Attack on parliament and politicians' hypocrisy

If hypocrisy had another definition, the conduct of many of Pakistan's political luminaries currently occupying high seats in the parliament and the cabinets would fit it. People entrusted with the mandate to stand for civility and moral values; protect citizens' rights as enshrined in the Constitution; and fight for civilian supremacy are these days themselves instrumental in undermining all the aforementioned notions.

The latest addition to this litany of shame was the arrest of PTI MPs from within the Parliament House premises. Subsequent responses by Ayaz Sadiq, the Speaker, as well as speeches by several MPs, including PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and the Defence Minister Khawaja Asif, were as much farcical as duplicitous.

By all definitions, September 10 would sit in history books as a black day in the parliamentary history, regardless of what people like Asif and Rana Tanvir or Bilawal put on the course of events. The PML-N now enjoys the double privilege of having assaulted the Supreme Court in 1997 and ordering a police charge into the parliament for the arrest of opposition leaders booked on flimsy charges.

Strangely, the instant public response by the Speaker was to summon the city police chief, and suspend several private security officials for four months. Nothing could be a more cruder attempt to hoodwink the affected MPs and people at large.

Through his orders and the subsequent statements, the Speaker pretended innocence - as if totally ignorant of the power politics currently in play. His administrative actions were a window dressing at best. Even a layman knows that these private security officials and guards are literally lame ducks when confronted with either police or security agencies. Can private security guards really stand up to state security officials?

Even more grotesque was Bilawal's speech on the floor of the National Assembly on September 11. "If the government's only job is to decide who should we jail today as 'Khan did this to us and ruined the air' so […] you will be happy for one day but tomorrow, you and I will be in that same jail," said the PPP chairman.

"The manner in which we have been doing politics for quite some time, we have turned it into a gaali (swear word)… If this country has to move forward, both sides must work together," said Bilawal, putting up a democracy-friendly innocent face.

In this age of overflowing information, these leaders blatantly take common people for fools, it seems. Otherwise no man with an iota of responsibility would utter what Bilawal said. Reason: the PPP provided its shoulders to the PML-N for the government both in PDM-1 and PDM-2. Asif Ali Zardari is in the President House only because Bilawal's party lent its shoulders to the PML-N government.

Hardly do these leaders realise that their duplicitous conduct and the series of compromises on the fundamental principles have greatly eroded their credibility - not only among the majority of Pakistanis but also among foreigners. Major countries and their leaders look at most Pakistani leaders as instruments for their geopolitical objectives and hence accord minimal respect to what is and should be critical for the 250 million Pakistanis.

Foreign missions know how the PDM government has continued to dig the grave of constitutional rights since August 2023 through brazen legislation that only legally empowered the non-political forces.

Without a shred of doubt, the PDM leaders - in their quest for power - have contributed to the historic disequilibrium in the distribution of state power in Pakistan.

These PDM leaders - by parroting a particular narrative - predominantly directed at one party and its founder Imran Khan - continue to dent their own integrity and reputation by betraying sense of entitlement as ruling MPs on the one hand, and a sense of insecurity vis a vis PTI on the other.

It seems that those who are making key decisions are totally oblivious to the long-term implications of their actions which will certainly entail lasting effects as far as the youth, in particular, is concerned. Support for bizarre, whimsical and often illegal actions such as the sanction to the police to arrest MPs from inside the Parliament House hardly sits in synch with the pontificating words that the civilian and military leadership often uses against the political opposition.

Do we need the parliament, or the law universities, at all? Why spend billions of rupees annually on a house that - in the words of Maulana Fazlur Rehman - has declined to the status of a rubber stamp only? Will the advocacy by the country's top guns for justice, rule of law and democratic freedoms really resonate with the people who continue to witness state forces mauling all the aforementioned values day in and day out?