PAKPAC WORK AND
ACHIEVEMENTS
Any organization
working on political activity and is a part of political action
committee needs to understands that politics is a process.
Whenever someone works for a process, they cannot claim success at
any point because the process continues on and needs to be
strengthened further.
The Pakistani-American
Public Affairs Committee since its existence from 1989 has been an
active voice of the Pakistani-American community with respect to
the challenges that are faced by the Pakistani-American community
in United States but also important issues with respect to
Pakistan and United States relationship.
Over the last many
years, there have been different challenges that have been faced
by our community. These have included some of the situations which
affect the long-term healthy survival and success of the people in
Pakistan, but also success of the people of Pakistani heritage in
United States. Over time, just like with any other community, the
main issues for our community have changed. With evolution of
newer issues and at times the same issues with newer
manifestations, the evolution of this group at the national scale
has strengthened. There have clearly been challenges that needed
to be responded to and the committee adapted to manage the
challenges at hand.
The following is a brief outline of the activities of
PAKPAC over the past many years. This is in no way a complete
list, but at least gives a glimpse to the younger community
members may not be informed about the successes and achievements
of this group.
As a result of rampant
discrimination challenges against Medical graduates of Countries
outside of United States in 1985, Association of Physicians of
Pakistani Descent in North America (APPNA) developed political
alliance with other foreign medical graduate associations. 1986,
APPNA formed a political action committee and hired a lobbyist
with other members of the foreign medical graduate association to
fight legislation which cut off all Medicare payments to foreign
medical graduates. In an emergent situation which was threatening
to cut off Medicare payments for services that were being provided
by foreign medical graduates, a team of Pakistani American
Physicians successfully lobbied congress and developed an alliance
of Physician Groups. The alliance officially became the
International Association of American Physicians (IAAP). PAKPAC
was thus officially created under the APPNA presidency of Arif
Toor to conduct political lobbying which APPNA could not do
because of its 501 c(3) status. With the efforts of this
organization and the support of the IAAP, Senate Bill 304 and
House Resolution 614 are presented in Congress to end
discrimination against foreign medical graduates.
The efforts of PAKPAC
continued on to help protect the future and rights of the
Pakistani American community members, primarily the physician
community. In 1992 the Health Professionals Reauthorization Act (Solarz,
Kennedy, Simon bill) was enacted into law which legally ended all
discrimination against foreign medical graduates. The Physicians
of Pakistani Heritage in United States who are either practicing,
teaching and going through their training process do need to
recognize the efforts of the organizations and it timely effective
advocacy which has helped their future and those of all other
foreign medical graduates.
At the end of the Cold
War, the US reevaluated and downgraded their relationship with
Pakistan on the ground that the new global environment did not
warrant the old strategic partnership. An immediate and far
reaching consequence was the emergence of differences between the
two countries on the nuclear issue. In October 1990, economic and
military sanctions were imposed on Pakistan under the Pressler
Amendment, a country-specific law that singled out only one nation
on the nuclear issue, while other nations who were in the same
category were not impacted. One consequence of the Pressler
sanctions was the US decision to withhold Pakistan military
equipment contracted prior to 1990, worth about $1.2 billion at
that time, even though Pakistan had paid for the equipment.
In 1992 and 1993, there was very well coordinated effort
by certain political groups to have the Country of Pakistan be
declared a terrorist state. The advocacy efforts of PAKPAC at that
time helped educate the members of congress about the impact on
the people of Pakistan and long term relations ship of Pakistan
and United States and with their efforts the efforts of these
groups failed. During the same time there were many community
challenges that the Pakistani American community members faced
within Untied States.
PAKPAC remained active in their efforts to help educate the
Members of Congress. In May 1995, the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee adopted by a near unanimous, bipartisan vote, an
amendment moved by Republican Senator, Brown to ease Pressler
sanctions. This amendment helped remove from the purview of
Pressler all non-military assistance. In the House of
Representatives, a similar effort was initiated by the newly
elected Republican Chairman of the House International Relations
Sub-Committee on South Asia, Doug Bereuter, who proposed an
amendment to remove Pressler restrictions on all forms of
non-military assistance.
Meanwhile, the PAKPAC
coordinated their efforts to help educate Senator Larry Pressler
(republican Senator from South Dakota) on his views and some
misguided decisions. On clear understanding that he was unwilling
to look at a different perspective, the Pakistani American
community joined hands and supported Senator Tim Johnson. In 1996,
Tim Johnson defeated Pressler, who was running for a fourth term
in the Senate. Pressler was the only incumbent Republican senator
to lose reelection that year. PAKPAC played an instrumental role
in the process. Even the Former CIA director James Woolsey has
discussed the role of the Pakistani American community in this
particular election.
PAKPAC assisted the
community to help their respective issues by educating the
Ambassadors Abida Hussain and Maleeha Lodhi’s teams in the embassy
to help the specific cases.
