-Calls for creative solutions to enroll 100% children, promote preventive health treatment
Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: President Dr Arif Alvi on Monday urged the international community to show a common resolve against Islamophobia and work towards consolidating the values of tolerance and coexistence.
Strongly condemning the desecration of the Holy Quran in Sweden, the president said the abhorrent incident insulted the holy scripture of Islam and hurt the feelings of billions of Muslims under the guise of freedom of expression. He termed the act as senseless, provocative and Islamophobic which hurt the religious sensitivities of Muslims around the world.
Dr Alvi called upon the world to criminalize all acts that promote the ideology of hatred and not allow extremist and radical elements to spread hatred against Islamic sanctities and values.
He termed the act as senseless, provocative and Islamophobic which hurt the religious sensitivities of Muslims around the world. The president, in a statement, stressed that the immoral incident was an act of needless incitement and a serious provocation to the feelings of Muslims in the world.
This is against the internationally accepted norms and principles of legitimate expression of the right to freedom of expression or opinion, which obliged everyone to not resort to hate speech and incite people to violence, he said.
The president said that Islam preached respect and reverence for all religions of the world whereas this heinous act has hurt Muslims by insulting their sacred values, and reflected the alarming levels of Islamophobia.
Meanwhile, President Dr Arif Alvi on Monday said that creative and out-of-the-box solutions must be adopted to ensure 100% enrolment of children in schools. In this regard, he also stressed upon promotion of preventive health mode of treatment for ensuring accelerated socio-economic uplift of the people and the progress and development of the country. The president expressed these views during a meeting with Chairman of the National Commission for Human Development (NCHD), Col (retd) Dr Amirullah Marwat, who called on him, at Aiwan-e-Sadr, President Secretariat Press Wing said in a press release.
Dr Nasim Ashraf, Chairman of the Pakistan Human Development Fund, and senior members of the NCHD were also present during the meeting.
Talking to NCHD chairman, the president said that as per estimates only 68% of the country’s children were enrolled in schools at the primary level, which was alarming and observed that 100% enrolment of children must be ensured by instituting out-of-box solutions like using mosques from Fajr to Zohar as schools and using hybrid modes of learning wherever possible.
He highlighted the need for adopting innovative Information and communication technology tools for imparting education at the grassroots level and imparting marketable skills to the youth through non-formal and formal education and skill development programs.
The president said that there was a need of creating a comprehensive system in the country to retain professionals, which included doctors, engineers, IT specialists and persons with high levels of skills in other sectors, so as to utilize their intellect, knowledge and expertise within the country and take tangible steps to stop the brain drain of precious human resources. He said that the Pakistani diaspora, which was contributing to the growth and development of their host countries, should be engaged to transfer their expertise, skills and knowledge to Pakistan through various online and hybrid platforms.
The oresident said that the large family size, especially in the poor segments of society, could be substantially reduced by meeting the need for contraceptives with longer efficacy by making them readily available to people, besides providing them with education and improving their economic status, which would contribute to bringing down the population growth in a reasonable timeframe.
The president lauded NCHD’s role in the capacity building and training of teachers and health workers, its efforts for poverty alleviation, conducting research studies and data collection, and global resource mobilization to fund its operations.
He noted that NCHD was playing a pivotal role in the critical fields of literacy and non-formal education, promoting universal primary education, and improving the condition of primary healthcare which were essential for human resource development and for creating a quality workforce in the country.
He also appreciated NCHD for its role in promoting human development with the support of the government and non-governmental organizations and assured NCHD of his full support in their efforts for this national cause.
