A game of thrones–lite

The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) continues in its attempts to recover from the defeats of the last general election and the subsequent local body elections. Hobbling along with an asymmetric co-leadership of father and son it is currently seeking to slay dragons in Punjab, the province currently in the fiefdom of the Sharif brothers and their multiple scions, some of them dragon riders and others professional conspirators and purveyors of bespoke rumours at the drop of a poisoned chalice. There is even a princess-lite ready to shift on to the cheaply-gilded throne in the event of anything of a terminal nature happening to the Sharif-in-Chief. Not so much a Game of Thrones more a matter of pass-the-parcel.

Thus it was that Bilawal Bhutto Zardari emerged probably briefly from his father’s looming shadow to proclaim on Sunday 9^th April that the days of deprivation for the people of South Punjab were over, that the PPP has ‘the best plans’ for the poverty-stricken masses and that the dawn of development prosperity and equal opportunities lay on the horizon. The PPP, quoth he, will ‘free South Punjab from the Throne of Raiwind in the next elections.’ He also declared himself ‘upset’ that the literacy rate in South Punjab stood at 12 per cent — a figure that may not survive some robust factchecking — and all will be resolved if only the peoples of South Punjab vote for the PPP a year hence.

It may be assumed that the starting gun for the 2018 general election has been fired. All the parties, mainstream and otherwise are beginning to manoeuvre their forces, explore alliances and in the case of the small religious parties explore the coalitions of yore — which did nothing by way of delivering power unto them. The PPP has much ground to make up and the PTI has taken territory that was the purlieu of the PPP. Whether it can hold it come Election Day is a moot point. The emergence of Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has been halting and uneven and he is no Jon Snow, 998^th Commander of the Night’s Watch. Let the battle commence.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 12^th, 2017.

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