- Pakistani political alliances last word in cynical opportunism
Democracy, even in a supportive environment, is not the easiest political system, involving a willing compromise among diverse viewpoints, keeping one’s finger on the pulse of the people, and the added ‘nuisance’ of facing public barbs. However, the relatively unfussy two-party system is largely a relic, even in Great Britain, but it survives in the USA, a hostage to powerful vested interests and status quo lobbyists, and with ‘outsider’ Trump proving an appalling failure, the conditions for a third political force to emerge may ripen in time. The general worldwide trend is for an unwieldy multiplicity of competing parties, even inclusive of centrifugal regional nationalist forces, as in case of Scotland and Catalonia.
Pakistan is fortunately blessed or unfortunately cursed with a mushroom of political parties of whom ‘only’ twelve are in Parliament, but their leaderships stand out for their incessant personal vendettas, hungering for power till eternity, for which they will sign a pact with the devil, form mutually self-serving alliances with those diametrically opposed to their own ideology, and act readily on ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’ theme. The political situation is further complicated by hung parliaments and provincial assemblies, which beg tenuous coalitions. The flight of the MQM from Musharraf’s lap to the Zardari spider’s web, of the JUI-F’s even further passage to the present PML-N counting house, are legendary, but so are the unprincipled unholy alliances at various times between the PPP and MQM, PPP and PML-Q, PML-N and PPP, the PTI and JUI-S, not forgetting the devious MMA, directed against all. These precarious marriages of convenience were obviously ephemeral and tended to weaken the political system and its credibility. Opportunistic politics encouraged polarity rather than conciliation.
Contrast this with Germany, where Angela Merkel is loath to form a minority government with parties who have ‘no common vision for modernisation or common basis of trust’, and might go for fresh elections instead. As the FDP leader in the negotiations remarked, ‘It is better not to govern than to govern badly’. That is sound Teutonic common sense and exemplary fidelity to fatherland.