There are multiple
other situations where PAKPAC representatives have helped educate
their respective Members of Congress on some of the issues which
do help the long term United State interests. In one instance when
one of the Members of Congress Sam Gejedensen of Connecticut
refused to meet any Pakistani American community member, the local
community helped his opponent lose the elections and leave his
Congressional post after 22 year in Congress. This margin of
victory in the 2000 elections was by only half a percent of votes.
His opponent acknowledged the role of the Pakistani American
community and PAKPAC support in his victory.
In another instance
when Congresswoman Nancy Johnson who had placed an advertisement
portraying Pakistan and Pakistani Americans in a negative light
was approached and educated on her misguided position. On her
refusal to pull the advertisement and understand some policy
issues, a decision was made to help her pursue her career outside
of Congress. The community members supported her opponent now
Congressman Chris Murphy and with the help of many volunteers
reached out and help Nancy Johnson lose congress after 24 years in
Congress.
PAKPAC has been active
is setting up Lobbying days and/or advocacy days on the Hill to
variety of issues. These have included the support and development
and lobbying for the Civil Rights Restoration Act (CLRA) which was
with efforts and collaboration with a large group of organization
uniting to protect the civil right so all Americans.
PAKPAC also helped
organize a Day on the Hill to help with the J1 visa delay
challenges that have been haunting the young Physicians coming to
the United States for further studies. This activity was repeated
and efforts were made for 4 years in a row while the education of
the administrative branch of the government was continued.
PAKPAC worked and
supported the SAFE ACT H.R. 3352 & S 1709, the "SAFE" Act
(Securities and freedom Ensured Act). The proposed SAFE Acts limit
“sneak and peek” warrants. SAFE Acts imposed additional sunset
clauses on several USA PATRIOT Act provisions.
PAKPAC organized a Day
on Hill and Meeting with the Administration to seek information
and stop the National
Security Agency Domestic Spying Program.
PAKPAC Started a
national program to help develop liaison with the Law Enforcement
Agencies on better education on the people of Pakistani heritage,
their beliefs and backgrounds. These include sensitivity training,
religious training as well as evaluation of the current training
processes of the law enforcement agencies.
PAKPAC representatives
met with the Attorney General of United States to share their
concerns on the civil rights related challenges.
After the devastating
earthquake in October 2005, PAKPAC helped take a leadership role
in organizing the Pakistani American community organizations to
become a single voice to go to the Hill and jointly arranged a
“Day on the Hill” to educate the members of congress and provide
support on Capitol Hill for additional relief funding to the
people in severe needs in Pakistan at that time. These efforts
lead to the vote of 423 yea (423-0) votes of the members of
congress in favor of the H.Res.492 (109th Congress)
PAKPAC has supported
multiple individual cases with respect to the visa requirements as
well and their specific cases which needed to be dealt on case buy
case basis.
The committee has an
annual dinner in Pakistan with the Head of State and the
administration representatives and many legislators. This event
allows the PAKPAC members to talk about their lives in United
States and help identify common issues and concerns to help
strengthen US-Pakistan relationship. The PAKPAC reps do get
opportunities to highlight the issues of concerns and policy needs
to help the lives of people of Pakistan. The issues that have been
and continue to be discussed have included law and order
situation, control of extremism, sectarian violence,
rehabilitation of educational institutions, and madrassah reform
and environment issues and democracy strengthening.
The PAKPAC representatives meet with the US ambassador to Pakistan
on an annual bases and do identify important issues and
perspectives that impact the Pakistani American community and
Pakistan US relationship. Discussions have included situation with
the war on terror, developing people to people diplomacy
opportunities, increasing Fulbright fellowship for students of
Pakistan. There has also been discussion to expedite the visa
processing for students, visitor applicants, businessmen from
Pakistan to United States and increasing bilateral trade and
tourism to name a few of the topics.
PAKPAC has hosted
multiple members of Congress on multiple sites, A brief list of
the Members of Congress hosted in the recent years includes Sen.
Richard Bryan, Sen. Harry Reid, Sen. Robert Torricelli, Sen.
Hillary Clinton, Sen. George Allen, Rep. Dan Burton, Rep. Al
Green, Rep. Benny Thompson, Rep. Elijah Cummings, Sen. Charles
Schumer, Sen. Arlen Specter, Sen. Rick Santorum, Rep. Dana
Rohrabacher, Rep. Xavier Becerra, Rep. Bob Livingston, Sen. Sam
Brownback, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, Rep. James Moran, Sen. Joe
Biden, Rep. John Larson, Rep. Rob Simmons, Sen. Tim Johnson, Rep.
Bill Paxon. (This is an incomplete list)
Some of the impact of
the Committee has been directly on behalf of the
Pakistani-American community, but also has been though other means
as well. One of the secondary affects of the advocacy efforts of
the organization has been a general increase in awareness of the
community in United States and their level of involvement in the
US political process either within the efforts of PAKPAC and
outside of it as well.
As mentioned earlier,
the reason one cannot claim success in politics is that it is a
process. The political process requires that people become a part
of it. We have tried to give you a glimpse of the past to help one
realize the potential possibilities in future.
Only communities
engaged in working for their future see the future..
