General strikes, protest demonstrations and sit-ins — all bring a host of troubles for the national economy. If the protestors are incognizant of the economic cost of their actions, the government is equally responsible for mishandling the situation at every stage of a protest movement. If the government has the power to kill, it should not necessarily apply it on its own people. Unfortunately, common citizens are brutally killed during every rule and every government whether military, civil or even interim. If the government has the firing squads, that does not mean those should be used at the first stage, rather it should be the last option and there should not be the last option of this kind in a civilized society. At least eight people were killed in the Islamabad sit-in, many of them as young as 30. Misuse of power not only brings disaster for the victim families, but for the economy. The state machinery has not been able to handle a handful of people peacefully in 20 days and this situation cost the national economy billions of rupees losses, not only in taxes and duties, but also in man-hours.
According to estimates, the sit-ins cost the national economy $2.5 billion and it will adversely affect the GDP growth during the current fiscal year. It means the government will burden the people with more indirect taxes to cover the losses and it will also be difficult to arrest the rising rate of inflation in the country. Had the government negotiated with protestors to end the sit-in in the beginning, there would have not been the losses incurred by the national economy to this level until this day. But the government bowed to the pressure too late and in a manner too damaging to its credibility.
The national assembly and senate are still functional and a new law is required to deal with protests and sit-ins, of course, peacefully to the optimum level. A standard operating procedure is the need of the hour to deal with unfortunate situations. Otherwise, the people will continue to be killed and economy will continue to be suffered for indefinite period of time. The political elite, which deems itself indispensible for this nation, should set up think-tanks to discuss issues and devise strategies to deal with political, social, civil and economic issues. Enough is enough.
