A convocation and a thought

If only coming together of 3 main parties at the dais of BNU convocation could in future form a grand coalition.

Wonder of wonders. A PML-N buoyed by the rout of the opponents in the recent by-elections, a PPP exhuming confidence about its probable re-election for a second term and the expectant PTI sharing the same dais last week. The occasion was the seventh convocation of the Beaconhouse National University (BNU) in the battleground city of Lahore. The venue was the sprawling new campus of BNU near Jaati Umra, a place too close for political comfort. No howlers. No blame game. The serenity of the occasion had overtaken the politics of confrontation. There was the venerable Sartaj Aziz, twice the finance minister of the PML-N and the chair of the manifesto committee of the PML-N, and a possible presidential candidate. BNU vice chancellor’s address of welcome focused on the significance of producing knowledge for socio-economic change and the dwindling allocation of public resources to education. Ms Nasreen Kasuri spoke as the Chairperson of the BNU board, while Mr Khursheed Kasuri, a PTI stalwart, looked on. Ms Kasuri’s point essentially was that education was too important to be left to the government alone. Noticeably, there was no attempt at point scoring about the raging controversy about the Higher Education Commission.



The keynote speaker was Dr Hafeez Shaikh, a PPP senator and finance minister. He flew into Lahore the night before from Washington DC, after an unfinished innings with the IMF. He did not look retired hurt. Away from the donors and ongoingness of a ministry where no more rather than do more is the refrain, Dr Shaikh felt relaxed and happy speaking to the youth, the real change-makers. They do not embody the “cynicism of those who got the most out of this country.” He extolled the achievements of civil society and the private sector. Edhi and Abdus Salam were mentioned, as was Nasreen Kasuri. Like a loyal PPP man, the sacrifices of Benazir Bhutto were remembered. Of matters economic, nothing much was said. The economist in him was, perhaps, jet-lagged. But the achievements where all parties came together were narrated with great admiration. The Seventh Finance Commission Award, the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution, the restoration of an independent judiciary and the establishment of an autonomous Election Commission were singled out as the outstanding examples of our collective genius. So they are. How much one wished, though, that he would underscore the desirability of coming together on the Accountability Bill.

Dr Shaikh did not “wish to talk like a partisan.” This precisely is the issue. The haste with which the PML-N left the federal coalition with the PPP was a mistake. It would have achieved much more by persisting with a bipartisan setting than it did as ‘friendly’ opposition. While problems have magnified, there is nothing to suggest that the coming elections are likely to throw up a single winner. If only the coming together of the three main parties at the dais of the BNU convocation could be projected into future to form a grand coalition. The vicissitudes of our short history tell us that the country is more diverse than its founding fathers had thought. Unity in diversity is the real test of the art of the possible. It is just a thought, provoked by the diverse political presence at a convocation. Or, was it a representation at technocratic level, whose coming together is not unusual?

Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th, 2012.