WHILE Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government celebrated second anniversary of its success in July 25 2018 general election on Saturday, opposition parties used the occasion to question the fairness of elections and accused government of having totally failed in ensuring good governance. A message came from Information Minister Senator Shibli Faraz, describing PTI’s victory in the elections as a historic day in country’s democratic history saying they smashed the two party nexus.
There is no doubt that youth of the country came out in full support of PTI in the 2018 elections after becoming disgruntled both with PML (N) and PPP governance. People in general were fed up of dynastic politics and wanted a change in political culture as well as governance system so that their issues were properly addressed. Hence, this second election anniversary is an important occasion for the ruling party to carry out deep retrospection as well as fair analysis of its performance whether it made any headway in the direction it had visualised for the country before elections. Foremost amongst the promises were drastic improvement in governance, uphold merit, rule of law and justice as well as provide millions of jobs and houses to people. No doubt PTI assumed power in most difficult economic situation and breakout of Covid-19 further complicated the matters. However, youth of the country had voted for PTI in the hope of a positive change that would get them rid of rotten system. Today the biggest challenge for PTI is to live up to those big expectations and promises it made with the people. Given the divisions within the opposition, the PTI faces no threat whatsoever from them but from its own poor performance.
A majority of population especially the youth has still not lost hope in the leadership of Prime Minister Imran Khan and they are convinced that he will deliver in most difficult times yet it is also for his team members to rise above mere bashing the opposition and focus their energies to bring visible improvement in the life of the people. It is time for real action and not rhetoric to maintain confidence of the public. Incentives given most recently to small and medium enterprises as well as construction sector are good initiatives taken by the government and it must build on them apart from fully supporting agriculture sector in order to take economy towards upward trajectory. Development projects must be executed at fast pace, as it will also provide job opportunities to the people. In addition, practical steps on the ground are required to save people from price hike and high taxes. It is also for the opposition parties to rise above point scoring and sit with government to bring such genuine election reforms so that in future nobody could raise questions on credibility of elections.
