Unlikely, from the looks of things
After the poor show of PPP and the growing popularity of PTI, heavy weights started joining the latter and it will be an uphill task for the new PPP leadership to bring back these disgruntled leaders into the party fold
Lahore will always have a special significance for the Peoples Party. This is where it was formed by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto about half a century ago on 30 November 1967. Benazir Bhutto also selected the same city when she landed at the Lahore airport on 10 April 1986 after saying goodbye to her self-imposed exile. And now, Bilawal, the thir-generation Bhutto to lead the party, has also started his active politics from Lahore — the stronghold of the Sharifs — where the party is celebrating its foundation day these days. PPP has clearly started gearing up for the general elections of 2018 and Punjab has been made the main focus as all the party leadership is camping in Lahore for the week-long celebrations of the foundation day. The chairman of PPP, Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, has handed over command of the party in the central Punjab to loyalists Qamar Zaman Kaira and Nadeem Afzal Chan, who have been selected as the president and general secretary respectively.
A daunting task awaits them keeping in view the dismal performance of the party in the province during the general elections of 2013 when its share shrank to eight seats from 93 in the Punjab Assembly. Loosing 85 seats in the short span of five years was a glaring question mark over the performance of party cadres in the province.
There are 25 districts in central Punjab and PPP could not win even a single seat of National Assembly or Provincial Assembly from these districts in 2013. That was one of the worst performances of PPP in Punjab because most of its candidates could not secure the runner-up position, which were taken by candidates of Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI). Qamar Zaman Kaira, the recently promoted president of central Punjab, stood at number three from NA-106 and was defeated by a margin of 50,000 votes in 2013. It was the same Kaira who had won the election from NA-106 in 2002 and 2008 by grabbing over 80,000 votes. This downtrend in Punjab continued as the party could win only one by-election out of 17 held so far for the Punjab Assembly since 2013 and that sole seat could be possible because of the personal vote bank of Mian Manzoor Wattoo in Okara.
After the poor show of PPP and the growing popularity of PTI, heavy weights started joining the latter and it will be an uphill task for the new PPP leadership to bring back these disgruntled leaders into the party fold.
“I’ll contest the election of 2018 on the ticket of PTI and Kaira Sahib knows my reservations very well,” said Raja Riaz Ahmad, former leader of the opposition in the Punjab Assembly and one-time stalwart of the PPP. “So he will not force me to rejoin.”
Bilawal recited the same poem on the foundation day that his mother had also once recited in Lahore; ‘Mein Baghi Hon, Mein Baghi Hon; Jo Chaho Mujh Pe Zulm Karo’ to charge the PPP workers. But such revolutionary poems and ‘Bhutto slogan’ will not work anymore in Punjab
He further said PPP will not be in a position to play any active role in the near future in Punjab because of the poor policies of its central leadership during its five-year tenure. It was a sheer embarrassment for PPP when Raja Riaz, former senior minister of Punjab, who has also served as MPA in 1993, 2002 and 2008, joined PTI because of his differences with the party.
The characteristics of Benazir Bhutto (BB) are missing in Bilawal, said Riaz, while adding that BB was a hard worker believing in team work.
“I had some differences with Faryal Talpur, sister of former president Asif Ali Zardari, and I met with Zardari but my reservations were not addressed by him and then I decided to quit the party,” he said.
According to him, PPP did not give development funds to the workers of Punjab while the PML-N was continuously obliging its workers and this was one of the main reasons for PPP’s defeat in Punjab. “The story is simple. PML-N is not interested in Sindh. Similarly, PPP is not bothered by the plight of its workers in Punjab,” Riaz said dejectedly. He was of the view that Bilawal came to Punjab after nine months this time, which is an apt reflection of his interest in the politics of this province.
