Perception management, a challenge to Nawaz Sharif’s govt
Social media is flooded with stories that a cabal of big business persons have ganged up around the Prime Minister.
A little over two weeks after the third Nawaz government was installed, the top decision makers of the party have started complaining against media and the judiciary -- the two institutions that had not allowed the previous government to savour a single feel-good moment during its five years in power.
After presiding the maiden meeting of officers and institutions controlling the law and order scene since taking charge of his ministry, Nisar had addressed an exhaustive press conference. I myself was shocked to read tickers constantly played on a particular 24/7 channel, which claimed that through his press conference the interior minister had set a one-month deadline for the Sindh government to handle the growing incidents of targeted killings in Karachi. “Otherwise, the federal government would have to act on this count”. The opposition was also justified to take strong note of the remarks attributed to him in the National Assembly on Saturday.
With a hurt heart and a baffled face, Nisar kept repeating that being an experienced parliamentarian and thus fully aware of constitutional constraints, he could never dare to set deadlines for the provincial governments. Maintaining law and order remains their exclusive domain; the federal government can only aid and assist them, that too only if they appropriately asked for it.
Nisar is not media-friendly. He mostly plays solo and lives like a recluse. Even his old friends often complain over “the arrogant” conduct of this scion of an elitist family of the Payal Rajputs from Chakri. In this phase of his political career, though, he has begun surprising his critics with lovey-dovey dealings in the assembly. He went an extra mile to praise and please his old friend from the Atchison College days, Imran Khan, when he came to take oath and deliver his first speech in this house as the PTI leader.
He maintained the appeasing mien while dealing with the MQM legislators, who were trying hard to sell the story that “agencies’ were kidnapping their supporters and a definite “gang of criminals (read Peoples Aman Committee)” was target-killing this party’s activists in Karachi.
The interior minister started his speech by candidly admitting that the details furnished for him regarding the issue of missing persons in Karachi, “by the interior minister’s babus” failed to satisfy him. He has asked for a more comprehensive report on this issue. It must tell nothing but the whole truth. He would only present the said report in the national assembly, only it fully satisfied him.
The MQM needed to score points, though, with breast-beating and sob stories. That provoked Nisar to remind them, slyly, that the so-called agencies used to pick persons in the past as well. The target killing is also not new to Karachi while “you have been sitting in both the national and provincial governments since 2002. Why did you not create such a fuss on these issues during those days?”
The parliament-smart Nisar very subtly dropped hints to convey the feeling as if the PML-N government might not want to change the MQM-nominated Governor in Sindh and perhaps prefer to work with him to resolve the accumulated issues related to maintaining law and order in Karachi. Without appreciating the scene-stealing behavior of Nisar, Nabil Gabool, a recent convert to the MQM cause, just exposed but himself by clearly demanding that as the interior minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan should request General Asfaq Pervez Kiani to conduct a “clean up operation” in Karachi. Nisar earned spirited desk thumping from both sides of the house by thundering: “It is below the dignity of an elected government to request the Chief of Army Staff to handle an issue which we should address as public representatives.”
Contrary to Nisar, Ishaq Dar sounded miserable in defending the budget that he had proposed. He had ample time to spin some feel good story by dressing up numbers coldly put in the budget documents with some politically positive message. Alas, he failed on this count. Dar could even not dilute the perception that instead of focusing on the unleashing of economic activity, his budgetary proposals, essentially drafted by the usual suspects working for the finance ministry since ages, aimed at squeezing a bailout package from the IMF in the last quarter of this year. No wonder, we notice loud pretensions “for strict and across the board collection of taxes” in his proposals. Doing this, however, the government seems as if being punitive to those segments of society who already feel trapped in the tax net.
Perception management, allow me to forewarn, may soon emerge as the biggest challenge to third government of Nawaz Sharif. Already, social media is flooded with gossipy stories that promote the feeling that a cabal of big business persons from Punjab have ganged up around the Prime Minister. This cabal is being alleged to have “planted the idea” of addressing the issue of circular debt in one go to massively reduce long hours of load shedding. The ideas, apparently, is people-friendly. Yet, the reality remains that the tycoons mostly seen around Nawaz Sharif during policy-formulation meetings these days also happen to own mega project of privately produced electricity. Isn’t it a clear case of conflict of interests?!!
