The great PML leaders’ meeting in Islamabad on July 4 that was to decide Nawaz Sharif’s fate was a bit of a damp squib except that a group of 31 dissidents was able to voice its rejection of him as leader of the party in a press conference. This, despite the perception that any party headed by Mr Sharif could not possibly play any significant role in a future political set-up planned by an army high command headed by General Pervez Musharraf. And this, despite some plain talking by General Musharraf to Raja Zafar ul Haq a couple of days earlier. And all this, despite the rebel group led by Mian Azhar, Khurshid Kasuri, Fakhr Imam et al which has long agitated to knock out Mr Sharif and whose leader Mian Azhar was doubtless offered inducements by General Musharraf to shake off Mr Sharif.
There are several reasons for the continuing “unity” of the Muslim League. First, there is still no leader in the Muslim League who comes even remotely close to matching the popularity of Mr Sharif in the rank and file of the League as far as the party’s vote-bank is concerned. Certainly, Begum Kulsoom’s aggressive posturing has helped her husband retain his centrality in this vote-bank. But Mr Sharif’s refusal to bend before the men in khaki has also helped his personal cause immeasurably — bravery and martyrdom being significant elements in the mythology of charismatic leadership. Second, the regime’s inability to knock out Mr Sharif via the courts within the first month or two of his ouster has helped perpetuate the belief that perhaps he isn’t guilty of all the sins heaped at his door by General Musharraf. Third, the government’s avowed intention to “nab” many League leaders, including the Chaudhurys of Gujrat, has only served to harden their resolve not to abandon Mr Sharif in the expectation that safety lies in sinking or swimming together. Fourth, the army’s assault on the bazaar, a mainstay of Mr Sharif’s urban constituency, has evoked a wave of sympathy for their deposed leader and a matching revulsion for army rule. Finally, the military regime has earned few, if any, brownie points for its grandiose plans to revive the economy which continues to languish in no-man’s land. Indeed, the recurring flip-flops of the regime have already earned General Musharraf the unflattering epithet of CMLA — Cancel My Last Announcement!
On June 25, Nawaz Sharif played an all but masterful card. He announced the appointment of six new vice-presidents of the party in the provinces. All were young and second-rung leaders keen to support Mr Sharif’s ‘forward’ policies. The idea was to increase the strength of pro-Kulsoom vice-presidents in the central working committee to give Begum Sahiba the majority she needed to take the entire party along the path of confrontation. The tactic would have worked beautifully if he hadn’t overplayed his hand by appointing Saad Rafiq as Acting-Secretary General Punjab in place of Rana Nazir who has been ‘nabbed’. The League leadership, in particular Chaudhury Shujaat, reacted against this step by arguing that if the party president in jail (Nawaz Sharif) was not to be replaced by an acting president merely because NAB was proceeding against him, what was the unholy haste in deposing Rana Nazir? Doubtless, Chaudhury Sahib was wondering about his own fate in the PML in the eventuality of falling foul of NAB? That was sufficient to put paid to Begum Kulsoom’s efforts to take over the party.
There are three groupings in the PML today. The Chaudhurys, playing their cards well from behind the ‘consensual’ figure of Raja Zafar ul Haq, have emerged as the biggest faction in contact with other dissidents like Fakhr Imam and Mian Kasuri. The second faction is that of Mian Azhar who leads a group in Punjab clearly resolved to remove Nawaz Sharif from the leadership of the party. The third grouping is of course the loyalists led by Kulsoom Nawaz, greatly fortified by Nawaz Sharif’s power to make new appointments for the party from his prison cell. Out of the three, it was Mian Azhar’s faction that seemed isolated among the PML rank and file because of its radical stance, but General Musharraf has partly removed this weakness by meeting Mian Azhar the same day as Raja Zafar ul Haq. However, at the end of the day, the biggest grouping led by Raja Zafar-ul-Haq has decided not to oust Nawaz Sharif from the Presidentship of the PML for the time being. The sole reason for this is that any other route would have led to a bloody break-up of the party, with deleterious consequences for each of the three groups.
The Chaudhurys have been reassured by Raja Zafar ul Haq’s contact with General Musharraf. Raja Sahib in turn has strengthened his position as a “go-between” within the party. The Sharif faction led by Begum Kulsoom has also watered down its rhetoric against the Chaudhurys by apologising for Nawaz Sharif’s act of appointing vice presidents without consultation. Mian Sharif, who has so far stayed out of the PML fray, is also expected to become active as a ‘rebuking father’ to repair his son’s excesses. So we may expect the turbulence within the PML to continue without leading to a crash.