THE PML-N is these days carrying out an expansive campaign to cover whatever territories it possibly can in the anticipation of a general election. And, with ideological compatibility never a prerequisite for alliances here, the League has plenty to choose from. In recent days, the Sindh National Front has not just allied itself but merged with the PML-N in pursuance of its policy to embrace anti-PPP forces. In Punjab, the PML-Likeminded faction has practically ceased to exist and is now a part of the N-League. These mergers are what Nawaz Sharif had been working for. It has been a while since the Likeminded group had applied for refuge in the house of the Sharifs, from where it had once opportunistically walked out. Its re-entry is a case of the N-League leadership finally agreeing to accept it back into the fold. For a brief moment in the interim, it seemed as if the Likeminded could join the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf which has also shown an ability to absorb varied colours and shades. Its return to its origins, instead, is indicative of the success of the Sharif drive at consolidation.

This is as much a response to the PPP and its equally unlikely allies in the PML-Q, etc, as it is a reaction to the spawning of new realities such as Imran Khan. The odd man out is Hamid Nasir Chattha who has been at the forefront of the rather fitful search for an alternative to the Sharif name in Punjab. His case represents the fall in the fortunes of old politicians who could survive without a major-party label. The ‘alternative’ group that included people such as Mr Chattha and Manzoor Wattoo has all but vanished. Mr Wattoo is a PPP man and it is to him that the PPP now turns for its dismissal of the bonding of the Likeminded and the PML-N.

The Likeminded include ‘electables’ from the PPP base of Sindh. Their alliance with the Sharifs as well as the inclusion of Mumtaz Bhutto’s SNF in PML-N would appear to give a more wholesome look to the N-League challenge to the PPP. There are also reports Sindhi nationalist Dr Qadir Magsi could join hands with Nawaz Sharif. This could well be a desperate attempt by the Sindhi nationalists to break the old rival’s stranglehold on Sindh — which, in Pakistani terms, is ideology enough. The PML-N having shown its hand, it is time for the PPP to make its choices now. It can ignore the emerging pattern only at its own peril. In politics, nothing is taken for granted.