Has Nawaz Sharif Blundered In His Handling Of The Affair?

ARTICLE:Asif Zardari is said to be an impudent fellow who hardly shows respect to his words. Soon after forging an alliance with PML-N, he set a trap for Nawaz Sharif and the latter walked straight into it. That it was a clever plan designed to trick Nawaz by making him trust Zardari in the following weeks and months, there’s nothing much the PML-N chief can do about it. He’ll just have to grin and bear it.

While it remains to be seen whether or not Nawaz will be blushing profusely at the memory of his agreements or conversations with Zardari, one may rubbish the argument that the PML-N chief perhaps lacks the experience of life, knowledge or good judgement and willing to believe that people always tell him the truth: to be politically naive. Unfortunately, however, his approach to politics following February 18 elections appears to be dangerously and refreshingly naïve. Consider:

There is a widely held perception that Zardari has been bluffing all the while to get out of the situation by continuing to tell lies, especially when Nawaz and his comrades suspect him that he is not being honest. But Nawaz is no fool either. It is highly unbelievable that Nawaz allowed Zardari to succeed in dealing with a difficult situation by making him believe something which is not true.

Despite the fact that his deep-rooted animosity towards a former chief of army staff, Pervez Musharraf, does not go down well with the army, one would hardly subscribe to the argument that Nawaz had failed to appreciate his own constraints and shortcomings in terms of numbers at the center and in Sindh, NWFP and Balochistan.

It was soon after the announcement of February 18 elections that Zardari made the most shrewd move by making it clear that he’s clever at understanding and making judgements about a situation. He didn’t say that the coalition partners would be making governments in the province.

In fact, in relation to the provinces in particular, Zardari was clear and categorical. His message was that PML-N would form government in the Punjab while his party would be there to extend to it the required support. According to him, such an arrangement has been necessitated by the poll outcome in the context of Punjab and that he, after all, respects people’s mandate.

Thus he was able to send his message across that all those who were sitting on the fences could put their weight behind Nawaz’s younger brother Shahbaz. The independents in particular joined the PML-N in flocks. Those very close to Zardari in the party felt as if he had made a serious mistake, if not a colossal blunder. But they found the answer to their question in their party chief’s broad grin.

That the resignation of Pervez Musharraf on August 18 drastically shortened the life of the already fragile coalition, there was little doubt that the coalition was floundering helplessly owing to a variety of issues, particularly the one relating to the independence of judiciary or restoration of judges, from the Murree Declaration to August 7 agreement between the two major coalition parties.

The PML-N, which made enviable electoral gains in the Punjab on the slogan of restoration of judges, had been finding it extremely difficult to let this issue become a part of an overall constitutional package that PPP had contemplated for righting a number of constitutional wrongs.

The PML-N, it appears, was of the view that inclusion of the judiciary issue in the constitutional package would jeopardise the prospects of getting it through once the entire package was set into motion in parliament for debate. Such a proposition, from the PML-N standpoint, would not augur well for the prospects of some of their objectives which they had ostensibly linked to the restoration of deposed judges, particularly, Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry.

It was, therefore, keen to seek resolution of the issue preferably through an executive order. Notwithstanding the contentious issue of NRO, the PPP could not just do the needful, for it is widely believed, other coalition partners, particularly JUI-F in centre and MQM in Sindh province, had been showing a lot of reluctance to the restoration of deposed chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry.

PPP’s woes on this count had been accentuated by the fact that restoration of deposed chief justice required the upstaging of incumbent chief justice of Supreme Court of Pakistan Abdul Hameed Dogar from Khairpur, indeed an extremely difficult proposition for a Sindh-based federal party.

Ruling the largest province of the country on the back of highly crucial and valuable PPP support while firmly insisting on the judges issue even at the cost of coalition’s life showed that the PML leaders were wanting to have their cake and eat it too or they were keen to take advantage of something without its disadvantages.

Understandably, the lack of flexibility on the part of Nawaz Sharif allowed Zardari to force him into a difficult situation. He has effectively got him in a corner, and there isn’t much he can do about it. Zardari would like that PML-N continues to rule the Punjab with PPP as its partner.

Should this arrangement fail to work out now or in the immediate future, the quantum of support that Zardari has exhibited in his run up to the presidential election strongly indicates that he, on the chessboard of politics, has put Nawaz in a position from which he cannot escape.

Nawaz has fielded Justice Saeed-uz-Zaman Siddiqui against Zardari for the post of president in order to gain more ground in relation to one’s moral standing. His latest move seems to be entirely consistent with its populist position viz-a-viz the judiciary. This will come handy once the voices of a popular fresh popular vote are raised.

Unfortunately, however, he has not given due consideration to the fact that while then Chief Justice of Pakistan Saeed-uz-Zaman Siddiqui made history by becoming one of the few judges by refusing to take oath under PCO following October 1999 coup by General Musharraf, he has hardly vindicated his role in the controversy of Chief Justice Sajjad Ali Shah which ended in the latter’s unceremonious exit from the highest office of judiciary in Pakistan earlier.