Say that PML-N should “admit loss” and “gracefully transfer power.”
The day-long election for 20 seats of the Punjab Assembly, which was touted as a game-changer for the country’s politics, concluded on Sunday evening with minor conflicts and anomalies at 14 polling stations.
Immediately thereafter, unofficial results began coming in, revealing that the PTI was in a commanding position and poised for a decisive victory.
Even before any official pronouncements were made, journalists, lawmakers, and pundits from throughout the nation took to Twitter to congratulate PTI and offer PML-N advice.
A week from today, all eyes will be on the Punjab Assembly by-elections, which will take place against the backdrop of soaring global energy and food costs that have forced extensive power outages and draconian price hikes at home, resulting in astonishing inflation of over 20%.
The Pakistani electorate, in my humble opinion, is a very shrewd group that frequently defies predictions by voting for parties and candidates whom it believes will be good for the country and democracy.
Unless, of course, the voters be deceived out of their verdict in the name of ‘the greater good,’ ‘clean government,’ ‘Islamisation,’ ‘accountability,’ ‘patriotism,’ or any other misleading herring to appease extra-parliamentary, anti-democracy forces.
These factors are deeply rooted in the nation and its structures. Don’t get me wrong, but when these forces are mentioned, people picture khaki. In the ranks of the court and political parties, however, there are also several willing collaborators, some of whom claim to be equal partners.
It is self-defeating for political entities, especially those with the backing of the people, to join forces with non-political forces to seize power and trade away their authority to make choices and govern.
However, as the saying goes, it is what it is.
Even after knowing the rules of their relationship with an implicit ‘junior’ partner position and agreeing to be led into the halls of power, which are a practical mirage, they act like jilted lovers when their naive attempts to express themselves fail.
I believe they are foolish because, having abandoned popular support as the sole method of pushing their march to government, rather than actual power or authority, they are eventually bewildered by wailing sirens, flashing beacons, secure passageways, helicopters, and official jets.
The capacity to lock up political opponents suppress dissent and dissidents, as well as ride roughshod over independent media, gives them a false sensation of being all-powerful if any sanity or reality remained to remind them of their relatively subordinate status.
Then, when they awake, it is too late, the dream is gone, and the horror of being outside in the cold strikes. Predictably, they protest. However, the shoe is currently on the other foot. Another eager collaborator has replaced them, and their rants will accomplish very little. Their ‘historic’ defiance will only persist as long as it takes to reverse their fall from grace.
Some parties will fit this description entirely, while others will only partially do so. Few people today will be so sensible and principled as to refuse this. I leave it to your creativity to determine which of our political parties fits into each of these categories.
Please feel free to modify the settings to better reflect your perspective on the matter. In any event, this was more of a broad comment on the tragic narrative and the tragic reality of our politics and its political and non-political participants.
A week from now, voters in the 20 by-elections in four urban and 16 rural (with the inevitable spillover of an urban region or two in some) Punjab Assembly constituencies will have examined some of the aforementioned issues and made up their minds before casting their ballots.
Walid Iqbal, a senator for the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), an accomplished Harvard and Cambridge-educated attorney, and one of the funniest people I’ve ever encountered, sounded pretty serious when he told Arifa Noor on her DawnNews program, “We’ll win all 20 seats.” He said that such is the increase in popularity of Imran Khan.
Both Walid Iqbal and his successor, Imran Khan, subjected their “landslide” to a level playing field. Despite their concerns, the PTI leadership appeared confident that its workers would protect the vote box and prevent the theft of their mandate.
The basic tenet of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) remains to attribute its loss of power to a conspiracy and urge the military leadership to abandon its self-proclaimed neutrality and pave the party’s route back into office in the name of economic stability and national interest.
According to PML-N Punjab Chief Minister Hamza Shehbaz, the people of Punjab are well aware of “our record of khidmat” and know who is to blame for the current economic catastrophe.
Despite the PML-N dispute over whether Miftah Ismail (supported officially by Khwaja Asif and Shahid Khaqan Abbasi) or Ishaq Dar (supported openly by Khwaja Saad Rafique) is best suited to run the economy, PML supporters predict a final tally of 15/5 plus/minus a few seats.
Whoever makes the most convincing case to voters will win the most seats, and the existing coalition’s fate in Islamabad will also depend on this outcome. To unseat Hamza Shehbaz as chief minister, the PTI will need to win approximately 14 seats, according to our calculations.
Despite the large crowds Imran Khan is attracting to his jalsas, many observers believe this is a difficult order. By exactly midnight one week from now, it will be evident who is correct. If the incumbent is unable to remain in office following the by-election, the defeat will send shockwaves to Islamabad and may generate the need for a new national election.
If not, the coalition may be granted a reprieve and around a year to handle near-impossible difficulties in an economically hostile global context with rising food costs. Only a worldwide economic slowdown or recession that pushes down oil prices might provide relief.
