News
Friday, October 28, 2011
Nawaz vs Imran: See who rules Lahore?By Muhammad Akram
LAHORE: Lahore, the political nerve centre of the country is going to experience some interesting political action spread over a prolonged weekend with the main opposition party the PML-N prepared to flex its muscles through a protest rally on Friday apparently aimed at dislodging the PPP from the power but essentially against the potential political threat to it by the PTI of Imran Khan.
On Sunday, a day after the PML-N rally, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, which had been warming up its supporters in Lahore and the adjoining districts for over a couple of weeks through workers conventions and public meetings, appeared confident of staging a great political show of strength at the huge lawns under the shade of Minar-e-Pakistan.
The PML-N’s apparent waning political support largely its own doing as an idle or friendly opposition to the four-years rule of the PPP and the recent epidemic of dengue virus across the plains of its ruled Punjab province appeared to have put it on the disadvantageous side of taking up the mantle of a popular opposition party in the country.
Though the idea to unleash a street agitation on the issue of electricity load-shedding in the country at the start of this month was its own which it carried along without creating a significant political impact, it was made to face the music not by the ruling PPP but the PTI of Imran Khan through successful shows of strength in its strong political holds in Gujranwala and Faisalabad. It was largely assumed that the Lahore rally from Nasir Bagh to Bhaati Chowk was forced on the PML-N by the PTI, which announced the holding of a public meeting in the city posing a direct challenge to the ‘custodian’ of Takht-e-Lahore. The PML-N did win the first round of political battle involving presence of mind and unnerving the opponent. It succeeded in pushing the potential challenger the PTI to a venue, which required an ocean of men to fill and to create a political impact. And for itself selected a much easier task of staging a political rally on the comparatively narrow lane from Nasir Bagh to Bhaati Chowk, a tradition route of agitations for all the developing political movements in the past.
The PML-N did conveniently change the date of its agitation rally from time to time from the day of its announcement following the PTI’s plan to hold a public meeting in the city. The PML-N finally chooses on Friday afternoon as the time of holding protest rally since the day marked the start of weekend when most of the adjoining districts like Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Sialkot, Gujrat, Okara and others remained closed to do trade with business houses in Lahore.
The route of the PML-N protest rally was also been carefully selected by the shrewd minds in the party as 15,000 to 20,000 supporters would be enough to create an impact on an approximately one and half kilometre long route with lanes leading up to Bhaati Chowk from Nasir Bagh variedly 20 metres to 40 metres wide.
The conservative traders of the city, which forms the active support base of the PML-N, would conveniently be part of the protest rally besides those from different provincial and district offices who would have no option but to show their presence at the rally for good in future. The Nasir Bagh-Bhaati Chowk route of the rally, which remained choked even during normal working days, presents a messy look on all Fridays due to greater inflow of people from adjoining districts. The PML-N would be overjoyed with the fact of choking of the route with normal traffic on the day when it would be in need that TV cameras show the halt of life in an around Bhaati Chowk where Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif would address the party workers and make a promised announcement public.
The PTI on the other hand has an uphill task before it since it requires the presence of a crowd of not less than a hundred thousand people at the lawns of Minar-e-Pakistan to justify an over ambitious decision of selecting the huge venue which had been filled only twice in the past, on both the occasion by the PPP under the leadership of Benazir Bhutto. In April 1986, the PPP in fact brought out the entire city on roads to welcome Benazir Bhutto when she ended political exile to challenge tyrant Ziaul Haq. On the second occasion the PPP did manage to hold a successful public meeting during the 1988 general elections and afterward even the PPP didn’t manage to beat its own record of filling this huge venue which in view of some political observers required a crowd of half a million people to make its present felt at the venue.
The traditional venue of Mochi Gate had remained the ultimate choice of all the political parties to hold a public meeting, which too required over 30,000 heads to make their presence felt to the political critiques and analysts. The venue has not been used since long as the political parties including the PPP and the PML-N are shying away from holding public rallies there due to lack of political strength and also because of the fact that a bar had also been imposed to use the venue for political purposes any more.
An optimistic looking PTI leadership appeared to be confident enough to meet the challenge of beating the PML-N in the latter’s claimed political bastion with the help erstwhile jiyalas of the PPP and the matwalas of the PML-N besides a motivated silent majority it claimed to have brought on its side thanks to the daring leadership of Imran Khan.
The PTI may get some covert political support of the PML-N rivals besides an overt support of those conservative right wingers which previously allied with the PML-N but feel more close to Imran Khan for his political views and obviously the vulnerability he perhaps still carry to be easily manoeuverable for his being naïve in politics.
The coming three days would pass easily for the PML-N since it has with the help of great political maturity secured it political position, however, for the PTI it is an insurmountable task if it fails to mobiles support other than its own which is stated to be politically silent and organisationally dithering.
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk