No parting of the ways—II

Head of PPP Media Cell

PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto’s presser on last Saturday appreciating PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz, for her arduous struggle for the restoration of democracy, is indeed a unique public gesture that may be taken in good stride by the PML-N leadership. This does emphasize reciprocity. After this, the leadership of the PML-N may put their sword in the scabbard and move on for the furtherance of the PDM’s shared objective of undiluted democracy, the materialisation of that may surely be increasingly within reach with the passing of every day.

The chairman reminded that he was the first who raised voice in the Parliament against the arrest of the vice president, adding also gave instructions to the PPP workers to ensure their presence when Maryam Nawaz would appear before NAB. He questioned as how he could ask his party senators to vote in favour of controversial nominee of the PML-N for the Senate opposition leader. At the same breath, the chairman advocated the unity of alliance is of profoundly important. The PML-N leaders’ big guns may now fall silent after the chairman’s press conference and devote their energies for the restoration of democracy that had been hijacked by the PTI in collusion with the authoritarian forces. These are the times to put the small irritants in the backburner, the chairman stressed, and move forward as per the aspirations of the people of Pakistan.

The infuriation of the PML-N may understandably take some time to calm down altogether over the PPP’s nominee Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani securing the slot of Senate Opposition leader last week. It may be kept in mind to understand the political perspective of the PPP that the incumbent Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly is Shahbaz Sharif, PML-N, who is also head of the Public Accounts Committee. PPP, the second largest parliamentary party of the Opposition, therefore, deserves the comparable slot of the Senate. It made lot of sense especially after the PPP nominee lost to the government candidate in the recently held election of the Senate chairman. PPP might have been deeply obliged to the PML-N if it had offered the position to the PPP at its own initiative as a good will gesture in view of party’s numerical strength in the incumbent Senate. Now in the same token, the PPP leadership may return the position of Opposition Leader of the Senate to a mutually agreed Senator of the PML-N if Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani is declared as winner of chairman of Senate in the Intra-Court appeal. However, this issue may be laid to rest for the time being in the face of bigger cause. Pleasantly, both the parties are unequivocally committed to the objectives of the Pakistan Democratic Alliance (PDM), the restoration of the constitutional rule in the country and exposing the foisted government of the PTI for being devoid of electoral legitimacy of unprecedented scale. The leadership of the both the parties in their statements, after the notification of the Senate Opposition Leader, have sensibly underscored the importance of keeping the alliance intact come what may because the people of Pakistan have pinned all their hopes for their political emancipation with the alliance. Being the most popular parties among the people they may surely give due weightage to the aspirations of the people in their run up political decisions and calculations. The fleeting ups and downs are not uncommon in such a mega political alliance those are likely to be taken care of by the great political minds. Such disagreements indeed reinforce the democratic dynamics of the alliance making it robust and responsive in the real sense.

Without engaging in the discourse of the post and pre-Senate Opposition’s Leader notification, the people of Pakistan hope and pray that leadership of both the major political parties in particular and the others in general may not put their focus off the core issue pertaining to the restoration of democracy as per the Constitution of Pakistan. The presence of Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani in the Senate may surely prove a good omen for forging unity within the Opposition ranks leading to generating enabling environment to facilitate the legislative business that had been stalled due to the unprecedented brinkmanship unleashed by the treasury benches.

Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani, being an experienced and accomplished parliamentarian, may surely prove his mettle as a successful leader of Opposition, as he had proved so as leader of the House in 2008. He undoubtedly proved himself worthy of the honour when he was unanimously elected as the leader of the House. The then Parliament was the center of gravity of country’s politics, an envy of the developed democracies of the world if reviewed in the context of legislative undertakings both in qualitative and quantitative terms. The Parliament also served as a great equalizer, a rare distinction in the functioning of parliamentary democracy.

It may be recalled that PPP during its last tenure tabled 139 bills and incredibly 98% were adopted with consensus equating with the manifestation of collective wisdom of the parliamentary politics in the finest form. The incumbent Senate Opposition Leader, being the then leader of the House, must have played leading role in evolving consensus on extremely complicated and tricky long standing issues like provincial autonomy, restoration of democratic and federal and parliamentary nature of the constitution mutilated by the successive military dictators. The historic 18th Amendment in the Constitution was made possible with consensus during this period removing major chunk of anomalies incorporated in the Constitution by the dictators. The 7th National Finance Award significantly increased the financial resources of the federating units. It was yet another milestone that guaranteed the financial autonomy to the provinces. Afterwards, the new financial award had yet to see the light of the day.

In the last week column titled “Parting of the ways: NO” predicted that the schadenfreude of the ruling leadership and its backers might be short-lived because the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) would survive the differences those had cropped up due to PPP’s reluctance to resign from the assemblies and now PPP claiming the position of Senate Opposition leader. The PML-N leadership should have taken into account the reservations of PPP leadership conveyed to supermo Nawaz Sharif by the Co-Chairman of PPP on the Party’s nomination of Azam Tarrar as its candidate for the Senate Opposition leader. He was the lawyer of the police officer who had doused the site of the assassination of Shaheed Benazir Bhutto to destroy the evidence. The very fact the co-chairman of the PPP spoke to the top leadership of the PML-N explicitly highlighting the sensitivity of the subject. It should have been duly redressed. The change of the candidate should have not been big deal to revert the untoward situation the PDM was now confronted with. It was least expected as both Shaheed Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif successfully launched campaign against military dictator General Pervez Musharraf.

The glee of the government’s ministers and the spokespersons was seeing in believing as they were recklessly pre-occupied in asserting the PPP had rocked the boat of PDM making it unworthy of sailing again. They had been totally dismayed because the PPP Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari had reportedly spoken to the Chief of PDM Maulana Fazlur Rehman, assuring him that his party would continue to remain the integral a part of alliance to spearhead the role for getting rid of the illegitimate PTI government imposed upon the people through fraudulent elections manipulated by the celestial powers. It must have removed the wool from the eyes of those who were jumping out of their skin over the perceived unbridgeable cleavages cropped up between the two major parties of the PDM. The leaderships of the two parties, (PML-N) and (PPP), may not issue un-guarded statements over recent developments in the interest of the longevity of the PDM. It will surely swim through the troubled waters to the utter disappointment of the political adversaries who are bent upon to cash on the resultant fissures. They may be oblivious of the strong possibility of falling themselves in the fault lines as the all ground realities have gathered against them. Lately, the conspiracy theories mills have been on overdrive implying that the PPP has abandoned the PDM and has embraced the powers that be for the sake of power politics at the altar of democracy and of the constitutional rule. This scenario is impossible and time will bear witness to it sooner than later.

The DNA of PPP may surely shrug off such kite-flying. The impeccable democratic credentials of the PPP throughout of its history are enough to rebut such baseless allegations thoroughly and comprehensively. The facts remained unburied on the memories of the people that it always came to power through elections notwithstanding the authoritarian forces bare-knuckled mechanisations to deprive PPP from getting overwhelming majority in the elections in the past. The credit to the continuity of democracy in the country today generally goes to the PPP leadership that had struggle indefatigably against the dictators and the dictatorial rules in the past. The enactment of the 18th Amendment, transferring the presidential powers 58(2) b to the Parliament, 7th National Finance Award including the provincial autonomy during the PPP last government, under Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani, had kept the balance of power in favour of democratic dispensation notwithstanding the PTI leadership’s unabated hammering of delegitimizing the democratic institutions.

muhammadshaheedi@yahoo.com