Daily Times

I must admit that I am a nobody when it comes to domestic politics back home. As a very ordinary observer, I look up to the heavyweights of political analysis to remain informed. Very sadly, I must say I am deeply disappointed with all of them on one particular point. No wonder why our pesky neighbours constantly ridicule us on this particular issue. I have said it umpteen times here and on Twitter that we are really light years behind when it comes to understanding and respecting the concept of democracy.

One can overlook and ignore the overly zealous keyboard patriots, but when it comes to credible names it just depresses you. Allow me to elaborate. For the last few weeks and perhaps months, even the ordinarily reasonable and sane voices have been peddling and building the ‘fear factor’ of an ‘intervention’. Perhaps they have well-founded reasons or maybe they have some inside information.

Our revolutionary Mr Khan had initially issued a warning to ‘lock’ the capital on 30th October. Perhaps he or his close associates, in their usual haste, had not seen the 2016 calendar to determine that it was a Sunday. They came up with a flimsy reason to move it to 2nd November. But political pundits have predicted that it is meant to create pressure and instigate people to commit violence, and seeing such a scenario, the powers to be will intervene and possibly take over.

I am having a tough time digesting this possibility, and in my simplistic opinion, I have some reasons to argue this bizarre position of many bigwigs. We all know that people have the right to protest, but this right comes with certain responsibilities. Any time a protest infringes upon the freedoms of other citizens, it becomes a constitutional issue. Ignoring basic civilities, let’s assume that a crowd converges in the capital on 2nd November, a workday, and people are told to stop their work, restricting their daily movement. Civilian law enforcement agencies or Rangers prevent them from fulfilling their motive. God forbid, there are clashes and/or arrests, and just because of that the prime minister (PM) succumbs and resigns. Quite simplistic yet unrealistic.

This exercise and a similar threat were unsuccessful in 2014, what then makes 2016 any different. The emphasis this time around is on two words: “unprecedented crowd.” But the capital has certain limitations of space and accommodation; one can reasonably quantify a number when it comes to the capacity of our capital. Fine, this happens, but none of the towering giants can rationally or convincingly explain how this invites an ‘intervention’ and ultimately, a ‘takeover’.

Folks who dislike the PM try to club any and everything in an all-encompassing argument and rest their case by issuing a verdict: he has to go come what may. Let’s just strictly focus on this picture: an unprecedented and charged crowd demands the resignation, and the power centre is compelled to intervene. Let’s assume for a minute that it happens and the PM resigns, but how does this justify a so-called takeover?

Last I remember there was a thing called parliamentary democracy and a constitution with certain provisions. This is where I am at a total blank. Let’s assume that happens too for a minute; the constitution is set aside, but can the age old doctrine of necessity be invoked?

In my very humble opinion, it cannot be invoked. I remember those headlines that the former Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry made, “All doors to a dictatorship have been closed forever.” So how would this so-called takeover get its legitimacy? The other possibilities that most analysts present are the usual: ‘minus one’, ‘interim government’ and ‘early elections’. All of this is quite bizarre.

What Mr Khan and company has to realise from a purely political standpoint, anytime you remove a prime minister mid-stream you create a sympathy factor. That is undeniable. The voters in our region, unfortunately, do not vote on issues, they vote on emotional affiliations. No matter how rational the argument may be, but in the end the emotions tend to supersede.

The other rather strong position of Mr Khan will backfire where he is of the opinion that the PM will be disqualified in light of the evidence from the Panama Papers. This is again a very tough argument. Whether it is the Election Commission of Pakistan or any court of law, it has to strictly act in accordance with the law and the evidence. So someone somewhere will have to build a case on clear and convincing evidence implicating the PM on the basis of a money trail and formation of the alleged companies in Panama. In order to accomplish this goal, the cooperation of Panamanian authorities will be required and chances are fairly slim of that happening.

Lastly, someone ought to remind Mr Khan that he is not Nadir Shah and Islamabad is not New Delhi. Let’s do not roll our clocks backward to 1739.

The writer is a Pakistani-US mortgage banker.
He can be reached at dasghar@aol.com. He tweets at http://twitter.com/dasghar