Party politics

The recent by-elections in Punjab for six provincial and two national assembly seats cannot and should not be dismissed as an ordinary political affair. They tell us a lot about political trends and foretell something about the next general elections. There are three important social facts about these elections which are not likely to change. First, the elections were fiercely contested among at least two to three rival groups, parties and individuals, with two leading and one winning. This is a historical pattern of contesting elections and it will continue. We will see more than three candidates in each constituency, and everywhere in Punjab, there will be close contests between three candidates representing three parties — the PML-N, the PPP, the PML-Q, and the PTI. The smaller parties and religious groups, if pragmatic, will join one of three electoral alliances.

The second important trend is grassroots political mobilisation that the contestants have done. In this election, they have knocked at every door, used every social contact and employed all means to bring people to the polling stations. Compared to other by-elections during the past four years, these elections were different in pulling crowds to vote. This also shows the role of money as candidates must spend on travelling frequently in huge caravans of vehicles in the constituency, feeding and bringing people to polling stations. The publicity through posters and public rallies also requires big money, quite beyond the limits set by the Elections Commission of Pakistan. There will be a far bigger role of money in the next general elections than we have ever seen.

Third, electoral politics in the recent elections again confirmed another trend: elections are the social domain of the influential individuals and families at the local level. There can be many grounds for being influential. The shrines, land, tribe and caste are as permanent a feature of political influence as the personality cult in the political culture of Punjab. There were in these elections some individuals that had little of the above merits but were connected through social networking and always close to people. That is not a lesser factor in getting votes in rural communities than a high social place. For a while, we will see the ‘electable’ individual on account of their family, social place and, in rare cases, personal charisma dominating the electoral scene. They will have party labels and party affiliations and identities will matter but their influence will be secondary. Make no mistake; the elections will be, as they have been, candidate-centred.

Finally, the ‘electable’ candidates make strategic choices about choosing a party and in doing so, they go by the future prospects. For this reason, there is a big rush of  ‘electable’ persons and powerful traditional political families towards the PML-N. The polling results of the recent by-elections confirm a popular wave in favour of the PML-N. The PPP-PML-Q alliance has suffered a grave blow and will not be able to recover from this setback without greater efforts. They are, however, down but not out and Punjab is the turf where they will have to pull all the resources together to do better.

The PTI is going to be the third important point in the political triangle of Punjab. It is a rising, new political force that no political opponent should dismiss so easily. It is PTI’s popular challenge that the PML-N has, as usual, fallen back upon the elite politics. The PTI cannot escape this choice either. This is the tyranny of a truly Pakistani political culture.

Will the PTI change the political culture of Pakistan through a political wave that it thinks it is creating? Who will really benefit from the three-way contest, if it is going to realistically shape that way? Keep watching the Punjab politics.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 11^th, 2012.