Bush poem sparks row in Pak

ISLAMABAD: Groaning under mounting pressure from the religious and liberal circles here, the higher-ups of the education ministry in Pakistan have been compelled to consider deleting an English poem 'The Leader' from a grade-eleven textbook which points to none other than American President George W Bush. 

Approved by the Education Ministry and published by none other than the National Book Foundation, the first letters of each verse of the poem in question form the name ‘President George W Bush’. The poem in the English book, though, does not mention the American president directly but if one reads the first letter of every verse vertically, it actually makes ‘PRESIDENT GEORGE W BUSH’.

The officials in the education ministry have said the inclusion of the poem was merely accidental and they are ready to delete the same, provided the government higher-ups agree to it.

The poem has created a stir in the country’s conservative religious as well as liberal and progressive circles which are literally fuming at the way the Musharraf-led government in Pakistan is increasingly bowing to the ever-growing American hegemony in the region.

The two schools of thought which have been traditional rivals in Pakistani politics are united on this particular issue and are exerting pressure on the federal government to delete the poem from the approved textbook. In the words of Qazi Hussain Ahmed, the chief of Jamaat-e-Islami, at a time when the American nation along with the rest of the world is pondering over the policies of the US president, thus unable yet to figure out whether to categorise him as a hero or villain, Pervez Musharraf through inclusion of this poem in the students’ syllabus, has tried to prove that President Bush’s policies are not only agreeable but are also worthy of turning him into a hero.

A central leader of the Bhutto-led PPP and a member of the National Assembly, Raja Pervez Ashraf said that from the pro US goverment, “this doesn’t come as a shock.”