President's Zardari's ill-fated two-nation tour has finally come to an end and in spite of stiff domestic and international opposition, he did not reduce the visit by a single day. Forced to go on the defensive, the President explained to a sceptic British and Pakistani audience that the Chief Executive of Pakistan is Prime Minister Gilani and the responsibility to deal with the floods devolves on him.
By implication, one is compelled to assume that foreign policy is not the Prime Minister's domain nor indeed the Foreign Minister's who remained in Pakistan during the President's tour. Be that as it may to add insult to injury the chief executive that the President indicated was responsible for the flood relief efforts called on the international community the same day for assistance of 2.5 billion dollars.
The controversy surrounding the trip began with British Prime Minister David Cameron's remarks in India - remarks that were criticised in the UK and Pakistan. The UK critics of Cameron's remarks were members of the recently defeated Labour Party, and several prominent members of the Pakistani community resident in the UK, including MQM chief Altaf Hussain. In Pakistan there has been across the broad condemnation of Cameron's remarks that he reiterated on five different occasions: from the Prime Minister who referred to Cameron's statement as "galling" given that the remarks were made in India, which has angered some Pakistanis as the focus has shifted to the location the remarks were made instead of their content, to the summoning of the British High Commissioner to the Foreign Office, which, according to some media sources, did not lead to the handing over of a written protest, to members of the opposition.
However, what must be galling for the PPP high command other than the party's two co-chairmen is that the focus of international opinion, both in the local and international media, is no longer on Cameron's inopportune and inappropriate remarks but the visit of President Asif Ali Zardari to France and England at a time when the country that voted his party to power is in the grip of severe floods. Casualties have risen to 1600 and the number of those affected, displaced and without any means to feed themselves is being estimated at around 4 million, and rising.
PPP's defence of the timing of the President's visit has been profoundly lacklustre with the exception of some members of the PPP, who are considered to be particularly close to him notably Law Minister Babar Awan, Raja Riaz and the indubitable Fauzia Wahab. And their defence of the President has focused on attacking the sojourn of other Pakistani politicians in the UK rather than providing a potent rationale for the timing of the visit of head of state and de facto head of government. However, to determine whether the President's visit was a success or not it is relevant to first look at Cameron's remarks that sparked off the initial domestic opposition to the timing of the President's UK, as opposed to the French, visit. The reason is obvious: if Cameron's remarks reflect a shift in UK foreign policy, then this necessitates a revisit of our current foreign policy thrust towards the UK.
Cameron's offensive remarks came while on a visit to India trying to sell British goods. His visit was a success from his perspective with the signing of a 775 million dollar deal envisaging the supply of 57 Hawk trainer aircraft by BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce to India's leading aerospace company, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). What has been ignored is that Cameron made at least two errors, one in India and another in Turkey, during his recent foreign tour.
In India the UK authorities had reportedly sought prior approval to announce some funding proposals by Cameron during his visit. The Indians refused to allow this. The reason: the India government was legitimately angered by the recent debate in London over allegations that some of its funds had been "misused" in India, followed by calls for reconsidering aid to New Delhi. India maintained that it is India alone that must take the lead in deciding whether it needs aid at all from countries like the UK. Few Pakistanis would be able to resist drawing comparisons with Pakistani officialdom - civilian and military - to similar claims by the US State Department.
And in Turkey, Cameron declared Gaza as a prison, a statement which angered Israel. This remark was hailed by the Muslim world but can hardly be considered a diplomatic coup in the UK.
Cameron neither referred to India's human rights violations in Kashmir, nor expressed dismay at the refusal of Sonia Gandhi to meet him nor indeed raised any issues while on his visit to Turkey that have been cited by the European Union as impediments to Turkey's entry into that body.
The British newspaper Guardian noted that 'not mentioning Kashmir is as sensible as not mentioning Gaza when discussing the Middle East.' In other words, Cameron had his cake and ate it too: mentioned Gaza while in Turkey and did not mention Kashmir while in India.
His defence, not to the Pakistanis or Zardari, but to domestic opposition to his comments was that he is into plain speaking. However, this plain speaking too account of the political sensitivities of the countries that hosted him.
Cameron stated: "We cannot tolerate in any sense the idea that this country (Pakistan) is allowed to look both ways and is able, in any way, to promote the export of terror, whether to India or whether to Afghanistan or anywhere else in the world." Cameron added: "It should be a relationship based on a very clear message: that it is not right to have any relationship with groups that are promoting terror".
This charge was premised on ISI's reported support sustaining Taliban rule in Afghanistan prior to 9/11. This is well acknowledged. Is ISI still engaged in supporting the Afghan Taliban? The release of over 92,000 documents by WikiLeaks claims that it is. Pakistani sources have hotly denied this and the proof, they argue, is in the fact that Pakistan has become the heaviest victim of terror attacks, 3000 people died in Pakistan in terror attacks as compared to 2000 in Afghanistan. The success of the armed operation in South Waziristan has not come without a very heavy cost that was paid by the large number of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) as well as the rest of the country as the government struggled to pay for the military and social costs of the operation, costs that are not being reimbursed by the international community.
So should President Zardari have gone at this particular time? And what were the landmark achievements, if any, of the trip? With respect to France individual Pakistanis may have strong links to France, and the President certainly owns a much coveted property there which Pakistanis were not aware of prior to his visit, yet official ties are next to negligible. There is certainly a potential for improvement of ties but this, perhaps, was not the time to start. Unfortunately for President Zardari, the details of his meeting with Nicolas Sarkozy came from him and his delegation rather than from the Elysee Palace. There was no joint press conference. In other words, few would be convinced that Franco-Pakistan ties have progressed as a consequence of the trip.
The same pattern was followed by the British government where President Zardari came under a barrage of criticism from the more informed British media. In defence of his two-nation tour on British television, the President sounded garbled and made several grammatical mistakes. He would be wise to acknowledge his own weaknesses and speaking extempore to an audience, especially an audience that is not carefully selected, is not one of his strengths. To argue that President Zardari has sought assistance for the flood victims will hardly hold water as the UK had already announced 5 million pound assistance prior to his arrival.
To invite David Cameron to Pakistan and hope that he would be more sensitive to Pakistani sensibilities while on the visit may well be wishful thinking as we cannot afford to make expensive purchases of British goods given the state of the economy and our very wealthy citizenry are not only already proud owners of palatial estates in the UK but also bank their considerable wealth in that country.
One can only hope that the President and his entourage have learned valuable lessons from this fiasco, however, past precedence shows that the lesson learned is to trust one's coalition partners as well as members of the opposition even less who have remarked negatively on the President's timing for the trip.