| 29 August 2003 | Friday | 30 Jamadi-us-Saani 1424 |
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Situation vacant: wanted a new PM
This is the ad now in circulation around some of the campfires of political intrigue in Islamabad, a city dedicated to political intrigue since its founding. It was the late Maulana Kausar Niazi, himself, no innocent in matters of intrigue, who said there should be a special graveyard in the capital for ex-prime ministers. Seeing their high mortality rate, he had a point.
Zafarullah Jamali is the latest in a long line of prime ministers who should soon be looking for burial space in the capital. The knives are out for him and his sins, real or alleged, are being recounted with a zeal that sounds a bit funny considering that Jamali was not elected prime minister by anyone but selected for the job by the president and his men. If he is now proving to be unsuitable, who is to blame? His friends will swear to his loyalty and easy-going nature. They'll be hard put to swear to his competence. So who deserves quartering? Jamali or his selectors?
A prince, as Machiavelli taught us, is known by his advisers and by his ability to choose good or bad ones. If Jamali is proving to be a failure it's less a reflection on him than on his handlers. Islamabad, however, has always been heavy on intrigue, not on this sort of accountability. So have no fear. When Jamali is finally delivered of his misery no one is going to ask any questions of his selectors.
Anyone with doubts on this score can consult the track record of Pakistan's cricket czar, serving Lt Gen Tauqir Zia. The cricket team can march from one disaster to another. Players can be axed, captains changed but no finger dare be pointed at Zia. Men in uniform can do no wrong. Which makes it a silly question to ask why Gen Pervez Musharraf is not keen to take off his uniform. Sooner ask a king why he is not keen to take off his crown.
Jamali's chief selector was of course Chaudry Shujaat Hussain. Why did he push his candidacy so hard? Why were Shujaat and cousin Pervez Ellahi, Punjab mansabdar, so set against any prime minister from Punjab? Were they afraid their dominance of Pakistan's largest province would thereby be challenged?
But back to His Heaviness: what's the gathering chargesheet against him? That he hasn't delivered is a managerial failure, has ruffled too many cabinet feathers. Rumours of corruption are also circulating. A case cited is that of extravagant landing rights nearly given to a foreign airline. In return for what, wagging tongues ask?
All these items would be nothing if Jamali still stood high in presidential favour. After all, in a country where half the country can be lost and no questions are asked, these charges, by comparison piddling, amount to nothing.
But people who matter have begun to lose patience with him. They are not happy with the political scene. The political system spawned by the referendum and the Legal Framework Order is not working, or at least that is the overriding impression. Rudderless and adrift is what the government looks like and Jamali, by the very nature of his position, is the most visible symbol of this drift. (Never mind the president. He can do no wrong.)
A mess like this, with so much in-built cause for laughter, cannot go on forever. Something has to give, some head has to roll, some scapegoat found, some shoulder selected on which to pin the blame for the failure of 'real' democracy, the mythical bird General Musharraf promised to gift the nation when he and his generals seized power. The head and shoulders being readied for sacrifice are Jamali's.
Even so, he may yet linger on for some time for never under-estimate the drag of mediocrity. Jamali's sins fall in the register of petty crimes, misdemeanours that can try a judge's patience, not move him to black anger. Indeed, for the moment this may be Jamali's best defence. Musharraf or his men may have been reduced to a sense of helplessness by Jamali's performance as prime minister. But he's no Junejo and thus no threat to anyone. Which means that even if those who matter are keen to see the last of him they are taking their time in unhorsing him and sending him back to Balochistan.
Another thing working in Jamali's favour is the absence of a consensus candidate to replace him. Getting rid of Jamali is the easy part. Finding a replacement is harder because the beached whale experiment - selecting a beached whale as prime minister - is a luxury not for repeating. If it is repeated, it will spell the end of 'real' democracy.
Several people are in the run. Some three have been short-listed: finance minister Shaukat Aziz, commerce minister Humayun Akhtar and, believe it or not, MNA Jahangir Tareen. Jahangir who? Quite right but that's the way with 'real' democracy where prime ministers are selected and not elected. Indeed, if Jamali can be prime minister anyone can be prime minister.
The Q League and other Musharraf allies raised their hands for Jamali. They'll raise their hands for whoever is selected as his replacement. "Their's not to reason why, their's but to do and die."When Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was going to Shimla for talks with Mrs Gandhi he called a meeting of PPP parliamentarians in Lahore, ostensibly to seek their opinion. As one MNA after another said his piece, my father stood up to say that if Mrs Gandhi were to roll into Lahore at the head of her tanks these people whose opinion Mr Bhutto was asking would line the roads and shower her with rose petals. So Mr Bhutto should stop wasting his time in consulting them and do what he had to do.
Which really means that whatever is ordained from on high, the Q League and its allies will do what is expected of them. So no surprises if Jahangir Who, or anyone else for that matter, is short-listed. Stranger things have happened in the Islamic Republic.
A sign of shortening patience on presidential hill was the recent meeting called by the president at which his message to the king's party and other allies was to become proactive. The invitees: 40 parliamentarians. Pray, why 40, why not 45 or 35? Why invite comparisons with Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves? A comparison only strengthened when some of these favoured souls indulged in some spirited behaviour when the National Assembly met soon after.
Ask Naheed Khan who says that Raza Haraj, a state minister, abused her (although knowing Naheed I find it hard to believe that she did not give as good as she got). Or ask Sher Afgan, pride of Mianwali and desperate minister-in-waiting, who in the heat of battle couldn't resist making some gestures with his hands which spirited Pathans and Punjabis (people from Mianwali claim to be Pathans) make when moved to anger. Verily, whom the gods wish to confound, they first make ridiculous. Forty indeed.
Around Islamabad's campfires as this new ad is circulated, two things are being forgotten. (1) The problems of 'real' democracy are less managerial than political. Jamali represented only himself, not even Balochistan.
The three hopefuls in the new short-list represent only themselves and their master's voice. How can political nonentities impart credibility to a political system? (2) Military strongmen like prime ministers at once ultra-obedient and super-efficient - a tough prescription to follow.
