The Peoples Party (PPP) has been on the defensive since Asif Zardari took over its reins. He has had to contend with all manner of personal and political attacks from elements in the media and the opposition. These are based on a lingering perception of corruption, a string of broken pledges and for being “pro-America”.
Meanwhile, Mr Nawaz Sharif’s popularity has soared because of his “principled” politics in support of an “independent” judiciary. He is also getting unqualified political benefits from judgments passed by the “independent” but grateful judges. Emboldened by the opinion polls, the PMLN has become aggressive in recent times. Mr Sharif has been demanding a “High Treason” trial for General (retd) Pervez Musharraf, notwithstanding a “safe passage” agreement between President Zardari, COAS General Ashfaq Kayani, and the governments of USA, UK and Saudi Arabia. Mr Sharif’s immediate motive is to extract public mileage by embarrassing Mr Zardari for doing an NRO deal with a detestable dictator whom he is now protecting from prosecution. The PMLN is not interested in seeking a conviction against General (retd) Musharraf because that would envelope the entire army leadership, including the current army chief, pit the civilians against the internal and external establishment and hurt his own civilian cause no less than that of Mr Zardari.
Mr Sharif is also the inspiration behind a vigorous campaign in a section of the media to discredit the Zardari regime. Indeed, the embattled Presidency has had to confront a “Minus-One” conspiracy hatched by the opposition to drive a wedge between Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani and President Zardari, weaken the PPP and then get rid of Mr Zardari from the Presidency, as a prelude to a mid term election next year enabling Mr Sharif to romp back to power.
But the tables have now been turned. Suddenly, the focus is on the PMLN and Mr Sharif, whose past misdeeds have been dusted off the shelves and weighted in the scales. One man – Brig (retd) Imtiaz Ahmed aka Billa – is singularly responsible for putting the boot on the other foot. He was a key player in the ISI from 1988-90 when he was tasked by General Aslam Beg and President Ghulam Ishaq Khan to stop the PPP under Benazir Bhutto from sweeping the 1988 elections and then from returning to power in 1990. Brig Billa was rewarded and appointed DG-IB by Mr Sharif for his machinations. But Brig Billa was arrested during the Musharraf regime and successfully prosecuted for corruption. Like a jack-in-the-box, he has suddenly erupted on all TV channels with a profound mea culpa which is making all political players, including Mr Sharif and the ISI, squirm and look distinctly soiled. That is, all except the PPP and its leaders.
Brig Imtiaz says the ISI used money received from dubious sources at home and abroad to pay a clutch of opposition politicians, including Mr Sharif, so that they prop up their election campaigns and enable the Muslim League to win the 1990 elections. Much of this is already part of the record of the supreme court of Pakistan where a case against the ISI is pending. But he also makes credible accusations against PPP turncoats like Mustafa Khar. Significantly, he claims that the army operation against the MQM in Karachi in 1992 was ordered by President Ishaq on the basis of a trumped up charge of an MQM conspiracy to carve out a separate province of Jinnahpur from Sindh, a claim that lets the MQM off the hook for provoking a bloody crackdown by the state at that time. The net result of these revelations is that the PMLN is angry because it is being shown in a bad light. The PPP is smirking smugly because the Minus-One Formula has dissolved. The MQM has become self-righteous and aggrieved. And General (retd) Musharraf is strutting about confidently instead of being cowed down by threats of trial for High Treason.
The PMLN has accused the Presidency of harbouring a secret media cell to manufacture and launch this anti-PMLN guided missile named Brig Billa. Naturally, the PPP’s denial has been equally fast and furious. Brig Billa’s multiple motives may include personal bitterness at Mr Sharif for sidelining him in the 1990s, abandoning him when he was in prison during the Musharraf regime and finally refusing him re-entry into the higher echelons of the PLMN upon Mr Sharif’s return to Pakistan in 2008. He could also have been suitably induced by supporters and loyalists of Asif Zardari, Altaf Hussain and Pervez Musharraf to sting Mr Sharif and the PMLN good and proper.
To Mr Sharif’s added dismay, his nemesis-in-exile, Pervez Musharraf, has been suddenly accorded a royal welcome in Saudi Arabia by King Abdullah. Now his old benefactor is signaling Mr Sharif – he has been summoned to Riyadh – to stop baying for Mr Musharraf’s blood and refrain from destablising the Zardari regime. What next?
Will PM Gilani step into the fray and calm everyone down? Or will Mr Sharif turn to the judiciary once again rather than the media to undermine the Zardari regime and improve his political prospects?