Internal and external factors
The timing of the Panama Leaks has been particularly brutal for Nawaz Sharif. At home he’d weathered the dharnas and steered the party well through the by-elections and LG polls. But with the operation creeping into Punjab tension was once again mounting with the brass. PML-N in Punjab did not do too well on that front. It had just made the boast about its police force being up to the task; and an unprecedented humiliation lay just around the corner. Then came this bolt from the blue. The opposition naturally went for the jugular. Since then Nawaz has always reacted, never acted.
The outside situation has not helped. Kabul has just cut off Pakistan from the peace talks, throwing the entire QCG (Quadrilateral Coordination Group) thing into a tailspin. And just as quickly Washington has gone back to the ‘do more’ demand. The Haqqnis are back in the news, and Pakistan’s ‘sanctuary’ for the Afghan Taliban is, again, unnerving everybody from Ghani in Kabul to Congress in Capitol Hill. And the less said about the latest pendulum-swing in relations with India the better. Clearly meaningful, result-oriented talks are not on the horizon. Nawaz must find this bit particularly difficult right now since he chose to play foreign minister himself since the beginning of the term.
Unfortunately, Nawaz does not seem to have adequate answers to any of his pressing problems. There’s no telling where the Panama probe might go; especially since any real investigation will require a forensic audit. And money trail are surprisingly easy to uncover in this day and age. Also, it’s difficult to see where the Afghan confrontation will lead. If there’s no cooperation on the talks, there’s little quantifiable common ground. And since the process is so intricately linked to goodwill in the White House, there’s a lot of important funding that might suddenly be in jeopardy. With options running out at home and abroad, this must not be a particularly enviable time to be the prime minister of Pakistan.