The Lahore High Court has ordered that pictures and speeches of MQM leader-in-exile Altaf Hussain may not be aired because they are subversive and against the national interest. Mr Hussain has been abusing the army and threatening to call for a separate Muhajir province that could plunge Sindh into an orgy of violence. The military has banned the collection and sale of animal hides by the MQM and the activities of its “welfare” organisations because their proceeds allegedly feed into terror financing.
Meanwhile, the noose around Mr Hussain is tightening in London. Scotland Yard has finally been allowed to interrogate two alleged assassins of Dr Imran Farooq in Pakistani custody. Both are likely to implicate Mr Hussain in the murder. Mr Hussain’s links with Indian intelligence agencies that have been funding MQM terrorism in Karachi are also now firmly established not just in the mind of the military but also in the public imagination. The gravity of the MQM’s plight is proved by the fact that many of its erstwhile leaders have fled Karachi for safer shores, partly out of fear of the military and partly out of fear of Mr Hussain’s violent recriminations. Nor is any political leader or interlocutor bending over backwards to cajole the MQM to return to parliament after it resigned in protest. Unprecedentedly, the media is openly critical of the MQM.
It may be argued that the MQM suffered and survived a similar predicament in 1991-92 when an army led crackdown all but decimated it and compelled Altaf Hussain to flee to exile. But there are two critical differences that distinguish that episode from this one. First, the MQM was subsequently revived and nourished by Gen Pervez Musharraf from 1999-2008 because he needed a political ally against the PPP in Sindh. But the current army leadership has determined that terrorism in any form poses an existential crisis for state and society and must be stamped out. Second, Mr Hussain used asylum and security in Britain to regain control of his party and extend its tentacles into the corridors of power in Pakistan. But today he is ailing, facing murder and money laundering charges, and unable to retain his demagogic hold over his followers. If ever he and his party faced an existential crisis, it is now.
The PPP is deep in the doldrums too. Its Sindh government is in a shambles, rocked by scandals of corruption and incompetence. In the last elections it was reduced to a rural Sindh party, due entirely to the bad politics and abysmal mismanagement of Asif Zardari. Two PPP prime ministers from that period are charged with gross corruption. In the current Sindh dispensation, stories are legion of how Mr Zardari’s near and dear ones have their hands deep in the till. The Rangers have a list of those who are running criminal gangs and funnelling arms into the city, and they mean to arrest them. Mr Zardari has fled Pakistan. He was visibly shaken by the arrest of his confidante Dr Asim Hussain and thundered against the generals for encroaching upon his administration. But a wave of public condemnation compelled him to retreat and retract.
Mr Zardari’s shenanigans aside, the PPP is now faced with a true existential crisis. After the loss of Benazir Bhutto, it has progressively become rudderless and leaderless. Mr Zardari is neither charismatic like her, nor wise like she became after her long years in and out of exile and power. Her natural heir, Bilawal, is still struggling not just to shed his father’s dead weight but also to define a new role for himself.
It may be argued that the PPP has been through such reversals in the past but has always managed to return to power. There are critical differences this time round. Benazir cashed in on her father’s martyrdom and then became a leader in her own right. Zardari has cashed in on her martyrdom but failed to become a leader in his own right. Benazir could always rely upon an ideological vote bank to give her a boost. But that vote bank has now dissipated. Memories of martyrdom have faded with the rise of a new youthful urbanizing middle class that is inclined to sweep away the dynastic past on the back of contender Imran Khan. Finally, unlike Benazir who was nurtured as a political heir by her father, Bilawal has had no political grooming. Indeed, Benazir often stressed that her children would not follow in her footsteps. If the PPP has abandoned the philosophy of poverty it is only because there is a total poverty of philosophy in its rank and file today. The era of “victimhood” is coming to an end and the Party is unable to reinvent itself.
The crises of the PPP and MQM cast a deep shadow on Pakistan. Both represent important minority and progressive constituencies that require representation in state and society. But both lack new leaders with new ideas and visions who can seize the moment.