The future of the People’s Party and its co-chairperson Asif Zardari, and may be the emerging shape of Pakistan’s politics, hinges on two important decisions — the party nominations for the posts of prime minister and Sindh chief minister.
While the whole country waits with bated breath, the anxiety is not shared by the man who has to make the crucial decisions: Asif Zardari. Even if he is worried at all, he must be given the credit for successfully camouflaging it with his smiling demeanour. His composure was enough to disarm in an informal chat with me and a senior colleague from Dawn late on Friday night.
One cannot say the same thing about the three prime ministerial hopefuls: Makhdoom Amin Fahim, Yousuf Raza Gilani and Shah Mahmood Qureshi. They were mostly silent participants in the meeting.
Makhdoom Fahim was visibly more ashen-faced than the two Seraiki competitors, whose case rests on the theory that they will preserve the Punjab vote bank in the face of the Sharif juggernaut. The fourth contender, Chaudhary Mukhtar, we were told, had had a more relaxed meeting with Mr Zardari earlier in the day.
One is not sure if Chaudhary Mukhtar knows whether, in case he gets the chance to become prime minister, he will be a mere ‘bench warmer’ for three months to pave the way for Mr Zardari’s ultimate entry into the fray or a more permanent financial guru.
One cannot blame Mr Zardari for taking his time, considering the enormity of the task. He realises that on these decisions depends the unity of not just his party, but also his relationship with political allies.
So far, the PPP co-chairman may have performed sensibly on most counts. He curbed outrage after Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, held the party together in taking the crucial decision to contest elections and fought them well under difficult circumstances.
After elections, he outsmarted his opponents in aligning with Nawaz Sharif, Asfandyar Wali, even Altaf Hussain. Although comparisons, as they say, are odious, it remains to be seen whether Mr Zardari would be able to act as a voice of reconciliation the way Nelson Mandela did in South Africa.
He is yet to be tested on issues like the reinstatement of judges, his handling of friends and foes (where Aitzaz falls only time will tell). But all of this can wait.The defining moment may have come now where he does not have the luxury of floating for long. Either he will swim with the tide or perish in a strormy sea.
The crucial nominations are a test case that will reveal what goes on inside his mind. It is not just about a selection between a few contenders. A lot more is at stake.
The decisions will, among other things, reveal whether Asif Zardari wants to be “Mr Sonia Gandhi”, a desire expressed earlier, or whether he has changed his spots to play a more active role; whether he chooses those who were given hope by Ms Bhutto --- the likes of Nisar Khoro and Qaim Ali Shah in Sindh, and Makhdoom Amin Fahin in the Centre— or go for his own loyalists.
It is obvious that Mr Zardari is sandwiched between two camps.
On one side are gung-ho ‘smarties’ egging the Ceaser to seize the moment and grab the reins in his own hands. If he does not, they fear, they will not be able to benefit from his court.
The ongoing honeymoon with Nawaz Sharif, goes the theory, is ephemeral. Hence PPP’s governments at the Centre, Balochistan (and possibly Punjab at some stage) should stand on its own majority. A fresh crop of friends seems to be trying to win Asif Zardari’s favours these days. They comprise lobbyists representing cartels of oil, stocks and real estate. Others are driving home the wisdom that power flows through Washington. Still others connect him to people in the establishment every now and then on the pretext that “you can’t survive fighting them”.
On the other side is the silent PPP old guard who pray that he stays the course that he has adopted so far. He should simply go along the tide of the public mood, fulfil his pledge of saving Ms Bhutto’s legacy while remaining behind the scene.
The question is whether the PPP will be able to maintain unity if Mr Zardari’s decision goes wrong. Most people have their fingers crossed.
The PML-Q and their cheerleader up on the hill are counting on the first group. Actually, some of Mr Zardari’s newly found friends are working for both sides.
The PML-Q, it seems, are making a last ditch effort to maintain some unity for may be just another quarter in which they hope the allies to fall apart. Pervaiz Elahi realizes that the only thing that can save (or delay) the PML (Q) from disintegration is the break-up of the PPP.
Nawaz Sharif too has a stake in the fate of the PPP. But he seems sitting pretty as he will go along the PPP as far as it remains on course on the issues that are crucial to the new media, new judiciary and the new civil society, something that Asif Zardari has still not come to grips with. No matter how PPP trouble shooters conjure up figures, Nawaz Sharif holds the trump card of holding the next elections how and when he wants it.
Till then the silent majority who has voted both the PPP and PML (N) to power is watching everything like never before.
It is not just about the selection of the PPP nominee, but the finesse in which the whole thing should have happened. Asif Zardari may have already caused some damage by delaying things unnecessary.
Mutual acrimony among various groups and contenders has already set in. It will take a while before this bitterness is healed up, if at all it came down to that.
