacts on per capita income, spending on education, unemployment and all related ratios and indices is summarily brushed aside, by a rather logical comment that it's not that these Pakistanis suddenly came out of nowhere, they were always there and the economy was booming! Don't we have the best performing stock exchange and a robust property market?

I have this sinking feeling that the majority of Pakistanis are more concerned with resurgence of international cricket at home rather than escalating external debt. Even the threat of sanctions cannot distract coffee table discussions revolving around an unseen but all powerful Establishment. Leiven while concluding his article warns that Pakistan has to find answers to its critical issue to guarantee its long time survival, which according to him is extreme shortage of water, "exacerbated by population growth, climate change and appallingly poor water management". Contrarily, big dams remain a banned subject across the political landscape.

So is sitting back and enjoying the present perhaps the right strategy. It would be if we knew the real reasons behind our resilience and anti-fragility, and had answer to a pertinent question: the party will continue for how long?

(The writer is chartered accountant based in Islamabad. Email: [email protected])

Copyright Business Recorder, 2017