"We've suffered too much," Tayyab Mahmood, a 30-year-old accountant with a steel company based in Karachi, sighed when talking about the current situation in Pakistan. "What we need most is stability," Mahmood said.
Mahmood, who has five mouths to feed at home, has much to complain on the fast increasing price of flour in recent days, an aftereffect of the nationwide turmoil after former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated on Dec. 27.
Although earning some 15,000 rupees (some 250 U.S. dollars) per month, Mahmood still finds the current flour price, up to 35 rupees (some 60 U.S cents) per kilo, a big pressure to his wallet.
However, Mahmood is not the only Pakistani who is suffering from the unrest.
To many shopowners and factories in such important Pakistani cities as Karachi and Islamabad, turmoil and violence meant direct loss of business during the turmoil in the aftermath of the Bhutto assassination.
The violence, which lasted a few days after Bhutto was assassinated, left some 60 people dead, causing huge property losses to the South Asian country.
The Karachi Chamber of Industries and Commercial estimated that the city of Karachi alone recorded a corporate loss of 80 billion rupees (some 1.33 billion U.S. dollars) and a GDP loss of 8.7 billion rupees (some 145 million dollars) during the five-day-long riots.
The owner of a cosmetics shop in the luxurious "The Forum" shopping mall in Karachi said his shop had to be shut down for four days for fear of looting. So were hundreds of other shops and groceries in the biggest city of Pakistan and many other cities during the turmoil.
Pakistan's Central Bank warned the turmoil had hit the economy so hard that it might not reach its 7.2 percent growth target for the year to June 2008.
Common people are suffering most from the turmoil. The flour shortage, which had persisted in various parts of the country, turned into severe crisis after the assassination of Bhutto when violence acts erupted all over the country.
Wheat flour is a staple foodstuff in Pakistan, where rotis or unleavened bread are eaten with almost every meal.
In Karachi, the flourmills are getting wheat from government at the rate of 12 rupees per kg, but they are selling flour above 28 rupees a kg to retailers and the retail price has climbed to around 32-35 rupees a kg, The Nation daily reported.
Residents have to pay 10 rupees more for their daily flour than before the turmoil, the report said.
The Pakistani government said it has no lack of wheat supplies and blamed it on distribution problems and hoarders.
Power shortage is another headache for Pakistanis in the wake of turmoil after the assassination of Bhutto. The country is suffering a huge power deficit due to low water levels at hydro dams and damage to two main power lines attacked during the violence that erupted after Bhutto's assassination.
Having seen too much unrest, the Pakistani people have expectations on the coming election as they hope the newly elected government will secure a stable life for them.
Salman Ali, a car driver who works for a small enterprise in Karachi, said he will take part in the vote next month despite the possibility that some extremists could stage violent attacks at polling stations on the polling day.
"I hope a capable new government will be elected," he said.
Mohmood said the new government to be elected should, on the one hand, have the capability of stabilizing the country, and on the other hand, take much more care about the people living at the bottom of society.
The Pakistani government has said it is committed to a "free, transparent and just" election and necessary efforts will be made to achieve the goal.
"Steps are being taken to maintain law and order during election process", said Interior Minister Hamid Nawaz Khan. Nobody would be allowed to take law in hand during the process, he said.
The government would welcome any international observer to monitor election process in Pakistan and his ministry was working to secure a safe stay of the international observers in Pakistan, he said.
Source:Xinhua
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