What is our politicians’ favourite, vicious pastime? Backstabbing, speculating, theorising, gossiping, rumour-mongering. Predicting the untimely demise of Prime Ministers and civilian governments.
Mr Nawaz Sharif’s detractors have claimed, with baffling certitude, that his days were numbered. We weren’t so sure. Nor did we think much good would come of it in the event we were proven wrong.
Now, of course, there is little to be said for the “doom and gloom brigade.” The President has confirmed the appointment of Gen Asif Nawaz as COAS with effect from the date that Gen Mirza Aslam Beg, who was at the centre of this tug-of-war, will retire on August 17.
One measure of the poor PM’s anxiety can be gauged from his hopeless response: “Necessary action can be taken against these rumour-mongerers who are enemies of democracy and Pakistan”, he threatened the other day. Leaving aside his silly threat, let us review the disgruntled rumour-mongerers.
There is, first, Mr Jatoi, the man who would be King if only the Heavens would part at the distant rumble of jackboots and let him in through the back door. Then there is Mr Zahid Sarfraz, our unemployed maverick from Faisalabad. Usually given to ridiculous out outbursts against the Americans, he has rather absurdly trained his peashooter on the prime minister. Not to be left behind is the indefatigable conspirator for democracy, Nawabzada Nasrullah. And never to be forgotten is Pir Pagara who, though defunct, has long monitored the constellations for signs of “double march and family planning”.
More worrying, however, than the mutterings of such has-beens ar new shouts in the cacophony of would-be vandals, which include Mr Meraj Khalid and Mr Rao Rashid. By suggesting a constitutional role for the army, these gentlemen have opportunistically muddied the arena of political discourse.
Most worrying, of course, is the meaning we are expected to attach a change of tack by Ms Benazir Bhutto’s Peoples Party. Admittedly, Bhutto has had the rawest of all deals in recent times and she has every reason to be hopping mad. But what, in God’s name, does her party hope to achieve by rising the spectre of a trial of Gen Beg (for complicity in Zia ul Haq’s demise) after the General’s retirement next August? Her slippery loudmouth, Khwaja Tariq Rahim, has now gone the whole hog and spilled the beans, on record, if you please. “It is the duty of all institutions in Pakistan — the President, the superior courts, the army — to get rid of Nawaz Sharif & Co”, he has been exhorting of late, while advising us improperly that “the army has a role in politics…. and it should be institutionalised”.
What ar we to make of all this? That the PPP has foolishly ganged up with the stale conspirators of yore of oust Mian Nawaz Sharif’s government by hook or by crook?
Since 1988, we have seen the back of one President and three prime ministers. The Muslim league under Mr Nawaz Sharif conspired against the PPP in 1988, 1989 and 1990. The PPP returned the compliment in 1989 and is suspiciously, though ineffectually, inclined to improve its score in 1991. While the politicians have been stupidly slugging it out among themselves, the army has quitely consolidated de-facto control over crucial areas of foreign and domestic policy. This is ridiculous. No wonder Mian Sahib is not the only one who is extremely vexed.
The rumour-virus thrives in chaotic and controversial situations. Its breeding ground is societal anxiety which it continuously recreates and heightens. New mutations follow rapidly to fit new conditions and circumstances.
Mian Nawaz Sharif was installed and survives as PM in circumstances no less chaotic and controversial than those in which Benazir Bhutto was ousted. The lady has every right to protest, doubly so, given the arbitrary and ruthless nature of her subsequent victimisation at the hands of his government. If Mian Sahib doesn’t relish being repaid in the same coin he has been dishing out to his political opponents in the past, he should be stretching out his hand in friendship rather than threatening to try them for treason.
By announcing the new COAS the President has removed one dimension of anxiety and uncertainty. The PM can rid us all of this vicious, nail-biting rumour virus by concentrating on battling the visible chaos about Pakistan — the disintegrating social contract between the state and its subjects — rather than trying to notch up false kudos at everyone’s expenses.