US diplomat says Shahbaz Sharif personifies vision and ability to deliver success

LONDON: America’s former Consulate General in Lahore Zachary V. Harkenrider has said that Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif’s vision and management skills are unmatched and he never came across any other leader of his energy and capability.

Zachary Harkenrider served in Pakistan from summer 2013 to summer 2016 as United States Consul General in Lahore where he was responsible for all U.S. Government activities in Punjab Province. He is now working for the United States embassy in London as a senior diplomat.

The US diplomat said in an interview here that he was able to work closely with Shahbaz Sharif during his years as US Counsel General in Lahore and was “tremendously impressed by the man, his leadership skills, his dynamism and vision”.

Zachary V. Harkenrider said that Sharif personifies both the vision and the ability to deliver the vision in practical form. “Its not only his strategic vision of where to take his province but also a practical capacity to implement that vision in the day to day life of his country and his city. That’s something completely unique in my experience in the developing world. I have never seen anyone who is that capable of matching vision and execution as Shahbaz Sharif was”.

The senior US diplomat said that he has served in a “couple of dozens countries” but of all the leaders he met, it was Shahbaz Sharif who left lasting impressions on him.”

“In Shahbaz Sharif I saw both a strategic vision for where to go blended with a dexterity in understanding how to get there, a capacity to implement as well visualise for what the future needed to be. You have got lots of leaders in this world in my country and other countries who are capable of visualising success or where they want to go, they are the people who are very good at implementing projects. Its fairly rare to find somebody who blends both qualities and Shahbaz did that and that’s why I found him quite impressive and unique in my experience,” said the diplomat who served in Lahore and worked closely with the Punjab Chief Minister.

The US diplomat said that Shahbaz Sharif was a “good man and he provided great leadership to the people of Punjab and I tell you that we were working so hard to try to make things a little bit better and try to improve the US-Pakistan relations and try to invest in Pakistan’s success. It was great to have a partner like Shahbaz Sharif who was clearly every effective in getting things done”.

He said that people like Shahbaz Sharif are needed in leadership roles for genuine development. He likened the Punjab Chief Minister with Robert Moses, a character in history of the US city of New York.

“There’s a book called ‘The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York’ by Robert Caro, shows you what that kind of energy can do to transform a city, transform a state to bring together the powers of the government for a collective good wedded to a vision and that’s what I saw in Shahbaz Sharif. I saw in him a man of compelling vision with real leadership skills, real management skills and capacity to translate concepts into action and that’s unique in politics, very few leaders actually have that ability.

Zachary Harkenrider said that there is a whole depth to Lahori and Punjabi culture. “It goes very deep. It has deep historical roots. I am a Persian speaker so I was able to understand some of the cultural foundations of the Punjab. I ran ambassador’s cultural preservation fund and contributed towards conservations and preservations of some of Punjab’s great cultural heritage and historical monuments, from shrines in Multan to mosques in Lahore to support Pakistan’s heritage. I am a historian by background and diplomat by profession. It was a great fusion of our assistance resources and Pakistan’s rich deep history. And it gave me a great appreciation for the country’s texture.”

Zachary Harkenrider, who works in the political section of the US Embassy in London, said that the fact that Pakistan and the US were not happy with each other and asking each other to do more showed that how much both needed depended on each other. He said the US placed tremendous importance to its relations with Pakistan and vice versa. “We work together on shared priorities and not only in the security sphere but in the economic sphere too. The US has provided over 50 billion dollars of assistance, both economic and military to Pakistan in the last 15 years, and that reflects the tremendous priority that we have for relations with your country.”

He said that the US also valued Pakistan because it has the potential to be a great Asian success story. “When I look at the picture of the economic growth that we saw in the last few years, the tremendous success in energy, culture, free media and you name it, this is an Asian success story that’s waiting to happen and I am proud to be part of that. And the emphasis the United States places on Pakistan is not misplaced when you consider the tremendous potential of that country in contributing towards a prosperous Asian future,” said the diplomat.