Fazl gives hard-hitting salvos on Fata merger

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ISLAMABAD: Rarely one sees Maulana Fazlur Rehman thundering, intimidating political opponents, and that too at the National Assembly floor. Monday was such odd day when one could witness the JUI-F chief threatening to block any move, may be with force, to merge Fata with KP sans a referendum on the issue.

Whether he would be able to do it, is any body’s guess. Going by Maulana’s political logic, it meant to throw the whole progress on the issue in limbo, and indefinitely delay progress on Fata reforms achieved so far through a painstaking tedious process already approved by the federal cabinet.

But loud rhetoric and claims apart, the JUI-F seemed cornered and singled out on the issue as he found no political support in the Lower House of Parliament. The situation at hand makes the JUI-F chief jittery. So he snubbed, almost intimidated a Fata member Shahji Gul Afridi who, a few moments before the whole saga, had come to Maulana’s seat to pay respects on Monday evening.

Many opposition-treasury members were taken aback by this outburst by Maulana despite his party members being part of the federal cabinet. Shah Mahmood Qureshi was shrewd enough to ask whether JUI-F wants to block the whole process passed by his treasury allies, or leave the cabinet under protest. 

Opposition Leader Khursheed Shah was blunter.   Sarcastically, he assured the Maulana that no progress would be made by the government at the cost of his annoyance. In fact, the whole exercise revolved around treasury looking to secure Fata members’ support for the federal budget passage in early June and nothing more. Before Maulana could reply, the Maghrib prayer allowed the JUI-F leader an escape route from this difficult situation. He did not return to the House afterwards as Fata members complained about his threatening, intimidating tone. So the two bills were referred to the Safron committee which would invite relevant members and stakeholders before coming up with final draft. 

Earlier, an experienced, respected and old guard like Aftab Ahmed Sherpao added some sense to the whole madness and that was too staring Maulana in the eyes. Sherpao was politically correct, pragmatic, and to the point as he dwelt in detail the whole process which led to the present day when two bills related to Fata reforms were being laid and sent to the respective parliamentary committees. He brushed aside the logic Fata having been governed for 125 years under the notorious FCR law, so it should not suffer for more time till a referendum is held there. He wanted sanity to prevail on this sensitive issue. Tomorrow is another day. On Tuesday, PTI-PPP opposition wants to take on the treasury over the “news leaks” end game. The opposition lot wanted political mileage from it to turn it into a political storm in the days to come – naturally through Panama case JIT end result. But, merely 25 days into the apex court majority verdict to form a JIT on PanamaLeaks, one likes it or not, the initial steam from the demand that Premier Sharif should resign has faded away. All this is not an outcome of brainy, meticulous strategy of the ruling party, it has largely to do with PTI’s mainstay urban elites. This crowd of vested interests bombards chairman Imran Khan with its brainy yet unworkable ideas, all the time. Throughout this time, Imran held a few public meetings. But that didn’t impact much except making some fiery headlines by capturing maximum airtime on television beams. It definitely put the ruling Sharifs and aides on defensive, but they are successfully ducking PTI’s bouncers since the Panama explosion in April 2016. Since then, the PML-N media-cum-political strategists have employed aggressive defence most of the time, ducking on occasions to sail through difficult moments. They can guess that the PTI, a potent urban phenomenon, is circling around its own propaganda scheme. Instead of winning over new voters from town and villages, it is stuck in a whirlpool of self-reassurance tactics and there is nothing more. The same set of urban middle class voters and supporters are complementing themselves through social media, time and again and there are inflated egos and superiority complex at its best. A few incidents of scores of students raising “go Nawaz go” chants in front of perplexed PML-N ministers earned them some happy moments, but the joy was short-lived. Never ever close to a national campaign or outcry on a nationwide level as PTI chairman and majority of his novice political aides would like us to believe. The plan to form a formidable opposition alliance against the PML-N dispensation seems to have fallen prey to the inherent fault lines in the divided opposition camp. 

Despite his inflated claims of mastering the art and science of politics, Sheikh Rashid stands alone in this quest. PPP under Zardari sahib may be one of the biggest beneficiaries of such an eventuality, but PTI knows it thrives on bad points of PPP and PML-N. And a rapprochement with PPP would dent its credibility. Imran Khan realises fully well that his fast shift from ideological to pragmatic politics is not going well with the hardcore party supporters. So a rapprochement with PPP, even on a single point agenda to oust the Sharif-led government, would not swing more votes in his favour. Already, widespread yet muted voices from within the PTI vote mass are jittery and confused about the uninterrupted entry of tried and tested electable politicians in the party folds. Ghulam Mustafa Khar, a PPP stalwart of yesteryears turned rebel, Liaquat Jatoi the PML-N man turned Musharraf crony. Babar Awans, Fawad Chaudhrys, Shafqat Mahmoods occupying key party positions and having uninterrupted access to Imran Khan’s ears are part of this long and intriguing list.

Tail piece: Some momentary give-and-take on this day on the Leaks issue as opposition didn’t press for their adjournment motion. Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar seems all geared up to take on any likely opposition onslaught on this issue – most likely to occur on Tuesday (today). Interestingly, Nisar was in consistent contact with the top general even on the day military spokesman’s tweet had unexpectedly jolted the civil-military relations. Deprived of any political mileage on the issue and after failing to create a wedge between executive and garrison, the PPP-PTI opposition feels they have lost a golden opportunity. Interestingly, the situation compelled some social media friendly opposition supporters to have a go at the garrison, compelling the interior minister to warn all those involved in such activities would face the law. Informed people suspect that some text and Whatsapp messages on the role of Army leadership in Leaks issue are being thrown up on social media through a server in Pune, India, with malicious design and objectives. And some of the Pakistani social media trolls are unknowingly becoming their tool. There is a much organised campaign being elaborately orchestrated by some forces who want to create trust deficit among rank and file of the garrison. Therefore, one should resist the tendency of forwarding texts without knowing the originator.