The newly-appointed chairman of the Capital Development Authority has launched a vicious campaign against street vendors in Islamabad. This is outrageous because street vendors are a part of the informal economy. Street food is the signature identifier of the culture of a country.
In Pakistan, more than 70 percent of labour force is employed by the informal economy. It provides sustenance to the poor. But the government is after precisely this section of the economy.
Scholar and architect Arif Hasan has written about how the judiciary in the previous PTI government ordered demolition of the katchi abadis along Gujjar and Orangi Nullahs in Karachi. He has also written about evictions from the land of Karachi Circular Railway in Karachi.
Unfortunately, the judiciary and bureaucracy carry an anti-poor bias. While thousands of acres of land acquired by housing societies are regularized for pittance in Karachi, no such mercy is shown to the poor. Their homes are razed overnight and micro-businesses are robbed in broad daylight in name of the rule of law.
This trend of taking away from the poor and redirecting it to the rish is evident in other countries as well. Apparently, katchi abadis along the Gujjar and Orangi Nullahs in Karachi were demolished to make way for a highway for the rich and it would inflate the price of land for the influential along the areas where this highway is constructed. The formula is simple: take the tiny subsistence land, dwellings, livelihoods away from the poor and launder them for the rich. All organs of the state seem complicit in this undeclared class war.
If the judiciary and bureaucracy cannot keep away from legalizing the illegal occupation of resources and property by the rich and influential; then at least do not take away livelihoods from street vendors and katchi abadi dwellings from non-skilled workers.
Marx famously analysed the concept of “primitive accumulation” and it has historically manifested through many forms, including colonialism and slavery. Its classic form is that of snatching land from the poor and giving it to proto-capitalists. In developing countries like Pakistan, as many have analysed, agricultural land is not being re-routed to emerging capitalists but to real estate developers and housing societies.
Why can’t Pakistan grow vertically to provide affordable housing for the poor? Instead the cities are growing horizontally with more and more agricultural land being snatched away from the rural and peri-rural poor. This dispossession is leading to instant super valuation of land as gated communities spread their tentacles all around the cities. It does not lead to much productivity as no new factories are built. On the basis of property speculation, the rich become super rich.
One major disadvantage of interference of non-political elements in democracy in Pakistan is that political forces are given the message that regime change can be manipulated, and not necessarily through the power of vote. Hence, even the supposed democratic governments are not wary of enforcing anti-people measures such as launching drives against street vendors and demolition of katchi abadis. They know they can afford to take anti-people measures and yet their political capital is not affected much – because the source of regime change can largely lie elsewhere and not necessarily depend on the people’s true aspirations and votes. All the more reason to call for an end to alleged manipulation and restore democracy as per its constitutional mandate.
Street vendors who participate in the food business not only earn their livelihoods but they also perform an essential service to the poor working class of the cities. Does the Islamabad administration think that by driving away food street vendors, the labourers, gardeners, unskilled workers, domestic workers are going to eat in formal restaurants in Islamabad if they are deprived of essential street food? Can they afford anything more than street food in these times of hyper-inflation? There is a whole cascading effect and supply chain linked with street vendors. To close down street vendors’ business, Islamabad administration like such drives in other major cities (whenever they take place from time to time) have disrupted the whole informal economy chain of command without any reason or provocation. It is simple bloody mindedness.
It is about time that this undeclared class warfare is highlighted by all concerned. People living in the peripheries of the country and the poor even within the centre of major cities are being hugely discriminated against. Resources are being taken away from the rural and urban poor and ethnic minorities and they are being given to the elite both in the centre and peripheries. What is called “socialization of loss and privatization of profit”.
Why burden the poor more with indirect taxes? End the subsidies of the rich and powerful. Cut civil and military non-essential expenditure. Heavily tax the unproductive real estate sector. Increase the social protection budget as much as possible.
If the judiciary and bureaucracy cannot keep away from legalizing the illegal occupation of resources and property by the rich and influential; then at least do not take away livelihoods from street vendors and katchi abadi dwellings from non-skilled workers. It is hard to believe that this is taking place is supposedly democratic Pakistan and not enough voice is being raised against it. Time to stand up and be counted.