Elections of the Upper House
Elections, in our neck of the woods especially, tend to expose shortcomings of politicians more than highlighting their virtues. The rush for the Senate, for example, would make far more sense if those in power treated it with dignity. And the present dispensation is perhaps the finest example. The prime minister does not bother with the Upper House at all, despite the Senate making it mandatory for him to attend at least once a month. And who can forget when the interior minister made his only visit; getting into a fight and making a mockery of proceedings? Interestingly, with the vote finally playing out, Nawaz has flown to Riyadh to feed the Saudis’ obsession with their outreach and influence, instead of tending to important issues at home.
The matter of horse-trading has brought a bunch of interesting news to the fore as well. There have been rumours of discontent within ruling party ranks for a while, and the Senate race seems to have brought some issues to the fore. Balochistan Assembly Speaker Jan Mohammad Jamali refusing to withdraw his daughter in favour of the party’s preferred candidate, despite formal requests by senior PML-N leaders (including Kh Saad), is just one such example. There are similar concerns in Punjab, which is obviously why the party was so eager to push the 22nd Amendment through.
Significantly, even though PPP did not stand by the government (like last time), its partner in the anti horse-trading campaign – PTI – has also had its back-and-forths. First Imran raised controversy by calling Zardari. Some news reports suggests he agreed to meet the former president but was held back by some senior leaders. Then he publically badmouthed PPP and JUI-F, again. But then there were rumours of PTI’s new heavyweight going active in his native Faisalabad to rally in favour of PPP’s Afzal Chan. Meanwhile, allegations and counter-allegations – about horse-trading, vote-buying, and what not – continue, of course.
In creating a storm over what should be regular, straight-forward, political procedure, our politicians do a great disservice to democratic politics. It is because of them, at the end of the day, not ‘outside forces’, that democracy fails to deliver. As long as they continue to fight over power, influence and funds, instead of empowering institutions and extracting maximum public benefit from them, little else can be expected from such elections.