The real battleground for the next election will no doubt be Punjab as there are 148 seats of National Assembly in the province and any political party can easily form its government in the centre after performing well in this province. So Bilawal has also decided to launch his protest movement from Punjab if his four demands are not met by 27 December — the day when Asif Zardari will also be present in the country to address party workers on the death anniversary of BB.
Qamar Bhatti, president of Punjab Assembly Press Gallery, told DNA that the first phase of PPP’s revival in Punjab was successful as the party was able to mobilise old jiyalas and the second phase will be more interesting when party will announce its divisional and district chapters.
“Disgruntled leaders from south Punjab have started contacting the party and old stalwarts will also approach the leadership before 5 July next year when PPP will observe black day against the military coup of Zia ul Haq,” said Bhatti, who has been closely covering the PPP for more than two decades and is camping in Bilawal House since the PPP chairman came to Lahore to celebrate the foundation day.
According to him, the political wave is more important than the party’s manifesto as PTI was able to create a wave in the elections of 2013 and became the second largest party in terms of securing votes. He was of the view that PML-N conquered Lahore in the last polls because the Sharifs launched the Metro Bus Service just before the elections but the situation is going to be different altogether this time as the citizens of Lahore are fed up with the ongoing construction work of the Orange Train and PPP will exploit this issue to regain Lahore.
“The PPP can only revive its fortunes in Punjab after getting rid of corrupt elements responsible of staining its image after the death of BB,” said Ashraf Khan Sohna, former provincial minister of PPP from Punjab, in a conversation with DNA. It was another embarrassment for PPP when Sohna, who was elected as MPA in 2002 and 2008, joined PTI last year. It was a great blow for PPP as Sohna had also served as PPP president for Okara district while another stalwart from the district, Sumsam Bukhari, also joined PTI. Bukhari had served as state minister in the PPP-lead coalition government in the centre. Sohna told DNA that PPP had become a ‘B Team’ of PML-N and jiyalas cannot vote for the party unless it stops supporting PML-N.
It is worth noticing here that former diehard workers of PPP are completely taking the line of PTI. “I’ll contest next election from Okara on the ticket of PTI,” Sohna said, while adding that the newly inducted leadership of central Punjab will also leave the party once it realises that the strings of the party are being controlled by someone else.
Veteran journalist and senior analyst Sohail Warraich told DNA that the revival of PPP in central Punjab was not likely in the upcoming elections because of multiple factors.
“There is a voting habit in Punjab and Sindh that people prefer to vote for the first or second party; whereas the PPP comes at number three in the Punjab,” Warraich said, who is undoubtedly an expert on the constituency politics of Pakistan.
He further added that the lower-middle income class of Punjab has not yet been catered to by any political party as PML-N represents the business community while PTI is represented by the corporate class. So, the only option left for PPP is to go for the lower-middle segment in this scenario, which will be an uphill task.
According to him, the PPP was wiped out in the urban areas long ago and it was a great setback for the party when its electables from rural areas also defected to PTI in the recent past. Warraich thinks PPP might get some seats in south Punjab as the dynamics of that part of Punjab are similar to interior Sindh where PPP has a significant vote bank.
“Poor farmers and deprived people live in both South Punjab and interior Sindh and many landlords hailing from PPP have much control over these people,” he said.
Warraich revealed that he didn’t ever see such festivities of PPP in Lahore and it was completely a brainchild of Bilawal in a bid to mobilise party workers. Bilawal needs to infuse fresh blood into the party as the generation of true jiyalas has become old and a 50-year old worker can’t take active part in the practical politics, he added.
Bilawal recited the same poem on the foundation day that his mother had also once recited in Lahore; ‘Mein Baghi Hon, Mein Baghi Hon; Jo Chaho Mujh Pe Zulm Karo’ to charge the PPP workers. But such revolutionary poems and ‘Bhutto slogan’ will not work anymore in Punjab. Bilawal has to make his party relevant once again through some quantifiable moves in the political arena of country’s largest province by the mid of next year if he really wants to become the prime minister in 2018.
