HAVE you ever wondered why there is so little balance in so many of our views? Things can’t always be all good or all bad. But that is how we see them.

Consider Thursday’s lunch hosted by the prime minister at his official residence to say farewell to the president who completes his term of office in another day or two. Everybody, well not quite everyone as the PTI decided to stay away, thought it was a good idea.

Till here the consensus-seeking prime minister got a consensus. Onwards, the views as gathered from electronic and social media were divergent and polarised. Some people were gushing at how Nawaz Sharif spoke of Asif Zardari and how the latter reciprocated.

Others expressed utter and total disdain at the jhoot (lie), the farce being played out and used language like “one chor (thief) telling the other we left you free to plunder now you return the compliment”.

So, where do you stand? Was it the beginning of a grand political tradition in the country or was it a mere farce, yet another muk mukaa (give and take), as Imran Khan calls it, by politicians many of whom wish to seek and/or afford space to each other for loot and plunder?

Let me share my two bits’ worth. I think it was the start of a nice tradition but it was also an object lesson to politicians to say whatever they like during their public appearances (election-related or otherwise) but to keep the discourse civilised; not least because TV is a cruel, unforgiving medium.

Some smart producers juxtaposed the prime minister’s tributes to the president’s “sagacity, political accommodation and personal warmth” with Mr Sharif’s campaign speeches where his criticism of Mr Zardari was in terms most unkind. Hence, some decried what they called hypocrisy.

If you add the language used by the prime minister’s brother and the Punjab supremo Shahbaz Sharif to the argument you could take the debate anywhere you wished. Was this the reason that all through the lunch whenever the camera cut to him the Punjab chief minister seemed to be in a sulk?

Whether Shahbaz Sharif was sulking because of what he seemed to be reading or he didn’t agree with what the elder brother was saying and was simply embarrassed to be part of a day to honour a man he had pledged to string up from the nearest tree barely a few months earlier we’ll never know.

What we do know is that as the day (to me at least) represented some form of a milestone, a (mini) coming of age of our politicians, they will have to watch what they say, what they promise in public. For there can be no greater discomfort to them than their words being played in a loop by the media.

Although some commentators have given credit to the PML-N’s media management for the lack of discussion on stories such as that of the exit of party stalwart in Sindh Syed Ghous Ali Shah, it is equally true sometimes the governing party’s media handling is shambolic.

One need look no further than the ‘leaked story’ earlier this week as the cabinet met to decide how to restore peace to Karachi. The story said that an officer said to be close to the PML-N had been posted to replace the PPP-appointed Sindh police chief.

When PPP leaders and the Sindh cabinet spokesman reacted angrily to the news, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan not only denied it but also criticised the media for airing a story which wasn’t based on facts. It has to be the province’s decision not ours, he added.

A few hours later PML-N MNA Dr Tariq Chaudhry, who often speaks for the party, claimed credit for political accommodation saying the decision was reversed after the Sindh government expressed unhappiness with it. We’re not likely to ever know what actually happened. Regardless of these blips and bumps, the PML-N has got its optics more or less correct inasmuch as its interaction with the provinces is concerned. Soon after the polls, for the leadership to say they respected the verdict in provinces where, despite not being the biggest party, there was a numerical possibility for the PML-N to form governments was a welcome move.

What few commentators have so far acknowledged is that it was an astute move too. Sindh’s mandate was unambiguous. But there was no outright majority winner in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. The PML-N left the dire challenges there for other parties, even as it looked good and democratic.

The coming months will put its avowed belief in political accommodation and provincial autonomy to serious test. For instance, how long does one expect a nationalist-led Balochistan government to look the other way as the state pursues its kidnap, kill and dump policy with gusto?

Why does a PML-N government committed to a ‘dialogue first’ policy with the TTP think differently about Baloch separatists particularly when the state is clearly culpable in pushing the Baloch to the wall? (And no I don’t condone but condemn the murder of innocent non-Baloch in the province too.)

Also, one earnestly hopes the Karachi operation is conducted sensibly and even-handedly so that it doesn’t trigger unnecessary controversy. Otherwise, the moment the ‘team captain’ is made to feel like the 12th man, the exercise can potentially descend into a province-centre row.

The prime minister’s farewell for the president was not a dramatic development but a small step towards celebrating democratic order in the country. Such an environment will only acquire permanence when each one of us acquires the ability to be tolerant of and appreciate diversity.

The writer is a former editor of Dawn.

abbas.nasir@hotmail.com