NO matter what his performance has been there is no doubt that Nawaz Sharif has been a great survivor throughout his political career. He has the capacity to be knocked down and get up again before the end of the count down and now his return from his self-imposed exile is proof of his great talents as a survivor proving once again that his political history is full of dramatic reversals and it is not yet the time to write him off as a an also ran in the roller coaster political race of the country.
No other political leader in Pakistan has shown the great survival traits of Nawaz Sharif. In 1999 when he was bundled out of the country by a military dictator it was thought that after this exile to Saudi Arabia the sun has finally set on his political career and he will never be able to stage a comeback. He surprised all political pundits and his opponents when he came back to win the 2013 elections and became Prime Minister for the third time. Now after four years in the political wilderness he is back once again to take on his rivals in the 2024 elections and make a serious bid for the fourth time Prime Minister Ship of the country.
Nawaz Sharif’s political career began in the 1980s when he was handpicked by former ISI Gen Ghulam Jilani and introduced to the powerful military ruler General Zia Ul Haque who soon enough managed to induct him into the Punjab cabinet as a minister and subsequently installed him as the chief minister of the Punjab. After entering politics at the provincial level the Sharif family business empire progressed by leaps and bounds and in no time became one of the leading business houses of the country. Nawaz Sharif’s political career has been through many choppy seas and seen many ups and downs and he has not been able to complete his tenure as Prime Minister even once. He has been ousted by military dictators and elected president when the president had the constitutional powers of the clause 58 (2) B. During his third stint in power he was forced out of office in 2017 after the controversial Supreme Court ruling and his clash with the military establishment of the day. He managed to fly away to London after a dubious declaration to return after treatment. His four years in exile proved damaging and injurious for his party PMLN because his younger brother Shahbaz Sharif who became Prime Minister of the PDM coalition could not impress the electorate by his performance because he lacked the popularity and political skill to lead the party of his elder brother.
The 16 months rule of the PDM was a complete disaster and the PMLN lost its popularity in their stronghold of the Punjab province. This period witnessed the worst economic crisis in our history largely due to the incompetence and miss governance of the Imran Khan led coalition but the PMLN had to pay a huge political price. The spiraling prices and the increase in the price of petrol and gas ignited public anger and discontent. The party suffered decline in public support. From a high of 59 percent of the popular vote in the Punjab in 1997 in the national assembly they managed 0nly 47 percent in the 2013 elections and then only 35 percent in the 2018 elections. In spite of the 2018 elections rigged in favor of the PTI the PMLN did manage to win a respectable number of seats.
Ironically the party of Nawaz Sharif is now deeply divided with senior members like Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Miftah Ismail openly voicing their criticism of the party policies. Nawaz Sharif and the top leadership of PMLN now have a daunting uphill task of reorganizing and overhauling their party to improve their image and party organization. The party needs new narratives, new slogans and a brand new appeal to attract and capture the imagination of the voters. The old tactics of playing the Punjab card or depending on the electable of the powerful Punjab biradiris will not work this time.
Nawaz Sharif will now have to design a new message to attract voters to convince the public that he has the policy solutions to cure the economic and political ills of the country. He will also need to organize and field a new team to lead the party in the forthcoming elections.
During his speech on the 21st October in Lahore he focused on the past injustices done to him and his past contributions in developing the infrastructure of the country but the public today is more interested in knowing the future plans and policies of the political leaders.
Nawaz Sharif speak about economic challenges faced by the country but had nothing to say about the solutions to these problems that he plans to introduce. The voters are very anxious to know his future plans and not his past grievances and troubles. He must realise that the Pakistan of 2023 is deeply polarised and it is a different country politically, socially and economically
—The writer is Professor of History, based in Islamabad.
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