K-P chief minister Pervez Khattak. PHOTO: APP
Chief Minister (CM) Pervez Khattak has turned out to be the most regular chief executive at provincial assembly sessions.
The K-P Assembly has so far held three sessions including Monday’s sitting and Khattak has only missed a few. On Monday, the assembly had a brief session to pass a resolution on using the assembly hall for presidential polling and Khattak was present then too.
Interestingly, in addition to attending assembly proceedings regularly, the CM never leaves an opportunity to address the house.
Some Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) critics attribute Khattak’s zeal to his relative inexperience, while others attribute it to the lack of an outspoken information minister like the previous government’s Mian Iftikhar Hussain.
The CM on Monday spoke at length on the house floor and took on the opposition benches for what he termed a ‘media campaign’ against his government aimed at showing that the PTI had failed to deliver anything during its 60-day rule in the province.
Khattak asked the lawmakers to wait till August 30 to see what his government does in 90 days. “I have no right to be in the government if I cannot deliver,” he stated, criticising his predecessors for their performance.
However, the echo of Khattak’s riveting speech had not died down when the Taliban struck the DI Khan Central Jail late Monday night and escaped with 248 prisoners, including high-profile militants.
The CM’s first reaction the next day was to deny the K-P government’s responsibility and to pin the blame on the intelligence agencies and the federal government. It turned out, however, that the provincial government had been forewarned about the attack by intelligence agencies.
The provincial government has repeatedly brushed responsibility of various important issues, be it the power crisis or law and order. Regarding the DI Khan jailbreak, CM Khattak said the federal government should have contacted the provincial government about it, yet it had not.
It can be argued that in light of the attack, instead of complaining, the provincial government could have contacted the centre itself and asked for its help.
The dilemma for PTI in K-P is in fact that the promises it made during the course of its election campaign will haunt it in the long run. Once the party assumed power, it realised it cannot make problems disappear in a given period. On the other hand, a determined opposition has no intentions of letting the PTI-led coalition government have some breathing space.
The opposition will chase the government with questions about putting an end to drone strikes, closing off Nato supplies, tackling the energy crisis, ending corruption, creation of a uniform education system and bettering healthcare. Given the government’s attitude, it is very likely to face a tough time at the hands of a strong opposition.
Keeping in view that little progress has been made in the PTI government’s 66-day rule, it would be unwise to expect any concrete developments in the 30 days of August.
The 90 days to bring change rhetoric will remain attached to the provincial government and prove to be a strong weapon for the opposition to criticise PTI’s performance in the days to come.
Published in The Express Tribune, August 5th, 2013.
COMMENTS (38)
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Pakistan problems in general and KP in particular are deep rooted and terminal and won't be solved in 66 months let alone 66 days. It may even take 66 years.
@ Uza Syed
They CANNOT fool us any more... If PTI doesn't resign on its own after its failure to deliver in 90 days, as promised, the tsunami of the people will kick them out forever. The sword of Disqualification hangs on his head after his rants on the superior judiciary. Yousaf Raza Gilani's fate is in front of all of us. Imran Khan is now mentally preparing for this fate and that is why he has started following the footsteps of PPP to brand himself as a political martyr (siyasi shaheed).
@A Pakistani: Well, this is Pakistan my friend, here these gangsters, with various names and identities, have been fooling Most of us, Most of the time and would continue doing this until WE put our foot down and decide to stand up and fight them all and chase them all, they aren't any good and they all must go.
KPK has been better of the FOUR provinces so far. Let's take Budget for example, but Unfortunately our biased Media won't utter a Word regarding that..! I Dare ET to publish a Report of Comparison between all the Four Provinces in these 66 days so that we can get a clear picture, but I'm sure they won't :)
66 days in power means that we have to bear them for another 24 days. And then the PTI will resign from Assemblies, as per the election slogan & promise of Imran Khan. We hope that Imran Khan sticks to his promise and doesn't take another U-turn! You can fool some of the people some of the time. But you cannot fool all of the people all the time.
