In Jhelum, voters wait as political scene heats up

Emergence of new candidates will challenge the political order.

JHELUM:

With polls just under five weeks away, the people of Jhelum are still clouded by the uncertainty that surrounds its politics. While the rest of the country is making all the necessary election preparations, Jhelum continues to be buried under past happenings which have had a profound effect on the district’s political landscape.

Raja Muhammad Afzal Khan, one of Jhelum’s most popular political figures and former member of the PML-N, defected to the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) in January this year after developing differences with party members. While the move has arguably weakened PML-N’s bargaining power — it has won six times in the district since 1998 — the party is ultimately a reflection of the political indecisiveness that grips the district and its people.

Khan, along with Nawabzada Iqbal Mehdi, former governor Punjab Chaudhry Altaf Hussain (late) and his son, Chaudhry Farrukh Altaf, have played key roles in the politics of Jhelum but the emergence of smaller players this time around is likely to fiddle with the hierarchy of power in the district.

For the first time in Jhelum’s history, 172 party aspirants, independents and transgenders have filed their nomination papers to contest two national and four provincial assembly seats.

The abundance of new candidates is refreshing news for NA-63, which has seen the PML-N, PML-Q and PPP triumvirate dominate the political scene over the past few decades.

In 2002, Khan, unable to contest the polls because of no educational degree, fielded his son, Raja Muhammad Asad on the PML-N ticket. Asad’s 46,722 votes proved enough to defeat his closest rivals, PML-Q’s Shams Haider and PPP’s General (retd) Saeedul Hassan.

In 2008, Asad was victorious again, yielding 79,662 votes comfortably above his closest rival.

PML-N failed to deliver desired results to its constituency despite winning both NA seats. The only major development success of note was the construction of a bridge on nullah Ghan costing Rs40.5 million, along with smaller scale projects like the creation of a new sewerage line and a government college for women.

The lack of infrastructure in Jhelum today is most worrying for its inhabitants, who suffer because of poor drainage systems, a dearth of new water channels, and a limited supply of gas to small industrial estates among other problems.

A total of 25 candidates have filed their nomination papers from NA-63, of which there are many new faces. Some of them include Raja Tariq, who will be contesting from Pind Dadan Khan on the Jamaat-i-Islami ticket, and Usmanur Rehman Chohan from Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf.

While this is likely to provide much needed alternatives for the district’s disenfranchised inhabitants, increased competition is likely cause more political wrangling between rival factions in the lead-up to polls on May 11. The people of Jhelum are least interested in petty inter-party disputes and candidates would do well to recognise that harmony in the district can only be achieved once these people’s problems are addressed.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, April 13^th, 2013.