Daily Times

Sir: I remember back in the day, professional freelance politicians who were considered crucial for winning elections were called ghoras or horses owing to the term ‘horse-trading’.

Over time, our political jargon evolved, and such politicians were given a more derogatory name, lotas. Now our jargon has evolved once more, owing to Imran Khan’s defence of how the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) distributed party tickets, in which he said “electables were needed to win elections”.

It is clear that such dirty politics will continue as long as laws aren’t introduce to restrict the practice of horse-trading before elections. All that will change is what we call it. These ‘electables’ are opportunists who take advantage of the work of loyal party workers.

To stop this practice, laws should be introduced which ensure that once a person formally joins a political party, he should be made to serve that party and that party alone, for a period of no less than ten years.

IQBAL TARIQ

Kasur

Published in Daily Times, June 27^th 2018.