No way to govern a country

What has been witnessed in this forsaken country during July and August is, to put it mildly, disgusting. No sane being with the power of thought should have anything but disgust and disdain for all the political players in the sordid drama.

The government formed by the third coming of Mian Nawaz Sharif, which in singularly wondrous manner was welcomed in by many endowed with sanity and the power of thought, has been for over one year a disaster in as much as any form of governance is concerned. That it should have been evident from a glance at the second Nawaz Sharif regime, and how that panned out. Things and people in this country do not better themselves over time, they worsen. That has been proven time and time again.

Sharif has been in politics since 1985. He cannot claim to be immature or ‘innocent’ of its art and science. Yet again, he stands exposed. The madness of Imran Khan and his PTI followers, the antics of cleric Qadri and the turmoil they have wrought upon the political so-called ‘system’ — which has little to do with whatever democracy denotes — must be fairly and squarely laid at his feet.

The shallowness of this government has been horribly highlighted since the happenings at Gujranwala at the end of July to which it remained mute and unmoved, so one must suppose the horrible incident fell into its field of approval — and then Model Town. It fiddled and faddled with the two ‘threats’ posed by the rantings and ravings of an unhinged Imran Khan and an irascible cleric, and dug itself into a hole. In its helplessness, it invoked Article 245 of the constitution pre-empting the failure of the civil administration. By the time Islamabad was invaded by the two (somewhat pathetic in terms of numbers) numbskull revolutionaries and their motor marchers the government was paralytic. The Raiwind family cabinet and its close cronies were stumped.

And, wonder of wonders, it has all happened as it always happens when our political Dracos with their absolute whims and fancies make a thorough mess — the chosen General to whom the army has been given emerges as not only the sole arbiter but as the sole player who currently earns some degree of respect.

The revolutionary movement of the Mad Khan initially involved the ballot box, but in the space of two weeks it morphed into a good deal more. In this country, and under the present ‘system’ its leadership cares to boast about, there can be no such thing as a free and fair election. It just can’t happen. So, the 2013 election was as unfair, as fixed and as mismanaged as have been all elections since 1970. Really, in Pakistani terms, no big deal. But Imran Khan chose to make it into one. And who is to argue that on that particular point he is not right. The entire electoral ‘system’ needs dismantling, given a lot of thought and analysis by a competent group of people (can one be found?) and restructured.

It’s not only the ballot boxes that have to be sorted out, it is the entire process from start to finish. There is the matter of fraudulent constituencies, should we continue with ‘first past the post’, why are senators indirectly elected, hand-picked so to say, and the president of the great republic should not be appointed as he is — either self-chosen or a mere dummy installed at the whim of a prime minister with a ‘mundayte’. He should be directly elected by the people.

This will take time, patience and much thought to sort out. It will not happen if we are subjected to leaderships such as we have so far had. This country can no longer afford to be bereft of governance, at the mercy of Sharifs, Qadris, Zardaris — you name them all. The sole right in this self-defeating tragicomedy is the call for change.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 30^th, 2014.

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