PTI is just another drama queen
@Saleem: Saleem saab give PTI some slack. They have started to turn the steering towards the right direction. Soon you would see the ship aligned facing the right direction. You can feel its slow because of Ramdan. Out of the 66 days 27 has been in ramazan. In ramzan you know as a muslim that things are slow and people are more concerned about ibadat. Nawaz sharif saab is in saudi spending last few days in makkah. however i met atif khan education minister yesterday even thought in ramzan he was in his office from 7:30 to 6 and very entucistic about the new education reform bill to be tabled soon in assembly. he is meeting different people and working day and night for it. In Ramdan govt offices closes at 1 or 2 and things are usually on the slower side. Let ramdan finish in peace and then you will see. Give them some slack. They are very sincere people and i have seen them with my own eyes. They will deliver i dont have any doubt. They will need some help from sincere people and inshallah they will deliver more than expected.
For ET editorial agenda is supreme..objectivity is a nuisance & hence this news item !!
@Mishrab: They never promised they will give us a young CM. Where are u living and from which bag are you pulling out a new promise associated to PTI everyday. Let them work and help them out. They are sincere people and are trying there best. No one said they will make all problems go in 90 days. They said in 90 days thing will move towards positive. People will feel and see a difference in governance. We already see that difference in KPK. Corruption would be tackled and machinery is being formed to tackle that. Education system us being over hauled and steps have been taken for that. They cnay bring power from the skies or from the earth in two months. They said they will work towards making more dams, which they have started, add more mega watts and make KPK a province that would sell energy to the rest of Pakistan and they are working for that day and night and have signed three bills already and are opening up Private sector power development projects. The only issue is law and order. I have seen it peronally improved in most of KPK but its not something that can be fixed in a day or two. Drines cannot be stopped by Imran. He said he will do it if he is elected at fedral level which his party is not. On provincial level they can beef up police, better train them, take measures to stop terrorisim in province but cant stop drones which is a fedral matter cant stop Nato supplies as its being stopped by itself due to the planned exit of US. Stopping nato routes would mean stopping them from moving out og Afghanistan. Still i think this is the only sector in which they can do more and deliver more. For god sake it been 2 months by now. And 1 month of which was ramadan which we all muslims know is for ibadat and govt machinery and everyone is kind of on the low. Let ramadan finish in peace and inshallah then you will see. We want people to be after us and make us do things but not in negative way but in a positive way.
May Allah Bless your efforts and intentions PTI.
With Punjabis controlling all sphere of federation and funds and making security policies it is not easy to perform as all efforts of CM house and Presidency is pointed towards Punjab, especially Lahore and Islamabad (even though ISB is capital territory but is under full control if Punjab).
I hope PTI perform in long term on their promises. Everyone in KPK knows that issues require time to be resolved, as long as the intention and direction is right.
Good luck to PTI.
ET is quite consistent when it comes to bashing PTI. They don't realize that even 90 days have not passed with PTI in power. They could tolerate Zardari for 5 years. Nawaz Sharif for last 25 years, Army for last 60 years, but cannot tolerate PTI for even 90 days.
ET, please let go of PTI . Why you never mention of PMLN's promises of working out the load shedding problem within 3/6 months?
66-days and counting! I would not pass any judgment yet but have started to feel uneasiness about the direction we are going and wonder what will happen once this honey-moon period is over. Is it too late to turn for the better? Difficult but possible.
No match of Shahbaz Sharif .... Accept it or not .... !
@Usman Masood:
They did dharna demanding the previous kpk govt to stop NATO trucks?? They have a right to refuse use of kpk roads, or at least pass a resolution and isssue orders.
Considering the rhetoric of past few years they should have done that on the first session of the assembly. But they have stopped even giving lip service.....
Neither they are admitting that they have come to realise that their past whinning about the issue was unrealistic.
No positive change?? What about "Mobile Courts"? Aren't they a positive change?? that people can avail justice at their doorsteps
NATO Supplies and Drone Strikes are part of the foreign policy. So you can't blame them. Maybe you should've voted for PTI, and if they had the Federal Govt. And then your demands for PTI to live upto this promise would have been legitimate.
