The floods, the politico-judicial crisis and an economy more and more resembling a rollercoaster. These have been the main themes of our misfortunes this summer. In terms of their relative gravity, it is a hard pick. Any one of these could be dangerous enough to rock the government. Combined, the three can rock the state and society as well. The leadership should be scrambling to find solutions and save the people, in whose name they govern, from a great convulsion. But that does not seem to be the case.
Those in government like to believe that they should buy time and things may just work out. In any case, they send daily SOS signals to the international community to bail us out. They think that the US and its allies will not let a nuclear-armed country of 170 million threatened by Islamic militants, or go under.
People wonder if Pakistan’s political class follows any norms, or if it just follows the basic instinct to survive, bending the rules and regulations to cater to the growing pyramid of needs of its members. Another of their failings is the lack of a will to learn from the past. The country’s largest parties refuse to draw lessons from their own negative experiences.
The media, particularly television’s anchormen and the growing number of anchorwomen, are ever so eager to speculate about the government’s imminent fall. By fast-forwarding Musharraf’s downfall, they have tasted blood. Nothing will now satisfy them other than seeing governments’ downfalls.
But in all fairness to the media, the rulers themselves provide grist to the mills of political forecasters. Unfortunately for them, the press does not particularly like those governments which stay in office after their “best-before” date has passed in popular perception.
The result of the media’s ongoing “offensive” against President Zardari is that he has “dug in,” projecting himself as a potential martyr.
Our present government is under intense pressure, but it seems in no mood to try turning things around by seriously addressing the issues which have made it unpopular. Of the multiple challenges today, the state of our economy is the most worrying.
If we are to believe the media reports, Mr Zardari has said “no” to setting an example by trimming the size of “his” cabinet. If the Presidency, the Prime Minister’s House and the cabinet do not cut their expenses, how do they expect the legislature and civil administration down the line to tighten their belts?
Two years of democratic profligacy should be enough to start course correction now. Like justice should be seen to be done, elected rulers must prove their capacity to govern, not only before elections but everyday of their rule. It does not help to shy away from tackling price hikes, reject expert advice and take shelter by accusing the technocrats for having ambitions to rule the country.
Prime Minister Gilani may be justified in advising the technocrats to contest elections if they want to rule the country but what should we make of India’s second-longest-serving prime minister who has yet to be elected to the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian parliament.
Manmohan Singh’s party leader has no hesitation to keep him in office as a member of the upper house. It is not clear how keen our technocrats are to be in the hot seat but they do expect the rulers to draw some lines while resisting technical advice in matters of taxation and revenue collection. Time is running out fast for controlling financial haemorrhage in the name of democracy.