Into the third week of March, with a new ISI Chief, and freshly elected Senators in place and the President addressing the joint sitting of Parliament today, it is the PPP which have come out looking like winners. All the urgency and hectic to’s and fro’s of the last month have subsided and we as a nation sit back to take deep breaths (as taught by the visiting Indian guru of the Art of Living fame) to take a fresh, realistic stock of the situation. The power of deep breathing, which according to the guru, can also destress the Taliban if they gave it a shot, is much needed to restore equilibrium and come to terms with the way things were, are and look like they are going to be.
The year ahead looks like the government of the day is very much going to remain in place till it completes its full term and the cry for early elections seems to have subsided completely. The only change possible on the horizon stems from the Prime Minister’s contempt issue case, which is going to be decided in the coming days.
The PM says he is a PM (as opposed to a peon) and will not stick a knife in the back of his party head. He invokes his lineage in his arguments and says that rather than be disloyal, he would give up politics. All this he said in speeches made to the public in the last week. This is so Pakistan!
We tend to mix so many things together in our issues. Every debate invokes traditional, cultural, ethnic, khoon, khandaan, yaron ka yar and what have you in our behaviour/thinking patterns. In short, all the lines of argument, except legalities and logic!
The Prime Minister, we can comprehend would like to be perceived as a gentleman, particularly as loyalties go, but what about some of the other acts he has done in his current office which do not quite match up to this pipsqueaky clean gentleman image? What happened to his inherent values then?
The days ahead will, probably, see that this one prediction, that of a change of face in the Prime Minister’s house, will come true on the grounds that the Supreme Court does not seem like it is going to roll back on its position. And the Prime Minister has gone public on his non-compliance.
It really is an unpredictable country because it is all about being the flavour of the month and catching the imagination of people for the moment. The magic of PTI’s October 30 jalsa in Lahore and its resultant rush towards it as the new party of choice seems to have stalled. However, this does not mean that it cannot do something that will start it chugging along again or that the party is over.
The PTI has taken a setback also because of its decisions of sending a representative to the DPC rally in Karachi and boycotting the by-elections. The MQM and PML-N are all wooing the women, not in the literal sense but as vote banks, and the PTI should note that women, too, would prefer absolutely clear and progressive policies on their issues, as demonstrated by some recent good legislation done by this Parliament.
The print and electronic media continues to play a strong role and enjoys the freedom it has to the hilt. After the hue and cry it raised over the slap-happy Waheeda Shah and her subsequent disqualification, the case of Sargodha’s school teacher has also got the attention it deserved. The elderly teacher, who had his legs broken by the ruffians of an affluent political leader for daring to name him in front of a khuli kacheri, has led to the ruing of the same by the accused politician. When he was arrested and put behind bars, the man looked straight into the eyes of all the cameras and said: “Hum sharif log hain, mai nai kuch nahi kiya!” With such shurafa, there remains no need for any badmash!
So slowly and steadily, even though a shade too slowly, things are changing. Before the ever-present video camera eyes on all mobile phones, there was very little which could be recorded and shown to the world as proof of the countless brutalities that the meek and helpless have to bear in this part of the world. These two recent incidents will definitely grudgingly force a lessening of brutish behaviour.
Postscript: Another recent visitor from India to Pakistan was Manohar Singh Gill, who is ex-CEC of India. He was interviewed on TV and it was fascinating to listen to him about how India has managed its elections and the all-powerful role of the Indian Chief Election Commissioner (CEC). He was of the view that retired bureaucrats are better choices for CECs compared to judges.
It was in Manohar Singh Gill’s tenure that electronic voting machines were introduced for the Indian electorate and which have taken care of the issue of dhandli to a large extent. He said that he personally introduced the machine at a common man’s bazaar and asked people to familiarise themselves with it and used it in the elections only after being reassured that people would not shy away from it, given their illiteracy.
He also spoke about how the Election Commission (EC) in India has the powers to shuffle District Administration around to ensure they have no bearings on the results. In short, it was essential for the CEC to be neutral and honest. Compare to our CEC, who did not vote for the disqualification of Waheeda Shah.
The writer is a public relations and event management professional based in Islamabad.
Email: tallatazim@yahoo.com