The climax of Panama leaks has finally hit the wires by JIT’s report. Both in government and opposition camps have reacted. Regardless of these reactions it is pertinent to jog down the history lane and examine why such inquiries, cases, references and orders against the elected prime ministers, no matter, how potent or how noble these may sound still don't seem so straight forward. And also it worth exploring the rationale of ousting PMs always sounds lopsided. To analyse this, let us have a chronological walk through these events in their historical perspective. To start with, let us prefix the year followed by the ousted PM coupled with the charges leveled against:
1977 - Elder Bhutto was ousted in a military coup; apparently to normalise the political climate that seemed ‘out of control’ at that time. It somehow resulted in the death of most popularly elected PM of Pakistan.
1990 - Benzair Bhutto was dismissed as PM only after 18 months in office; the reason quoted was the rampant corruption and because some newspaper report criticised the lifestyle of BB’s husband Asif Ali Zardari, whose pet horses would be served with honey and jam.
1993 - Nawaz Sharif thrown out of office after around half of his tenure on charges of corruption and cronyism although apparently he was considered as the most ‘safe’ PM. Apparently he lost in the war of egos against the bureaucrat-turned-president Ghulam Ishaq Khan.
1996 - Benazir Bhutto was again removed from PM office after three years again on charges of corruption and nepotism. These charges were treated differently and as a result her husband spent eight years of his life in the prison cell. The charges still considered dubious and presently the fate of these charges is unknown.
1999 - Nawaz Sharif was arrested and put behind bars in a military coup on the charges of sedition only after 30 months of his mandated time of 60 months.
2012 - Yusuf Raza Gilani was disqualified to remain as PM after three and a half years in power; owing to the apparent contempt of court but what history tells us, he too lost in the war of egos. But this time apex court was behind the dismissal.
2017 - And now Nawaz Sharif’s fate is hanging again; charges again are corruption and other financial mismanagement…. Well that’s that; lets see the other side of picture now.
1977 - General Zia-ul-Haq comes to power through a coup and rules till his last breath in 1988.
1999 - Musharraf comes to power through a coup and leaves office with an accorded guard of honour in 2008.
Now clearly we have more tolerance for the people who subvert the constitution and then choose to stay as long as they wish to. But this analysis should not be taken as that anybody vouch for corruption here or advocating against the accountability but how to believe that everything that is happening in this country has changed dramatically and people have shelved their lust for power?
To complicate the things, this time the flag bearer of this movement was not any bureaucrat but a popular political leader who has been in the grumpy mood since his party lost election in 2013. That’s not a big deal, however, the political folks whom he inspired or erstwhile people who would consider Election Day as just another holiday. Their attitude is very complex, the least to say. This new political class of voters, need to understand and question why the office of PM is so rickety and everyone who sits there is a compulsory corrupt while all other offices are always chaste?
May be right things are happening but since when these ‘corruption’ tales have become a new phenomenon? In 1993, Sharif was dismissed for the very same reasons but the Supreme Court of that time had reinstated him. But obviously when Ishaq dismissed him there must be some information would have been made available to him. So how come his case was ignored for this long? Or how about if we infer that, although, it is not judicious to talk like that but maybe, just maybe, we don’t like powerful and recalcitrant PMs. Even if we ignore this argument too, then how we would explain the hanging of a non-corrupt PM? Of course he was hanged by the orders of the courts but does that serves as an enviable precedence? And also not long ago, a former chief justice who fought for his job with the help of covert and political support and how much kudos we showered on him but what was the end result? Politics is in our blood. We never stay content with the role we are assigned, we just love political games. Like our media, that broadcast politics almost 95% of its air time.
So here is the contention, things are not as simple as it seems. System is odorous and to still keep it functional the way it is, we see different acts and theatrics. But as Einstein said, "The definition of insanity is to keep on doing the same thing over and over and expect different result." How true!
Nothing inherently changes at the foundation level while new faces are/get introduced and poor public thinks that their salvation goal is close so they start cheering for a new face. Once Nawaz Sharif was treated the same way by the urban middle class as in those days PPP was branded as traitor party. It is a vicious loop that will continue till we don't understand that real power belong to the people and if any change that can come, it would be through them. But somehow public also wants short cuts, they cannot wait for a process rather they need a messiah who would change the destiny of the nation with his magic wind. So on one glimpse of a new saviour, they discard the previous one. No matter if even they themselves chose the person in the first place. This is how we are used to.
Now to the solution part and its boring but it strictly lies in the uninterrupted democracy and power to remove a 'corrupt' fellow should lie within the ambit of parliament. The precedence that are being set and widely cheered by the media and everyone else, are going to haunt us for long time to come. No one, even the one that nation apparently falls in love with now, can drive us out until public wouldn't consider the sanctity of their vote. It’s not an advocacy to tolerate a wrong guy on power citadel, but rules of the game need to set by the parliament and only they should decide. If someone gets convicted by courts, parliament should remove that rotten apple out of the system. Why we forget that BB's governments were apparently removed on the charges based on newspaper clippings. How hard it is to bring up charges against anyone in the midst of power game. Do we have any dearth of fake witnesses? Just one trip to the lower courts on a normal day, would be enough to see this phenomenon in motion.
Of course, there could certain changes be brought out like, giving in to our thin patience level, by reducing the PM's tenure to three or four years, so that if we encounter any inept person, he/she should get less time to do the damage. Solution lies in the uninterrupted democracy - it is a self cleansing process. Also we need to streamline the media so they could tell apart important from important. Less rants and more projection of positive aspects of life would help - not the 24/7 projection of political hysteria.