Back to the 1990s?
The decision by Raza Rabbani to boycott the presidential elections is no ordinary matter as he was the nominee of the former ruling party which is now the largest opposition party in the National Assembly. Rabbani has expressed serious reservations about the way the Presidential polls were brought forward from August 6 to July 30. He has maintained that the Supreme Court verdict was delivered without listening to all the parties which is against the basic principles of justice. According to him the verdict has created an impression that the electoral college for the presidential poll was only present in Islamabad while the fact is that four provincial assemblies are also included in it. He has argued that the verdict is thus an attack on the federation. He has also accused the Election Commission of advising the PML-N to go against its judgment to Supreme Court, thus handing over its own jurisdiction to the apex court. Rabbani was supported by the ANP leader Asfandyar Wali who questioned the relevance of the Election Commission if the Supreme Court was itself to announce the schedule of the presidential elections.
Besides the PPP, the Awami National Party and the Balochistan National Party-Awami (BNP-A) have also announced boycott of the presidential poll. The PML-Q too has declared that it would not take part in polling in case the opposition failed to agree on a unanimous candidate. The boycott of the presidential election by PPP which rules Sindh, the second largest province of the federation, poses worrisome questions about national unity. In case Sindh Assembly was to oppose the elections, things could take an ugly turn.
Khursheed Shah failed as a leader of the opposition to evolve a consensus on a single presidential candidate contesting against the PML-N nomine. His second failure was to persuade all opposition parties to join the boycott. The PPP has thus fewer supporters of boycott among the opposition in the National Assembly. The question regarding the election date should have been resolved through negotiations between the political parties. That this did not happen underlines the absence of trust among them, which is a throwback to the 1990s. The recourse to the Supreme Court also underlines an unhealthy tendency to take political disputes to the courts. The advice by the Election Commission to the PPP to approach the Supreme Court was not followed on account of suspicions expressed by Raza Rabbani. With the Election Commission having been informed by Rabbani’s proposer that his name has been withdrawn, the boycott has become irreversible. Only diplomacy at the highest level can stop the situation from further deterioration. There is a need on the part of Mian Nawaz Sharif to take the initiative to ensure the PPP that there is no conspiracy afoot to introduce a unitary form of government in the country.
