Hopefully performance will match the hype
After nearly three months of inaction, and the so-called honeymoon period of 100 days about to expire, the PML-N government has finally decided that it is action time. The prime minister is in Karachi, and so is the entire federal cabinet. Despite an earlier show of temper by the MQM in response to the withdrawal of invitation to Farooq Sattar to attend the cabinet meeting on Wednesday, its representatives were present in Prime minister’s meeting with provincial leaders of political parties. In the meeting Mian Nawaz Sharif pledged “not to politicise a planned solution to restore peace to Karachi”, hoping that in this federal endeavour with the provincial government providing the lead “others would cooperate”. Today’s cabinet session is likely to set the ball rolling for a planned, intensive and targeted operation against the criminal gangs and armed militias of all political parties, whose deadly turf war has ruined peace in the country’s economic hub. As far as sound-bites go, the PM hit all the right chords: “He was not there representing the PML-N but as prime minister of the entire country… Karachi is the economic hub and unemployment will rise if the unrest is not quelled… Peace [in Karachi] is imperative in bringing foreign investment into the country.”Hopefully Nawaz will take on board all the parties with significant presence in Karachi while finalising the line of action to put an end to violence and crime in the metropolis.
Karachi has suffered for far too long. While what happened there before of the present dispensation is lamentable, one cannot but castigate the PML-N’s procrastination in taking this particular bull – among many others haunting us – by the horns, in the name of ‘forging a consensus’. It is always good to lineup a cross section of people behind a government when dealing with such singularly difficult assignments as restoring peace to Karachi or taming the terrorists, but the buck in parliamentary democracy stops at the prime minister’s desk. It is part of his job description as the first among equals to take decisions and deliver. Putting it off and hiding behind the ‘consensus’ bogey is tantamount to abdicating responsibility.
Now, if as expected, when the federal cabinet gives the interior minister’s ‘comprehensive’ plan ‘an all systems go’ signal, clinical precision in execution is an essential. It is also anticipated that the troika of police, the Rangers and the intelligence outfits would be well-equipped and exceptionally motivated to be up to the challenge. Above all, the operation would cut a swathe on the armed gangs of all hues, without the least consideration about their political branding. With the hype about a solution to the Karachi conundrum on a high, from now on it is the performance on the ground that would be under the microscope. One hopes that this time round all involved score better than they have in the past.
