The frustrated ex-Prime Minister

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“…his intriguing and “royal nature” always forced him to become the king, like his former host the king of Saudi-Arabia. Had he tried to become the Queen of England, circumstances may have favoured him.”

 

To be fair, it was a terrifying thought: Nawaz Sharif cannily trying to obstruct justice, plying through the government institutions with flattery and carefully scripted suggestions. If that had been successful – what would the reaction of the public have been?

And here’s a thought that had been equally frightening: if Sharif lost, we would have had the threat from his aides to deal with.

But – nothing of the sort happened. Things went peacefully, and we could smell what was coming in the air – whatever it was, was not in Sharif’s favour.

It’s so sad, really. Name anyone and he is found involved in some sort of corruption – both monetary and moral. Every one elected seems having a right to play with the national exchequer and get the maximum benefit out of it. Only a strong check-and-balance system can stop this practice, may be because of fear but can stop it. Supreme Court has set an example which will definitely help to stop this process of abusing national exchequer, money laundering, purchasing properties beyond means and all misdoings with the public funds.

We all knew the country was run by a guy who wanders around in an ego-filled cloud, saying whatever the heck pops into his head, always howling and trying to ridicule the sensitive institutions of the country.  It’s a bare fact: he and his government proved they are a combination of ineptitude and bad intent. His team is proven incompetent in every field of government, but if he had the abilities, formation of good team was not difficult or problem; he surely has sharp and intelligent people in his party.  But his intriguing and “royal nature” always forced him to become the king, like his former host the king of Saudi-Arabia. Had he tried to become the Queen of England, circumstances may have favoured him.  Even then, all felt he may well have been the better choice – if nothing else, at least he was no Zardari & company.

Because of his own in-competency, he was surrounded by people like Khawaja Asif, Abid Sher Ali,  Saad Rafiq, Mushahid Ullah, Parvez Rashid etc., who basically have no standing of their own and have thus become essential for eachother’s political survival. They have one agenda: “Imran Phobia”.

It’s so unfortunate that two very important ministries – defence and water and power – were under the control of a highly irresponsible and incompetent minister. Khawaja Asif doesn’t know what to say or when to say it. He is now our Foreign Minister.

“Water & power” had an additional character: the Minister of state, Abid Sher Ali – another pawn without any knowledge, experience or awareness of the ministry.

Foreign Ministry remained without a regular Minister, which badly affected country’s foreign policy – something that should have been our defence against both India’s diplomacy and her cunning rulers. This ministry requires an intelligent and shrewd person, and, under the present circumstances aggressive foreign policy is required on war-footings. As we’ve discussed before though, what it got was Khawaja Asif.

Information, one of the important ministries, was headed by Parvez Rashid, another patient of “Imran Phobia”. It was also, after a time, looked after by a minister of state, Maryam Aurangzeb – an unprofessional, incompetent and inexperienced personality who didn’t know her limitations as a state minister and worked on single agenda; “talk against Imran Khan”.

(While we’re on the topic, I must note: perhaps all ministers and die-hard workers like Danyal, Talal, Mushahid Ullah and others feel that “Imran Phobia” will keep them close to Nawaz Sharif. Perhaps, they feel, this will keep up and one day they would be able to grab a ministry – or at least become “minister of state”.)

Now, to the main point; while coming out from the judicial academy where JIT questioned Nawaz Sharif for three hours, like Danial Aziz, Talal Chaudhry and Maryam Aurangzeb, Nawaz also grabbed the chance to address the press with a written note, while his pawn Dr. Asif Saeed stood beside him with a usual “annoyed” and “fuming” look. Hussain Nawaz stood behind his PM father quiet calm but with a weary look. Nawaz should have avoided any press conference at that instance.

As explained by Shaheen Sehbai: frustrated and desperate, Nawaz had – evidently –gotten to the point where he came out in the open and started accusing and abusing the army of trying to subvert the political system. And again – to reinforce his position – he had planned seeking outside help by meeting Saudi royals and leaders of US and Islamic world in good-for-nothing summits as everybody is watching and following where he stands and how long will he survive domestically.

 

Unfortunately for him, in such situations, no one actually pays attention, except offering routine protocols to falling leaders.

