- An uphill task for Musahid Hussain
After all the anti-judiciary, anti-army rhetoric from Nawaz Sharif, any attempt to improve relations with the establishment is a daunting task. The SC has already disqualified Sharif, shot down parliament’s decision allowing him to continue as PML-N president while references in the accountability court are nearing their logical end. A handful of PML-N MNAs have defected to the PTI while Imran Khan has managed to recruit a fairly large number of heavyweights from Punjab districts. Nawaz Sharif claims that the prime security agencies have helped the PTI.
Shahbaz Sharif faces a dilemma. While he accepts Nawaz as the helmsman and permanent guide of the party, he also wants to lead the PML-N to victory. He is therefore keen to revive confidence with those who matter while keeping up the morale of the party workers. It appears that he has sublet the job to Mushahid Hussain while appointing him the new chief of the PML-N’s media cell.
Mushahid Hussain is in a way the fittest man to negotiate with the establishment. What remains to be seen is if he can succeed at a time when the two sides are engaged in headlong clash. Mushahid Hussain has tried to assure the establishment that the party will have normal relations with it after winning the polls. The PML-N has been a party of the establishment throughout its history till Nawaz Sharif started asserting his authority by fits and starts. Since he did so without any plan or sense of timing or taking the main opposition forces on board, he invariably had to eat the humble pie. Can Hussain assure the establishment that with Nawaz in jail the PML will turn its back on him?
Hussain wants to bolster the spirits of both the doves and hawks in the PML-N. He assures the first that Shahbaz has good rapport with the establishment. The second group is told that non-elected forces cannot change the outcome of the election as proved during the 1988 elections. What’s more all local and international surveys show the PML-N is in the lead. Winning over establishment while keeping the PML-N one peace is going to be an uphill task.