If Pak had money to buy F-16s, why didn't it have money for flood victims: Expert

Montrial (Canada), Oct. 22 (ANI): Pakistan is an oligarchy (a government in which a small group exercises control, especially for corrupt and selfish purposes), which has money to buy F-16s and exempts the rich from paying income tax, has money to keep an atomic arsenal capable of destroying half the planet, but does not have money to provide aid to flood victims, a media professional has said.

In an article, Patrice Lagaci of La Presse says it is shocking and appalling that Islamabad is in a position to fork out approximately 40 million dollars for each F-16 that it wants, but says its cash flows are drained, if not empty, when it comes to rehabilitating 20,000,000 flood disaster victims.

Lagaci believes that the West (read Canada and United States) are quite right in refusing to send funds over the Pakistan for the flood victims, and adds that Islamabad would do well to rethink its priorities and redirect its finances for more justifiable causes.

Islamabad may be clamoring for international aid for widely acknowledged catastrophe and cholera and is probably right in doing so, but the international community is also within its rights to question the way funding is to be released and for what purpose.

Lagaci describes himself/herself as a naove journalist who wanted to know that if Pakistan had 1.4 billion dollars to acquire fighter planes from Lockheed, why didn't have 460 million dollars to help its own "drenched" citizens?

"I apologize to the Red Cross, to CARE, to Oxfam and other non-governmental organizations, but I, for one, will not give one red penny towards the humanitarian relief in Pakistan. I will not give a penny to help Pakistan because Pakistan never had any problem buying military equipment or getting financial help to buy some," Lagaci said. (ANI)