I believe political parties are public properties rather than family enterprises. The debate about how a party should be managed is a public debate rather than delegated to handful of individual members.
I saw a very interesting interview of Ch. Sarwar today on Talat Hussain program Naya Pakistan. Before commenting on the interview, let me first state that Ch. Sarwar being the first Muslim Member of Parliament in UK is an astute politician. He also has extensive experience in dealing with European Union and played a key role to get status of GST+ for Pakistan.
I sent an email to Talat Hussain and Ch. Sarwar after the program in which i asked following questions based on the comments made by Ch. Sarwar:
- Sarwar says he wants to eradicate corruption. Does he mean all corruption or just corruption of other parties? If it is all corruption what steps has he taken to fight corruption in KP especially allegations of corruption against PTI KP CM?
- Sarwar says there is no dharna just jalsas while IK says there will be dharna. How many street protests did he planned against the Tory government with which they vehemently disagreed during his tenure as MP? What was his attendance as MP? And why he is not telling IK to attend parliament more often?
- Sarwar says PTI protests are peaceful if that is the case then why Sheikh Rasheed is tolerable who openly says burn, kill and die. How many times his Labor party chairman threatened to have violent protests because he did not agree with government?
- Sarwar says past irregularities should be forgotten and move forward in response to a question about Justice wajih order. If that is the case does he suggest closing all courts because they punish past crimes?
- Why is ch. Sarwar lead recruiter of status quo electables in the party? What efforts has he made to train and develop new cadre of leaders?
- He said that decisions are made by Chairman. Does he agree with these decisions? If he does then he is also responsible for those decisions. If he does not agree then why is he not protesting against these decisions.
- He says our Pakistani system is based on flattery to get tickets. In other words he believes only flatterers succeed in Pakistan and there is no need for merit and stand up for it.
In other words Ch. Sarwar, instead of introducing democratic politics he learned in UK, has decided to adjust to politics of cronyism and nepotism practiced in Pakistan. It is a loss of democracy that Ch. Sarwar converted himself to Pakistani politics rather than transform it. This approach is driven more by self-interest rather than principles.
Abdul Quayyum Khan Kundi
