Not very often in the peacetime that a nation has called upon one of his worthy sons to use his prodigious talents to salvage the country at the brink of precipice; to unite a divided house and a society fragmented by ethnicity, parochial prejudices, religious and theological differences; to remove the dangerous mistrust and doubts among the federating units of the state; to bring about a consensus on national issues; to reduce the alarming gap between the rich and the poor; to invigorate a stagnant economy; to restore the dignity and credibility of the state institutions, modernise the colonial era state structure, reform the decadent and outdated civil services; to eliminate hunger, poverty, disease and ignorance; to give a sense of direction and hope to a people in the wilderness and to protect the life and property of all citizens.
My God! What a frightening task and unending agenda is before Shaukat Aziz, the new Prime Minister of Pakistan.
Shaukat Aziz has performed exceptionally well as Finance Minister during the past five years, and business community and industrialists are quite satisfied with his policies. But being a Prime Minister is a different ball game, altogether.
Shaukat Aziz, 55, son of a government servant was born in Karachi and educated in Rawalpindi and Karachi. He adopted banking as a career and is more familiar with the streets of New York, western social and cultural life than with the rustic and primitive living in any village of Pakistan. So are the paradoxes of the Nature.
Let us scholastically examine and rationally analyse this otherwise interesting scenario. What kind of a state structure and the strata of society Shaukat Aziz would be presiding as Prime Minister of Pakistan.
THEY ARE AS FOLLOWS:
ESTABLISHMENT: On top is the Establishment (civil and military), with a few honourable individual exceptions, as an institution it is suffering from a notion of self-righteous, trained to rule, arbiter and defend Pakistan's ideological and geographical frontiers, promoter, facilitator and protector of political leadership of its own liking, architect of the country's socio-economic policies and adventures, manager of the national economy, an ally of feudal aristocracy and political elite to control the masses and protect the status quo. All previous attempts to modernise it have failed.
FEUDAL ARISTOCRACY AND POLITICAL ELITE: Our colonial rulers installed this feudal aristocracy to perpetuate their rule and tighten their grip over the people.
They were given titles of Nawabs, Khan Bahadurs, Maliks, Waderas, Sardars, Mirs, Chaudhries, Zaildars and Numberdars. They mostly acted as local tyrants and suppressed the people.
Although Father of the Nation, Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah wanted to abolish the feudalism, but he did not live long enough to achieve this goal.
During the past 57 years, all governments and establishments have preserved and protected their perks and privileges, They have their 'safe' family constituencies and to be elected is not a problem for them.
Presently, they dominate the political parties and are the biggest survivalists.
BUSINESS COMMUNITY: Although this community has the money and brains with technical know-how and international exposure, yet it has not played its due role in the national arena.
They have suffered enormously under different regimes due to political instability that has caused mistrust and flight of the capital. Different government departments fleece them. Presently, this community has many doubts about the present set-up.
CLERGY: Earlier, clergy was an oppressed community and dependent on the support of the feudal and the business community. However, since 1977 it has been playing a significant and aggressive role in Pakistan's politics. During General Zia's dictatorship and Afghan War they were richly patronised with the western and Arab money.
In October 2002 Elections, the combination of six religious parties (MMA) did fairly well and now they have their own provincial government in strategic NWFP, and are coalition partners in the other disturbed Balochistan province.
They are closer to masses than any other political party by virtue of their hold of mosques and religious institutions.
PEOPLE: At the bottom are the people. They are small landholders, peasants, farm workers, harries, kammis, labourers, artisans, daily-wage earners, shopkeepers etc.
They form 90 percent of the population but have been criminally ignored by all previous governments.
They suffer from hunger, poverty, illiteracy, ignorance, diseases, unemployment and all kind of miseries and misfortunes. They have nominal share in the resources of the State. A state of despondency and uncertain future surrounds them.
In the first speech after getting vote of confidence in the National Assembly, Shaukat Aziz unfolded his agenda that showed nothing new or any shift in previous policy or strategy.
Some analysts say that from the earlier policies of Shaukat Aziz only big business has benefited and the poor suffered the most; so there might be not any big change.
Allah Almighty has already given Shaukat Aziz a second life. Therefore, the poor people will keenly watch what he makes out of his Second Coming.