Ado about nothing

Of late the national landscape has been taken by storm of intense political activity - the kind of vista that generally obtains during the run-up to election. Incidents of politicians deserting their parties, some of them of their own free will or lured by irresistible offers and being shown the door on charges of disloyalty and or to forestall and pre-empt possibility of missing the last bus, are being received from all over the country.
But the PPP-led coalition government isn't greatly impressed by these developments, as after some wavering during the early phase of NRO hearing it seems to have firmed up its stand that election won't be held anytime sooner than the end of its tenure on March 18, 2013. The other day when asked if the government was in touch with Opposition over formation of interim set-up by the end of the year, Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira's reply was quite categorical, yes there would be an interim government but after the end of government's five-year term and that set-up will hold general election. Not only that he also blew off his palm the PML-N's much ballyhooed list of potential caretaker prime minister, saying it would be "too early" for consultations.
That legal and constitutional position as stated by the information minister may be right but how does he explain the logic of his party chief's series of meetings with the party leaders and his periodic exhortations to prepare for elections. Of particular interest is his recent visit to Lahore and his hurrah that next Punjab government would be of the PPP. In fact, the reality on the ground is that not only the PPP but all other parties are feverishly engaged in realigning their positions and that is being done at as basic a level as the constituencies.
Thanks to the rising tempo of mud-slinging, corruption allegations, lotaism and ideological networking parties are being buffed by incidents of what in national political idiom is called 'politics of jorr-torr'. The PTI, for instance, which unleashed 'tsunami' in the wake of its Lahore rally early this year and had witnessed senior politicians bee-lining for its door is now confronted with the challenge of desertions. Despite repeated attempt to revive MMA the JUI (F) has not succeeded but that failure is being perfectly compensated by its growing ranks in southern Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa where the PPP and the ANP have lost to it some of their proven electable members. The PML-Q's case is not very different either, while the PML-N is both losing and gaining. As the MQM remains intact its principal ally, PPP, is confronted with challenge of erosion in its home ground to contending nationalists.
And the people of Pakistan are hapless, powerless spectators to this political merry-go-round, as their hopes and aspirations don't match. Even when the government tries playing cool over the question of early elections it is committed, whole-time and exclusively, to win another term at any cost. Add to this the superior judiciary's sticking to its policy of seen-to-have-been delivered justice the government functioning is being held hostage to its single-purpose goal of political survival. The truth is that all of it on the part of political elite of the country is anti-people. General election is not in sight anytime before March next year there is no justification whatsoever for the political stakeholders to create theatrics that dilute the government focus on the problems the man in street faces on day-to-day basis. Then there are other impossibilities to early elections, the one most critical being that final electoral rolls are not yet ready. Then there is the issue of enfranchising dual-nationals. Let the Election Commission of Pakistan put in place the best-possible arrangements to hold fair, free and transparent elections - for nothing short of that would work and help restore people's faith in democracy.