Politics of Punjab’s belly

There was an interesting article by Cyril Almeida about Imran Khan’s prospects in Punjab. Given the fact that there is a lot of hype surrounding the issue, the important thing to see is whether the PML(N) should get uncomfortable at PTI’s dharna and rally showings, and whether these numbers can be converted into the 30 odd seats everyone seems to be talking about.

It is said that ‘You don’t lose an election to poor performance, you lose an election to another candidate.’

As mentioned in the article, the primary goal should be to see whether the PTI can a) find enough candidates, or b) steal potential winners from other parties. So far, their big name signing has been Mian Azhar, who I’m afraid is probably the most irrelevant politician in Punjab. However, the floodgates open after perceptions start changing. Basically if I’m a PML(N) man, Rana XYZ in Gujranwala, and I see PTI flags and dharnas everywhere, Icould very well think that maybe now’s the time to jump ship. Combine that with rumours and whispers about ‘angelic’ support, and a lot of candidates could switch from the PML-N, Q or the PPP to the PTI purely on the basis of perceived chances of this new party.

All well and good; Except electoral politics, and Punjabi politics in general, functions according to micro-foundational mechanisms that ultimately make Rana XYZ a winning candidate.

Everyone will agree that the overarching principle for an electoral victory in 21st century Pakistan is patronage. But the logical follow up to this repeated assertion is where does this elusive patronage come from?

Well for starters, a candidate is backed by what is called the belly of Punjab. We see Rana XYZ of Gujranwala, but we don’t see his backers, Chaudhary ABC, and Shaikh GHI. Chaudhary sb is a local construction magnate. Shaikh sb, on the other hand, is the head of Saddar bazaar traders association, and controls a multi-million rupee business. Together, they’ve decided that they run their businesses, which will finance Rana sb’s elections. Come election time, they’ll make sure their biraderis are in line, their minions running around distributing favours and bottles of cold drinks and cups of hot tea, and Rana Sb is reminded of what needs to be done after a victory is secured. So after Rana sb secures his seat in the NA (or PA), he gets around to re-paying Chaudhary sb and Shaikh sb. Everyone’s happy, except the disconnected underbelly (i.e. the ‘plebs’), but who cares about that.

So when you start looking at these micro-foundational mechanisms for every constituency, you will find different patterns and subsequently, different chances for success or failure. The problem with existing analysis of PTI’s chances is that we’re assuming either a straight up ship-jump of winning or close candidates (kind of like the PML(N) to PML(Q) jump of 2002), or Imran Khan’s ability to make winners out of, what are essentially, losers (like Mian Azhar). The former is much more difficult without the coercive apparatus of a dictator or a strong winning perception of the PTI, while the latter is too reliant on Imran’s charisma, the new disconnected urban/peri-urban middle class, and the ability of his party folks to actually run an election at the constituency level.

Another problem is that we often overlook the importance of provincial assembly candidates in determining the fate of national assembly seats. While complacency has stuck with the PML(N) for much of its time in power, they did manage to wean away 40 odd MPAs from the PML(Q) i.e. 40 winners in places where their hastily assembled candidate couldn’t do anything.

Now winning an MPA election is less expensive but not much less difficult than an MNA election. It’s a complete process, whereby the party machinery works in such a way that MNAs back their party’s MPA candidates, while the (usually) two MPA candidates back their man for the NA seat. Their patronage networks are also interlinked, with the same Chaudhary sbs and Shaikh sbs working behind the scenes to ensure victory for their chosen horses. Does the PTI have that kind of reach at all levels of politics? The PML(N) was literally bred during the 80’s, and even then it took them the best part of 3 decades to finally have a functioning political machine. Leaving aside the fact that the machine was overhauled in 2002, it just shows that patronage networks aren’t won or made that easily, nor are they susceptible to mood-swings.

So what’s the lesson here? Predicting electoral victories for any party at this point in time is slightly presumptuous and perhaps too reliant on national moods, and less on constituency level facts.

The last time I wrote a piece on Imran Khan, I secretly promised myself that I won’t make any predictions about his chances till I study the metropolitan and city pages of the Urdu press for at least 8-10 months.

You see, the thing is that between all those press releases and yellow journalism stories, you will often find a couple of nuggets from different areas on how the head of some traders association in some market held a strike in solidarity with one political party or the other. You will also see little tidbits on how some local magnate is meeting the district president of some party. When we start seeing PTI feature heavily in these little, on-the-face-of-it irrelevant pieces of district level reporting, we’ll have a better idea of whether the tide is turning, and whether Imran Khan has the support of the Belly of Punjab. Interesting.

The writer works in the social sector and blogs at http://recycled-thought.blogspot.com. Contact him at [email protected]