In science, a vacuum is ‘space devoid of matter’. In politics, inflation, unemployment and gross mis-governance create a political vacuum. Science has it that nature abhors a vacuum. Politics, just like nature, also abhors a vacuum. Science cannot be separated from politics – and a political vacuum is “when someone has lost control of something and no one has replaced them.” To be certain, “economic policy does not occur in a political vacuum” – and Pakistan is a living example of it.
Vacuums devour state authority. Investors do not invest in a vacuum. Bureaucrats do not work in a vacuum. Governments cannot implement reforms in a vacuum. Policy changes cannot take place in a vacuum. Even if the PTI knew the ‘ideal economic policy’, it would not be able to implement it in a vacuum (read: without the help of other political players). There’s no stability in a vacuum – and citizen-state trust takes leave.
Lo and behold, mafias – sugar, electricity and wheat – love vacuums because a Robin Hood-in reverse comes into play whereby money gets sucked out of the pockets of the already-poor into the pockets of the already-rich (over the past two years, an estimated Rs3,000 billion has been sucked out of the pockets of the already-poor into the pockets of the already-rich).
In science, forces ‘rush in’ to fill the vacuum as soon as it is created. The PTI-induced inflation, unemployment and gross mis-governance created a vacuum. First, the establishment got sucked in and now the opposition is ‘rushing in’. The ground reality is that the joint opposition has nothing new to offer to a common Pakistani and stands united based on vested interests-not on a common ideology. Yes, the vacuum – inflation, unemployment and mis-governance – is playing to the opposition’s advantage.
For the record, this is stagflation’s third consecutive year (stagflation means a high rate of inflation in tandem with high unemployment). The mother of all questions is if the current status quo – that comprises rampant inflation, unemployment, mis-governance and extreme political polarization – can be sustained (and sustained at what economic cost)? Or, how will the current status quo serve our collective national interest? Or, how is the current status quo serving our national security interests? At the same time, the opposition cannot be allowed to create chaos and disorder.
The power vacuum – the root cause of which is rampant food inflation, unemployment and mis-governance – risks heightened violence. Yes, sustaining the vacuum has an economic cost. Yes, letting the opposition create chaos and disorder also has an economic cost. Ideally, both these costs must be minimized. Ideally, both the government and the opposition must not climb up the escalatory ladder (which they are).
All our national actors need to jointly devise a strategy to end the current rather awfully dangerous deadlock via mediation, facilitation, dialogue, negotiations, inclusion and reconciliation. The vacuum, to be certain, is a national security vulnerability. We need to end this zero-sum political stalemate. We need to arrive at ‘practical and peaceful solutions to our problems’. We need to arrive at a ‘shared vision of the future’. "The real problem is the vacuum – not so much the opposition.
The writer is a columnist based in Islamabad.
Email: farrukh15@hotmail.com Twitter: @saleemfarrukh
