Mum’s the word
From the newsroom’s point of view, the N-league is the most organised party, despite tying itself in knots every now and then. PPP never recovered from the ’13 rout and Asif Zardari has been unable to breathe fresh life into the party. Catapulting Bilawal to the top didn’t quite work out either. The move seems premature in hindsight, but at the time it looked like a workable gamble. The dharna was at its peak and there was talk of the government falling.
PPP came out in support of democracy, etc, of course, but Bilawal was a contingency manoeuvre in case push did come to shove. If there really were an election, Bilawal would rally the party’s scattered periphery, especially in Punjab. Things turned out very different, needless to say, and the last Zardari spoke of his kids, Bilawal was still not mature enough and there was a hint at promoting Aseefa instead.
PTI’s not doing too well either. It wriggled well to salvage some pride when the dharna ran out of steam, and huge crowds at subsequent jalsas across the country put some wind in its sails again. Then it also (finally) won the judicial commission. But it’s been downhill since. They didn’t exactly bombard the commission with evidence of vote fraud. And the Karachi by-election and cantonment board poll results did not match the party’s claims. And there’s been infighting. Even Justice Wajih has not fallen out with kaptaan. How Imran handled the probe into his own party polls did not impress many within the party either.
And then there’s MQM. The screws of the state, seemingly, have come down so tightly on it that it will be some time before Muttahida can find its bearing again. A Raw-level charge does not just come from the SSP level. It means several layers of the official machinery are in flow, and the party will not be the same at the end of this process.
NAP never made it beyond twenty-something interesting points on a memo. As one ex police officer and security analyst put it, “It’s a blueprint of an impressive building, but it does not have a first floor”. So they are basically building it in the air
And the JIs and JUIs do not matter much except in matters of alliances after elections. So N is sitting comfortably in Islamabad. Everybody’s been all praise since Zarb-e-Azb. The last threats to the throne, if any still remained, will fizzle out with the judicial commission. And the Chinese investment bonanza has won him many points.
Yet, strangely, N sticks to a style of governance that rubs the opposition, and even many in his own ranks, the wrong way. He likes to alienate opposition parties, the public at large, and even the majority of his own party regarding some of the most crucial problems confronting the country.
The National Action Plan (NAP) is the perfect example. Zarb-e-Azb had been going on for a while, but it took Peshawar to finally unite the political spectrum on fighting terrorists to the finish. Hence NAP. But there’s been nothing since then. Important meetings never took place. Intelligence agencies were integrated only on paper. There’s even no word on how the plan is going to work. First the interior ministry was supposed to take care of oversight. But then the grapevine spoke of distance between Ch Nisar and the prime minister. And then there were stories about the interior ministry being taken out of the loop. But nothing on ground. No word either. NAP never made it beyond twenty-something interesting points on a memo. As one ex police officer and security analyst put it, “It’s a blueprint of an impressive building, but it does not have a first floor”. So they are basically building it in the air.
Similar secrecy surrounds other major initiatives. The LNG import from Qatar, for example. Why the fuss over pricing? What strategic imperative could there possibly be for keeping the public in the dark? That’s tax payer money, remember? And why the mystery about a ship (with LNG) coming, then not coming, then perhaps coming, while the price was not decided? These are the same people that – quite mysteriously – paid the circular debt in full not too long ago, and it bounced right back in no time.
And the Chinese corridor is no different. Here’s a masterpiece that connects a number of countries, triggers scores of projects, raises employment across the continent and will lead to trade windfalls for a number of countries. But Mian sb’s government wants to keep the route secret. Surely he, and his kitchen cabinet, is smart enough to realise they can’t pull the Lahore-Islamabad motorway stunt here. Fiddling with the route, before the project has even taken off, will not only shift important benchmarks, but also leave a bad aftertaste with our Chinese friends. But for N, for the time being, the route is too important a matter to be disclosed to the people.
N is sitting comfortably in Islamabad. Everybody’s been all praise since Zarb-e-Azb. The last threats to the throne, if any still remained, will fizzle out with the judicial commission. And the Chinese investment bonanza has won him many points
Strangely, in some cases, the secrecy continues in issues that have been supposedly laid to rest. Parliament, apparently, did just that with the Yemen matter when it ruled against the Saudi request. But then Shahbaz led a delegation to Riyadh – outranking senior government ministers somehow. And then Nawaz went himself. Interestingly, the Saudis have not changed their demands at all, and they’ve not been very discreet about it either. So what can N possibly offer beyond what he already did, quite publically, after parliament’s snub? Why the back and forth? And what about Iran? Maybe the kitchen cabinet didn’t notice it, but the international community has been inching closer to Iran all the while it has been distancing itself from Saudi Arabia since the Arab Spring degenerated. How wise, then, of Pakistan to do just the opposite, especially when a new international sanctions regime might bring the IP pipeline back on the table, much to Pakistan’s benefit.
And this is N’s way after being humbled out of a number of tough positions. Remember the early days, when he tried to put the military in its place by taking Musharraf to the cleaners? The Khawajas of the party didn’t seem so gung ho when the boss had to ask the military to ‘facilitate’. Then the dilly-dallying about the judicial commission had to come to an end, too, finally.
One thing that helps N is the opposition’s inability to mount an opposition. When PTI continues to embarrass itself, PPP can’t find its own feet, MQM has its back to the wall, religious parties just couldn’t come of age politically, and the military is too stretched with military matters, there’s little in the way of Nawaz being Nawaz. And as long as he can do that, he’ll run the country as he likes running it, and that’s by keeping his cards very close to his chest.
