The art of the impossible

When in 1977 Z A Bhutto went for early elections with a field that represented conventional choices – feudals, pirs, makhdooms and the like – he had to also revert back to a conventional mode of assuring his electoral success; mass-scale rigging. This was to subsequently prove his nemesis in all manners of saying. Many questioned his tactic: with a victory almost assured, because he held such sway on the political scene, why did he have to resort to overkill through manipulation of the poll? We wondered but never got the answer.
The answer to the puzzle lay in his politics. Having shed his ideological brand over the six years that he ruled Pakistan he had gradually reverted into the shell of traditionalism based around a tribal electoral culture and electability. Whatever be the reasons, and there were many – from the insecurity of an in-house competition with the revolutionary ideologues in his party to a less than successful translation of the socialist ideology into practical policy – he sadly found comfort in the bosom of conservatism. That doomed the possibility of shedding conservatism in our political culture.
We have since been in the lap of one Muslim League or another as Pakistan’s default political destiny. Political innovation under an effective leader has at times been the mantra that has trumped this traditional default, but in its absence convention has ruled. Tribalism and electability still reign. With it has remained the proclivity to succeed at all cost in the primordial culture of familial eminence. With such hallowed elitism attached to the process of elections, all is fair game. This is the ethos that drives Pakistan’s electoral politics and the tradition of manipulation in the polls.
What then was the PTI’s challenge of the 2013 elections about? To IK’s mind, as is apparent, he rode the swell of popularity in the mould of ZAB of 1970 but was unable to convert it into as spectacular an electoral success. He failed to recognise a few fundamental differences. One, he did not have a founding ideology that could moor his own beliefs and thus find expression as he went around exhorting people to support him. Two, there wasn’t a germinating idea that could offer those seeking redemption from an exploitative system as an alternate course. His plan was ‘good governance’. Good governance’ is a function, not an ideology, and thus while it can evoke sympathy among the affected it fails to capture their imagination – an essential to begin a movement.
No doubt there were many, perhaps an overwhelming majority, who would agree with IK’s stand against corruption and ill-gotten wealth. But sympathy is one thing, to move people from their traditional choices to a newer phenomenon needs a significantly different scheme. Without a coalescing idea the translation to the level of sweeping an election remained an unfulfilled dream. Consider how ZAB raised the people to the notion of ownership of the lands and the industry ‘away from the fat-cats who had usurped them from the people only to relegate the common man to a position of serf’.
One may take issue with how much ZAB meant of what he said – and he did a considerable to give meaning to his claimed chimes – but there was a coagulating narrative and an effective enunciation. IK lacked such intellectual underpinnings of his exhortations. Running opponents down is hardly a good replacement for a message. Negatives don’t begin a movement; positives do.
Even Prophets had to have a message to wean people away from their known ways into what was new to them. IK’s was a more earthly undertaking that needed rigour and application. Mere charisma can do only so much. Despite IK’s charm his message for the most part remained pedestrian. And his charm alone gave him the seven million who voted in his favour. To make the seven million, there were numerous first-time voters who came out for IK. These mostly consisted of the baboos and the generals who carried an institutional bias against the traditional politician and wished to see them evicted through their own placement largely moulded as an anti-thesis to pocked conventionalism. In place of institutional intervention, they now resorted to a DIY option. Women were the other new entrants to the field of electoral politicking and, without being a gender-alarmist, were driven by their desire to see their prince charming win.
Beyond these two categories there was little to excite and inspire the man on the street or the village. The visible groups which came out for Imran Khan every evening and adorned the 24/7 TV channels may have offered some fresh sights but largely represented the elitist, well-groomed exceptions of Islamabad society who over time became the dominating relational conscience of the IK movement. To the common man then, IK was for the rich and the classy; and this image only got more and more entrenched. Alongside were the real people thronging TuQ’s assembly. The co-location of the surreal and the real became a crass depiction with entirely different origins of the two movements. It did not help IK’s cause.
Then there was the case of the ‘raised finger’; beyond the ‘moving finger’. Both did not oblige. And each of these disappointments added to IK’s frustrations. This is usually when those in the hunt for a weakness in a man get their toe in; each for his own purpose. The more they whispered in his ears, usually before the cameras for all to see, the more he lost the plot. Somewhere along the way he went past the point-of-return. A man who had failed to realise the dream of his life through some basic misperceptions of his capacity and his motives only got sucked into making even more errors. To those from within the party who knew better it became sacrilegious to bring home some reality. The bandwagon of dreams had sped too far into the horizon. He began believing in fables, which were spun by the moment.
In the end those who had pushed him on the road to embarrassment did a Houdini on him. The Judicial Commission became a godsend to escape the strategic cul-de-sac. If the gamble on the commission worked he just might have a kosher chance at things again. If not, it would at least help end the ordeal. Accepting realities is difficult but whenever one does it invariably proves to be an assured beginning, again. That is what IK and the PTI need at the moment. They should stop fighting shadows – or believing them.
Taking a lead from the recommendations of the Judicial Commission, the PTI must work the hardest to change the scope of the political and the electoral landscape. Political cultures rarely change with tsunamis because they are difficult to come by; only application and deliberation with combined wisdom can help change the course. Electoral reforms must not only help a credible electoral process, but must also open up space for non-conventional representation in politics. Where revolutions become a rarity, incremental change if persevered will change the course. Crooks must not be the only ones on the ballot. If IK can help change structures his rather spirited dalliance with the inanity of misplaced agitation may still have given us some positives.
The writer is a retired air-vice marshal, former ambassador and a security and political analyst.
Email: shhzdchdhry@yahoo.com