The honeymoon might end sooner if . . .
REGARDLESS of whom the court rulings serve in the days to come, the Government Honeymoon as well as freak moves by the Opposition are bound to be over soon, as Pakistan with so much potential can ill afford the ignominy of being consigned to history without a fair run.
But before another adventurer yet again seizes the opportunity and puts the country on the back foot, let the constitutionally empowered forces intervene to call order and put some sense into the ensuing directionless madness leading to nothing but destruction.
It is neither time for the Opposition to cry foul, nor for the Government to marvel over paying it back in the same coin in the run up to the Senate mid-term exercise because neither side has won, and only the system has lost about whose efficacy there are now big question marks.
And if both sides of the divide do not go into a huddle to correct the wrongs collectively, they may well together rue their chances forever in any future set-up.
My fears are that unless some proverbial heavenly intervention takes place, there appear to be no signs of any sense prevailing for political rapprochement.
Anybody and everybody would have followed suit if this conglomerate of political parties with divergent ideologies but common objective to get rid of the sitting Government, had the Opposition based its thrust upon the state of economy and the plight and predicament of the common man being crushed by relentless price hikes over which the Government neither had control nor vision.
Unfortunately, each of them including the mainstream PML(N), the PPP and to some extent JUI, had only been possessed by personalized goals and no roadmap for the common man.
All their energies have been dissipated in running down the sitting Government by hook or by crook and seeking to see the back of it, except for the latest reservation expressed by PPP’s Asif Ali Zardari at the PDM forum over resigning from the Assemblies to make the Long March effective, as he believed in fighting while remaining within the system.
The PPP’s stance right from the beginning of the present Government’s term made sense because the PPP with Government in Sindh had obvious stakes in the system opposed to the PML(N) and the JUI which had been knocked out of reckoning in all Provinces.
Zardari’s proposal that if the PDM genuinely intended to make the movement potent, the PML(N) leader Nawaz Sharif should return to the country to lead it, in which case the PPP would happily present its resignations to him, makes eminent sense.
The Opposition in my view missed the bus at the very beginning because had it been genuinely convinced about stealing of the 2018 elections by the powers that be, they ought to have refused to take oath and join the Assemblies at the very outset.
The personalized goals and objectives particularly of the mainstream Opposition within the PDM have yet again surfaced in the leakedin-camera discussions among four big of the PML(N), clearly suggesting that each Party with the fragile one-point agenda was concurrently working to outsmart the other for political gains; weary of each step sought to be taken collectively within the Alliance which could be detrimental to their individual interests.
But Imran Khan’s Governmentmust not get carried away by his Party’s apparent success in the Senate elections whose ultimate outcome still hangs in a balance with References to the Election Commission and the superior courts, nor should it relax over postponement of the PDM Long March and possible sit-in.
Even otherwise, it has done no better by more than half its time blaming the past regimes of siphoning out national resources bringing the economy to such a pass, and the other half in gunning for its arch rivals through a highly partisan and ill-equipped accountability set-up delivering nothing.
The energies of the sitting Government of PTI have been dissipated in the wild goose chase of accountability through an instrument propped up by Pervez Musharraf, which was aimed at fixing his opponents rather than across-the-board accountability.
Mr. Khan ought to have first in concert with the Opposition, restructured the Accountability Bureau with a clear mandate and objective before setting it in motion, and divorced himself completely from it then on to concentrate on Foreign Policy, social welfare and revival of the battered economy.
Imran Khan’s coinage of the State of Medina will remain a pipe-dream unless he translates his vision into practical reality not by his stubbornness and unbending nature, but through a mix of firmness of resolve and farsightedness, accommodation and compassion, as characterized every moment of his life by the Holy Prophet (SAW) ; if that is the example he wishes to even remotely emulate.
The common man will not sleep hungry, not through cosmetic programs like Ehsaas Disbursement, Health Card or Shelter Homes nor the Naya Pakistan Housing, but by a workable plan to control prices and permanent relief to the masses, which is possible only by raising productivity to get out of the lender’s web, and not by making the State Bank subservient to donor Agencies under the smokescreen of autonomy.
For their spiritual satisfaction, the State of Medina would also require of the rulers to protect the edict of the Quran against fashioning a social system in the Islamic polity which had been imperceptibly pursued in the past but was now being openly sought to subvert Islamic values by misdirected women’s empowerment demonstrations engineered by faithless foreign-funded NGOs.
Using slogans like ‘Mera jism meri marzi’ meaning freedom to use her body in the manner she may choose, is tantamount to blatant disregard of Quranic teachings, to which Muslim women all over the world not just Pakistan should revert, in order to seek guidance as it vividly describes the parameters of chastity and sanctity of the female body and attire.
—The writer is a media professional, member of Pioneering team of PTV and a veteran ex Director Programmes.
