SUNDAY April 18, 2021
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY Page 3
3D printing allows you to make multiple changes at a low cost — Ovais Qureshi
2.5 % of Pakistan’s GDP is spent on the country’s education sector
DEFENCE & SECURITY
LAW & JUSTICE
Page 4
Page 8
Ditching the Russian deal would irreversibly harm India’s partnership — Andrew Korybko
Judicial overreach transforms the judicial role into that of legislation — Justice Shah
BEST LAID PLANS By Naveed Hussain | Design by: Umar Waqas
After whipping up a political storm midway into Imran Khan’s tenure, the PDM has run aground almost. The Express Tribune dissects what went wrong with the multiparty opposition alliance and whether it was doomed from the start
T
The Pakistan Democratic Movement has died an unceremonious death. While the Pakistan Peoples Party rang the death knells, the Awami National Party wrote the sorry epitaph to the opposition alliance that whipped up a political storm, which, at one stage, threatened to sweep away the beleaguered government. For its supporters, the PDM’s demise must be painful because nobody gave a eulogy to celebrate its six-odd months’ momentous struggle to wrest back civilian control of power. More painful must be the ongoing rancorous exchanges and verbal dueling among the opposition politicians who had had each other’s backs until recently. The rare bonhomie has quickly evaporated into the thin air. And souring relations have laid bare old scars and reopened unhealed wounds. The PDM’s undramatic collapse – not even conceivable only a few weeks ago – has left many scratching their heads about what went wrong with the alliance that had brought together 11 disparate parties to put up a formidable challenge to the government of Imran Khan, which they considered as an appendage of the miltablishment. The PDM was a strange potpourri of right-wing politicoreligious groups, centrist and left-of-centre mainstream parties as well as secular nationalists. Supporters hailed it as a new political awakening to win “true democracy” in the country. But critics called it an unnatural alliance, doomed from the beginning. The government, meanwhile, mocked it as a tempest in a teapot stirred up by a “clique of the corrupt” in an effort to escape accountability for their financial shenanigans. The PDM was not the first, and would not be the last,
The inclusive alliance owed its success to the political acumen of Fazl and the political naivety and self-aggrandisement of PM Khan
movement of its kind. It was the latest in a number of alliances cobbled together by political parties for the “restoration of real democracy” in a country mired in a chronic civil-military tug of war. The alliance was significant in more ways than one. Firstly, the PDM espoused a radical narrative of former three-time prime minister Nawaz Sharif, who is currently in London supposedly for the treatment of some undiagnosed illness. Sharif, who blames the military for his unceremonious exit from power, believes the miltablishment is responsible for the country’s current economic morass. And he believed the PDM could trigger radical changes in the nature of the state by shifting the centre of power from Rawalpindi to Islamabad. He unleashed frontal attacks on the establishment – sometimes naming the generals – in his virtual addresses at the PDM events. His vitriol quickly stole the media spotlight. These tirades were unprecedented because Sharif was himself a protégé of military dictator Gen Ziaul Haq. And the miltablishment consistently played him off against other political parties, especially the PPP. Secondly, the PDM brought together almost all opposition parties – including bitter traditional rivals of the past – on one platform, leaving Prime Minister Khan politically isolated. The coming together of the PPP and the PML-N made the alliance a potent threat for the embattled government. At the same time, the PDM also provided an opportunity to peripheral nationalist groups from KhyberPakhtunkhwa and Balochistan – who, chronically disillusioned by the state, have traditionally treated Punjab as a synonym for the establishment – to speak to people in the heartland of Punjab. The inclusive alliance owed its existence partly to the political acumen of Maulana Fazlur Rehman and partly to the political naivety and narcissistic self-aggrandisement of Prime Minister Khan. Thirdly, the PDM was virtually led by the PML-N, which has its bastion of power in Punjab, the home of the army brass and soldiery. This was the reason when Sharif amped up his anti-establishment rhetoric, Asif Ali Zardari took a dig at him: “My domicile does not offer me such immunity.” And when Sharif explicitly accused two severing generals of “stealing” the 2018 elections for the PTI, Bilawal BhuttoZardari quipped: “I’m sure Mian Sahib has credible evidence to back up his allegations.” Liberal political observers agree
The governing party was convinced that internal contradictions would not allow the PDM to pose an existential threat that nationalist groups from smaller provinces were demonised as “traitors” only for voicing their disillusionment with the state, let alone saying things that Sharif says. Fourthly, the PDM generated a lot of political momentum with successful power shows in major cities of the country. Its promise to banish the establishment from politics, fired up people’s imaginations and projected the PDM as a genuine opposition. The sky-high inflation and exorbitant consumer prices resulting from lack of governance and economic mismanagement added to the vocal popular support for the PDM. Meanwhile, Maulana Fazlur Rehman, who is driven by deep-seated loathing of Prime Minister Khan, did not let the alliance slack off. These jalsas did not cause jitters, though government ministers would come out without fail to respond to the PDM criticism after every rally. The PDM demanded ouster of Prime Minister Khan. Their real target, however, were his military backers. Sharif and his political heir apparent Maryam Nawaz repeatedly said their struggle was not against the “selected prime minister” but against the “selector” – a not-so-veiled reference to the establishment. The ruling party was convinced that internal contradictions would not allow the PDM to pose an existential threat to the government. It decided to let the alliance roll on and fizzle out. However, a shocking drubbing in the Senate elections threw the government off balance. Prime Minister Khan appeared clearly shaken during his televised address the next day. He decided to take a fresh vote of confidence from parliament to reassert his legitimacy. The PDM relished its success. Not for too long, though. Its
leaders started squabbling publicly over the spoils. And the subsequent defeat of their candidate for Senate chairman’s slot set off a blame game within the alliance as all component parties looked askance at each other. The defeat was embarrassing because the alliance had clear numerical superiority in the house. And this is what led to the PDM’s ‘implosion’. But critics believe a number of factors led to the falling apart of the nascent alliance. Firstly, the PDM was fraught with chronic distrust, especially between its two main component parties. The PPP and the PML-N had an unenviable relationship in the past. And senior leaders from both parties made no secret of this mutual distrust. Khawaja Asif said in a televised talkshow that he was unable to “trust this gentleman, Asif Zardari”, even if tried to. Similarly, Aitzaz Ahsan would openly express his loathing of the ‘untrustworthy’ Nawaz Sharif. While the PML-N and the JUI-F pushed for bringing down the whole system by resigning en masse from the assemblies before marching on the capital, the PPP did not agree. It had a lot at stake.
PDM was fraught with distrust, especially between its two main component parties. PPP and PML-N had an unenviable relationship Zardari did not want to give up his party’s government in Sindh, which has traditionally been the PPP’s political powerhouse. He knew that once out of power, it would be difficult for the PPP to reclaim Sindh, where the PTI has been making inroads. Zardari also knew that his party’s political survival hinges on its presence in power. The PPP flaunts the 18th constitutional amendment, which reversed a military ruler’s attempts to centralise power in the indirectly elected office of the presidency, as its achievement. CONTINUED ON PAGE 2