Pakistan just suffered an enormous natural disaster and now it is on its way to experience a colossal man-made disaster – or rather government-made disaster: the higher education crisis.

Now I understand we are a poor country and we are going through a very terrible time but our stance on education has not changed overnight has it? Isn’t educating the masses the solution to half the country’s problems? Because if it is, the current varsity strike really is not helping the problem. Now before anyone criticises the teachers and professors for going on strike and chanting their slogans, let’s pause. The lawyers did it, the nurses did it and the general public did it – all for various significant causes and because of the attention and pressure, certain results were achieved. Now we should let the education sector have their turn. I still don’t feel this is the best approach to being heard but then again this is a society where you need to scream and shout (and damage a bit of public property) until your demands are met – so honourable faculties, scream away.

The monument being built to honour Benazir Bhutto is set to cost around Rs.1 billion, give or take. That’s a whole lot of money. Not that our former leader does not deserve an expensive monument but question is, would she have wanted that given the disastrous state of our country today? But this is not about what she would have wanted – she already was made a target of terrorism and became a victim of Pakistan’s violence. But she was a staunch believer in Pakistan’s youth and Pakistan’s youth right now is already pretty messed up. Channelling funds towards universities may help out Pakistan a bit more right now instead of the construction of expensive monuments. In fact, an education fund or grant in the memory Benazir Bhutto would help the country so much more.

Here, I must quote Kamran Shafi who recently wrote about the construction of this monument:

The reasons are many: popular political leaders such as Ms Bhutto simply do not need a huge and fancy and expensive monument for people to remember them by. Political leaders live in people’s hearts, not in lifeless concrete and stone. Case in point: do the people vote for the PPP because there is a monument built in Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s honour? The finest way to remember Benazir is to find and prosecute her murderers to the full extent of the law. No better monument could be raised to her memory than to lock up for all their days on this earth those who conspired to have her killed; and those who, by their acts of omission and commission, helped the criminals in their vile enterprise.

When Pakistan becomes a rich, self-sufficient and poverty-free country, I doubt anyone will have a problem with funds being used for monuments but for now, our masses are hungry, angry, desolate, desperate and illiterate – they do not need monuments.

“The monument is a small token of love and respect the people of Pakistan have for their great leader Benazir Bhutto,” Prime Minsiter Yousuf Raza Gilani had said at the monument’s ground-breaking ceremony a couple of months back. Perhaps he can gather private donations to construct this “small” token of love and the taxpayer’s money can instead be used towards causes which are breaking down the nation.

The portion of youth that is enrolled in higher education programmes in the country already suffers enough with universities closing down every now and then due to strikes and violence in various cities. Now if their faculties go on strike and wrap up lessons much before the semester ends, these students will go through further loss. Devoid of education, they will have problems with employment and problems with employment will create further downfall in the struggling economy. Any amount of money spent on bolstering a nation’s education sector can never be called a waste.

Halt the concrete for now and hear out the demands of the universities – this is not just a mere question of salaries; this is about all the resources that are needed for a successful education sector. And if we can’t advance the sector further then can we at least facilitate the existing ones?

Shyema Sajjad is the Deputy Editor at Dawn.com

The views expressed by this blogger and in the following reader comments do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Dawn Media Group.