Published in The Express Tribune, June 23rd, 2013.
After presiding the maiden meeting of officers and institutions controlling the law and order scene since taking charge of his ministry, Nisar had addressed an exhaustive press conference. I myself was shocked to read tickers constantly played on a particular 24/7 channel, which claimed that through his press conference the interior minister had set a one-month deadline for the Sindh government to handle the growing incidents of targeted killings in Karachi. “Otherwise, the federal government would have to act on this count”. The opposition was also justified to take strong note of the remarks attributed to him in the National Assembly on Saturday.
With a hurt heart and a baffled face, Nisar kept repeating that being an experienced parliamentarian and thus fully aware of constitutional constraints, he could never dare to set deadlines for the provincial governments. Maintaining law and order remains their exclusive domain; the federal government can only aid and assist them, that too only if they appropriately asked for it.
Nisar is not media-friendly. He mostly plays solo and lives like a recluse. Even his old friends often complain over “the arrogant” conduct of this scion of an elitist family of the Payal Rajputs from Chakri. In this phase of his political career, though, he has begun surprising his critics with lovey-dovey dealings in the assembly. He went an extra mile to praise and please his old friend from the Atchison College days, Imran Khan, when he came to take oath and deliver his first speech in this house as the PTI leader.
He maintained the appeasing mien while dealing with the MQM legislators, who were trying hard to sell the story that “agencies’ were kidnapping their supporters and a definite “gang of criminals (read Peoples Aman Committee)” was target-killing this party’s activists in Karachi.
The interior minister started his speech by candidly admitting that the details furnished for him regarding the issue of missing persons in Karachi, “by the interior minister’s babus” failed to satisfy him. He has asked for a more comprehensive report on this issue. It must tell nothing but the whole truth. He would only present the said report in the national assembly, only it fully satisfied him.
The MQM needed to score points, though, with breast-beating and sob stories. That provoked Nisar to remind them, slyly, that the so-called agencies used to pick persons in the past as well. The target killing is also not new to Karachi while “you have been sitting in both the national and provincial governments since 2002. Why did you not create such a fuss on these issues during those days?”
The parliament-smart Nisar very subtly dropped hints to convey the feeling as if the PML-N government might not want to change the MQM-nominated Governor in Sindh and perhaps prefer to work with him to resolve the accumulated issues related to maintaining law and order in Karachi. Without appreciating the scene-stealing behavior of Nisar, Nabil Gabool, a recent convert to the MQM cause, just exposed but himself by clearly demanding that as the interior minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan should request General Asfaq Pervez Kiani to conduct a “clean up operation” in Karachi. Nisar earned spirited desk thumping from both sides of the house by thundering: “It is below the dignity of an elected government to request the Chief of Army Staff to handle an issue which we should address as public representatives.”
Contrary to Nisar, Ishaq Dar sounded miserable in defending the budget that he had proposed. He had ample time to spin some feel good story by dressing up numbers coldly put in the budget documents with some politically positive message. Alas, he failed on this count. Dar could even not dilute the perception that instead of focusing on the unleashing of economic activity, his budgetary proposals, essentially drafted by the usual suspects working for the finance ministry since ages, aimed at squeezing a bailout package from the IMF in the last quarter of this year. No wonder, we notice loud pretensions “for strict and across the board collection of taxes” in his proposals. Doing this, however, the government seems as if being punitive to those segments of society who already feel trapped in the tax net.
Perception management, allow me to forewarn, may soon emerge as the biggest challenge to third government of Nawaz Sharif. Already, social media is flooded with gossipy stories that promote the feeling that a cabal of big business persons from Punjab have ganged up around the Prime Minister. This cabal is being alleged to have “planted the idea” of addressing the issue of circular debt in one go to massively reduce long hours of load shedding. The ideas, apparently, is people-friendly. Yet, the reality remains that the tycoons mostly seen around Nawaz Sharif during policy-formulation meetings these days also happen to own mega project of privately produced electricity. Isn’t it a clear case of conflict of interests?!!
Published in The Express Tribune, June 23rd, 2013.