“We will die before we let the province be divided.” Variations of this sentiment increasingly surface whenever the question of new provinces is raised. Such slogans are politically powerful because they turn an administrative proposal into an existential question of identity and belonging. But a federation cannot govern itself through sentiment alone. There is a familiar metaphor for societies resisting change: when the road finally reaches the village, some stand in its path because the unfamiliar is easier to fear than to examine. The point is not that every proposed change constitutes progress, but that resistance itself cannot be treated as an argument against reform.

Perhaps the debate on new provinces has been asking the wrong question. The issue is not whether the country should be divided further, but whether power should remain concentrated so far from the citizens it is meant to serve.

Unfortunately, among the masses, the concept of federation has not evolved from the map of territory. In reality, it is also a map of access. It is access to power, public money, political representation, hospitals, universities and the institutions that shape everyday life. Pakistan’s debate on creating new provinces should therefore move beyond the language of “division”. The more important question is whether a country of around 260 million people can still be governed effectively through only four provinces. It is neither convincing nor humanely possible. 

Pakistan has reached a point where creating more provinces should be treated not as a threat to national unity, but as an instrument of better government. We are not in........

© Paradigm Shift