Daily Times

PPP Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari has been acquitted in the last pending reference against him by an accountability court. The development comes at a time when National Accountability Court (NAB) is set to file corruption references against ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. With general elections only a year away, the timing of the acquittal is certainly significant. PTI chief Imran Khan has already termed it a result of a deal between the ruling party and the PPP.

After Zardari’s 2015 speech against military establishment, many feared the PPP would have a hard time undergoing a revival since it had angered the establishment. But upon his return to Pakistan last year after an 18-month stay in Dubai, Zardari went into appeasement mode.

Some analysts believe Zardari now has friendlier relations with the establishment given the PPP refrained from standing with Nawaz Sharif after his disqualification the way it had been standing with him during the 2014 Islamabad sit-in by PTI and PAT demanding the former PM’s resignation.

This could mean the party has realised that the reconciliation policy is not working, especially in Punjab where several bigwigs have left the party in the last few years. It appears that the PPP is now all set to prepare for the upcoming elections and will also be ready to compromise on its ideological principles if need be.

The acquittal will certainly help the party during its election campaign as PPP leaders have always maintained that all corruption cases against Zardari were politically motivated. Having said that, Zardari and Bilawal should know the fastest way to revive PPP across the country remains efforts that can improve governance in the province that the party has been ruling for the last 8 years. Furthermore, the PPP needs to set an agenda especially for Pakistan’s young, uneducated voters if it really wants to revive it’s position as a popular national party. Brokering deals with the establishment will only dent its credibility further. We hope that the party’s young Chairman will avoid that short cut and accordingly advise his elders including his father.*

Published in Daily Times, August 29^th 2017.