Mamnoon spoke in parliament in line with demands of his office

ISLAMABAD: The parliamentary speech of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s President (Mamnoon Hussain), delivered on Wednesday, was entirely different from the addresses of self-styled defenders of national interests, who had occupied this exalted office and imposed themselves on the nation with the force of domineering power attached to their official positions.

As the incumbent president did not even touch any controversial issue or make any adverse remarks on any aspect of governance, his speech was listless and drab for the opposition parties. They wanted him to speak their language. It was expecting too much from a Head of State like Mamnoon Hussain.

The opposition wished that the president should have spoken on the offshore companies identified in the Panama Papers disclosures or named otherwise, and the May 21 drone attack in Noshki, Balochistan, in which Afghan Taliban chief Mulla Akhtar Mansour along with a taxi driver was killed. This is a subject for the government to deal with.

Not only Rafiq Tarar, who was selected for this berth back in the nineties, was as a stickler for rules, but Mamnoon Hussain is no different from him. Both just read out the texts provided to them by the government. This is what every president ought to do as required under the Constitution and law because he has to only narrate the performance of the government during the outgoing year and spell out its policies and plans in the new year in different areas.

Nawaz Sharif has proved to be lucky that none of his preferences, chosen after a lot of care and deliberations, made him pass sleepless night through their divisive speeches in the parliament or remarks at their pressers. Mamnoon Hussain has no obsession to get massive coverage. Tarar was precisely of the same type.

Ironically, the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) was unlucky to have preferred its ‘time-tested’ loyalist, Farooq Leghari, as its president, who subsequently turned out to be its nemesis to the extent that he sent its government packing and framed grave corruption charges against the Prime Minister (Benazir Bhutto) he had dismissed. He was very fond of high-watt publicity to dominate the government and always felt that he knows each and everything much better than anyone in the government.

However, the PPP regime had an unprecedented smooth sailing and faced no bombardment from the Presidency when it was occupied by its chief, Asif Ali Zardari. President Zardari was also the virtual prime minister because all principal decisions were taken in his office. He directly ran the government and no prime minister ever dared to defy him. Therefore, question of any rift or split did not arise during all its whole five-year tenure (2008-2013).

In his three speeches delivered in a row over as many years, Mamnoon Hussain strictly followed what the Nawaz Sharif government furnished him. Not even once, did he create any minor or major problem for it. Instead, he approves the government policies and keeps highlighting them whenever he finds an opportunity to do so.

In his parliamentary addresses, Tarar had also never whipped up any dispute to embarrass Nawaz Sharif. The day his government was dismissed by General Pervez Musharraf in October 1999 through military coup, Tarar wanted to immediately quit but had to continue as president because he was asked by the Sharif family to stay. He used to stoutly defend the government.

It had gone to Farooq Leghari’s head that only he was the defender and proponent of the national interests and the Benazir Bhutto government was playing havoc with them in every field. He had entrenched himself above the government and tried to become the virtual ruler. This obsession got him out of office when he tried to repeat his policy vis-à-vis the next government headed by Nawaz Sharif. He conspired with the then Supreme Court chief justice to topple it but failed. Finally, he had to leave the office unceremoniously.

Pervez Musharraf and Ziaul Haq, who seized the offices of the president through fake public referendums, followed by military coups, always nursed the strong conviction that they were the only defenders of national interests while the civilian governments they had contrived were just a bunch of buffoons and self-seekers.

Contrary to the parliamentary speeches of Nawaz Sharif’s presidents and Zardari, such addresses of Musharraf and Ziaul Haq used to revolve around self-aggrandisement. They were mostly charge-sheets against and served as torpedoes for the civilian governments. This was inherent devastating defect in the quasi-civilian arrangement. This happened only when the president was all powerful, having discretionary powers to dismiss the government, dissolve the National Assembly, and appoint services chiefs. This authority was actually meant to emasculate the civilian dispensation and make the nominees of the establishment as the main decision-makers.

Ghulam Ishaq Khan, who was always a trusted nominee of the establishment, was no different from Musharraf and Ziaul Haq. During his five-year incumbency, he never allowed any civilian government to breathe smoothly and kept jumping down its throat on every available opportunity. He also always thought that the national interest was what he follows and states. His term kept creating political chaos and anarchy, making Pakistan a laughing stock around the globe.