Politics is about never acknowledging serious mistakes and Pakistani politicians have displayed this tendency like their counterparts in the rest of the world. However while in the West politicians' focus is on the defence of their policies and their far from salutary outcomes yet in this country the defence is for serious crimes be they on charges of tax evasion, money laundering, accepting commissions on the award of contracts, changing regulatory orders to benefit a political family or indeed murder or terrorism. And their defence: claims of political victimisation.
Claiming victimisation allows our politicians to self righteously deny any wrongdoing and this has been consistently the defence by our politicians, democrats and autocrats alike. To-date no political party is immune from charges of engaging in illegal activity: Musharraf is embroiled in murder cases as is the MQM (though the National Reconciliation Ordinance wiped the slate clean as it did on corruption charges of PPP leadership), the PPP of corruption and establishing a militant/criminal wing after the assassination of its charismatic leader Benazir Bhutto, the PML-N of manipulating statutory regulatory orders to benefit the Sharif family, continuing to defy public procurement rules, refusing to undertake policy decisions that have an input from relevant experts at the cost of the tax payers (examples include the Nandipur power project, claims of untold natural resources in Chiniot) and the most serious charge of all - of being responsible for the Model Town tragedy which killed several Pakistan Awami Tehrik workers last year, the PTI of attacking the prime minister's house last year, the JUI (F) of a partiality to winning diesel contracts, and the ANP's corruption during its tenure in 2008-13 was the subject of even foreign reports. Our politicians continue to ignore the proverb where there is smoke there is fire and post Musharraf there appears to be complicity between the PML-N and the PPP to go slower than a snail in proactively investigating charges of corruption against their leadership - an unfortunate outcome of the Charter of Democracy.
Pakistan in its 68-year history has been led by military dictators for longer than civilian elected governments which have been few and far between. To gain legitimacy, after the first civilian government of Z A Bhutto was summarily dismissed, military dictators relied on three major political forces in the country to consolidate power and don the ill fitting garb of being democrats: the wooing and subsequent splintering of Pakistan Muslim League politicians (which explains why this party amongst all others has the largest number of factions) together with some from within the PPP ranks eager to join the government for personal gain (seeking ministerial and other positions and exemption from active litigation on charges of corruption or other serious crimes); MQM support for the ubiquitous establishment, a support that allowed Musharraf to destabilise Karachi on 12th May 2007 - yet another black day in the history of this country. However frequent apologies by the MQM chief Altaf Hussain are exclusively for the language used rather than for actions taken.
The legacy of post-Bhutto dictators namely Ziaul Haq and Musharraf has been extremely damaging for the country in not only fuelling fundamentalism and its offshoot militancy but they are also accountable for an appalling state of the economy today. While supporters of the two men may point out legitimately that foreign assistance during their tenures skyrocketed and compares more than favourably with inflows during civilian governments' tenures yet the credit for this lies in Afghanistan's politics. The invasion of the country by the USSR in 1979 and its exit in February 1989 allowed Ziaul Haq legitimacy internationally, though the country continues to reel under his flawed Afghan policy; while Musharraf got his international legitimacy after 9/11/2001 - two years after his coup d'etat - as the Afghan Taliban continued to provide sanctuary to the perpetrators of the attack namely al Qaeda. In addition MQM was birthed during Ziaul Haq's government and it was a key supporter of Musharraf during his entire tenure with the dictator going so far as to ban entry to Karachi of some politicians including Imran Khan on instructions from the MQM.
Economically the two dictators claimed higher growth rates (than during the tenures of their civilian counterparts) but unfortunately that claim was not been backed by either: (i) improved social and physical infrastructure that increased the percentage benefiting or formulation or implementation of policies/projects designed to meet the estimated rise in the gap between supply and demand in the energy, water, education and health sectors; or (ii) improved governance structure of key entities requiring urgent reforms including the Federal Board of Revenue which relies on taxes on petroleum and products to the tune of 20 percent of total revenue and the tax structure continues to be anomalous and unfair. The dictators, like their civilian counterparts today, did not institute cases against their political supporters, only against their opponents. Had they provided justice equally to all or indeed insisted on politically challenging reforms in the power and tax sectors we would have been in a better situation than we are today.
Neither Ziaul Haq's heirs, with critics placing Nawaz Sharif in that category as well, nor Musharraf's are willing to admit that their policies were flawed - a tendency that is also displayed by parties that supported the two dictators. Noteworthy in this category is the MQM which emerged during the Musharraf dictatorship on a stronger and at the same time a weaker wicket - stronger because the party was granted physical control of Karachi and Hyderabad with the consensus being that its performance was exemplary under the able leadership of Mustafa Kamal, but weaker morally because of its decision to support Musharraf's call for a show of strength on 12th May 2007 during which a large number of people were killed and media offices attacked though it denies any involvement. Rumours of MQM complicity in crimes ranging from extortion to murder, talked of in muted terms before, have now begun to be talked of openly with the March 2015 raid on Nine-Zero (and the resulting accusations by criminals turned approvers, extensive video and purportedly documentary records appropriated by the Rangers, as well as the Rangers anger at threats by party leader); and arrest and bail of a close associate of Altaf Hussain in London Muhammad Anwar which is not that easy to be dismissed as victimisation. An apology in this case would be legal and political suicide however there is a need to delink the militant wing from the party. There appears to be no evidence that this is on the cards yet.
The PML (N) and the PPP emerged from the immediate post-Musharraf era strong and vibrant, however, post-2008-13 the PPP emerged considerably weakened due to appallingly poor performance and reports of mega scams while the PML-N, two years into power, has weakened itself for the same reason: poor performance. Nawaz Sharif's team, by and large the same as during his previous two administrations, is following policies of the 1990s when the party was last in power. Thus his economic czar, Ishaq Dar, is equating increasing external indebtedness with support of the international community for his policies - a flawed argument as donor support is linked to his taking us on an IMF programme - and rising reliance on commercial domestic borrowing which is raising the cost of living index. His manipulation of the rupee rate is impacting negatively on exports but showing lower annual principal and interest payments and data shows a picture that is rosier than reality. The energy trio - Khawaja Asif, Abid Sher Ali and Shahid Khaqan Abbasi - have not improved governance and the LNG contract from Qatar has become as controversial as the rental power projects mainly because of the secrecy that shrouds the deal.
There is no doubt accepting the range of criminal charges against their leadership is the way forward for any party simply because that would be tantamount to not only political suicide but also legal suicide. However one must acknowledge former President Zardari's immeasurable contribution to democracy in the country as, by completing his five-year tenure, he allowed the public to vote on the basis of performance for the first time in the country's history as opposed to the past practice of political parties rejuvenating themselves through summary dismissals by army strongmen. This feat, to remain in power for five years, incidentally required President Zardari to not only back down whenever the establishment required him to, on occasions with severe loss of face, but to have his policy of reconciliation labelled publicly as the policy of unlimited crime. (The views expressed in this article are not necessarily those of the newspaper).
However what is disturbing is that no lessons have been learned and parties continue to engage in the same activities as before: the PML(N) in flawed economic policies, lack of timely decision-making and violating public procurement rules (though the party has backed down from a confrontational stance with the establishment in recent months), the PPP in corruption and disregard for the people that voted for it (for example the continuing deaths in Tharparkar), and the MQM in claiming victimisation (though Saulat Mirza's wife is charging the party with threatening her and her family). Perhaps Imran Khan would take a lesson from this: that while change in one's private life is immediate yet on socio-economic and political life it is painstakingly slow.