There doesn’t seem to be an end to these absurdities. The Punjab Assembly keeps creating controversies by adopting pointless resolutions, thanks to the province’s myopic political leadership. Last week’s resolution asking the federal government to develop consensus among the federating units for building the Kalabagh Dam was no less bizarre than the one it had adopted against the media three months ago. You can’t expect anything sensible from the Q-League especially from its mindless opposition leader who must be unaware of the fact that such a resolution would only provide an opportunity to the smaller provinces for Punjab bashing.
Ch Zaheeruddin’s desperation for moving the resolution was hard to fathom lest it was aimed at winning the kudos of a media house that keeps beating a dead horse as part of its self-proclaimed patriotism. Strange, as it may sound, was the PPP’s unequivocal support for the Kalabagh Dam. If senior minister Raja Riaz sees nothing in the resolution that violates the party policies then Governor Salman Taseer goes a step ahead to warn that the future generations would not forgive us if we shelve the project for political expediencies.
The Q-League being in the opposition can afford to take such ‘initiatives’ for it has nothing to lose. While in power it acted with extra care and caution. The then Punjab Assembly was never seen indulging in any controversy. It simply restricted itself to the resolutions seeking Pervez Musharraf’s election as president in uniform over and over again. But its leadership never raised the voice for any issue that could have ruffled many feathers.
There is now much at stake both for N-League and the PPP. More so for the former, which is in the driving seat in the province. It can’t escape the blame for sparking a controversy by passing the buck on to the quislings. Mian Shahbaz Sharif needs to understand that the KBD resolution will only exacerbate the sense of deprivation among the smaller provinces at a time when the nation has to forge unity for countering the various threats to its sovereignty. But he will find himself detached from reality until he gets rid of the dictatorial straitjacket that prevents him from deciding important matters in consultation with his political colleagues.
The kid brother will only be taxing his intelligence if he thinks that he can claim exclusivity over wisdom. It was the peculiar mindset which had earlier pitted the Punjab Assembly against the media. No matter how innocuous were the contents of the resolution moved by N’s Sanaullah Mastikhel, parliamentarians launched a scathing attack against journalists, terming them blackmailers and shouting offensive slogans when the media-men staged a walkout from the Press Gallery in protest. Mian Shahbaz, then sitting in his chamber, might have prided himself with conceiving a ‘wonderful’ plan to discipline the media, only to realise later how big a disaster it could turn out to be.
Perhaps in the combative House of Sharifs, it was only Mian Nawaz Sharif who got upset over the mischief done by his party. Then, on a sojourn to London, he tried to cool the temper of the agitating journalists by issuing instructions for the mover of the resolution to be thrown out of the party. Like everyone else, he was at a loss to understand what actually prompted his provincial leadership to take on the media: a section of which was then training its guns only at the PPP. And what might have been more disconcerting for him was the non-compliance of his orders for Mastikhel’s expulsion from the party. The poor fellow who earned notoriety for tabling an anti-media resolution and was even denounced by his Party president as a turncoat certainly didn’t do all this on his own. He acted according to the brief. Maybe he was not given the choice to ask questions when summoned to the 7-Club and handed over a ‘carefully’ crafted resolution. The most interesting aspect was Mastikhel being subsequently given a clean chit by an inquiry committee for not having violated party discipline. That ran counter to the CM and his pointman Rana Sanaullah’s initial claim that it was an individual act and the party had nothing to do with it.
The two resolutions not only point to the N leadership’s complete disregard for the free media as well as for inter-provincial harmony but also bring into question its political vision. Mian Shahbaz needs to take a break from his personal image-building to closely monitor the way administration and legislatures are being run. There are serious issues of governance that might await his immediate attention but at the same time he shouldn’t continue to abstain himself from the Punjab Assembly sessions. It’s time he took ownership of what is happening in the house rather than leaving it to Rana Sana to throw everything in jeopardy.
The writer is Executive Editor, Pakistan Today
