PIA — gross mishandling

February 6, 2016

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Or a method in the madness?

If the original plan was to shut down the national carrier and create a new airline on its debris, it went all wrong. Three dead bodies of the protesting PIA staff, certainly not part of the script, have thrown a spanner in the works.

The government could have simply shut the tap on the cash strapped airline and let it wither away amid protests of its bloated staff. But in its anxiety to please the IMF mandarins meeting in Dubai, it went too far.

After the event, the Fund giving a pat on the back to the Pakistani government that it has performed well has approved another tranche for $497 million. Certainly Finance Minister Ishaq Dar, wallowing in his bloated ego, must be very happy with himself.

The Rangers are alleging that masked men amongst the protesting PIA employees last Tuesday were the real agents provocateurs responsible for the killing of the protesters. The question that begs an answer: with their hands already full ridding Karachi of dons and mafias, why were the Rangers fishing in troubled waters?

The simple truth is that the federal government invited the Rangers who in their current trigger happy mode readily obliged. It was a simple administrative issue gone all wrong. Once the LEAs are given orders to deal with an iron hand, red lines cannot be easily drawn.

It is obvious from belligerent statements of the prime minister and his information minister on the day of the tragedy that orders were to stop the demonstrators at any cost. The protesters led by the maverick Sohail Baloch, the ex-pilot heading the so-called action committee, were trying to reach the main airport building.

Had they been successful, not only PIA operations but also the rest of the airlines landing or taking off from Karachi would have been jeopardised. Airports are strategic assets and no government worth its salt would allow them to be taken over by armed mobs.

Undoubtedly the PIA affair has been grossly mishandled and further compounded by the ruling party’s current spat with the political opposition. The government for far too long has been beating about the bush by hiding its real intentions of privatising the national carrier.

Instead of calling a spade a spade, it keeps on harping that it is simply going to convert PIA into a limited company and disinvest 26 per cent of its shares to an investor to run it professionally. To say that the employees will not be affected in such an eventuality is engaging in worse kind of chicanery.

The national airline is grossly overstaffed and top heavy. Packed with cronies by successive governments, including the present one, no private investor can turn it around. It has 600-plus employees per aircraft whereas the international average is around 200.

The PML-N has been dabbling in the Airlines’ staff union politics through the so-called Air League, one-time headed by its stalwart Mushahid Ullah, whereas the PPP supports Peoples Unity. The MQM has its own union the United.

No investor in his right mind would buy such a top heavy and unionised entity. That the PIA has to be downsized before selling it is stating but the obvious. But unfortunately hand-picked cronies advising the prime minister and running the affairs of the Airline have misled him.

The chairman of the Airline, Nasser Jaffer, did the honourable thing by resigning. But Shujaat Azeem, the gentleman advising the prime minister on aviation, is at the same time heading the CAA (Civil Aviation Authority). He is a former pilot of the late Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri, who was instrumental in brokering the deal for Nawaz Sharif and his family’s exit with Musharraf in 2000.

Thanks to the mishandling by the government, the strike that was initially confined to Karachi spread like wildfire all over the country. While the state functionaries and ministers are still talking tough, apparently the minister of privatisation, Mohammad Zubair, has opened negotiations with the strikers.

What is there to negotiate? Unless the employs agree to a downsizing plan, PIA simply put cannot be salvaged. For that the government should chip in a substantial sum for a golden handshake with the employees. But first, charity begins at home. It should be willing to get rid of the cronies that got it in the present mess in the first place.

For example, what business has PML-N Senator Mushahid Ullah reportedly placing twenty of his relatives, including his two brothers, holding plum positions dabbling in the affairs the airline? Similarly, instead of entrusting the task to Shujaat Azeem, the prime minister should hire professionals to advise him regarding privatisation of the national carrier.

If the government’s intention was to shut down the airline in order to privatise it, the protesters played right into its hands by shutting it down. Causing extreme inconvenience and disruption to the ordinary citizen, losing public sympathy in the process, they have not furthered their cause.

It is not unusual for national carriers to shut down and reinvent themselves under a new entity. The Philippines Airlines, the Swiss national carrier Swiss Airline, and closer to home the Indian Airlines merged into Air India, which are all prime examples of this phenomenon.

Unfortunately the opposition fishing in troubled waters have made the PIA their cause célèbre. But by not taking the opposition parties on board the government itself has botched its case.

Since the arrest of PPP Co-Chairperson Asif Ali Zardari’s close associate Dr Asim Hussain last August, the tacit understanding between the ruling PML-N and the PPP has virtually broken down. As for the PTI, it is always more than willing to fish in troubled waters. Hence true to his colours, Imran Khan is all set to agitate on the issue.

If Sharif and his team are serious about their economic agenda and actually wish that no one should play politics with the economy, they must reach out to the opposition. There is no such thing as a free lunch. More so in politics.

Since the days of the dharna, when the PPP bailed out the PML-N, things have moved a full circle. Thanks to the PML-N’s own brand of divisive politics, it no longer seems surreal to see the PPP, PTI, Jamaat-e-Islami and the MQM on the same page.

The prime minister, instead of allowing matters to drift, should be reining in his own ministers to behave more maturely and responsibly towards the opposition. For starters, it is high time he starts attending the parliament and engaging the parliamentary opposition.

Sidelight: The prime minister visiting the ISI headquarters and chairing a high level meeting in the presence of the COAS and the top brass including the DG ISI is a positive development. The government reposing full confidence in the ISI for its counter-terrorism efforts rather than keep on flogging a dead horse in the form of NACTA (National Counter Terrorism Authority) is the only way forward. The ISI should also focus on its mandated job rather than dabbling in exogenous matters.