- Speculations, assumptions and gossips galore
With the court decision in Panama Leaks case expected soon and national elections on the cards, hopefully not far removed from the original schedule, the controversies of the political arena are becoming sharper and clearly defined, with rare realistic appraisals dwarfed by runaway rumours, wild theorising, and more often than not, mere wishful thinking by protagonists and pundits. Overshadowing them are the misgivings about alleged behind-the-scenes manipulation or engineering of the political process. The apprehension voiced by the PTI spokesman that the latest Nawaz Sharif visit to London to inquire about his ailing spouse’s health gave rise to suspicions that it could turn out to be a one-way-trip. These have since proved to be just a figment of his imagination, as the former PM duly ‘reported’ back in Pakistan on Monday in time for the Accountability Court hearing. Perhaps the PTI spokesman was actually reiterating his party’s stance that Nawaz Sharif be placed on the Exit Control List, as indeed is the norm in National Accountability Bureau cases.
But Leader of the Opposition, PPP’s Khurshid Shah, whose darts directed at the opposition are seldom poisonous, unlike the sometimes vehement and strident blasts of Asif Zardari, Imran Khan, Sheikh Rashid and even Bilawal Bhutto, was more accurate in his assessment, maintaining all along that the beleaguered disqualified PM would return but he also held that, had the ex-premier attached due importance to parliament, which raised him to the premiership, he would not find himself in his present predicament. The PPP leader expressed a parallel opinion to the PML-N regarding the ‘interference of judiciary in civil administrative issues’ and also hinted that a consensus between the two on the all-important caretaker setup was within reach. With the pre-poll politicking picking up, Shahbaz Sharif currently staking his claim in Sindh, Imran holding his ‘biggest ever’ Lahore rally on 29th April and seeking new allies after the JI divorce, Bilawal leading the PPP campaign trail, there should be constructive, issue-oriented debates, rather than a case of total electoral war. Politics is not a continuation of war by other means, to invert Clausewitz’s famous dictum, as some of our politicians might imagine.
