Amir Mateen
Islamabad: It was perhaps the darkest chapter in our parliamentary history. Military dictators may have packed it off several times but they never desecrated the Parliament while it was in session.
Nearly 100 parliamentarians, with an equal number of journalists and hundreds of officials were kept hostage for hours. The only layers between the hostages and hundreds of largely PAT workers were that of uniformed people. Actually, the police and the Frontier Constabulary thinned out to see the agitators shaking the grilled gates to bring them down. This was after Tahirul Qadri roared from his podium to seal Parliament and “let nobody come in or go out.”  The khakis saved the day for the besieged parliamentarians. An army officer had to warn the raging mobsters on microphone to back off.
The very spectacle of khakis guarding the inner entrance of Parliament, snipers on rooftop, was painful. Ironically, it was being saved from the very people it was supposed to represent. It was also the first time that we entered the Parliament, almost as thieves, from a side door of the Cabinet block with one eye towards the PAT desperados.
So it made sense that the parliamentarians were furious. Mahmood Khan Achakzai suggested that Imran and Company should be summoned before the Privilege Committee for insulting the august House. PML (N)’s Obaidullah Shadikhel, who got elected on the Mianwali seat vacated by Imran Khan, claimed that he knew from experience that “Imran Khan can only be sorted out through the use of brute force.” He almost suggested that the rebels be wiped off as they did it in the Tiananmen Square. Others came out with Cromwellian solutions of hanging them at some stage. Still others reconciled to a meek resolution condemning the act. However, the biggest worry was: how to get out of there. There was some panic when the news came in that they were in a hostage situation.
I was lucky to survive because I was right on the gate when the army people saved me from PAT mobsters as their Messiah had declared the Parliament inmates as fair meat to be “hunted.” Though, as always, he later denied that he ever asked his workers to encircle Parliament. I was the first one to use the back gate that passes through the Presidency. Lucky that I never got the chance to see President Mamnoon Hussain on the way! A beeline of parliamentarians followed me to escape through the Parliament.
All this happened just because 38 MNAs in a Parliament of 447 members, had gathered a mob outside to pressure the Prime Minister to resign and to dissolve the National Assembly. It did not matter that the entire spectrum of political parties, except Sheikh Rasheed and Pervaiz Elahi, opposed the demand. It was also opposed by the civil society, at least three provinces and even PTI allies like Jamat-i-Islami. Welcome to Imranism!
Obviously Imran Khan had landed himself into a dead end. He could still salvage himself by, as a US General advised in Vietnam, “declaring victory and then withdraw.” Imran Khan can claim a few gains. He energised his workers, gave them a taste and hope of more power. He got the PML (N) government bend on its knees, pressuring it to form a judicial commission to investigate the rigging charges. The shape and terms of the commission can change if somebody has problems with that. Imran Khan could extract a few more concessions if he withdrew his maximalist demand of Prime Minister’s resignation. In the process, he has also virtually wiped off whatever was left of the PPP in Punjab. Now it’s a straight PML (N)-PTI fight in the heartlands of five rivers.
Imran has definitely dented the arrogant attitude of the PML (N) besides pushing the political discourse to right issues. This may be a win-win situation for every body.
The losses may be bigger if he refuses to budge. If the PML (N) government manages to get out of the crisis the PTI might just be biggest casualty. It may lose its seats in the National Assembly, which will also mean that it will not have any say in the electoral reforms for which it started the whole thing. This also means that the next elections will also remain controversial and the polity is not likely to recover from the instability. This might be the reason that the PTI is yet to file its resignations to the Speaker. And the government might take time to accept them. For this might just push the PTI into further desperation. The PTI is all set to lose its government in Peshawar and will need PML (N) help to save it from the no-confidence motion. For all we know the PML (N) could persuade JI to choose its own Chief Minister with a possible forward bloc from the PTI. This could give a big jolt to the PTI – as many of its MNAS, heartbroken because of forced resignations, might just leave the party.
The only way the PTI can succeed is if there is large-scale violence leading to military intervention. The PML (N) government, after the debacle in Model Town, played a master shot by not confronting the PTI/PAT hordes – much to the chagrin of Sheikh Rasheed/Tahirul Qadri and his cohorts.
But if it came to violence or military intervention, though unlikely, the blame would largely rest on Imran’s shoulders.
The biggest lesson for Imran Khan is that next time when somebody uses the name of Rawalpindi to dupe him into a difficult situation he should check a hundred times. The air marshal who was the bridge between Tahirul Qadri and Aabpara, as he told a meeting in my presence, had failed to rope Imran in the PAT rally last year. This time the persuasion was more convincing but something went wrong. Either the messenger was fake or the Skipper could not gather the required number. Or may be things and times may also have changed. We just hope that this might be the last of the D-Chowk rallies. The Parliament should legislate to stop it if it wants to save itself from becoming hostage next time. By the way the air marshal was all over media today but seemed to have changed his position.
The News
August 21, 2014