by Mazhar Abbas in TNS, Nov 1, 2020
The writer is a senior columnist and analyst of GEO, The News and Jang.
The Pakistan Democratic Movement, an 11-party opposition alliance, has launched a campaign to oust Prime Minister Imran Khan. Two highly controversial speeches by three times prime minister Nawaz Sharif seem to have set the tone for it. However, it is still far from clear where all this will ultimately lead to.
As for the government, Prime Minister Imran Khan has rejected PDM demands for fresh elections and his resignation. He has also vowed to fight and refused to allow any relief to Sharif or former president Asif Ali Zardari.
It will be interesting to see how the man on the street responds to the opposition parties’ power show in Peshawar which has so far been a bastion of support for Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-insaf but where a blast at a madrassa killed several people and injured nearly 100 on Tuesday. Earlier, an explosion in Quetta had left a few people injured.
The new wave of terrorism in Pakistan could be linked to developments in the neighbouring Afghanistan, where recently a suicide attacked killed many. In the nearly three-week break, the opposition parties would be challenging the PTI in the Gilgit-Baltistan elections scheduled for November 11.
According to former IGP Afzal Shigri, a GB watcher, the PPP alone can give the PTI a tough fight in the region. The people have traditionally voted for candidates fielded by the party heading the government in Islamabad. Some ‘electables’ have already left the PML-N and the PPP to join the PTI. However, he says that the presence of Bliawal Bhutto, who is leading an aggressive campaign, will certainly help the PPP. None of the key PML-N leaders has visited the area so far.
While Maulana Fazlur Rehman is fully endorsing the Sharif’s narrative, Bilawal Bhutto has somewhat distanced himself from it in saying that the core issues are neither person-specific nor limited to 2018 elections.
Broadly, however, PDM parties have sounded on ‘one page’ with regard to alleged interference by ‘selectors’.
The PDM has set itself the task of building enough momentum over the next two months to be able then to march on Islamabad and oust the government. It has already held three well-attended public meetings in Gujranwala, Karachi and Quetta.
Sharif, who was disqualified for public office in 2017 and has recently been declared an absconder, has directly accused the military top brass of rigging the 2018 election. His speech at Gujranwala led to a PEMRA ban on TV channels and the registration of a sedition case against him. However, after skipping the Karachi rally he returned to address the public meeting in Quetta and was as aggressive and direct.
Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, still the single largest party in the Punjab, has so far stood behind him despite speculation of a rifts and substantial support for ‘moderates’ headed by younger brother Shahbaz Sharif and his son Hamza Shahbaz. Both Shahbaz, the leader of the opposition in the National Assembly, and Hamza, the leader of the opposition in the Punjab Assembly, are in jail facing accountability cases.
It is for the first time in Pakistan’s political history that a leader from the Punjab, has taken a clear stance against the establishment and managed to keep the party intact.
Sharif was allowed to leave for London for medical treatment, some nine months ago. Prime Minister Imran Khan has since said he regrets the decision and that he was misguided. “I will now do everything to bring him back… even go to London to talk to Prime Minister Boris Johnson,” Khan said in an interview with a private TV channel.
However, most legal experts in Pakistan and UK believe that it would not be easy. The recent sedition case might actually work in Sharif’s favour in his victimisation plea.
But what can Sharif accomplish if stays back in London?
Federal Minister Sheikh Rasheed Ahmad, a key Khan ally, sees no future for PML-N in 2021. He is predicting a spontaneous disintegration of the party.
The PDM leaders have not yet chalked out any plans so far beyond public meetings but there is already a debate over what exactly the opposition narrative ought to be.
What happened after the public meeting in Karachi was unprecedented and the mystery has remained unresolved. After Sharif’s son-in-law Capt Safdar (retired) raised pro-democracy slogans at the Quaid-i-Azam’s mausoleum’s Federal Minister Ali Zaidi asked the Sindh police to register a case against him and arrest him. Later IGP Mushtaq Mehar was allegedly forced to get Safdar arrested. The situation aggravated after all the top Sindh Police officers applied for leave to express solidarity with the IGP who himself refused to carry on.
Bilawal Bhutto then asked the army chief and the ISI director general to investigate into the alleged involvement of some security officials in pressuring the IGP. Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa promptly ordered an inquiry. Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah on Monday told TNS that he hoped that an impartial inquiry would lead to action against all those responsible. “I don’t know the outcome of the probe but I hope that [appropriate] action will follow,” he said.
The major battlefield in the fight between the PDM and the PTI-led federal government is going to be the Punjab. The PML-N is trying to organise massive rallies in Multan and in Lahore.
Prime Minister Khan was particularly furious following Sharif’s address to the Gujranwala meeting calling it an assault on a national institution (the establishment). So far the institution has not responded directly beyond a confirmation by the ISPR director general of two meetings between PML-N leader Muhammad Zubair and the army chief, including one in which ISI Director General Lt-Gen Faiz Hameed was also present.
Difficult days lie ahead for the opposition, particularly the Sharifs and the PML-N leadership. This could make the job of organising PDM public meetings and rallies in the Punjab harder.
If PDM manages to draw big crowds in the Punjab, those who matter in the government may decide that use of force to put down the PDM campaign could be counterproductive. Otherwise, Prime Minister Imran Khan will be in a much stronger position ahead of the Senate elections.
Thus much depends on the showdown in December. The game is on with a slight edge to the government over the opposition.
Government leaders and some analysts are saying the Sharifs are desperate for an NRO-like relief in accountability cases against them. Others are questioning the silence with regard to allegation of rigging.
So far the PDM has neither entirely adopted Nawaz Sharif’s narrative nor clearly distanced itself from it. There appears to be a consensus about the ‘selectors’ role in the 2018 elections but not beyond that.
The PDM leaders appear confident that by the end of December they will be able to mobilise public opinion and give a call for a march on Islamabad but this depends on their performance in the Punjab.
Come January the show-down will decide the fate of the Sharifs and the PML-N as well as some PPP leaders. Two to three hundred thousand activists camping in Islamabad can be quite a handful for the administration. On the other hand Imran Khan is a very unlikely leader to resign in the face of a protesting crowd. It could really come down to ‘selectors’.https://www.thenews.com.pk/tns/detail/736965-no-telling-where-pdm-is-headed