@Salman Agreed u arguments make sense
Perhaps the momentum of the elections psyche takes some time to wind down - but the PTI government in KPK could do well to remember that the elections are, after all, over and done with, and that they have won, and that there are no more elections to worry about for another five years. There is no need to spend your time in defending your actions or making sure it be known that the jail break was the fault of another agency's. Which of course, in itself is ludicrous to say so entirely; surely no intelligence agency could be expected to possess clairvoyant-like abilities to know beforehand of every single possible militant incident, and not come up with any false positives along the way either. And even if it is their failure, it is naturally also a failure of the KPK government because protecting the jail after all was their duty. And regardless of whoever's failure it is, it is really quite an irrelevant point to focus on at this point in time (as I said - the elections are over); what is important is to try to see what can be done to ensure that such incidents don't repeat themselves. And no - I'm not some kind of PMLN or PPP or MQM or ANP politico; I'm a sane person who voted for PTI, as any other sane person should have done in the previous elections. But it is clear to see that unfortunately, PTI is falling far, far short of their expectations. Maybe democracy is just inevitably destined to doom in this country. How I miss Musharraf and the military...
Any government based in Peshawar which is run from Lahore or Isloo is going to fail. Imran ran the cricket team as a dictator when he was the captain and he is now doing the same with KPK government - unlikely to get any success in politics. JI are hiding somewhere quietly and people have kind of forgotten that they are coalition partners in KPK with PTI. I predict that JI will soon resign from government, that's how they have always played their dirty politics.
ET - negative reputation is also reputation - and .................... gets clicks
66 days of PTI government in KPK, nothing done so far?! I thought they were going to turn things around in 90 days----does it mean that they would resign and go home after exactly 24 days for the reason of incompetence and failure to deliver even anything close to any positive change.
Mr. Khattak is right, there was a failure of 'intelligence', but whose??
PTI would not bring any change just false statements and promises. If PTI really wants to bring change (Naya Pakistan), then first it should work on Law and Order situation in KPK.
The author could have waited a bit more to pass any judgement as August will prove to be a very important month for the KP reforms process by PTI. Multiple bills including the much promised anti corruption bill, the Right to Service Law and the Right to Information Law are to be introduced in the assembly. The Education reform package was also okayed recently at the highest level and is going to be announced by third week of August. Similar is the case with Health Reforms Package which was finalised in a recent meeting with IK in chair. And not to mention, something which would have the biggest impact on governance, the Local Government Bill has also been finalized and due to come soon with elections in November.
You could say the process if a bit slow, but it is surely in the right direction. At the very least, PTI has managed to curb top level corruption in the province as promised.
have steps been taken to set the province on the right direction? That si what needs to eb determined. Would be nice if ET would give us a round up on all steps taken by Provincial Govt and their current status vis a vis implementation etc.
@Mishrab: there is a constitutionally mandated age limit of 35 for Cm. Also Insha Allah the next CM will be much younger, atleast let some of these youngsters learn on the job as MPA's and Ministers.
We are a strong PTI supporters and as a responsbile party supporter, its our moral duty to critise the party as well when it cant deliver. Mr Khattak must deliver or leave the position. PTI foundation is based on delivering; walk the talk. If anyone cant, show him/her the door.
Mr Khattak, time is running out. Please do the needful. Goodluck and long live PTI.
Welcome to reality!! IK and PTI trolls always speak about idealism, theory, assumptions, which have had no practical implications.
I predict serious failure of PTI in KPK. When they cant have a young man as CM how would they fullfill thier other promisses.
Mashallah ET always biased reporting...
@LUMS... Y can't u ppl take some criticism +vely? U have all the right to critize (abuse) everyone but no one has the right to even criique PTI... Pls stop these biased behaviors. Stay united and think of Pakistan. If Nawaz is doing something for Pakistan then applaud it and if he is doing bad then criticize him. No one has forced KPK CM to give a deadline of 30 August but he himself is saying to deliver the promises by that date. Now, if he doesnt deliver by that date then atleast ppl have right to criticize him.
negative media campaign is in progress
I guess ET's correspondent could have waited another couple of weeks before passing this judgement; it would have been more objective. August 30 is not that far.
Why Don't u fry PTI in a frying pan and try to eat it up? Why does it feel like there is only One Province left in Pakistan, which is KPK!
Even being strong opponent of PTI, I wish their success in kpk to bring change and avoid them saying " Angoor khathay Han "
We expect PTI to deliver and best wishes for their tenure.