OVER the last three months, there have been as many incidents of wildfires that engulfed the Margalla Hills, indicating beyond doubt consistent failure, chronic environmental mismanagement, government apathy, and collective denial in the face of a growing climate emergency.

The collapsing system is marked by policy blindness, ecological neglect and reckless inaction.

It is easy to blame nature, the searing heatwave, dry winds, and rising temperatures. However, let us not fool ourselves into thinking any of this was unavoidable.

The fires, like many others in the past, were predictable and preventable.

The real reason was years of ignored warnings by climate experts, lack of resources, and a system designed to react only after the damage has been done.Every summer, we watch Margalla Hills burn as if it is normal. But this is not normal. Not when Pakistan is one of the most climate-vulnerable countries in the world. Not when Islamabad, the federal capital, suffers from the repeated destruction of one of its few remaining green lungs. Not when the forest burns, and, at the same time, machinery clears more land in the name of development.

What is worse is the silence that follows.

The fire dies, and so does the outrage.

Where were the drones for early detection? Where were the supposedly trained rapid-response fire brigades? And, why is the Ministry of Climate Change always reacting, never preparing? Worse still, the suffering has not been equal. The privileged flee to safer places, and carry on with their lives. But the poor, those living near the forest edges, depending on its resources, or breathing in its smoke, suffer the worst and are heard the least.

We need a climate-adaptive system, modern surveillance, better pay as well as protection for forest rangers, antiencroachment enforcement, and environmental education embedded at every level of society.

If Margalla Hills continue to burn every year and we continue to normalise it, we are no longer the victims. We are accomplices.

Muhammad Shahjahan Memon Islamabad