Nawaz Sharif: date with destiny?
By:Dr Farooq Hassan
It is clear from the Western media reports one gets the clear
feeling that PML-N Quaid Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif's entry into
power is about to occur. His stature seems so assured that hardly a
day passes without someone important from abroad seeking time from
him for an audience. This is quite different from his position back
in February 2008 when I had travelled to Pakistan simultaneously
with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee just before the then
scheduled general elections of February 18, 2008.
The then leader of this delegation Senator Joe Biden, and now the
vice president of the United States which also included Senator John
Forbes Kerry, the current chief of the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee had a different agenda in that visit as then they just
wanted to see him. It is clear that from the start when he was one
of the major players of the national political horizon, Nawaz Sharif
is now 'favourite' of the foreign analysts to lead the country.
He has been greatly helped in realising that exclusivity of status
by the poor performance of the incumbent president. It is of
significance to realise that in this period Pakistan itself has been
made the target of highly focused attention by Washington in which
it is considered that the continuity of the US interests in this
region is in jeopardy. Two famous quotes of President Barack Hussein
Obama are sufficient to emphasise this point. First the American
president has said that "Pakistan is the most dangerous country in
the world" and secondly his emphasis that the Pakistani government
now led by the PPP made a fundamental "mistake in entering into a
deal" with the militants in the Swat valley.
The approval of Nizam-e-Adl Regulation by the federal government had
provided an added impetus to the consolidation of the Swat peace
deal. This deal came after more than a year of sporadic fighting in
which the armed forces of the country made a heavy going. In
addition the western media, far being convinced that the deal could
have some beneficial aspects, instead dubbed it to be the abject
failure of the administration. A paradoxical atmosphere of mistrust
between security forces and the militants was given tremendous
perhaps exaggerated coverage by the Western media making it the main
cause through which a few extremist commanders of the Taliban,
outside of Malakand Division, had emphasised on the expansion of the
Taliban's influence. The Taliban and the people of Malakand were
being conditioned to believe that their 'peace deal' was under
constant threat as the same media constantly condemned the Swat
'peace deal', mocked the idea of Islamic (Qazi) courts, and the
media trial of the Nizam-e-Adl ordinance. It is this emerging
scenario in which the thinkers of US foreign policy are apparently
operating. After the commencement of recent operations by the
Pakistan Army in that area which has resulted in the creation of
more than a million refugees and about a 1000 militants dead, it is
considered that Nawaz Sharif may now be the man Washington was
looking for. Why? He has the capacity, it is argued, with his
pro-Islamic credentials to somehow paddle through these troubled
times that ensures that the army continues its vital demolition
campaign against this militancy, keep the overall acceptability of
the Western interest alive in the rest of the country and also is
'reliable'. |