 

The hard reality is that none of them could save him from the legal chainsaws that slowly grinded him, chasing him in a downward spiral and – eventually – leading to the ultimate logical end. But howsoever hard Nawaz and his company tried to avoid being pushed out of the system through the process, the consensus was that no unconstitutional action would or should be taken and the chainsaw continued to complete its bone-churning downward spiral.

 

Shaheen Sehbai has rightly stated; Nawaz tried hard to provoke action by the establishment, demonstrated by his flip flops on Dawn leaks, the lying to judges and deception of the superior courts, the targeting of the agencies through acts like the illegal tape recordings released by PEMRA, the promises and the insult to others by refusing to honour them, the leaking of discussions of closed door meetings etc.

 

And yet – no one got provoked  in to arbitrary action and only very brief and curt replies were given mainly to put the record straight.

 

He probably meant nothing indictable. But unfortunately we had a chief executive who said there’d be “nothing wrong” if he had undeclared property or assets abroad, or if he is unable to prove the legitimate trail of his property or assets, leaving an open space for everyone – especially those who come in power – to play with and misuse the national exchequer. Zardari is already on the hit-list for this sort of misdoings.

While I was talking to the general public about the present scenario, I happened upon a completely illiterate poor man pushing 80. When asked, he burst: “I’m done. I’m out of compassion and patience. If you voted for Nawaz and are still cheering him on, you are irredeemably stupid”.

I didn’t want Nawaz disqualified; I wanted him to irritate the public constantly and oblige his workers so that either the nation came to understand the drool at the prospect or Nawaz got tired of constant explanations and opted for resignation from the politics.

After all, this is the man who, at the press conference outside JIT’s head-quarter, upon his first chance to speak to the people after JIT’s formation, used the opportunity to:

  1. A) Brag about having won the election, and about being ousted illegally by General (without naming) but without mentioning his own misdoing or illegal act which caused the conflict which ultimately caused his arrest and deportation to Saudi Arabia. Actually nobody knows that, since the PML-N has a huge advantage in the Electoral College. That hasn’t stopped Nawaz from saying it constantly.

(But, now, there is no Musharraf in GHQ and those now in charge have somewhat learnt the handling of corrupt and defiant politicians.             There is a clear understanding that any leader, who has to be pushed out of the political system, must be forced to face the law and pass through the legal process.)

  1. B) Brag about nationalisation by Z.A.Bhutto when their one unit “Ittefaq Foundry” was nationalised. Though, the other units were not nationalized, which kept them alive and prospered to the extent that today they are a part of the political system.
  2. C) Brag about Benazir government’s not allowing the ship (only one) for their industry. Repeating again a much repeated story of huge losses because of the said step.

(While bragging, he forgets that if Sharifs were under heavy losses, the flats, offshore companies and steel mills in Saudia should not have been a possible purchase or easy to establish. This is what the nation wants to know, the trail of money.)

  1. D) Lash-out at Imran Khan for being “a constant interferer” for the investigation of election rigging, panama papers and dawn leaks. Khan’s determination towards explanation for looted national exchequer is a constant pain for PML-N’s leadership and die-hard workers. To subvert, all feel their duty to lash-out at Imran Khan with baseless and concocted stories. They don’t even realise that he still is not involved in any misdoing or plundering of national exchequer, whereas Nawaz and Company is.

But we digress. The bottom line here is that our ex-prime minister appears to be unnervingly loony. Not just in the normal political way, with bad judgment or an overblown sense of importance. He has a minimal ongoing relationship with reality, let alone truth.

People, had a lot many questions and thoughts. Do you think Nawaz has to go? The Panama crisis won’t get him impeached, but something else will come up. If he did leave, he’d be replaced by his daughter or may be nephew for the time being, but no body else. If Ishaq Dar or Chaudry Nisar have a hope to be PM, may be for a short period, they should write it off. Maryam or Hamza Shahbaz would ram ahead with the same agenda on every matter. BUT; things moved otherwise, person like Khaqan Abbassi became the “joker” to complete the series who ultimately will be replaced with the king of pawn “Shahbaz Sharif” after 45 days.

It was hard to imagine Nawaz standing out of the PM house and PML-N mourning their lost to power. Or, you know, just getting teed off at something he heard on TV and starting a nuclear war against Imran Khan.

I repeat: Every thing in your life is a reflection of a choice you have made, if you want a different result, make a different choice.

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